Question: How old was Mikhail Gorbachev when he ecame a member of the Politburo?
About the article "Dissolution of the Soviet Union", section "Soviet Union centre – the new General Secretary".

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Soviet Union centre – the new General Secretary.
Mikhail Gorbachev was elected General Secretary by the Politburo on 11 March 1985, only three hours after Konstantin Chernenko's death.
At age 54, he was the youngest member of the Politburo.
Gorbachev's primary goal as General Secretary was to revive the Soviet economy after the stagnant Brezhnev years.
In an effort to revive the stagnant Soviet economy, in 1985 new Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev began a process of increasing political liberalization (glasnost/perestroika) in the communist one-party state.
In 1985, he announced that the Soviet economy was stalled and that reorganization was needed.
Gorbachev soon realized that fixing the Soviet economy would be nearly impossible without reforming the political and social structure of the Communist nation.
The reforms began in personnel changes.
On 23 April 1985 Gorbachev brought his two proteges Yegor Ligachev, and Nikolai Ryzhkov into the Politburo as full members, and sensibly took the opportunity to keep the 'power' ministries happy by promoting KGB Head Viktor Chebrikov from candidate to full member of the Politburo, and appointing Minister of Defence Marshal Sergei Sokolov a Politburo candidate member.
Nikonov was brought into the CPSU Central Committee Secretariat.
However, this liberalization led to the emergence from 1986 onwards of nationalist movements and ethnic disputes within the diverse republics of the Soviet Union.
It also led to the revolutions of 1989, which saw the mainly peaceful (Romania excepted) toppling of the Soviet imposed Communist regimes of the Warsaw Pact, which in turn increased pressure on Gorbachev to introduce greater democracy and autonomy for the Soviet Union's constituent republics.
Under Gorbachev's leadership, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1989 introduced limited competitive elections to a new central legislature, the Congress of People's Deputies, although a ban on other political parties was not lifted until 1990.
A 17 March 1991 referendum showed 76.4% of Soviet citizens voting to retain the Union.
However, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldavia, Georgia, and Armenia did not participate.
In May 1985 in Leningrad Gorbachev made a speech advocating widespread reforms.
One of the first reforms Gorbachev introduced was the anti-alcohol campaign, begun in May 1985, which was designed to fight widespread alcoholism in the Soviet Union.
Prices of vodka, wine, and beer were raised, and their sales were restricted.
It was a serious blow to the state budget, a loss of approximately 100 billion rubles according to Alexander Yakovlev, after alcohol production migrated to the black market economy.
The purpose of these reforms, however, was to prop up the existing centrally planned economy, unlike later reforms, which tended toward market socialism.
On 1 July 1985 Gorbachev promoted Eduard Shevardnadze First Secretary of the Georgian Communist Party to full member of the Politburo, and the following day appointed Shevardnadze as Minister of Foreign Affairs replacing Andrei Gromyko.
Gromyko, disparaged as "Mr Nyet" in the West, had served for 28 years as Minister of Foreign Affairs and was considered an 'old thinker' who was kicked upstairs to the mainly ceremonial position of Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, which was officially Soviet Head of State.
Also on July 1, 1985 Gorbachev took the opportunity to dispose of his main rival by removing Grigory Romanov from the Politburo, and brought Boris Yeltsin and Lev Zaikov into the CPSU Central Committee Secretariat.
In the fall Gorbachev continued his program to bring forward younger and more energetic men into the government.
On September 27, 1985 Nikolai Ryzhkov replaced 79 year old Nikolai Tikhonov as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, effectively the Soviet Prime Minister, and on 14 October 1985 Nikolai Talyzin replaced Nikolai Baibakov as Chairman of the State Planning Committee (GOSPLAN).
At the next Central Committee meeting on 15 October 1985 Tikhonov retired from the Politburo and Nikolai Talyzin became a candidate member.
Finally on 23 December 1985 Gorbachev appointed Boris Yeltsin First Secretary of the Moscow Communist Party replacing Viktor Grishin.
An effectively multi-party system emerged in Soviet Union in the late 1980s in wake of the Gorbachev reforms.
A formal law for this purpose was introduced in October 1990.
In April 1991, the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) became the second officially registered party in the country.
