Perestroika A CATASTROPHIC CHANGE OF ECONOMIC REFORM POLICY: GENERAL PARADIGM OF A MODELED PROCESS BASIC STRUCTURE OF THE MODEL PUBLIC OPINION FUNCTION DEFINITION GENERAL HYPOTHESES OF THE MODEL SCENARIO OF CHANGES IN PUBLIC OPINION CASE OF FIXED POLICIES IMPLEMENTATION Situation A, p0 > 0 Situation B, p0 < 0. EMPIRICAL VERIFICATION OF THE MODEL ESTIMATING THE PUBLIC OPINION FUNCTIONS FAMILY AN INDICATOR OF THE CURRENT ECONOMIC SITUATION AN INDICATOR OF THE CURRENT POLITICAL SITUATION SUMMARIZING THE EMPIRICAL RESULTS QUALITATIVE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE PR

The general systems approach has been used to study one of the most intriging social phenomena in the process of Soviet perestroika. During the period from 1985 to 1991, a dramatic change in public opinion took place from approval of a centralized planning system to overwhelming support for a free-market system. To study the factors that caused this process as well as its performance, a nonlinear model was developed and verified on empirical data. The model has made it possible to trace and identify various stages of perestroika and to comprise different outcomes of a growing confliet between the central and the republican governments that reached its climax in August 1991, after a catastrophic change in public sentiment so impressively demonstrated in the Russian presidential elections in June of the same year.