The fall of communism was a great victory for human freedom. It is necessary to begin any discussion of what has happened since 1989 with such a definite and unequivocal statement since there is today a distinct sense of disillusioment abroad. It is not only those who believed the Stalinist states were models for the world's aspirations who articulate reservations about the new order. Many in the West and the East who were sharp critics of the old system look at the wars, the massacres and ethnic cleansing, the evident poverty and unemployment, the alienation and frustration generated by interminable political wrangling, and conclude that things today are as bad as, or even worse than, they were before.