THE NEW PROGRAMME OF THE CPSU by ERNEST GERMAIN
Marxism endeavors to apprehend the laws which govern the evolution of human societies. It attempts above all to apprehend the logic and the dynamics of capitalist society, to provide the working class with a valuable instrument for the revolutionary transformation of society: it is impossible to change reality consciously unless it is understood adequately.
Thus the programme of an organization claiming to be Marxist must be examined above all according to its capacity to apprehend the social reality of the epoch in which it is drafted. It must then be examined to what extent its theoretical and practical insight enables the proletariat to fulfill its historic role.
But we would be pedestrian Marxists - "idealist" Marxists so to speak — in the extreme if we remained at the level of these initial, obvious remarks. A programme is a theoretical work by a who cannot escape the laws of historical materialism whatever the level of consciousness to which they aspire. Even if their vision pierces into the obscurities of the future they remain bound to their epoch by a thousand
The Communist Manifesto remains even today astonishing for the boldness of its young authors, but even they could not foresee the era of electrification or atomic energy or the concrete the conquest of power by the proletariat would take place: the Republic of Soviets, that is to say democratically elected councils of workers and poor peasants. The Bolshevik Party was without doubt the most audacious party which history has known up to the present day. The programme which it adopted after its seizure of power at the Ninth Congress in 1919 reflects this audacity. Yet even this programme could not foresee the Fascist dictatorship, shift from the international Socialist revolution to the colonial revolution, nor even the new colossal upsurge of productive forces which capitalism in death agony has witnessed for nearly half a century thanks to a new and powerful technological revolution.
When we pass from these major theoretical achievements to much more timid burblings, (often rooted in "bad faith" and corresponding not so much to objective reality but to the pressure of the social milieu on the ideologists) the dif. ficulty of breaking free from the narrow limits of time and space becomes insurmountable. The Gotha programme of the German Social Democrats — the result of 15 years of experience and of sincere efforts by thousands of advanced work. ers - appeared completely outmoded by events ten years after it had been published. The Erfurt programme from the same party knew hardly a better fate, although produced by the leaders of a Marxist Party which at the time was admired by Lenin himself. Must we also recall that the powerful Austrian socialist party at the beginning of the twenties drafted the Linz programme which on paper predicated the dictatorship of the proletariat and yet ten years later that same party showed itself incapable of elementary self defence before the onslaught of Fascism and this because it feared to "provoke" the enemy?
Every programme thus merits a double examination. It possesses an intrinsic value, whether positive or negative. At the same time it is the is produced, often, rather in spite of its authors than because of them. The recent draft pragramme which Krushchev has prepared and which has been adopted at the 22nd Congress of the CPSU should be submitted to this double test, the one critical the other explanatory. IS THIS A "PROGRAMME OF COMMUNISM"?
Does this outline programme provide us with a scientific analysis of the social reality in which we live? Does it offer the proletariat the necessary arms to fulfill their role in the capitalist world? Does it give the proletariat of the Soviet Union and of the other workers' states, perspectives worthy of Communism? These are the questions concerning the intrinsic value of the programme which will let us know if we are in the presence of an authentic "programme of communism", without necessarily approving all the analysis or all the conclusions which it offers. Deficient analysis of contemporary capitalist reality.
Without doubt the most feeble and conservative aspect of the programme is that analysing the contemporary situation; it is also the most baffling for several reasons. It can be summarised under three headings.
1) Sections perfectly correct, but which are in this case only repetitions of ancient truths copied from the programme of 1919 or even that of 1903.
2) Sections plainly false, above all when the authors of the outline have tried — very timidly — to "innovate". , to analyse the new phenomenon of contemporary capitalism or to rationalise soviet reality if not to disguise it.
aspects of contemporary reality are passed over in silence, which are not mentioned, even by allusion and for which the strange Marxists who edited this programme have
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL no explanation whatsoever to offer. Of this more gramme makes no mention of Stalin and the cult of personality, the various revolutions begun and lost since 1918, the Peoples Communes in China, the Cuban revolution — the first revolution which has overthrown capitalism under the leadership of a party which is bound to Moscow neither in name or fact — nor of the tasks posed to the proletariat in the Imperialist countries and the workers' states by colonial wars (save for vague and insignificant terms such as "support").
The draft programme edited (in French) in Moscow by the Foreign Language Publications apparently only consists of 150 pages. In reality it should contain 250, but these 100 supplementary have evaporated. These are blank pages work. Siece intes helle tual teners biave the which the printers have gotten Stalin, the "manual workers equal in law" can allow themselves this little oversight.
In those places where the analysis of Capitalism does not refer textually or by summary to the passages in the Communist Manifesto or in unanswered.
The text (pI) affirms that the XXth century is a "century of tremendous increase in productive forces and in the development of science" , that the "putrefaction of capitalism is accentuated" (p23) that "this putrefaction does not mean a complete stagnation, sclerosis of the productive forces, and does not exclude expansion of the capitalist economy in countries" (p23). It adds that "as a whole capitalism paralyses more and more the development of modern productive forces" (p24) and that the crisis of the world capitalist economy "deepens". (p25). with revisionism, on managing the state? Or the taking over of a part of the economy by the state for the profit of the monopolies? or the monopolies making use of the state to control the non-monopolised sectors of the economy? The "outline" uses this description to cover these three distinct phenomena besides a few others—they are in no way distinguished by a specific analysis. Is the "world crisis of the capitalist economy" the periodic crisis of overproduction or a structural crisis? Has it been ac-. celerated since 1914, 1929 or since 1949? How is it that since the second world war in spite of
"accentuated crisis" (structural?), the pe riodic crises of overproduction not only follow a rather more rapid rhythm but are much reduced
5 in intensity and of shorter duration compared with the period 1913-1938? Is this phenomenon transitory? If so how is it to be explained and how will it come an end? If what conclusions can be drawn about the future evolution of capitalism?
How to explain the evident contradiction, unforeseen by Marxist-Leninist theory, that for twelve years the loss of colonial empires and the continual weakening of the Imperialists' position in the world has not been accompanied by an aggravation of the economic situation in the Imperialist countries, but on the contrary has been accompanied in all these countries, with the possible exception of the United States, by the most rapid development of their productive forces that they have known since the beginning of the twentieth century, if not since the beginning of Imperialism?
The outline gives in passing a sideblow at the absurd theory of the "absolute impoverishment of the proletariat" when it speaks of "the relative, sometimes even absolute impoverishment of the workers' conditions". This formula is correct; we have held it in the past against the theories in vogue in the CPs, particularly in the F.C.P. and the CPSU (1). However in the same document formulations can be found in flagrant opposition to this correct definition. Thus on page 2 it is stated that "the economic laws of its development (that of capitalism) lead inevitably to the formation of an immense reserve army" '. Now if this army is really inevitable and immense then absolute impoverishment is also inevitable and advanced. Only when it is understood that at certain periods the reserve army has a tendency to diminish or at least not to increase, can it be appreciated tha there is no "law" or "inevitability" about "ab. solute impoverishment". Finally, this viewpoint is in enterpered resumed in a particularly equivocal and contradictory passage which we reproduce in extenso:
"The fear of revolution, the successes achieved by the Socialist countries, the pressure exercised to make partial concessions on wages, conditions of work, social insurance. But the perpetual increases in the cost of living and inflation reduce frequently (not always then?) these concessions to nothing. Wages lag behind the material and cultural needs of the worker and his family which increase with the development of society. Even the relatively high standard of living of the few advanced capitalist countries is based on the misery of the peoples of Asia, Africa and Latin America, on unequal trade, discrimination against female labour, the cruel oppression of the black races and foreign workers as well as the intensi1) See "Quatrième Internationale" June-July No, 1957: Is there a Marxist theory on the "impoverishment of the proletariat"?
fied exploitation of these same countries. The bourgeois myth of "full employment" is only a sinister farce because the working class suffers from the uncertainty of tomorrow. Despite certain successes obtained by the working class in the economic struggle, its general situation deteriorates in the capitalist world"
There is only one correct phrase in this paragraph, that concerning the world conditions which limit the significance of the trends in wages in the advanced capitalist countries; even that is incomplete. But all the rest contradictory nonsense. If the "bourgeoisie" is forced to "certain concessions" on wages, how can it be argued that the situations of the workers is deteriorating? Or perhaps "the capitalist world bloc" includes both the workers of the colonial nations and those of the Imperialist countries? If so, then it is an "average" without any real significance, since one of the contradictions of social reality is precisely the contrast between the decline or stagnation of the standard of life of the colonial or semi-colonial peoples, and the undeniable raising of the standard of living in the Imperialist coun tries over the past 15 years (20 years in the USA, Canada, Australia and in those countries spared by the second world war).
