A REVOLUTIONARY CRITICISM of the Theses of the Moscow Conference
By LIVIO MAITAN
In November 1957 a conference of Communist Parties was called in Moscow for the evident purpose of damming up centrifugal tendencies that had developed after Stalin's death and the XXth Congress, and of proceeding to make a new theoretical systemization to replace that of the Stalinist period. The November 1960 conference had a similar purpose: the 1959-60 polemies, especially between the Soviets and the Chinese, had indeed brought into jeopardy the unity reëstablished in 1957.
It is an ardous task to formulate valid generalisations in a period so rich in convulsions, almost insoluble task for those who, proceeding in an empirical way, run the risk of seeing the constructions they have improvised under the drive of events blown sky-high from one day to the next. But at Moscow a most exceptional effort was made: this conference — by the quantity of the delegations to it, the duration of its labors, the breadth and sharpness of its discussions, and the very tone of its concluding document — went far beyond the 1957 conference. Later comments, especially by certain leaders, have confirmed the fundamental importance attributed to the officially sanctioned document the conference worked
Just as during the Sino-Soviet polemies in the preceding months, so at Moscow here came out all or nearly all the vital problems of the international workers' movement, or, more generally, the vital problems of the phase of historical transition from capitalism to socialism. The solutions selected, therefore, are to be evaluated not only (or not primarily) as systemizations of the past, but as the prospects for short- or long-term struggle for the various sectors of the international anti-capitalist battle-array.
We apologize to our readers if in the analysis of these problems we roughly follow the outline of a previous article, thus running the risk of repetition, but in this way it will be easier to remain within fixed limits. 1 In his report to the Central Committe of the Communist Party of the USSR, Khrushcher spoke of "a notable enrichment of the patrimony of ideas of international Tw.on Communism. The Resolution I...] is a Marxist-Leninist document of immense international scope."
PEACEFUL COEXISTENCE, WAR, AND REVOLUTION
The analysis of the international situation, summarized especially in the first chapter of the resolution, could obviously not fail to reflect the great events of these last years. Therefore the synthesizing evaluations are more elear-cut than in the 1957 document, even if they are not as much so as certain formulations that were current in the articles and speeches of the Chinese in the preceding months. It is not forgotten, in fact, that, despite all its failures, U S imperialism still has many fearful arrows to fit to its bow. 2
On one point the difference of accent compared with 1957 is clear. US imperialism is presented globally as enemy No. 1 ("the greatest international impoverisher" "the main stronghold of world reaction", "the international gendarme", etc), whereas, three years before, restrictive expressions were preferred ("the aggressive imperialist circles in the United States" "certain aggressive cireles in the United States"). Within the limits of the situation created since the failure of the summit conference, there were not too many objections to a certain radicalization of language, demanded especially by the Chinese, for example in the polemies about the role of Eisenhower.
More significant is an assertion whose importance has been particularly stressed by some official commentators:
What is original in this new stage in the general crisis of capitalism consists of the fact that it developed, not out of a world war, but in a period of competition and struggle between the two systems. 3
At first glance, this seems to be an all too obvious truth, immediately acceptable. But this step is linked up with another:
The fact that both world wars unleashed by imperialism ended in socialist revolutions does not at all mean that the road to 2 Khrushchev insisted on this point in his report to the CC of the US SR: "Imperialism still has great strength at its disposal, still possesses a powerful military machine." 3 This and immediately following quotation are translated from the Italian version appearing in l'Unità of 6 December 1960.
12 the social revolution must pass through a world war, especially in our epoch, in which exists the mighty world system of socialism. [Chapter 5].
Here, therefore, we have the polemical translation of the previous assertion, i e, in substance, the rejection of certain arguments put forward by the Chinese. But, though it would be absurd to formulate a "theory" according to which war must constitute the necessary precondition of revolution, it cannot be forgotten, in the first place - as the resolution seems to do in the first of the above quotations (and in contrast to the second!) — that the origins of the present crisis of imperialism lie, in the last analysis, in the convulsions caused by the war, beginning with the revolution in China, the base-element of the world crisis of capitalism in the last 15 years. In the second place, the problem is, not to be satisfied with general proclamations, but rather to analyze concretely whether the present phase does involve trends of development by which war and revolution are destined to be braided together into a process of war-revolution on an international scale. But, what is more, the assertion of the resolution remains ambiguous, apart from its apparent correctness, because, in the last analysis, it runs the risk of covering up the real revolutionary essence of the historical processes of recent years, marked by abrupt breaks, acute conflicts, almost uninterrupted partial wars, and the ever renewed danger of a general war.
We thus reach the moot point of "coexistence" and of whether war is inevitable or not.
The 1957 conference : in substance picked up again the arguments of the XXth Congress. The new resolution faces the problem in a much broader way, not only picking up the general theme again, but trying especially to answer the objections and reservations that emerged during polemies within the international workers' movement and more particularly the stands taken by the Chinese.
We have already seen how the argument that wars would originate revolutions was refuted. The leitmotiv of so many Chinese speeches and articles - the nature of imperialism has not changed — is taken up again (indeed, how could so elementary a truth be denied?), but with the immediate addition of new elements, whereby, notwithstanding the constant nature of imperialism, war can henceforth be avoided. As is known, the main argument is that the new correlation of forces created in the world permits effectively preventing the imperialists from unleashing the general conflict to which they are driven by the logie of their system.
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL
As the Chinese had not explicitly rejected the thesis that war can be avoided and that of coexistence, they can now put a good face in the matter. But they will not suceed in hiding their retreat because, as we emphasized in an earlier article, the divergence consisted predominantly in stressing certain themes rather than certain others, in using one tone rather than another; there is not the shadow of a doubt that the document of the 81 - especially on this point — represents substantially the Krushchevian and not the Chinese formulations.
