A major part of the political tumult that shook the Soviet Union in its final years can be attributed to events that occurred at the level of the republics or at even lower levels of the system. In the past, politics at the republic level or lower were always subordinate to political developments at the centre – in particular, changes in the Soviet Communist Party and its leadership, and policies set by the Politburo and within the government bureaucracy.

The major political development of 1990 occurred at the republic level when elections to republic parliaments took place. These elections followed the example of the 1989 national elections to the Congress of People's Deputies, the first in which there was widespread competition for seats. They resulted in what charitably might be called a new dynamism in Soviet politics; to put it another way, they resulted in a rapid escalation of conflict and unpredictability. Much of the instability was the result of protracted jurisdictional struggles between levels of government and between new political institutions at any given level.

New parliaments and leaders in the republics

In all republics except the Russian Federation, there were direct elections in 1990 for deputies to a republican Supreme Soviet (see pp. 31–4). In Russia, the USSR example of a Congress of People's Deputies was replicated, with the Congress in turn electing a Supreme Soviet from among its members.