The "bourgeois myth" of full employment is doubtless a farse in a long term historical perspective, but it has certainly not been myth over the past 15 years in a series of Imperialist countries. "The constant increase in the cost of living" could only render the "concessions of the bourgeoisie" nugatory if finally there was no rise in real wages. Now this increase is uncontestable in most of the Imperialist countries over the last twelve years. To believe that capitalism is somehow "embellished" if the true facts are stated, is to have an erroneous conception of Marxism which above all is a rigorously scientific method of analysis. It is this clinging to confused formulas such as those in the "draft" which gives ammunition to the revisionists and the social democrats, by creating the impression that a deliberate attempt is being made to deceive the soviet workers on the real situation in the Imperialist countries. The task of a Marxist Party is to explain the causes of these real phenomena, the increase in the standard of living of the workers of the Imperialist countries, to indicate their limits and to assess at what point increase will or will not limit the struggle of the proletarian class in the Imperialist countries.
It is easy to raise criticism someone will say. But our movement must be severe in relation to pseudo-theoreticians whether they be in the Stalinist camp or among the social democrats. It has not contented itself with posing questions; it has attempted to elaborate answers. If one studies the "Godesberg Programme" of the German SPD
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL or the recent "Statement of Aims" of the British Labour Party; if one reads the "Draft Programme" of the CPSU and compares these inept texts with the documents adopted on the same subjects by the Fifth and Sixth World Congress of the Fourth International and by the IEC of our movement convened between these two Congresses (2) it can be said: if the Fourth International is still weak from the organisational standpoint, no one can deny that it constitutes today the only serious
2322 Marxist current in the international workers' move-
ment, the only current which endeavors to follow closely the evolution of world reality and tries to give a Marxist explanation of the situation, particularly to the new economic phenomena which Equally inadequate analysis of the workers' states and of "underdeveloped nations".
The analysis of the objective situation of the colonial and semi-colonial countries is even weaker and more deficient than that of the objective situation in the Imperialist countries. The "Draft" juggles with some general notions ("reactionary pro-Imperialist regimes"; "based on feudalism"; "national bourgeoisie") without attempting the least analysis of the economic and social content of these ideas. What is the national bourgeoisie? Is it the Industrial bourgeoisie? Does it include the class which in turn becomes "monopolist"? If so where lies the line of demarcation? Are Tata and Birla in India the representative of the "national bourgeoisie"? What are the specific political movements inspired by these different strata and classes? Whoever desires a Marxist answer to these questions — and we are only enumerating the the most elementary ones — need not bother with the "Draft". It will be of no use to him.
As for the analysis of the situation of the workers' states, of the USSR in particular, it includes some ancient truths but it is guilty of silence and of the grossest revision of certain fundamental notions of Marxist-Leninism.
Mention has already been made that Stalin is not even refered to — and more serious - that the whole phenomenon of bureaucratisation is passed over in silence. From this point of view this programme is a step backwards by comparison with the programme of 1919 which, without previous experience, was sufficiently conscious to emphasise the dangers of a bureaucratic deforming of the workers' state. The enormous - and terrible — experience suffered by the USSR and by the "people's democracies" in the course of the last thirty years is simply passed over in silence 2) Theses on "The perspectives of the workers' movement in
Europe and our tasks" January 1960 "Quatrième Internationale".
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL without any conclusion, however general, being drawn.
The idea put forward by Marx in his writings on the Paris Commune, then by Lenin in "State and Revolution" and in his writings of the years 1918-1921, that differences in wages between officials and workers, and the high salaries given to specialists could be a source of demoralization for the workers and a source of bureaucratic deformation for the state, is replaced by the absurd formula of remuneration "according to the quantity and quality of work" (pp. 10, 93) in which the quality of work of an admiral, a prima donna or a member of the Presidium of the Central Committee is considered ten or twenty times superior to the "quality" of the highly skilled metallurgist or the acetylene welder. What are the objective criteria? According to what "inexorable law", to use the language of the authors of the draft? Mistery...
"The former opposition between town and country... has been overcome" affirms the draft
Indeed. Forced collectivisation (there is no mention of this in the draft, not even a condemnation) was not precisely the expression of perfect harmony. Neither did the reaction of the peasants to this forced collectivisation express a tender love for the town. Their behaviour since the world war indicates the same attitude. If all opposition between town and country had really been overcome, how is it possible to explain the 25 years of stagnation in the production of cereals, recognized by Kruscher himself in 1955? How to explain the fact that the deliveries of grain from the Kolkhozes to the state (and thence to the town) have not ceased to decline in the greater part of the USSR, as Kruscher himself recognized in the Plenum of the CC in January 1961?
And what can one say of the following passage, particularly revolting when it is compared with the reality it purports to describe?
"The whole life of Socialist society is based on a full democracy. Through the medium of the Soviets, the trade unions and other social organisations of the masses the workers participate actively in the direction of public affairs, in the solution of the problems which are posed in the building of the economy and in culture. Socialist democracy means political freedoms: freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly and association, freedom to elect and be elected, as social rights: the right to work, to leisure, to education, the right to be provided for in old age and in case of illness or being disabled for work; equality between citizens of all races and nationalities; equality of rights between men and women in all spheres of public life economic and cultural. As apposed to bourgeois democracy, socialist democracy does not rest with proclaiming the rights of the people, but guarantees the real possibility for the exercise of these rights" (p. 10-11).
The cynicism is devastating. Perhaps the authors of the "Draft" are thinking of the Soviet Constitution of 1936 edited by the unfortunate Bukharin, because these are certain! creal pos- "proclamations on paper"? But no, these are sibilities". If we understand it correctly then soviet workers have the right to organize a demonstration to protest against the bad organization of the food supply (freedom of assembly). They all have the right to organize public meetings to alter the law which restriets in practice access to the university of young workers (freedom of association). They have the right to organize any political group so long as it respects the Soviet constitution. Does this happen every day in Moscow and Leningrad? Has it happened only once during 30 years? Then do these liberties exist "only on paper" and • not in practice! (3).
Speaking at the VIIth Congress of the CPSU, precisely on the revision of the party programme, Lenin affirmed:
"Whereas a demand such as the guarantee of the right of association was formerly particularly important, our opinion on this subject is that no one can prevent associations today and that the power of the Soviets has only to assure the provision of assembly halls". (Works, vol. 27, p. 134, new series 1961).
The whole workers tradition is in agreement with this. Who would dare affirm that this is so today in the USSR? Is there freedom of the press when writers and students are denied the right to publish at their own expence non - political writings, for the simple reason that they do not have the approval of some official censor, although the power of the Soviets should put the printing presses at the disposal of all the workers, all citizens except counter-revolutionaries?
There are similar remarks on the subject from that part of the "draft" which concerns relations between the workers' states... "the formation and development of the world socialist system is founded on the basis of the sovereignty and free consent in accordance with the vital interests of the workers in all the states of this system" (pp. 1718) affirm the authors of the "draft". The Soviet intervention in Hungary, did that take place on 3) This was written before the "peace marchers" had reach.
uertainly, we are not pacifists; we affirm the right of the workers' states-even degenerated - to defend against the Imperialist menace.
USSR, the law forbids only counter-revolutionary propa.
ganda or propaganda for war. That of the "peace mar.
chers" is not counter revolutionary and it needs real dis honesty to call it war propaganda. Neverthless some of their pamphlets were seized and they were forbidden to demonstrate before the ministry of defence. What then of "freedom of assembly"?