According to former CPSU Politburo member Alexander Nikolaevich Yakovlev, the new party was a joint project of CPSU leadership and the KGB He described how KGB director Vladimir Kryuchkov presented the project of the puppet party at a meeting with Mikhail Gorbachev and informed him about his selection of LDPR leaders and the mechanism of funding.
KGB General Philipp Bobkov described the organization as "Zubatov's pseudo-party under KGB control that directs interests and sentiments of certain social groups".
The outspoken leader of LDPR, Vladimir Zhirinovsky, an effective media performer, gained 8% of votes during the 1991 Presidential elections.
He also supported the August 1991 coup attempt. 
In the Soviet Union, gerontocracy became increasingly entrenched starting in the 1970s, at least until March 1985, when a more dynamic and younger, ambitious leadership headed by Mikhail Gorbachev took power.
Leonid Brezhnev, its foremost representative, died in 1982 aged 75, but had suffered a heart attack in 1975, after which generalized arteriosclerosis set in, so that he was progressively infirm and had trouble speaking.
During his last two years he was essentially a figurehead.
In 1980, the average Politburo member was 70 years old (as opposed to 55 in 1952 and 61 in 1964), and by 1982, Brezhnev's Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrei Gromyko, his Minister of Defense Dmitriy Ustinov and his Premier Nikolai Tikhonov were all in their mid-to-late seventies.
Yuri Andropov, Brezhnev's 68-year-old successor, was seriously ill with kidney disease when he took over, and after his death fifteen months later, he was succeeded by Konstantin Chernenko, then 72, who lasted thirteen months before his death and replacement with Gorbachev. 
Andropov was elected the party's General Secretary on 12 November 1982 by a decision of the Central Committee.
The Central Committee meeting was held less than 24 hours after the announcement of Brezhnev's death.
A.R.
Judson Mitchell claims that the Central Committee meeting which elected Andropov as General Secretary, was little more than a rubber stamp meeting.
Andropov was in a good position to take over the control of the party apparatus; three big system hierarchs, Brezhnev, Kosygin and Suslov had all died.
A fourth, Kirilenko, was forced into retirement.
At the Central Committee meeting of 22 November 1982, Kirilenko lost his membership in the Politburo (after a decision within the Politburo itself), and Nikolai Ryzhkov, the Deputy Chairman of the State Planning Committee, was elected to the Secretariat.
Ryzhkov became the Head of the Economic Department of the Central Committee, and became the leading Central Committee member on matters regarding economic planning.
Shortly afterwards, Ryzhkov, after replacing Vladimir Dolgikh, began to oversee the civilian economy.
At the 14–15 June 1983 Central Committee meeting, Vitaly Vorotnikov was elected as a candidate member of the Politburo, Grigory Romanov was elected to the Secretariat and five members of the Central Committee were given full membership.
The election of Romanov in the Secretariat, weakened Chernenko's control considerably.
Later, Yegor Ligachev was appointed as Head of the Party Organisational Work Department of the Central Committee.
Certain Brezhnev appointees were kept, such as Viktor Chebrikov and Nikolai Savinkin.
With these appointments, Andropov effectively wielded the powers of the nomenklatura.
Even so, by the time he had succeeded in dominating the Central Committee, Andropov fell ill.
He was unable to attend the annual parade celebrating the victory of the October Revolution.
Chernenko, the official second-ranking secretary, competed for power with Mikhail Gorbachev.
The meetings of the Central Committee and the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union were postponed to the last possible moment because of Andropov's health.
Changes continued however, and the Andropov appointees continued Andropov's course of introducing new blood into the Central Committee and Party apparatus.
Vorotnikov and Mikhail Solomentsev were given full membership in the Politburo, Chebrikov was elected a candidate member of the Politburo and Ligachev became a member of the Secretariat.
Chernenko's position began to look precarious; Gorbachev was getting stronger by the day.
Four days after Andropov's death, on 9 February 1984, Chernenko was elected as the party's General Secretary.
Chernenko was elected as a compromise candidate by the Politburo; the Central Committee could never have accepted another candidate, considering that the majority of the Central Committee members were old Brezhnev appointees.
The Politburo could not, despite its powers, elect a General Secretary not supported by the Central Committee.
Even so, several leading Politburo members supported Chernenko, such as Nikolai Tikhonov and Viktor Grishin.