This evaluation is further confirmed by various other elements. Thus, concerning the consequences of a possible nuclear war, the resolution, while once more asserting that "if the imperialist countries unleash a war, the peoples will sweep capitalism away and bury it", nevertheless insists above all on the catastrophie nature that such a conflict would have and on priority of the struggle to avoid it, and makes no concession to any of the offhand arguments of the Chinese. 5 Thus also, concerning disarmament, it is substantially the Soviet thesis, that believes in the possibility of bringing it about, which prevails over the Chinese thesis, for which the campaign for disarmament is reduced, in the last analysis, to a propaganda manoeuvre. ® And thus, lastly, the assertion according to which, in order to eliminate war, "the complete victory of socialism all over the earth" will not be necessary, includes an implicit refutation of certain Chinese arguments about the irreducibility of the reactionary forces, even if they are confined to isolated citadels. T
But the Conference of the 81 was not able to ignore the polemical force of certain basic arguments put forward in the international workers' movement against the theses on coexistence -which were partially reflected in the theorizations of the Chinese — and, as some Communist Parties had already done in resolutions at their tionist" character. 4 This assertion (chapter 3) nevertheless appears abruptly inserted in the context, and takes on the character of hypothesis that must be made in order to avoid "revisionistic" slips, but without insisting very 5 Cf the assertions reported in "Problems and Prospecis of Our Time in the Mirror of the Sino-Soviet Polemies, by Livio Maitan, in Fourth International, Autumn 1960, pp 11-20. 6 Cf, e g, the declarations of 7 June 1960. Khrushcher, in the report quoted, insists on the possibility of bringing about disarmament (op cit, p 12). 7 Cf an article in the Chinese CP periodical Red Flag, April 1960.
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL
The policy of peaceful coexistence is a policy intended to mobilize the masses to engage in positive actions against the enemies of peace. Coexistence among states does not at all imply, as the revisionists assert, renouncing the class struggle.
Coexistence among states of different social systems is a form of the class struggle between socialism and capitalism. [...] Coexistence [...] does not involve conciliation between socialist and bourgeois ideologies. It presupposes, rather, an intensification of the struggle of the working class and all the Communist Parties for the triumph of socialist ideas [chapter 3].
To launch formulae which on paper overcome contradictions, reconciling opposed terms, is always possible; but it remains to be seen how things go in reality. Now the idea of coexistence either reduces itself to the assertion of a banal constant, at die i has a toget of its own which is concretized in a certain way in political struggle on either the national or international scale.
Let us first of all leave aside the question — one that is idle but constantly raised anew, especially in tendentious polemics against the revolutionary movement 8 — of the preferibility of the road to socialism via peace rather than via a new general war. In the abstract, nobody would be mad enough to "prefer" the latter to the former term of the alternative; but, let us repeat for the n th time, it is not a question of expressing preferences, but rather of analyzing objective trends, and settling on the most probable prospects. From this viewpoint formulations of the Moscow conference stick to generalizations, sketch out eclectic solutions, permit a certain breadth of interpretations (this was necessary to reach unanimity), and, in the last analysis, they might be called correct in saying both that war will break out and that imperialism will break up without having the strength to bring it about. 9
But what is lacking is just the concrete analysis on the basis of which to establish — with an approximateness inevitable in all political prognoses - what are the elements destined to prevail in the near future and what is, therefore, the most probable prospect for which the workers' movement must get prepared. On this point, our movement has also taken its stand much more rigor8 Cf the polemies against Trotsky and our movement already quoted in Fourth International, Autumn 1960 issue, page 18, and footnote 25. Cf also the old-style Stalinist atlack in the editorial of Reiman in Problems of Peace cien and Socialism, No. 10 October, 1960. 9 Cf the documents published in our Winter 1960-61 issue.
13 ously in the documents of its last congress, not being satisfied with a hypothetical casuistry: imperialism despite the weakening that it has undergone, and despite its inferiority in certain sectors of nuclear-missile weapons, still has at its disposal the necessary power to launch a general conflict and undergoes a constant pressure to do so from the way the contradictions of its own system become more acute. It is just because the imperialist crisis is irreversible in its general lines that the danger of a conflict is particularly acute, for the US leaders are well aware that time is working against them, and are not at all disposed to disappear as a ruling class from the stage of history without resorting to even the most desperate measures.
Khrushchev and his followers insists, on the other hand, on the Leninist origin of the theory of coexistence. But, beyond a few quotations, the meaning forgotten of certain stands of Lenin, which, in substance, as against the oversimplification of certain extremist partisans of revolutionary war under unfavorable con. ditions, recalled the elementary truth that the struggle between the international bourgeoisie and the first workers's state could not be steadily conceived in terms of hot war, and that there would be periods of "coexistence" without war. from which the workers' state would have to derive the greatest possible advantage for itself.
Trotsky shared a similar notion of coexsistence.10
It is immediately obvious that this is not the interpretation of the 81, in whose document coexistence appears, as we have seen, as a general conception of the way to go over from capitalism to socialism. And it is a conception that has its own internal logie and its corresponding practical implications.
One of these implications is that, if war can be avoided even without overthrowing capitalism, the anti-war struggle can be developed on the basis of a much wider front which goes as far as to include even sectors of the bourgeoisie. Here we are confronted by a now traditional contradiction between the policies of the Stalinist and post-Stalinist bureaucratic leaderships and at the same time by one of the greatest differences between both and the revolutionary Marxist move ment. It is a contradiction because either the alliance with certain bourgeois sectors is seriously sought — and in this case, it cannot fail to involve serious limitations to the consistent de10 At the 1922 Bolshevik Congress, Trotsky spoke of "a long period of peaceful coexistence and business-like collaboration with bourgeois countries." (Cf Isaac Deutscher, The Prophet Unarmed, p 31).
