On September 9, 2011, Huanqiu, the Chinese edition of Global Times, published an article titled “The Loss of Media Control in the Soviet Union Accelerated the Death of the Soviet Communist Party.” The author, Zhu Jidong, is executive director of the World Socialism Research Center, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Zhu blamed Mikhail Gorbachev for abolishing media censorship and inviting Western media into the Soviet Union.
“As the Soviet Union’s media surrendered themselves to the West, the people (of the Soviet Union) gradually lost both their trust in the Party and the country and their faith in socialism. In just two years, from January 1989 to January 1991, over 2.9 million Soviet Communist Party members denounced the Party. Relinquishing leadership over the media resulted in the loss of control that destroyed the foundation of Soviet ideology, did away with the Soviet Union’s core value system and idealistic beliefs, and accelerated the death of the Soviet Communist Party.”
Source: Huanqiu, September 9, 2011
http://opinion.huanqiu.com/roll/2011-09/1990652.html