8 the basis of the free consent of the Hungarian workers? Did not these workers conduct a general strike lasting three weeks, the longest in the world history of workers' struggles, against this intervention, under the leadership of workers' councils whose representative character was recognized by the Soviet army since they proceeded to negotiate with them? Was not this intervention aimed at the legal and sovereign workers' government led by Imre Nagy? Do the authors of the "draft" have the effrontery to claim that the division of Germany was realised with the "free consent" of its people? Without doubt it has proved necessary to construct a wall along the line of demarcation between East and West Berlin, to allow the inhabitants of East Berlin a chance to express their "free consent" to the regime installed in their city....
As a consequence of accumulating commonplaces, eulogistie chichés and dithyrambie adjectives on the subject of the "world socialist system" authors of the "Draft Programme" seem blissfully unaware that they are involved in flagrant contradictions. On page 14 the draft proclaims that:
« the socialist regime creates conditions to overcome the disequilibrium both economic and cultural between countries, the heritage of capitalism... all that is guaranteed by the advantages of the economie system of socialism by equality in economic relations ».
On page 16-17, they affirm that « in the socialist camp... no one has nor can have rights or particular privileges ».
The authors seem to forget that an official declaration of the Soviet government — the famous declaration of 23 October 1956 — recognized that this principle had been violated for a long period. Above all they disregard the contradictory character of this principle: As long as exchange value exists, exchange on the basis of equality between nations of unequal economic development creates precisely privileges for the more advanced countries. All exchange on the basis of equality "according to the prices on the world market" deprives less developed countries of a part of their wealth to the gain of the most developed countries. In practice moreover the soviet leaders have tacitly recognized this fact for since 1956-7 they have tried to compensate for this actual inequality by unilateral aid (and not assistance on the basis of equality), by cheap credits. But for easily comprehensible reasons of which more later, the « draft programme » makes no mention even of the duty of more advanced states to sacrifice unilaterally and without demanding a political equivalent, a part of their resources, accelerate the economic growth of less advanced workers' states.
As for the following passage: « the tendency to wish to construct socialism in isolation, at the mar-
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL gin of the world community of the socialist countries... is harmful from the economic point of view, because it ends in waste of social labour, the slowing down of the rate of growth of production..» (P. 17) this is perfectly correct from the general and abstract point of view, but it appears strange when related to the actual situation, that is to say deformation or even the bureaucratic degeneration of the leaders of this « world community » who deliberately drove out socialst Yugoslavia in 1948; who tried to strangle it by a monstrous blokade; who afterwards sought to drive it into the arms of capitalism and who at the beginning of 1957 had again in part disorganised its planning by refusing to fulfill contracts and orders. In spite of this the « rate of growth of production » is greatly superior in Yugoslavia compared with that in the other workers' states, which demonstrates not the virtues of isolation but the disadvantages of bureaucratic control and the advantages of control by work.
councils... Total absence of a programme for revolutionary action by the workers of the Imperialist countries.
The part in the « Draft Programme » devoted to the tasks of the international communist movement begins with a flagrant untruth:
« By the value of its example victorious socialism exerts a revolutionary influence on the spirit of the workers of the capitalist world, incites them further in the struggle against Imperialism and eases in great measure the conditions of this fight » (p. 32).
Since the whole of this passage does not apply to the colonial revolution which is treated separately, it is typical of the pious avowals and even more pious lies with which this « draft » overflows and which Maurice Thorez calls rather imprudently a Pet that the came Thore, Hat rambic formulas for a certain « Short History of the CPSU », today consigned to the rubbish bin. It is indeed a « monument » which can affirm — without qualifying clause or any reservation - that socialism » has exercised a « revolutionary influence » let us say on the workers of the United States, of Canada, of Great Britain and of West Germany (300 million citizens in the capitalist world) since 1945...
In fact all the communist leaders know from their own experience (the leader of the Norwegian CP recently admitted this publicly on the morrow of the legislative elections) that if the existence of the USSR indubitably weakens international capitalism and thus contributes objectively to the in: ternational class war, the policy followed by the Soviet leaders and the catastrophic error in bestowing the label « socialist » on conditions of existence inferior to those of the most advanced capitalist
ciliation with the capitalists and the peasants, the reformism of Krushchev.
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL nations have subjectively seriously impeded the struggle for socialism in the Imperialist countries. The considerable weakening of the communist parties in most of the Imperialist countries since twelve years is in part due to this factor. For the rest it is due to the very grave opportunist errors committed in these countries during the revolutionary crisis at the end of the second world. But the « draft » makes no mention of this decline nor of its causes.
Magic formulas such as « the capitalist nations are permanently shaken by class war » (P. 33), « the reactionary forces of the different capitalist nations are in no condition to meet the growing forces of democracy and socialism » (same page), « even in countries where the positions of the reformists are still powerful, substantial changes (sic) are working towards the left in the heart of the workers' movement » (p. 34), by their non dialec.
dogmatic and sterile character contribute nothing to a clarification of the serious questions placed before the western communist parties. munists struggling in the imperialist know very well that the United States is a unfortunately not « shaken permanently » by the class struggle; that the « reactionary forces in France have unfortunately been very capable of « opposing » the « forces of socialism » which in place of growing have been sensibly weakened; that in West Germany « substantial changes » have worked not in the direction of the left but towards the right in the heart of the workers' movement.
In toto the «draft programme» remains loyal to the neo-reformist theses of the XXth and the XXIst Congress of the CPSU and in this sense constitutes a retreat on the « Declaration of the 81». It affirms without any proof that « even before the defeat of capitalism » the working classe « can force the ruling circles (?) to stop preparations for a new world war... to put the economy at the service of peaceful industry » (p. 34). This is the most reactionary aspect of the theory of peaceful co-existence which appears here and which tends to substitute for the battle to overthrou capitalism a battle to « compel » the imperialist bourgeoisie to become « peaceful ». This is a reactionary utopia, an utopia because it has no chance of being achieved, reactionary because in consequence of this conception the communist parties tend to restrain the struggles of the masses which periodically go beyond the framework of capitalism, to moderate the objectives of these struggles and refuse to give them anti-capitalist perspectives.
Neo-reformism can be seen even more plainly in the following passage:
« Resting on the support of the majority of the people and resolutely opposing opportunist elements, incapable of renouncing the policy of con-
9 working class can inflict a defeat on the anti-popular and reactionary forces (?), conquer a solid majority in parliament, transform it from being an instrument of the bourgeoisie into an instrument at the service of the working people, boldly deploying the extra parliamentary action of the masses, break the resistance of the reactionary forces and create the necessary conditions for the peaceful accomplishment of the socialist revolution ».
Naturally, revolutionary marxists have never defended the thesis by which socialist revolution must necessarily be accompanied by a violent revolution, civil war, etc. The degree of violence which it involves depends exclusively on the balance of forces and the ability of the class enemy to resist. The « draft programme » is right when it recalls somewhat clumsily well known truths on this matter. But for them, as for Lenin, the content of revolution is the expropriation of the capitalists and the construction a new state apparatus based on democratically elected councils of workers and poor peasants, thus accomplishing in reality the transformation of the working class into the ruling class which takes over the management of the economy and the state. liamentary road to socialism" which neither tions the expropriation of capital nor councils, obviously constitutes a revisionist conception of the "socialist revolution" The authors
La great deal ot the principal ideological danger" which is that of revisionism (pp. 38-39); they do not seem to be aware that they have also jumped with both feet into the revisionist swamp.
In reality, these neo-reformist passages — interspersed in an eclectic manner with other references which insist on the necessity of "revolution" and "the dictatorship of the proletariat" under the "most varied forms" — only constitute a rationalisation, a theoretical equivalent for what took place in the "people's democracies" In fact it was only due to foreign intervention, thanks to the military bureaucratic pressure of the leaders of the USSR, that the communist parties of these "people's democracies" have been able "to transform parliaments from instruments the bourgeoisie into instruments of the working people" • not without also transforming into a farce the very notions of "parliament" "elections" "parties" • Of course the "draft programme" strongly insists that the CPs do not desire to conquer power "as the result of a war" or "with foreign aid". But history has not yet given us an example of a independant communist party achieving power by the parliamentary road without a foreign occupation. Formerly this was the principal argument of communist propaganda against the reformist social democracy. It is becoming a key argument of marxist revolutionaries against the neo-
10
The whole chapter on the tasks of the workers' movement in the imperialist countries suffers from two fundamental weaknesses. It gives no scientific, realistic perspective of the class struggle in these countries; it in no way answers the key problem posed by the class war, that is the problem of transitional demands and transitional forms of organization to bring over the great majority of workers with a predominantly reformist outlook to conduct in practice struggles which open the way to socialism.