14 velopment of the mass struggle (often, especially in certain countries of Western Europe, just this price has been paid) - or else the struggle against war is made into a form of the class struggle — and then the proposed alliance is not acceptable to those aimed at. It is one of the greatest divergences with revolutionary Marxism, because the latter continues to believe that the conditio sine qua non really to avoid a new general war is the overthrow of the system, if not necessarily in the entire world, at least in a whole series of decisive countries.
But the most genuine essence of the conception of coexistence •s made clear with greater plainness in the report of Khrushchev after the Conference of the 81:
The victory of the US SR in the economic competition with the United States and the victory of the whole socialist system over the capitalist system will signalize a radical turn in history, will exert a still more revolutionary influence on the workers' movement of the entire world. Then it will be clear even to the most indecisive that only socialism provides all that is needed for a happy life for man, and they will make their choice in favor of socialism. To win time in the economic competition with capitalism:
that is the essential thing today. 11
These things are not new, but perhaps never before have they been said in such explicit form. Naturally Khrushchev is not unaware of the struggle of the colonial peoples and of the proletariat of the advanced capitalist countries; but for him the decisive element in the historical confliet with capitalism that is being developed in these decades consists and will consist of the economic development of the USSR and of surpassing the productive potential of the United States in "peaceful" competition. The logical consequence of this formulation is the search for all possible collaborations with sectors of the international bourgeoisie, the prospect of a longrange collaboration with the national bourgeoisies of the colonial and semi-colonial countries, and the acceptance of the necessity of using certain brakes on revolutionary movement wherever this may be considered useful for the purposes of general strategy. 12.
It was against certain concretizations of this strategy that, in the last analysis, the Chinese Ii Cf Problems of Peace and Socialism, No. 1, January, 1961. 12 Already in the above mentioned article in the Autumn 1960 Fourth In'sational, the essential significance of the Khrushchevian lin was synthesized in these terms.
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL polemies aimed; but their weakness consisted in the fact that they refused to accept the inevitable implication of a conception which they claimed to share in general.
Revolutionary Marxists neither are unaware of nor underestimate the importance of the economic development of the US S R and the other workers' states as a revolutionary factor in both the objective and subjective sense. But the decisive battles for striking down capitalism on a world scale will be fought before the historically potential superiority of the collectivist system is translated into overwhelming economic superiority on all levels, and that in any case the example of socialist construction, despite its growing force of attraction, is not yet a sufficient factor. The decisive elements will consist of the anti-imperialist and anticapitalist revolutionary struggle of the colonial people in so many parts of the world and in the anti-capitalist struggle by the proletarians of the more advanced countries. Only the victory of these last-named, furthermore, to the extent that it is achieved in the best armed citadels of the world bourgeoisie, can provide the real definitive guarantee against the tragic threat of a nuclear catastrophe that is still hanging over those countries in which the revolution has triumphed.
Last but not least, there is another reason for insisting on this prospect and to struggle for its concretization. A development of revolutionary struggles in all sectors of the world would release the unlimited energies of the proletariat and the popular masses and therefore would undercut at its roots any bureaucratic incrustation. There is no doubt that, just for the same reason — considered from the viewpoint of the interests in opposition - the bureaucracy "prefers" and tries to impose the prospect and conception of "coexistence" -a conception which, far from being an "original" form of the class struggle, is in substance only the extreme prolongation, under deeply changed conditions, of the old theory of socialism in a single country. For the same fundamental reasons that the revolutionary Marxists did not accept the latter theory thirty years ago, they reject the former theory today. THE COLONIAL REVOLUTION AND THE "INDEPENDENT STATE OF NATIONAL DEMOCRACY"
The upsets of these last years, especially in Africa and Latin America, and the Chinese eriticism of certain aspects of the Khrushcher line, caused the Conference of the 81 to devote far more attention to the problems of the colonial revolution than the 1957 conference did. While
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL the 1957 resolution contained only rapid synthesizing references, that of this last November includes an entire chapter which not only sketches out an analysis of this situation but also defines prospects for mass struggles and the action of the Communist Parties. 13
We can naturally agree with a whole series of statements made in this document. Apart from the summary balance-sheet with which the chapter opens, we are not ones to deny that "the collapse of the system of colonial slavery, under the impact of the movement for national liberation, is, next to the formation of the world system of socialism, the second most important phenomenon in its historie scope". In a parallel way, more timely than ever is the condemnation of the neo-colonialism by means of which the old colonial powers and especially Yankee imperialism are trying to keep in their area of exploitation and hegemony the countries of Africa and Asia that have reached independence. 14
But the divergences become clear-cut as soon as the document raises the problem of the motive forces of the colonial revolution at its present stage and the trends and prospects of its develop-
Already in the denunciation of neo-colonialism, the assertion that the imperialists are trying to "corrupt a part of the bourgeoisie" is decidedly mistaken. In fact, it is not a matter of a degenerative phenomenon of corruption, but rather of a social phenomenon. Though certain sectors of the colonial bourgeoisie are seeking to guarantee themselves "positive neutralism", others foresee a new form of alliance with the metropolitan possessing classes as the way to a consolidation, even if only an ephemeral one, of the front against the pressure of the mass moveсато ment.
It would be a mistake to think that this can all be brought down to mere impreciseness of language by the drafters of the resolution; in reality, it is already a reflection of the general line of an analysis that assigns a positive function to the national bourgeoisie as a leading force even at this stage.
It is true that the document states that the basis of the National Front must be the alliance of the workers and peasants and explicitly introduces the idea of the dual nature of the national bourgeoisie. But despite these limitations — whose introduction is evidently the result of the very many polemios of the previous months, and 13 Cf the 1957 resolution, chapter 1, and chapter 4 of the 1960 resolution. tone, however is pagandi she dodent the pren lee the prevalent magogie.
