However this was not a bad thing for the Russian people and those under Soviet rule, the economy was in chaos and there was civil unrest all over the line. The communists of the old regime had become more concerned with maintaining political power than with improving the economy. This view spread to all levels of Soviet society, prompting the quip that the guiding principle of the Soviet economy was “you pretend to pay us, and we pretend to pay.” work." (Quenoy and Kautt). Glasnost was a major social reform in the Soviet Union that allowed for transparency of previous regimes and allowed the people of the Soviet Union to openly and freely criticize the places where they worked in an effort to improve the economy and industry in tatters. What Glasnost did instead was rally a restless populace