The only perspective" which this chapter puts forward is the thesis, completely contradicted by the experience of the ten last years, that the stronger grow the USSR and the countries of the "socialist camp", the more bitter becomes the class struggle in the imperialist countries and the stronger the communist movement. Subsidiary to this thesis is the illusion, which is widespread today in the leaderships of the CPs in the Imperialist countries, that this will be verified the moment that the standard of living of the soviet workers surpasses that of the most advanced capitalist countries.
This thesis is moreover explicitly contained in the "Draft programme" (p. 49). It is nowhere proved; does not the absolute standard of living influence the much more directly than a relative comparison with conditions elsewhere, above all when this standard of living is already high? It would then be necessary to demonstrate by what economie mechanism a lowering in the standard of living is probable - or inevitable — in the twenty years to come. Besides, this thesis is profoundly demoralising, for it tends to postpone the struggles for the victory of socialism in the West to a hypothetical point in the future, which can be 15, 20, or 25 years away or even more. A strategy in the colonial revolution which paralyses the communist movement.
The very title of the chapter which deals with the tasks of the communists in the colonial and semi-colonial countries is significant: "The movement of national liberation" • Thus the soviet bureaucracy continues to put forward its menshevik conception of two stages mechanically separated from one another, that of "national liberation" followed by that of the "socialist revolution" This conception has paralysed the communist parties of the colonial and semi-colonial countries, has prevented them from playing the role of the leadership or even of vanguard in many revolutions over the past ten years, and has resulted in severe defeats after shameful capitulations in countries such as Egypt and Iraq.
"Only a communist party which puts forward a class policy, a proletarian policy, a party armed
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL with revolutionary vanguard theory, forming a single bloc, closely bound to the masses is capable of organising and leading the people to the victory of socialism" (pp. 13-14) affirms the "draft programme".
How beautiful and easy... on paper. However an embarassing fact exists for the authors of this "draft". It is called Cuba. There a powerful communist party largely in control of the trade unions, possessed many cadres a well established tradition. There has been a major revolution in Cuba. Unfortunately for those who love dogmas and ready made schemes, it was not the communist party which unleashed this revolution; on the contrary it was restraining and sabotaging it until the very last moment. The heroic forces of the "July 26th" movement led by Fidel Castro were responsible for launching the insurrection, mobilising the people for armed combat against dictatorship of Batista, overthrowing this dictatorship, realising agrarian reform, breaking native bourgeoisie and — in spite of the hostility and lack of comprehension of the CP — going forward to the nationalization of all capitalist property and to the construction of socialism. This decisive historical experience finds no place in the dogmas of the authors of the "draft" the dogma that the communist party alone is capable of overthrowing capitalism or that which claims "national liberations" is separated by a whole stage from the "socialist revolution".
The "draft programme" continues to uphold a "broad democratic movement" which must include
"reactionary sections of the local exploiting classes" — who are the non-reactionary sections? - are excluded from this (p. 44). The authors of the draft continue thus be national bourgeoisie has by its nature a double character. In present conditions, the national bourgeoisie of the colonial, ex-colonial and dependant countries who are not bound to the imperialist milieux, is objectively interested in the accomplishment of the essential tasks of the anti- imperialist and anti- feudal revolution. follows that its progressive role, its capacity to participate in the solution of the pressing problems of national interest, has not been exhausted.
However the more contradictions develop between the workers and the exploiting classes and the class struggle sharpens internally, the more the national bourgeoisie tends to ally itself with the imperialists and internal reaction. The process of development of the liberated countries complicated and involves several stages. Taking into account the different historical, social, and economic conditions of the liberated countries (?), the creative initiative of the masses will lead to numerous unique features in the forms and rhythms
of their development on the path of social pro- novation this revisionist in- gramme" because they refuse to apply the el-
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL gress" (pp. 45-46).
Up to the present however it has heardly been the "creative initiative of the masses" which has really innovated "on the path of social progress" (old reformist formula, be it noted). Rather it is the fertile imagination of the bureaucrats who, since the conference of the 81, have brought to light a creature formerly unknown, neither fish nor fowl, called "the State of the national democracy"
According to the Marxist Leninist theory of the state, the state is a weapon of coercion class against another... "The state of the national democracy" , it would seem, is not the instrument of any class in particular, but the expression of a "bloc of all the progressive and patriotic forces in combat for complete national independance, for a powerful democracy, for the final plishment of the anti-imperialist, anti-feudal democratic revolution" (p.
The authors of the "draft programme" succeed here in contradicting themselves on every page. On the preceding page, it was a question of the disadvantages of a capitalist economy for colonial peoples on the path to liberation. One might conclude then that to accomplish the "final" national liberation means to overthrow the system of capitalist exploitation. In these conditions, the economy emerging from the outcome of olution would be an economy with a socialist base (as in Cuba), and we would then see a socialist revolution, not simply a national one, a workers' state and not a "national democracy"
Let us now examine the reverse hypothesis. Let us admit that "to lead the revolution to its final conclusion" means, in the context of the colonial countries, to leave intact" "indigenous" capitalist property. In this case the bourgeoisie remains the exploiting class. state tells us that the state is the coercive instrument of the dominant class. Then in this case the state would not be a "national democratic state" , but a bourgeois state, however extremely democratic. Lenin also has taught us that the most democratic bourgeois republic is only a veiled form of the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie. Would not this apply even more to the colonial countries?
The authors of the "Draft programme" give us then the choice between two revisionisms: that it is possible to eliminate the capitalist economy without creating a workers' state: that it is possible to wage the struggle for the liberation of the colonial peoples to a final conclusion without eliminating the capitalist economy. Between these two revisions, each to his choice. But even after this mournful choice, no trace can be found of the "state of national democracy"
the defenders of
11 • are pressed to their last defences and the question is posed to them: "Give us then examples of states of national democracy", they quote neither Iraq, nor Ghana, whose bourgeois status cannot be doubted, nor even Guinea, quote... Cuba, that is to say a country where foreign and native bourgeoisie has been completely expropriated and has disappeared as the possessing class; where not only the means of production have been nationalized but the working people are armed. If the point is argued further and the question asked: "What then is the difference between the Cuban state and the countries of the "people's democracy" a few years ago? The only serious answer given (except by the Cuban CP which is beginning to admit that the workers' state is an actuality) is that... there is no communist party in power. How strange these marxists are who use purely subjective criteria to define the nature of the state and finally conclude that the bourgeoisie of a country can be expropriated and a new social structure erected based on the nationalization of the means of production.. without it being a workers state.
When the "draft programme" states, p. 48, that "national states" appear more and more independent force in the confusion is at a premium. Here we have national states (always without a class character), which seem wifferent from "states on national democracy" but which have the advantage on this mysterious animal by the signal distinction of existing. Without doubt this means the states of India, Egypt, Iraq, Ghana, perhaps even Morocco, Tunisia? We can quite understand that the authors have had some scruples about characterising these states as "democratic" , since one of their principal activities imprisoning communists, and other militant workers and poor peasants. But these states — which exist - are they not bourgeois states? is this not to grossly deceive the peoples of these states and the soviet peoples to affirm so irresponsibly that the governments of these states constitute "in the main a progressive, revolutionary and anti-imperialist force"? Can one convince the Chinese people that the Nehru government plays such a role? Or the Algerian masses that Bourguiba or King Hassan Il play a revo. lutionary role? Or the Egyptian and Iraqui fellah crushed by an agrarian reform "from above" _ that Nasser and Kassem perform a "revolutionary role"? Or the workers of Ghana who have just protested by a general strike against the worsening of their standard of living that Nkrumah plays a "progressive" role?