15 whose purpose is, once again, to leave the door open to sufficiently broad interpretations and possible future changes en route — approval is given to "the great function of all the patriotic national forces" - among which the bourgeoisie, at least certain of its sectors, is included — and the progressive character that the latter can still have in participating in the struggle against imperialism and feudalism. 15
As for the nature of the revolution going on in the colonial and semi-colonial world, the document speaks of a "national, anti-imperialist, and democratic revolution" and of an "anti-imperialist and anti-feudal revolution"; and from this the possibility of a still leading function of the bourgeoisie would be derived. But a first crucial point is just this one: given its structure, composition, and economic-social tie-ups, is the national bourgeoisie, or even some sectors of it, able to develop coherently such a revolution, which involves, among other things, as the document itself says, a radical agrarian reform
"elimination of the economic roots of imperialist domination"? The 81 admit this possibility, even with the attenuations indicated above, while the revolutionary Marxists see it as an abstract diagram that does not correspond to reality. From Nehru's India to Nasser's Egypt, passing through Iraq, if not indeed Brazil or Venezuela, the experiences are by now numerous and significant. Though, in the international context imperialism's extreme weakness, certain national bourgeoisies have been able to play a front-rank part in the struggle for achieving formal political independence and the imposition of certain important anti-imperialist measures, the revolutionary process has nevertheless stopscote has not the ped half-way (when it has not gone openly backward), precisely because the national bourgeoisie has not been really able to solve the most important tasks, such as agrarian reform, industrialization, and the elimination of the economic bases of imperialism.
The 81 were not able to remain wholly indifferent to the verdict of those experiences and did in fact introduce in the resolution some paragraphs which, in the last analysis, form the major element of novelty in it. They admitted that, after independence is reached, "to the degree that social strife sharpens, the national bourgeoisie is ever more inclined to reach agreements with internal reaction and with imperialism," while "the popular masses become ever more convinced that the best way to emerge 15 The resolution distinguishes between "colonial and dependent" countries and countries already "freed from the colonial yoke," obviously restricting the possible funenational bourgeoisie to the second category.
16 from their age-old backwardness and to improve living conditions is that of a development of a noncapitalist type." But then, toward what economic-social form and under the leadership of what forces should the trend be?
Their answer is that "in the present historical situation, there are being created in many countries internal and international conditions favoring the setting up of a independent state of national democracy," ie, a state that fights coherently against imperialism and its military blocs, against neo-colonialism, and for an agrarian reform, and ensures "broad rights and democratic liberty to the people."
Here, therefore, we are up against a new kind of animal, a politico-social form that "is not of the capitalist type," but is also not — or not yet — of the proletarian-socialist type. As for the forces of leadership, things are even vaguer, for, as we have seen, the bourgeoisie's tendency to backslide is denounced and there is talk of the "extremely important function" (?) of the working class and the peasant masses, but a continuing Function of the said bourgeoisie or some sectors thereof is not at all explicitly excluded, nor is requirement of a proletarian leadership clearly stated. The case of Cuba would serve to demonstrate that an alliance with the bourgeoisie is not at all excluded in the very struggle for the "independent state of national democracy." 16
The dodging of this really essential question would be sufficient to reveal the nature of this "discovery" of the 81. There is not the slightest effort to demostrate that the passibility for a "national democracy" to emerge results from the objective trends of African or Latin American society; 17 they limit themselves to setting a goal and thinking up a formula, the mistaken nature of which is self-evident. Though there can occur in fact very brief transitional periods -measurable at most in months, if not in weeks and days — during which the social nature of a state is still fluid, there does not exist a development that is no longer capitalist without its becoming collectivist or socialist. 18 A contrary hypothesis would in fact imply a revision of the 16 We allude, naturally, to the interpretations of Blas Roca and his associates at the Summer 1960 congress. 17 A fresh proof of the intentionally vague and elusive character of the document is to be found in the fact that the hypothesis of the "independent state of national democracy" is put forward generically for "many countries" without giving any more specifie indication, even in the form of an example. 18 Cf, in the report of Vlahovič on the Conference of he 81, he substantially correct criticism made by the lugoslav "revisionists" of the formula of the "independent state of national democracy." (One Step Backward, Jugoslavija publishing house, Belgrade 1961, pp 71-72.) essential criteria of Marxist historical analysis,
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL and still more, it would irremediably clash with reality.
The fact has already been mentioned that the countries that have already become independent but where a proletarian leadership has not establi. shed itself have been unable to solve the problems that are crucial for their emancipation and development and certainly have not set out on a road of a "non-capitalist type." Without returning to the cases of Vietnam and Korea, recent and burning example of Cuba is a refutation, from the opposite viewpoint, by proof positive, of the fragility of the theorizations of the 81.
resolution, naturally, warmly hailed Cuba, but dodged, in a way that was almost grotesque, the problem of the characterization of the Fidelist revolution, defined as popular": really, the Solons of the Communist Parties did not rack their brains much! 19 But, leaving aside propaganda to divert attention, if there is a country which should have been the model of the "independent state of national democracy." that country is precisely Cuba, where the Fidelist leadership "struggled coherently for political and economic independence," carried out the agrarian reform, and extirpated the very roots of imperialist domination. We agree right away that in Cuba we are faced by a development "of a non-capitalist type"; but just what is it? — a historically new form, perhaps, not proletarian-socialist, such as to be able to be fitted into the diagram of the 81? The clear answer formulated by the leadership of our movement immediately upon the decisive measures of last October — and which has by now been given also, with greater or lesser precision and even for differing purposes, by various tendencies in the proletarian movement — is that in Cuba not only imperialist domination but also the hegemony of the dominant classes was overturned, and that relationships of a collectivist type were set up. In other terms, the Cuban revolution transformed itself, without a gap, from an anti-imperialist democratic revolution into a socialist revolution, bringing about the formation of a workers' state that is beginning socialist construction. 20
Sufficiently known now are the grotesque subterfuges with which the attempt was made to hide the Cuban reality outright, or the painful 19 In the report already mentioned, Khrushchev not much more specific, stating that "the people" attained power (op cit, p 13). 20 Cf the Sixth World Congress resolution on the Cuban state, pp 48-50 of the Winter 1960-61 issue of Fourth International, and the article, on pp 00-00 of the present issue.