To make matters worse for Chernenko, he did not have control over the Politburo; both Andrei Gromyko and Dmitriy Ustinov were both very independent politically, and the Politburo still contained several leading Andropov protégés, such as Gorbachev, Vorotnikov, Solomontsev and Heydar Aliyev.
Chernenko never got complete control over the Central Committee and Party apparatus; while Andropov never succeeded in removing the majority of Brezhnev appointees in the Central Committee, he had succeeding in dividing the Central Committee along factional lines.
In this confusion, Chernenko was never able to become a strong leader.
For example, Gorbachev quickly became the party's "de facto" Second Secretary, even though Chernenko did not support him.
The distribution of power within the Central Committee turned Chernenko into little more than a figurehead.
In contrast to previous general secretaries, Chernenko did not control the Cadre Department of the Central Committee, making Chernenko's position considerably weaker.
However, Chernenko did strengthen his position considerably at the beginning of 1985, not long before his death.
Chernenko died on 10 March 1985, and the Central Committee appointed Gorbachev General Secretary on 11 March. 
Central Committee apparatus.
The Political Bureau (Politburo), known as the Presidium from 1952 to 1966, was the highest party organ when the Congress and the Central Committee were in session.
Until 19th Conference (held in 1988), the Politburo alongside the Secretariat controlled appointments and dismissals nationwide.
In the post-Stalin period, the Politburo controlled the Central Committee apparatus through two channels; the General Department, which distributed the Politburo's orders to the Central Committee departments, and through the personnel overlap which existed within the Politburo and the Secretariat.
This personnel overlap gave the CPSU General Secretary of strengthening his position within the Politburo through the Secretariat.
Kirill Mazurov, Politburo member from 1965 to 1978, accused Brezhnev of turning the Politburo into a "second echelon" of power.
He was able to accomplish this by discussing policies before Politburo meetings with Mikhail Suslov, Andrei Kirilenko, Fyodor Kulakov and Dmitriy Ustinov among others, who held seats both in the Politburo and the Secretariat.
Mazurov's claim was later verified by Nikolai Ryzhkov, the Chairman of the Council of Ministers under Gorbachev, who claimed that Politburo meetings lasted only for 15 minutes because the people close to Brezhnev had already decided on what was to be approved.
The Politburo was "abolished", and replaced by a Presidium at the 19th Congress (held in 1952).
In the aftermath the 19th Congress and the 1st Plenum of of the 19th Central Committee, Stalin ordered the creation of the Bureau of the Presidium, which acted as the standing committee of the Presidium.
On 6 March 1953, one day after Stalin's death, the Presidium in a joint-session with the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet and the Council of Ministers, a new and smaller Presidium was elected, and the Bureau of the Presidium was abolished.
The CPSU General Secretary acted until 1990 as the informal chairman of the Politburo throughout most of its existence.
However, during its first half of the CPSU's existence, it was chaired by the Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars; first by Lenin, Aleksey Rykov, Molotov, Stalin and Malenkov.
After 1922, when Lenin was incapacitated due to bad health, Lev Kamenev as Deputy Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars chaired the Politburo's meetings.
This tradition lasted until Khrushchev's consolidation of power.
In the first post-Stalin years, when Malenkov chaired Politburo meetings, Khrushchev as First Secretary signed all Central Committee documents into force.
From 1954 until 1958, Khrushchev chaired the Politburo as First Secretary, but in 1958 he dismissed and succeeded Nikolai Bulganin as Chairman of the Council of Ministers.
It was during this period that the informal position of Second Secretary (later formalized as Deputy General Secretary) was established.
The Second Secretary became responsible for chairing the Secretariat in place of the General Secretary, and when the General Secretary could not chair the meetings of the Politburo, the Second Secretary would take his place.
This system survived until the dissolution of the CPSU in 1991.
To be elected to the Politburo, a member had to serve in the Central Committee.
The Central Committee elected the Politburo in the aftermath of a party Congress.
Members of the Central Committee were given a predetermined list of candidates for the Politburo (having only one candidate for each seat), for this reason the election of the Politburo was usually passed unanimously.
The more power the CPSU General Secretary had, the stronger the chance was that the Politburo membership were passed without a fuzz.