The leader associated with the reforms of Glasnost and Perestroika is which figure?

• A. Nikita Khrushchev
• B. Joseph Stalin
• C. Mikhail Gorbachev
• D. Leon Trotsky

Answer: (C)

Identifying the leader who implemented Glasnost and Perestroika. These reforms, aimed at opening up society and restructuring the economy, were introduced in the Soviet Union in the mid-1980s by Mikhail Gorbachev, who took leadership in 1985. Glasnost promised freer discussion, more transparency in government, and broader media freedom, while Perestroika sought to reform the economy and introduce limited market mechanisms alongside political changes. Gorbachev pursued these policies to modernize the USSR, reduce corruption, and ease Cold War tensions, even though the changes ultimately contributed to profound political upheaval and the dissolution of the Soviet Union. In contrast, leaders from earlier eras—Stalin, who built a centralized totalitarian system; Khrushchev, who initiated de-Stalinization and some reforms but not Glasnost/Perestroika; and Trotsky, a revolutionary figure who never led the Soviet state—did not oversee these specific reform programs.