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL formulae thought up to save face. 21 And this is not a matter only of the correctness of a sociological characterization; what is at stake here is a strategic line, a general outlook.
Like all the Communist Parties of Latin Ameriea, the Cuban Partido Socialista Popular had repeated ad nauseam that the revolution must be not proletarian-socialist, but "of national and agrarian liberation, patriotic and democratic, anti-imperialist and anti-feudal," and that it was necessary to work with the national bourgeoisie "interested in solving the tasks of the revolution." 22 That this line has proved bankrupt no longer needs demonstration: the Fidelist leadership has gone far beyond the objectives of Blas Roca and his comrades, who, fortunately, were not at the head of the revolutionary movement in the Sierra, otherwise Cuba would still have Batista or "national-bourgeois" substitute therefore, in the best of hypotheses in the style of Frondizi or Betancourt. . theoretical field, Castro, in his Unità interview, put the quietus on the thesis of collaboration with the national bourgeoisies in all Latin Ame-
Thus the document of the 81 has developed a diagram already resoundingly shattered by the most original revolutions in development, neglected to make a concrete analysis of the really special conditions of the African continent in ebullition - from which there may be expected no less original developments than those fore• shadowed in Latin America — 23 , stuck stubbornly to its old opportunist positions or avoided taking a clear stand on the nature of the forces leading the colonial revolution, and continued to ignore the key-problem for the consistent development of that revolution in theenew phase, i e, its transformation into a socialist revolution. But there is a profound logic in all this: it is precisely the logic of the general Khrushcher way of posing 21 In Moscow the news of the proclamation of the sicialist republic in Cuba was covered up as much as possible. As an example of the a posteriori formulæ of justification, ef the lead editorial in l'Unità for some declarations by Escalante in l'Unità later in May. socialism under the leadership of Fidel Castro. It is then probable that a turn of the Communist Parties is now being prepared, with several months delay, in front of events which did not allow any creephole. 22 This was the thesis set forth by Blas Roca at the P SP congress the previous summer. Let us recall further that, also last summer, the bureaucrats of the PSP and of the right wing of the 26 July movement attacked as teurs" the delegates of the Latin American sections the Fourth International to the Havana Youth Conference, "guilty" of having proposed the anti-imperialist and anticapitalist measures that were carried out by Castro months later. 23 Cf l'Unità, 1 February 1961.
17 things, of "coexistence" and the ways of passing over from capitalism to socialism.
If the Khrushehev line — which has been recalled here — is taken as a starting-point, there follows logically therefrom a collaboration with the national bourgeoisies of the colonial and semi-colonial countries, with the Nehrus, Nassers, Sukarnos, & Co — a collaboration which is not limited to the level of relations among states, but is extended to the policy of the various Communist Parties. It is an old line, which in Cuba did not prevent the victory of the revolution because of the insignificant weight of the party of Blas Roca, but caused damages in Iraq and Indonesia, and stood and still stands in the way of the growing maturity of the mass movement in, for example, India and Argentina. It is a line which, despite the rectifications and reservations already mentioned, is at the basis also of the document of the 81, while the only partial novelty — the "independent state of national democracy" — is only a wishful formula which in the best of hypotheses may serve as propaganda, and is, in the last analysis, the equivalent of the "progressive democracy" of the immediate postwar period or of the state which actuates an advanced democracy and controls monopolies, hypothesized by certain Middle. European Communist Parties. At the root of this and the other formulae lies the same conception, the same general outlook. OLD AND NEW CONTRADICTIONS OF ADVANCED CAPITALISM
In its analysis of the situation in the advanced capitalist countries and in settling on the so-called national paths toward socialism, the document of the 81 does not, compared to that of 1957, introduce outstanding rectifications or additions.
As already at that time, the analysis remains generie, often propagandistic in tone, with the repetition of already too obvious truths which are far from allowing one to grasp the essential concrete elements of certain phenomena. At least some of the parties present at Moscow had in the past years worked up, on the basis of similar arguments, far more thorough-going documents. 24
Let us take some examples. In the first chapter, with the intention of painting a completely negative and almost catastrophie picture of the situation of the capitalist world, not only phenomena that really indicate the break-down of the system are emphasized, but expressions like the following are added: 24 It suffices, to think, for example, of certain documents of the Italian CP, which have influenced the preparation of this part of the document.
18
Although there may be observed, in certain capitalist countries, to a greater or lesser extent a certain increase in production, that does not change the fact that the contradictions of capitalism are worsening on both the national and international plane. [...] The anarchie character of capitalist production is ever deepening.
That the contradictions of capitalism, in the last analysis, are sharpening and that capitalist production is not rationalizable, we have no difficulty in admitting: this conclusion was reached also by the documents of our last congress. But before reaching that point, it is necessary to analyze all the phenomena of these years, especially those relatively new ones that caught even Marxist theoreticians by surprise, with precision their specific limits, their specific contradictions. When, in a Western Europe that has been so deeply weakened by the collapse of colonialism and the world crisis of imperialism, there has occured a stage of productive expansion, often with unprecedented rates of growth, it is too easy to lig oneself out by speaking of "a certain increase," "in certain countries," "to a greater or lesser extent," and hastening to add "that does not change the fact that capitalism are worsening" and that "the anarchie character of capitalist production is ever deepening." Such assertions are reduced to stereotyped enunciations that simply pass over, without any effort at analysis, one of the most "original" and, let us repeat also, most surprising pheno. mena of this postwar period. if the living levels of the masses: Some other passages refer to the moot problem
Only by a tenacious struggle has the the working class succeeded in obtaining, in a few countries, the satisfaction of its varionis vital demands, while in capitalist countries the tenor of life renains always below the prewar level. [...]