All these contortions, all this confusion, all this mixture of half truths and three quarter lies are resorted to by the authors of the "draft pro-
12 ementary marxist principles which experience has confirmed. In colonial and semi-colonial countries, the proletariat and poor peasants, organised in popular or proletarian formations separate from the bourgeois parties - and as soon as possible in revolutionary marxist parties or tendencies can give critical support to any concrete, anti-imperialist action undertaken by the national bourgeoisie. But at the same time the masses should be educated in a spirit of distrust in relation to this bourgeoisie, so that they learn that by nature this bourgeoisie is incapable of leading the revolution to its final conclusion, that it will pass inevitably into the counter-revolutionary camp, above all at the moment where a radical agrarian reform threatens the edifice of private property, that they should then be led to push through the revolution without halting at any stage, to pursue the revolution in permanence", until social and economic liberation completes national liberation, that the construction of a socialist economy and society can develop after the destruction of the bourgeois state and the construction of a state of new type, the dictatorship of the proletariat and of the poor peasants, based on the democratic committees elected by the working people. AN ANAEMIC CONCEPTION OF COMMUNISM.
But if the "draft programme" is modest and misguiding for the masses of the imperialist coun tries, of the colonial and semi-colonial countries, it is on the contrary full of magnificent promises in relation to the masses of the workers' states and above all in relation to the masses of the USSR. The "draft programme" finishes with a triumphant call: "The party solemnly proclaims: the present generation of soviet citizens will live under communism" (p. 150). It proceeds to define the content of this "communism" both on the socio-economic and the political planes.
On the socio-economic plane we find the following definitions: "In the course of the next decade, the Soviet Union which will create the material and technical basis for communism will overtake in production per capita the most advanced and the wealthiest capitalist nation: the USA; the material well-being and the cultural and technical level of the workers will be increased considerably; comfort will be assured for all; the kolkhoz and sovkhoz will be transformed into highly productive cultivation; the needs of soviet citizens for comfortable dwellings will be satisfied in the main; painful manual work will disappear; the USSR will become the country with the shortest working day.
In the course of the second decade (1971-1980) the material and technical basis of communism will be created, an abundance of material and
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL be assured to the whole population; soviet society will come close to the application of the principle of each according to his needs; the transition will be made to the collective property of the whole people. Thus communist society in the USSR will have been boldly outlined. The construction of communist society will be constructed completely in the following period" (pp. 65-66).
These are indeed dazzling perspectives-if the facts correspond to the definitions. We will look at them a little more closely.
In the course of the next decade the USSR will overtake the production per capita USA. Can this promise be fulfilled? It is most unlikely. It seems even more improbable when further on (pp. 68-9) it is stated that to do this it would be necessary to surpass two and a half times the present level of industrial production of the USA. Now the present indices of the level of production of the USA is superior by at least 35% (some would argue from 40-50%) to soviet production. The latter must then pass from dice 65 to 200 or 250, that is to say it must triple or quadruple production in the space of ten years. The present rate or growth of soviet industry is in the order of 8-10% per annum. With this in mind it is clear that at this rate the indices in ten years time would stand not at 200250 but at 130-165 after ten years. Now the Soviet population surpasses by nearly 50 million the population of the USA; American production then has only to reach the indices 135-150 in ten years, and its per capita output would still remain 25-35% above that of the USSR. A rate of growth of 2ł-4% would suffice, which is not impossible.
Furthermore industrial production per capita arrive at this, account must be taken of agriculture, where American advance i in the field of productivity remains enormous, and consumer durable goods accumulated from the past, where the American advance is equally enormous. Briefly, on Krushchev's definition a communist country is one whose standard of living remains inferior to that of a capitalist country. Pointless to insist on the curious character of such a definition.
A statistical example will confirm our scepticism. For 1970, the "draft programme" foresees a production of electricity of 900-1000 milliards
Now the present output of electricity in the USA is 850 milliard kilowatts: in 1950 it was 620 i.e. an annual rate of growth of 6% per annum. With such a rate of growth, American production of electric energy still surpass that of the USSR by nearly 50% in 1970, without speaking of per capita production.
The rash predictions of Krushchev in relation
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL to agriculture have already shown themselves. The same applies to his prediction at the 21st Congress that from 1965 the production of the workers' states would be over half that of world industrial production. Yet we are at the end of 1961 and the output of the workers' states has only reached 35% of world industrial output. Manifestly, Krushcher has seriously underestimated the present increase of the Imperialist countries in Europe and Japan and also of certain capitalist semicolonial countries. To make such irresponsible promises (we denounced them at the time (4), adds nothing to the success and impressive dynamic of the soviet economy. This only expresses the boasting of the bureaucracy, a normal complement of its timid moderation before the mounting revolutionary forces in the world.
From the second decade "abundance of material and cultural services" will be produced in the USSR. It will then be possible to proceed to distribution according to need. Now the "draft programme" cruel deception on this point. It is true that it promises — in the course of the next 20 years — that "the social funds of consumption will be nearly equal to half of real income of the population" (p. 101). But it only arrives at this conclusion by including within it free education, social insurance, free medical service and other forms of indirect benefits which exist equally in the most advanced capitalist countries and which are currently valued at about 3540% of the income at the disposal of the workers.
In fact genuine progress in relation to the most advanced capitalist countries are only promised in three sectors: free housing (an enormous step, but all depends naturally on the quality of the housing); free public services (including publie transport); and free meals in factories and schools (that is to say a free meal once a day in the canteen). By serious marxist definition, this would be at the most the dawning of a socialist society, the dawning of the first stage of social. ism which begins to point to the horizon beyond. But to call this a communist society "built in its out-
13 market economy where production is geared to its "profitability"; it will even be necessary to maintain inequality of remuneration according to quan. tity and quality of work (p. 92) which remains well on this side of the definition given by Marx in the Critique of the Gotha Programme, that is, remuneration strictly egalitarian according to quantity of work alone. This is then a communism in which even bread is not free, in which real equality is still promised for... the day atter to-morrow.
A few examples will allow us to illuminate the miserably truncated character of this "communism"
In May 1917 (44 years ago when there was neither automation nor nuclear energy) Lenin edited some notes for the revision of the Party programme. He looked forward particularly to the forbid. ding of industrial work of children under 16. The present draft programme looks forward to a category of young workers with less than 11 years of education, working effectively from 16, 15 or even 14 years of age (p. 128). Lenin foresaw the immediate reduction of the working day from six to four hours in unhealthy industries; the "draft programme" foresees a working day of 5-6 hours in these same industries (p. 97). In 1918, dealing with the draft of this same new programme, Lenin speaks of the period of transition to socialism thus: "to reduce progressively the working day to 6 hours; to gradually equalise all salaries and wages in all professions and categories" (Lenins underlining • Vol. 27 Works - p. 158) but the authors of the draft programme have the effrontery to speak of "remuneration according to the quantity and the quality of work produced", for the period of transition from capitalism socialism, but for its second completed phase, the phase of communism.
These formulations do not permit misuse as mere labels. Do they not clearly indicate also that once more soviet society has not yet finished the construction of the first phase of socialism, not to speak of its second phase?
lines" is to debase communism, to reduce it to THE STATE WITHERS AWAY BUT IS an impoverished definition.
This strange "communism" will retain commodities, money, market economy. It will retain wages and even "remuneration according to work" (p. 94). Worse still, under this "communist society", it will be necessary always "to stimulate materially" the process of production (p. 75), it will be necessary to fix "purchase prices" (sic) which will stimulate the kolkhoz to increase the productivity of work" (P. 84) as in a vulgar 4) See "Quatrième Internationale" No. on the VI world con.
gress, theses on the "Tendencies and Perspectives of the
World Economy".
STRENGTHENED AT THE SAME TIME.
These contradictions reach their climax when the authors of the draft programme consider the problem of political organisation in communist society. First definition and first error:
"A process of transforming the state into a universal organisation of all the workers of socialist society has begun. Proletarian democracy is being more and more transformed into the socialist democracy of the people (P. 103).
