Ideology of renewal in Mikhail Gorbachev's rhetoric as an basic element of the perestroika image (on the example of preparing a speech at the February plenum of the CPSU Central Committee in 1988)

The article considers the materials of Mikhail Gorbachev's dictations served as the basis for the text of his speech at the February Plenum of the CPSU Central Committee in 1988. The author analyzed the archival materials from the funds of the Russian State Archive of Contemporary History and from the Gorbachev Foundation - the International Fund for Socio-Economic and Political Studies. All of them are introduced to the research field in the paper. The documents reflect the views of the Soviet leadership on radical reforms in the mid-1980s and provide an opportunity to understand the processes of forming the image of perestroika and its ideological basis. Gorbachev's speech raised the issue of reinforcing radical socioeconomic and political reforms of the ideological component which was important and problematic both for the Soviet system of government and society. There are contradictions in the materials that do not ensure unambiguous structure of the speech. The content of dictations reflects the fact that the Soviet authorities were in creative search for philosophical, theoretical, and, most importantly, ideological meanings of perestroika. The examined documents have a systemic character, affect a stable set of problems, and reflect a wide range of ideological challenges for the Soviet authorities.