In the capitalist countries, including the most developed ones, there continue to exist, and even to spread, economically underdeveloped areas, in which the poverty of the masses is particularly notable
[chapter 1].
And further on:
The exploitation of the workers and the process of impoverishment of large masses of the peasants are intensified [ ... ].
Here also there is a tendency to stuff everthing into the same sack, giving the impression of a prevailing trend toward impoverishment, but without explicitly asserting it, and being careful
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL not to specify with a few examples in what countries or category of countries the stated phenomena are occurring. "
But the solution thought up, if on the one hand it refers to a way of analysis traditional in Soviet economic documents, 26 on the other permits Thorez and the French C G T to continue to hold without contradiction their theses about impoverishment and Togliatti and the Italian C GIL to reject them.
This oversimplified characterization of the situation in the advanced capitalist countries and the uncritical indulgence toward certain formulæ about the impoverishment of the masses have more serious consequences than it might seem at first glance. For the conclusion that may legitimately be drawn is that there does not exist substantial difference among categories of capitalist countries and that even in the most advanced countries the most explosive elements for a break-up continue to be the penury and poverty of the masses. Thus the tendency that has been sketched out in these last years, especially in certain Western European countries (Italy and Belgium, for example), of a resharpening of class conflicts, but on a different basis from the past, that is, under the prevailing drive, not of poverty, but of the specific contradictions of the most highly developed capitalism, of "prosperity," of new needs that are constantly being extended (if only in relation with the continued developments of technology), and of the growing aspiration of the toilers to break the chains of alienation by becoming a conscious factor in the process of production - this tendency has been completely ignored by document. There are certainly things to discuss about the reach of this tendency, which is only now beginning to become concretized, and about the possible rhythms of its development; but a text that just neglects it forms an obstacle rather than an aid to an understanding of the conditions under which a whole decisive part of the workers' movement must operate.
As for the strategic line of the Communist Parties in the advanced capitalist countries, especially in Western Europe, and the roads to power for the working class, the 81 picked up again the themes of 1957. The main stress was on the struggle against monopolies and for a more advanced democracy, which has been worked out in detail by the congresses of the 25 It is not always clear in the document where allusions are to advanced capitalist countries and where, instead, they are to colonial and semi-colonial countries. 20 The thesis of absolute impoverishment has always had currency in the US SR. See also the Manual of Econorny published at the end of 1954.
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL individual parties and by the European party conference. Despite the advanced crisis of world capitalism, despite the growing contradictions of capitalist society and the growing force attraction represented by the workers' states -- all elements of which, as has been seen, the document is not unaware _ for the leaders of the CP the task of a revolution of a socialist nature is not yet posed to the working class. The strategic goal remains that of a democracy in which the power of the monopolies is beaten down - by the nationalization of key-sectors of the economy and their democratization _. but in which the capitalist regime survives. Let us leave to the sagacious tacticians à la Togliatti the arduous task of explaining how it is possible to carry out all this, i e, how to strike the present regime in its vital ganglia without breaking its framework, that is, without the overthrow of the bourgeoisie as a whole and without establishing the proletariat as the class in power.
We shall not insist on the questions of the forms of passing over to socialism: the resolution textually repeats the theses of 1957, in their turn a faithful echo of those worked out at the XXth Congress, which our movement has already repeatedly criticized. It will suffice for us to recall that here too, when all is said and done, the resolution sticks to generalities, without risking hypotheses or examples, which, however, are necessary to aid the practical guidance of the struggle. The fact that parties operating under such different conditions as, for example, the Italian and the Indian CPs have adopted for themselves same conception about the "peaceful" transition to socialism should by itself make one reflect about the real genesis of these positions, as also the most fervent partisans of the parliamentary road must admit that the French experience with Gaullism is not exactly a confirmation of their theses, and would deserve not to be completely passed over in silence.
Evidently, a scientifie analysis of so crucial a question would never have ended up in a species of casuistry, but would have given a more precise response to the various hypotheses put forward. The problem, especially as to the aims of the is not so much to contemplate the eventuality that the bourgeoisie accept or not accept the play of democracy, as to make a prognosis, based on past experience and objective trends, about the probability that it choose one
27 Such a formulation can make sense, while remaining essentially opportunistic, if it is conceived as a transitional formula in the Leninist manner. Such an interpretation, however, has been explicitly excluded: in the intentions of the formulators of this line, the "progressive democratic" phase is conceived as objectively attainable.
19 or the other path. For revolutionary Marxism it is beyond discussion that the second is far and sway the more probable outlook, on which, therefore, the practical prospects should be based, while the Communist Parties, though not excluding in the abstract the hypothesis of the revolutionary break-up, base their guidance on the variant of the "peaceful," "democratic," and "parliamentary" road, in substance, of a transformation from within, of a use of the old forms for a new content. 28
It is hardly necessary to say that on this point the Chinese and the other supporters of their criticism of the parliamentary paths have given way completely; there is, in this part of the document, no echo of last year's polemios. 29
The fifth chapter tackles also the problem of trade-union unity and the overcoming of the political split in the workers' ranks. Trade. union unity, especially in certain countries (France, Italy, Belgium), is doubtless a burning question, and proletarian political unity would also mark an evident step forward. But in some typical countries of Western Europe (in the first place, Great Britain and Germany, but also various minor countries) the problem is not so much that of an organizational division — in reality, the working class in its overwhelming majority, follows a single party — as that of a persistent predominance of the Social-Democratic leaderships. For what reasons does this continue to occur? by what paths, through what intermediate stages, and by means of what tactical plans will it be possible to overturn the situation so that new Marxist, revolutionary leaderships will be able to get the upper hand? These are the real questions which are raised and to which an answer must be given beyond general, even though abstractly correct, appeals to unity.
But it is an answer that would be sought in vain in the resolution of the 81. END OF THE GUIDE-STATE AND -PARTY ?