The first part of this passage begins with "a
We use the phrase "by violence" designedly. gaily embarked upon; in which this construction
11 process of transforming the state into a universal organisation of all the workers" (in a free association of communes of producers and consumers as Engels stated and Lenin upheld. But the "draft programme" rejects these "anarchist" conceptions). This is none other than the withering away of the state. Our bold authors however have forgotten their ABC because suddenly they affirm that the withering away of the state is the transformation of "proletarian democracy into the socialist democracy of the people". They cannot recall that Lenin taught that "the withering away of the state is the withering away of democracy... Democracy is the state recognizing the submission of the minority to the majority, that is to say the organisation of violence systematically exercised by one class upon another, one part of the population against the other" (State and Revolution Selected Works II pp. 227-228) To say that the state withers away but democracy exists, is to say that the state withers away and exists at the same time. To say that proletarian democracy is transforming itself into the democracy of the people, is to say that the systematic organisation of violence by the majority against the minority (dictatorship of the proletariat, proletarian democracy) is transforming itself into the systematic organisation of violence by the whole people... against itself. Second definition and second error.
"The state which has emerged as the state of the dictatorship of the proletariat is being transformed into the state of the whole people, into the organ which translates the interests and the will of the whole people... The party starts from the standpoint that the dictatorship of the proletariat abandons its function before the withering away of the state. The state, in as much as it is the organisation of the whole people, will remain until the complete victory of communism. Expressing the will of the people it is called upon... to govern the degree of work and consumption, to assure... the legal socialist order and socialist pro-
" (pp. 103-104).
We have deliberately overlooked the passage concerning the role of the state in "national defence" during the existence of capitalist encirelement. This is an ancient quarrel of definition and an ancient confusion. But here we content ourselves with this glaring confession, it is quite sufficient. Inus, having completed even in this society at the threshold of communism, "in its main outlines" the construction of communist society, it is then still necessary a state which imposes by violence, discipline, legality, control of consumption and the level of work. Is this communism? Is it even socialism?
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL Lenin returned to the point many times: the State is not the simple submission of minorities to majorities, the simple observation of elementary rules of morality and discipline. The state is a special machine, a particular arm of coercion and violence, which imposes submission and this submission is that of one class of society in the name of another. "Democracy" said Lenin "is a form of state, one of its varieties. It is then, like every the organized, systematic application of coercion to men". As long as economic and social conditions do not permit the disappearance classes, of exchange economy,. and the desire for private gain, — as long it is in fact necessary to have an organised punitive body restraining citizens so that they do not steal collective property, do not appropriate an exorbitant amount from the supply of articles of consumption, do not molest women in the streets and do not organize crime. But the survival of this constraint demonstrates precisely that classes remain, that we are not yet in a socialist society, without speaking of communist society.
perhaps this is simply an error of definition? The reality cannot be so explained. The soviet government has been obliged to reintroduce the death penalty for economic offences and it applies it to the little fish rather than the big ones — who however set the example. need any further proof that the state remains and is not withering, that the "dictatorship proletariat" remains under the guise of a bureaucratic degeneration, and that the rest is simply nonsense, dust in the eyes of the workers, sheer deception? Third definition and third error.
"The Party regards it as important to develop even further democratic principles in the administration. The principle of election and of accountability before representative organism and electors must be gradually extended to all the leading workers of state bodies. It is essential to reduce the personal appointed by the state apparatus, to initiate more and more people into public administration so that in the future state work in this apparatus ceases to be a profession" (p. 108).
Now Lenin defined the dictatorship of the proletariat as a regime in which 1) the army of functionaries begins to be replaced by workers fulfilling these functions in rotation; 2) a state in which those functionaries who remain are paid the average wage of the worker. But the authors of the "draft programme" have assured us that we have in the USSR a society in which the construction of socialism is already completed; in which the construction of communism is being
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL will be in its turn completed "in its main outlines" twenty years from now-but in which there continues to exist an of functionaries numerous and so powerful (official soviet statisties count them in millions) that their abuses exasperate the people, that it is necessary to reduce their number (slogan thrown to and fro for more than 25 years) and that it is necessary "gradually" to elect them rather than to appoint them. The very task which Lenin stressed as an essential for the period of transition from capitalism to socialism, the authors of the programme promise to realise "gradually" ... after the construction of communist society. They recognise in passing that here "administration" has not been characterised by the application of "democratic principles" (the formula: "even further" is simply a figure of speach) since there has been no election of functionaries. And they recognize in passing precisely this bureaucratic degeneration of the State which is characterised by the usurpation of a bureaucracy in the very sphere which according to Lenin lay the mission of the masses in the dictatorship of the proletariat: the management of the economy and the state. HOW TO EXPLAIN THE PROGRAMME?
This has been a severe criticism of the theoretical weaknesses of the programme. It is not however without merits, at least objectively. Above all it is a powerful demonstration of the tensions which exist at the present within the soviet bureaucracy, within soviet society, and the whole "socialist world". What does the "draft programme" reveal in this connection? What conclusions can be drawn from it in relation to the future of the URSS and the "socialist world"?
Much more significant than a product of a "logic" or of an "ideology" appropriate to the bureaucracy (6) this programme is the product of world and the soviet reality of today, of a reality seen through distorting mirrors no doubt, but which none the less forces the priveleged stratum in power in the USSR to manoever to yield, to fall back on its last defences in order to defend itself against the revolutionary forces which threaten its positions.
We can find the signs of four definite pres6) This is not to say that this "logic" or this "ideology" is absent. One of its significant features a rigid positivism, with places "communist man" in the midst of implacable "laws" and impels him constantly to "discover new laws". This positivism, which has nothing to do with dialectical materialism, sometimes takes grotesque forms: "The law (sic) which rules the existence of the party is the rigorous respect of Leninist norms in the life of the party and the principle of collective leadership"
(p. 144). It is a "law" which has been in abeyance for
25 years as was demonstrated at the XX Congress of the
CPSU.
15 sures which are making themselves felt on the soviet bureaucracy, to which they must. make concessions but which threaten constantly to overthrow it. The bureaucracy and the pressure of the colonial revolution.
The first pressure is that of the colonial revolution in full spate. If the formulations of the "draft programme" are compared with those of the XXth Congress and even with those of the "Declaration of the 81 CPs" the traces of this pressure can be seen clearly. The victory of the Cuban revolution; the radicalization of the Algerian revolution; the near paralysis of the numerous communist parties in countries experiencing nevertheless an impetuous revolutionary advance these are facts which have extracted from the Kremlin leaders.. some phrases, The importance of these phrases is of course not to be found in the intention of its authors. Its importance lies in the alibi it offers to the leaders of certain communist or para-communist parties to excuse the opportunist line of Moscow in relation to the colonial revolution.
The fundamental policy of the "draft programme" is the alliance with the national bourgeoisie of the colonial and semi-colonial countries - with the famous "national states" — with the object of forcing imperialism ("placed in the minority at UNO") to accept "peaceful coexisten-
• This policy is fundamentally opportunist because it eliminates the perspective of proletarian revolution in the rest of the world not only in the short run but in the long term also. Even when this opportunism takes a sharply adventurist form — the resumption of nuclear tests - the strategy remains the same: to exercise pressure on Imperialism, to rely on its conversion rather than its overthrow by the proletariat.
But within the framework of this opportunist policy the possibility is admitted the "countries liberated from the colonialist yoke" to choose "the non-capitalist path of development" (p. 46). This is only said in passing, it is so mixed up with restrictive clauses and reservations that it is quite obviously a purely verbal concession to the multiple forces which everywhere in the world more and more bitterly attack the Kremlin and the CPs for their passivity, their lack of audacity and their lack of initiative in face of the mounting energy of the colonial revolution. But revolutionary marxists will seize upon this phrase and turn it into a club to hammer the stalinist leaders who even in conutries where the number of proletarians can already by counted in millions, obstruct in practice "the non-capitalist" development of their people.
16 The bureaucracy in face of the pressure of the
Chinese revolution.
The second pressure is that of the Peoples Republic of China, great and indispensable ally of the Soviet Union, whose alliance is more valuable than all the nuclear weapons invented or invent-
It reflects in part the most general pressure of the colonial revolution - and in this measure the criticisms to which the soviet leaders are forced to reply conform to those we have just formulated.
But it also reflects something else. The People's Republic of China has become the spokesman of the working masses of all the workers' states less developed than the USSR or more exactly, of all the peoples of the economically underdeveloped nations, including their reigning bureau. cracy who criticise the leaders of the soviet bureaucracy of a national egotism, a flagrant lack of proletarian internationalism, when Krushcher promises a modern flat to each soviet family, even a car to each citizen of his country, while tens of millions of Chinese, of Vietnamese, Koreans and even of Albanians, Romanians, Bulgarians who are not certain of enough food or clothing in the course of the coming decade.
