Key Terms for Chapter 31

Glasnost Mikhail Gorbachev introduced Glasnost, which was a policy of the Soviet Union during the mid-1980s. Its meaning was 'openness' and 'freedom of access to information' in government institutions. In the USSR, around 1985, Gorbachev launched the policy of glasnost to enable public discussion and reduce corruption. It mattered because it had a part in the ultimate breaking of the Soviet stranglehold and the demise of the Cold War. Citation: Gorbachev, M. (1987). Perestroika: New thinking for our country and the world. Harper & Row. Iran-Contra Scandal The Iran-Contra Scandal was a big political scandal concerning the United States in which Ronald Reagan was president, which happened in the mid-80s. It also entailed secretly selling weapons to Iran (a violation of the embargo), profiting from such sales, and using the money to fund the Contra rebels in Nicaragua. This happened mainly between 1985 and 1987 and was exposed in Washington, D.C., and caused a national controversy. That was important because it was a chilling question regarding executive power and government transparency. Citation: Walsh, L. E. (1997). Firewall: The Iran-Contra conspiracy and cover-up. W. W. Norton & Company. Ross Perot Ross Perot was a self-made billionaire from Texas who ran as an independent for President of the United States in 1992. Along with being known for thinking about the national debt and government reform, he was also known. During the 1992 election, Perot made himself known to the rest of the country on television through televised infomercials. His campaign was important because he did get a large share of the vote for a third-party person and seemed to start a sort of push to go into American politics. Citation: Diamond, S. (1995). Roads to dominion: Right-wing movements and political power in the United States. Guilford Press. Saddam Hussein He was the presid...