Not even the chapter on "Strengthening and Conquests of the Socialist System" brings new 28 Khrushchev, in the above-mentioned report, spoke of a use of the "parliamentary form to put it at the service Seal he hate rene of ait a destronal one nia 16].,people and infuse it with a new. content lop cit,
The abandonment of the Leninist conception in
State and Revolution of the necessity to destroy all the old forms and create new and historically original ones, is
29 In his report to the CC of the Italian CP, Longo relerred to the reservations of the representatives certain C Ps about the conception of the peaceful path, attempting to explain these "difficulties in understanding"
by the conditions in their own countries, where "there is lacking, for the moment Isic!], any form of democratic life." (Cf l'Unità, 19 December 1960.)
20 elements worthy of interest. It takes up again the current characterizations of the nature of the USSR and the other workers' states at this stage, the arguments about equality among the workers' states already stated in 1957, and the usual hackneyed indications about the development of the economy. Significant is the reference to "the constant perfecting of the system of the international division of labor," which corresponds to the new stage which relations among the collectivist countries have now entered. In 1957 things were obviously much less advanced, and the formulations used were related to the then reality.
Beyond this, the document contains scarcely perceptible reflections of the most intensely debated and in fact most burning questions that been raised and are still being raised in the US S R, China, and the people's democracies in these years. It suffices to think of the problems of agriculture, of the methods and rhythms of ollectivization, and of the stimuli to increase n production. There is just a reference - not limited, however, wholly to agriculture — to the "Leninist principles of appeal to material interest" (immediately followed, to avoid any difficulty, by a similar reference to the "maximum moral stimuli") or a brief paragraph on the "voluntary passage of the peasants from 6mail private property to the big socialist coöperative estate" in the popular democracies.
the conspicuous differences various people's democracies and the numerous difficulties and contradictions of the gigantic - and much-discussed — experiment of Chinese communes, and of the critical situations in the US SR, revealed only a few weeks later in a resounding way, the resolution does not say a word. :
But, more generally, the internal dialecties of the phase of transition from capitalism socialism — which emerged, even if only in the forms noted, in the denunciations and polemies of 1956-57 — has disappeared almost completely. There are only two or three allusions to the degenerative phenomena of the Stalinist phase, and to the goal of ensuring that they have been eliminated. The "contradictions in the people" seem to have been forgotten. 30
More significant are the paragraphs regarding relations inside the anti-capitalist battle-array, among the various workers' states and the various Communist Parties. The importance of the Chinese Revolution is far more emphasized 30 To say, as the text does, that "independently of the forms in which it will be installed, the dictatorship of the proletariat will mean the broadening of democracy" is least too offhand, especially after the denunciations of 1956.
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL. than in 1957, and a special function is attributed to the development of the colonial revolution. Furthermore, any expression such as to give credence to arefully clim the thesis of the Guide-State is carefully eliminated, even though the vanguard
US SR and its leading party is recognized. 31
Khrushchev insisted particularly on this point. and on the impossibility of "exerting from any centre the leadership of the socialist countries. and the Communist Parties." The bureaucratic. leaders thus do not have the intention of returning to organizational forms of the type of the Comintern of the Stalinist phase or the ill-famed Cominform. But the document explicitly expresses a tendency to institutionalize conferences of the CPs as a normal form of consultation and common elaboration and establishes the principle of a discipline binding on all the participants. 32
We are naturally very far from a reconstitution of the International of the Leninist type. What is worse, the experience of the preparatory period, of the development of the conference itself, and of the information distributed after it, gives a clear picture of the methods that it is still intended to put over. Fundamental questions high tove important divergences are discussed only "on a high level," while the rank and file are not only not consulted but not even honestly informed about the respective positions, and simply asked to accept the conclusions when they are already an accomplished fact. 33 This is strictly already to the most classic bureaucratic traditions.
The violent attack against the Jugoslav Communists and the very form in which it was expressed are, furthermore, another sign in31 The 1957 resolution was still speaking of the "camp of socialist countries headed by the USSR" (op cit, p 182), while the more recent resolution — aside from states that the CP of the SU "has been and continues to Communist movement." The CP SU itself seems to have recommended this rectification, while it is known that, if paradoxically, it was the Chinese who insisted on the old formula. 32 Cf the closing chapter. Krushchev particularly emphasized the requirement that "every party conform scrupulously and loyally to the decisions on the conference in all its activity." (Op cit, p 19) 33. To a large extent an attempt was made even to deny dissidences as inventions of the bourgeois press, and one the Italian Alicata, polemized sharply against those who might have wanted "scandalous versions" (cf Rinascita; No. 12, December 1960, p 932). What was wanted was not scandalous versions, but simply the texts of the docunients, the speeches, etc, i e. honest indispensable information. Instead, they carefully refrained from publishing, for example, even the articles of the Chinese Communists.
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL dicative of the concerns and purposes of the bureaucrats who met in conference. As in the past, well-argued criticisms are not made here, nor are the real positions of the Jugoslav League examined: they limited themselves to sticking on labels and hurling epithets, nor sparing even vaguely threatening phrases. And some of the 81, returned home, hastened to double the dose, scattering downright polemical expedients of the purest Stalinist brand. 34
The Fourth International has not concealed the criticisms that it considered should be made of the Jugoslav Communists, both for their theoriz. ations and for their foreign and domestie policies. But the 81 accuse them above all for what is most valid in what they have done: for their tenacious defense of certain experiments with workers' management in the factories and for certain courageous analyses of the conflicts of the stage of transition contained in their most recent program. Precisely because certain auguments of capital importance, in the intentions of the bureaucrats, must remain taboo, they do not wish even to discuss this program, but prefer to deform it in a grotesque way or to bury it under an avalanche of polemical epithets. 35
The document contains also a more general criticism of revisionist or dogmatic tendencies. But there is nothing new on this plane. They are the now stereotyped formulæ that are again repeated, and the dosage is such that each leadership will always be able to orchestrate a campaign in one direction or another proclaiming itself to be faithful to the theses of the conference. PROVISIONAL SOLUTIONS
The Conference of the 81; preceded by the I boy che polemies that are well known, was the scene of 34 Compared to the expressions used at the congress of the Albanian CP, the text of the resolution of the 81 is admirably moderate. The Chinese also, both before and violently stepped up the anti-Jugoslav campaign, and doubtless they had an influence in working up this part of the text. It is curious, on the other hand, that Khrushchev in his report did not even mention the Jugoslavs. In his repori to the C C of the Italian CP, counters, and joint actions, not exclude "convergences, en- reference, not without reminding that the condemnation does
The Jugoslav reply to the resolution has been given especially in the already mentioned Vlahovič report. Certain criticisms go right to the bull's eye: eg, that on their methods of secret diplomacy in discussing the questions movement, that on the dodging of the problems of the development of socialism, that on the nature of the resolution in permitting a variety of interpretations, besides, of course, the denunciation of their altitude toward the Jugoslav League. On international questions - war, coexistence, ete — the well-known Jugoslav viewpoints are repeated; these are radically different from those of our movement.