This criticism becomes particularly acute in a world made very conscious of the problem of aid to the "under-developed" nations. It so impresses the authors of the "draft programme" that they are led to introduce the following hardly credible formulation into it: "The fact that the socialist states progress within the framework of a single world system, while using the laws and the advantage of this system, allows them to reduce delays in the building of socialism and to pass to communism more or less simultaneously within the limits of a single and the same historical epoch" (p. 139).
Unless the term "historical epoch" is given a meaning so wide as to be meaningless (for exam. ple "epoch century"), this would seem to mean that the whole "socialist bloc", with China especially prominent would be able to construct communism in the space of a few decades, that is to generally employed, would be able to overtake in 30-40 years the per capita output of the USA.
The figures have only to be consulted to make clear what that would mean. And then the eco aomists, the conscious communists of the PR of China could reply to the leaders of the soviet bureaucracy: either you are trying to say that within the existing framework of "mutual aid" such a "leap forward" is possible, in which case you are lying completely and mocking the heroic sacrifices and sufferings of the great. Chinese people; or you are trying to say that the USSR is
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL ready to make all the necessary efforts in this direction — efforts which necessitate ten times, twenty times more material aid than that which is given at present — in which case this is a promise to which henceforth you are bound before the workers of the entire world"
It is not a question only of the conservatism, of the narrow national egotism of the soviet bureaucracy which are incontestable facts. This is a major objective difficulty. The soviet proletariat has made for more than half a century enormous sacrifices for the sake of communism. The bureaucratic degeneration of the soviet state has quadrupled and quintupled the sacrifices which have met the industrialisation and the military defence of the country; but these sacrifices would have been enormous even without stalinist leadership. At the very moment when for the first time in many years, the standard of living is increasing rapidly and regularly, no leadership of the soviet CP can demand new and major sacrifices celerate the industrialisation of the PR of China although here also it would be possible to give much more and much better, without touching the rise in the standard of living of the soviet leadership of the economy were inspired by Leninist principles. But the objective difficulty remains.
This means that by a strange detour of history, the theory of socialism in a single country is yet again shown to be absurd, but in a domain where nobody have supposed it formerly. To affirm that the construction of communism; to create the illusion that the rule "from each according to his each according to his needs" can be capacities, to applied "at first" in a single country — is to arrive at the absurd conclusion that food can be free in Vladivostock whereas in Manchuria men go hungry; that it will be enough to go from Erzerum to Batum to be clothed free of charge; that the soviet people must then establish a permanent barrier on its frontiers to press back the millions who would want to cross from the hell of their daily life to this paradise at the wave of a hand, so preventing the greatest human migration of modern times. The hypothesis is of course absurd. But what better to underline the viewpoint of the young Marx who affirmed that comcould only triumph universally, that communist society could only be a world society or at least one which included the major part of the globes population?
Let us add that the "Draft programme" tains a revealing phrase on the necessity to "perceaselessly" the international division of labour" (p 141) which seems to reply in part to
the criticisms which certain CPs in power, notably first half of the XXth century. In particular spheres living of the soviet people has increased more than which the leaders of the institutions of the Union during the whole period 1917-1952, or the whole of the republics and of the regions cannot be
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL that of Poland have addressed to the Kremlin. The bureaucracy and the pressure of the soviet consumers.
The pressure which is most clearly defined in the "Draft programme" — in certain parts even on every page — is that of the soviet consumers.
When the "Draft" proclaims that "the difference between the high and relatively less high incomes must be gradually diminished" this reflects that the mass of the consumers is aware of this difference and is protesting noisily at the situation. When on the following page, the "Draft" affirms that:
"Already in the course of the coming ten years the real wages of the workers and of the employees who are receiving relatively low salaries will be increased in such a way that there will no longer remain in the country categories of workers and employees who are inadequately paid" (p. 95) that is to say then that whole "categories" — millions of women consider themselves today inadequately paid. When the draft proclaims that the "CPSU emphasises the task of resolving the most acute problem for the rise in the standard of living of the soviet people: that of housing" (p. 96), it reveals that discontent with the scandalous housing conditions of most of the soviet population is growing ceaselessly. When the draft declares that:
"Women must be employed on relatively lighter but sufficiently paid work" (p. 96) a break is made with the stalinist thesis which symbolised male and female by the fact that heavy and unhealthy labour was performed by as men a state of affairs which not fail to provoke discontent the soviet women When the "Draft" indicates that the "manufacture of automobiles for the population will be considerably increased" (p. 96), despite the fact that it declares previously: "The automobile park of the country will be increased so as to satisfy all the needs of business and passenger traffic. The location centres automobiles will be multiplied" (p. 73), it is clear then that millions of soviet citizens do not accept the Krushchevian thesis according to which taxis can satisfy all the needs of the soviet people in cars, and that they certainly desire to acquire a vehicle as private property or permanent use. And so forth.
The global balance of these promises is with-
1. 1r i beyond hal tel
the course of the last ten years the standard of
17 the promises will not perhaps be fulfilled. As regards agriculture especially, Krushcher continues to make rash promises, in spite of the experiences recent years which should have taught him prudence. Nonetheless the idea can be accepted that these promises will broadly be fulfilled which means that in ten years time the standard of living of the soviet people will have reached or overtaken that of most of the countries of western Europe and will be amongst the highest in the
"Krushchevian reformism" is based essentially on the theorem that in satisfying the stomach, it will calm the heart and slow down the brain, at the path of criticising the bureaucratic deformations of the system. But this theorem is false. If the amelioration of the standard of living avoids indeed the explosions of hunger and anger such as those of 16-17 June 1953 in East Germany or that of the 23 October 1956 in Hungary, it will finish by stimulating and not restraining the critical anti-bureaucratic spirit above all in a country where access to "State and Revoluis not only free but still (moderately) encouraged by the government. And the draft programme demonstrates incontestably that the bureaucracy is beginning to be subjected equally to a pressure on the part of soviet citizens who know that they are not only machines to consume more meat and milk than citizens in the United States, but that they are still citizens and producers who as such desire in short to exercise the rights which the soviet Constitution and the old party programme granted them-at least on paper. The bureaucracy and the pressure of soviet citizens.
For the first time since the arrival in power of Krushchev the "draft programme" contains in fact precise promises not only on matters concern. ing the standard of living of the masses but on questions concerning their democratic rights. Until now the new stratum of leaders who have succeeded Stalin have been content to abolish the most barbarous abuses of the stalinist era (all-powerful secret police; absence of a minimum of judicial guarentees for the defence: dissolution of concentration camps, etc.). Now, it is obliged to put forward reforms equally in the political domain.
The most essential of these reforms occurs in the following propositions:
1) "It is opportune to renew at each election at least a third of the deputies to the soviets" (p. 105).
2) "The principle must be established by
"As a general rule", desires to defend views different from those of
18 elected to their post, as a general rule more than three consecutive times" (p. 105).
3) "There must be put in to practice in full measure... free, detailed and public discussion in the sessions of the Soviets of all the important questions of state administrations, of economic and cultural programmes; ...the systematic discussion by the soviets of contributions from the deputies... (pp. 105-106).
4) "Legislative initiative, that is to say the right to submit statutory proposals must be allowed to the trade unions, to the Komsomol and to the other mass social organisations, represented by their central organs and organs of the Republics" (p. 107).
5) "It is right that the most important statutory proposals be submitted to popular approbation (referendum)". (p. 107).
6) "The party believes it necessary to reduce the number of personnel appointed from above, to renew at each ordinary election about half the members of every social organism. The party judges it appropriate that the leaders of the social institutions are not elected as a general rule more than two consecutive times" (p. 112).
"The development of democracy in the party..." (p. 147). : "To practice the systematic renewal, in proportions determined by the elected members of all the organisations from the base to the central committee, taking into account the continuity of the leadership. In all the ordinary elections, a quarter at least of the members of the CC of the CPSU and of its presidium will be renewed. As a general rule, members of the Presidium will not be elected more than three consecutive times... The members of the CCs of the CPs of the federal republics, Party commitees of the territory, of the region, will be reniewed by a third at least, at each ordinary election... The secretaries of the organisations of the base of the party cannot be elected more than two consecutive times" (pp. 145-6).