21 sharp and prolonged: discussions, as appeared from the reports of some of the participants and from certain admissions of the official texts themselves.
On almost all the basic themes, diverse positions were expressed, and the "Chinese" line, even if it was clearly in the minority, had nevertheless support of a certain number of delegations. 37
At the end, however, not only was the resolution adopted unanimously, but the attempt was successful to get the various parties in the fol. lowing months to take much more uniform attitudes, without the sometimes strident differentiations and polemical disclosures of the preceding period. On some points, compromises were obviously achieved, on certain others, the solution consisted of the adoption or repetition of suffciently elastic formulæ, and on still others the Chinese Communists retreated (or accepted, for the moment, the discipline of the majority.)
In the presentation of the results of the conference and in the application of the line of the document, there were, as we have already mentioned, diverse emphases: the Albanian CP and the Italian CP took their positions at opposite poles, so to speak, the former as the first outpost of Stalinist conservatism, and the latter in the latter in the vanguard of Khrushchevism. 38
For their part, the Chinese did not again take up their polemical attitudes of 1959 and 1960, put the accent on the unity that had been reachieved, especially with the CP of the SU muted their reservations about coexistence, and avoided any reference to the Guide-State. 39 Even the criticisms of the national bourgeoisies of certain colonial countries were diluted in their abundance, if not eliminated outright: indeed, since the agreement about the Chinese in Indo. 36 Cf, eg, the Longo report to the CC of the Italian by ihe leaders of the French CP (who mentioned, among already mentioned, and various informations other things, the Chinese and Albanian attacks against the French CP). We note that the December Ist communiqué spoke of "respective opinions and positions," while the final sentence of the resolution indicates "in a greater compactness of the CPs [...] the most important condition for uniting all the forces of the working class" ete. 37 Besides Albania, Australia also supported the Chinese, while the pro-Chinese position of the Indonesians at the Council of the World Federation of Trade Unions ai Pekin is well known. The Japanese, Indochinese, and Koreans seem also to have been more favorable to the Chinese (as well as certain Central American C Ps). leadership. 39 The ritual expression, "guided by the USSR" completely disappeared.
22 nesia, a new idyll with Sukarno is now going
But notwithstanding this, the differentiations have not disappeared. Apart from their sectarian reference to the Jugoslav Communists — in this matter the Chinese yield only to the Albanians - is no doubt that Mao Tse-Tung has a higher opinion than Khrushchev of the contribution of the revolutionary struggle of the masses in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Almost always the difference is one of emphasis rather than of explicit stands, but just the reading of the articles, speeches, and documents is per se revelatory.
Diversity af estimates of the world situation, in this post-conference stage, is more clear-cut. The Chinese express much more optimistic judgments about the international correlation of forces, and naturally the events of this past Spring - from the flight of Gagarin to the inglorious expedition against Cuba — are inducing them to step up the dose. 41 The practical implications of this analysis are clear: according to the Chinese, the US SR and the other workers' states ought to profit by the more favorable conditions by operating with greater audacity on certain crucial questions. 42 But it is once again on the 40 This confirms the empirical and contingent origin of certain Chinese positions even on this point (the polemies against Nehru, on the other hand, continue). * In an article in its May Day issue, the People's Daily spoke of the imperialist camp as "moribund." 42 According to leaks appearing in the English press, the characterization of the present stage seems to have formed one of the major motifs of conflict at the conference, the Chinese favoring a definition that would include
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL characterization of the US leadership that the divergences became most specific: the Chinese have never taken a relaxed or "waiting" attitude toward Kennedy, whom currently they describe right away as worse than Eisenhower. 43
It is not, however, because of the sketching out of these new divergences that the attempt at synthesis made by the 81 is not destined to turn out to be lasting. Partial divergences can sharpen or disappear, according to the conjuncture, and compromise formulæ may favor manœuvres and propagandistic fictions. What counts more is the fact that the Moscow resolution did not at all provide an answer to the crucial problems of the historical phase we are passing through, in substance dodging them or deforming them. These problems exist in reality, they require an effective solution, and they will constantly raise themselves again and again, no matter what formulæ or tactical subtities be excogitated. synthesis of the 81 will be battered and breached, more or less rapidiy, by events, and differentiations and divergences will inevitably reappear. the notion of a "period of wars and revolutions," the preferring formulæ of the type of those which prevailed (cf chapter 1 of the resolution). An indirect confirmation of this clash may be drawn from the importance that Khrushchev accorded to a definition of the resolution, rather banal in itself, but which evidently acgires significance in counter-position to a diverse definition (cf op cit, p 3). 43 What is in question here is a declaration by Mao Tse. Tung of 28 April, since then repeated frequently by the Chinese press (cf, eg, the already mentioned article in the People's Daily and another article in the same paper [Tsinhua News Agency despatch of 9 May 19611).