It is necessary to add an eighth point which we mentioned above, concerning the progressive election of functionaries.
How do we estimate this list of political reforms, at first so impressive? Two preliminary remarks suggest themselves. Firstly the series of measures proposed today as sensational innovations are already contained in the soviet constitution. It is admitted then (tacitly-which is not a good example of that ardently praised virtue self-criticism) that these have hardly been applied in practice.
In addition other measures are very greatly circumseribed in their democratic quality by the fact of restrictive clauses.
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL the members of the Presidium will not be elected more than three consecutive times. But "certain responsible figures of the party, of recognized authority and outstanding political and organisational qualities can be re-elected to the leading bodies several consecutive times for longer periods" (p. 145). The "condition" of being elected with a maiority of three quarters is rather platonic when one realises that at congresses the members of the Presidium are elected unanimously. Similarly a leader of the soviet bodies who "in the case where personal gifts in the general opinion make useful and necessary his further activity within the leading organisation" can be reelected more than three consecutive times with the three quarter majority (p. 105).
This said, a safety valve has nevertheless been opened which demonstrates that political pressure taken important forms. Certain of the introduced reforms will remain doubtless a dead (notably de union interpel letter. Others will be largely put into practice (notably the referendum, the right of initiative from trade unions and other social organisations, the discussion of interpellations from deputies), but for questions of a secondary order and mainly
The essence of these measures lies however in the fact that the police dictatorship of Stalin has been succeeded by a political dictatorship, plebiscitary in form, in which the atomised mass of individenjoys in reality increased rights, except that of organising themselves, and is able to check if only on secondary questions, the policy defined by the leading group of the bureaucracy.
Yet in comparison with the period which proceeded from the death of Stalin to the elimination of "the anti-party group", freedom of discussion within the leading organisations of the party risks being limited and not increased by the reforms of the "draft programme"
During this whole period, in order to crystal lise his power and avoid the excessive pressure of the army, Krushcher and his friends have been obliged to enlarge the circle who participate real discussions where questions of political orientation have been determined. He had at the same time to appeal to the mass of the members of the CC against the members of the Presidium, at the time of the decisive struggle against Malenkov, Molotov, Kaganovitch and their friends. Such an evolution favoured the formation of groups and tendencies within the Central Committee, indeed rendered their reappearance inevitable. With the new method, where at each congress one third of the membership is renewed, except for a small group of "indispensables" around Krushcher — who have appointed themselves to this category each member of the central committee who
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL the first secretary sees himself threatened automatically not with expulsion" (a measure against which remedy may and which involves a precise procedure) but with "non-reelection" at the next Congress. As it is the retiring leadership which proposes to congress the list of members for re-election, the members not to elect and the new candidates, this elimination by the narrow and "democratic" path can only be contradicted by an appeal to the members over the head of the Central Committee, an appeal explicitly forbidden as a "manifestation of factionalism and cliquism, incompatible with the spirit of a Marxist-Leninist party"
The same criticism applies to the apparently more democratic character of soviet elections. The Central Committee controls the Party, and through the latter, the trade unions, the Komsomols and all the organisations referred to , "social". The fact that the members of the soviets are regularly renewed in no way reduces the extremely bureaucratic and autocratic character of the system, as the leading fraction of the party retains an absolute monopoly on the presentation of candidates, whether directly or by the intermediary
"social organisations" which it controls.
This is the weak point in the whole edifice, a weak point which looks a ridiculous weakness in the conditions where "communism" will be contructed "in its main outlines" The forbidding of fractions (not "groups" or "tendencies") was justified by Lenin in 1921 by the extreme danger that the dictatorship of the proletariat was undergoing from the pressure of the peasant petit bourgeois milieu in Russia. He explained that in these conditions, every fractional conflict in the party could become the indirect (and unconscious) vehicle of the class conflict in the country.
But now we are told that the antagonisms of class have disappeared; that classes themselves have disappeared their main forms"; that there are no longer possible divergences "in depth" since these divergences only reflect in the last analysis antagonistic class interests. But at the same time "factionalism and group spirit" be forbidden. Better still, the programme of 1919 is altered, since it contained no reference to this "Leninist rule" of which apparently Lenin himself had no knowledge... (7). 7) Example (among many others): in the notes of Vol 26 of
Lenin's works which have just appeared it is mentioned that Bukharin had formed in 1916 an "anti-party group"
to oppose the "line of the party" on national policy.
Lenin did not seem to share this judgement since he pro.
posed and obtained the admission of the same Bukharin in 1919 to the Political Bureau and he sent him in 1920 to the IX Congress as a special representative of the CC for the trade Unions, saying to comrades who criticised this appointment "do you know a better theoretician than Buk.
harin?" In the spirit of the present "draft" Lenin would have had to exclude him from the party. It is also that by this same spirit, Lenin was hardly.. "leninist."
19
All this adds up to the ridiculous conclusion: when the Bolshevik party was weak, surrounded with powerful enemies, it was able to afford the luxury of freedom for tendencies and whole groups: when it was leading the soviet state in the middle of the civil war and of foreign intervention, at a time when the survival of the soviet state hung by a thread, when the latter was weak, delivered to famine and to widespread poverty, the party was still always able to afford the and liberty of tendency and group, to the point of not even breathing a word of "interdict" in the programme of 1919. But now that the USSR has become the first military power in the world and the second industrial power; at the moment when it is supposed to be engaged in the triumphal construction of communism, group spirit" becomes a mortal danger which it was neither in 1917 or 1918, 1919 or 1920. Understand who can...
The Krushchevian thesis would be more coherent if it had at the same time defended the Yugoslaviav position according to which the Party must also wither in accordance with the withering away of the state and classes, and since the party is only the advanced detachment of a social class, the proletariat, if the party withers, factions, groups, tendencies, wither also. But Krushchev affirms the contrary: in the degree that classes and the state wither, « the role of the party increases ». (p. 143), Since class antagonisms no longer exist this role can only increase in the domain of economic, cultural, and scientific control. But why should the « construction of communism » be menaced if in the cultural sphere the « non-figurative group » struggles with partisans of « socialist realism » at all level within the party? Why should the triumph of socialism be threatened by a vehement discussion involving two or three « fractions » on the utility or not of constructing at Bratsk a huge barrage... before the industries which consume electric energy
How can « free, detailed and public discussion » of all the economic and cultural problems be possible if on the one side, there is a held together by a strict discipline disposing of all the levers of power, and on the other side only isolated individuals who have no right to organise themselves, even temporarily, even the length of a single discussion, to make their point of view accepted? Is it not obvious that this system, in spite of the democratic formalism in which it is closed, remains that of bureaucratic centralism? Is it not clear that there will be no genuine re-establishment of the sovereign power of the soviets until the freedom to establish groups and tendencies is established within the directing party and the liberty to constitute other parties (or groups) in the framework of soviet legality and on the basis of the constitution is allowed in fact?
20
The programme of 1919 was discussed freely at the IXth Congress of the party. The USSR was in mortal danger. Nevertheless discussion was entirely free, divergences were expressed, passionate debates took place. But was there a real discussion at the XXIIth Congress? This : is a very precise test. No one can really believe that on the thousand problems raised by the «draft programme» — for example on the idea that democracy remains while the state withers — there is no difference among the hundreds of thousands of its cadres. Would any one dare to express differences of opinion at the Congress? Would he be given the chance? Clearly, the democratic clauses of the draft programme is eyewash and the real task re-establishing soviet democracy is far from being resolved in the Soviet Union. The question has not even been posed. The bureaucracy and the pressure of the soviet producers.
Finally the last pressure, not yet realised, still potential, since the "draft programme" does not reflect it, but which is decisive for the future of the Soviet Union: the pressure of the best qualified proletariat in Europe and the most numerous in the world, to take in its own hands the management of enterprises created by its own hands, with its own sacrifices and thanks to its own intelligence.
Here lies the supreme contradiction in the whole political policy of the "draft programme". The soviets are "democratised". The administration is "democratised". The party, the unions, the Komsomols are "democratised". But a possible democratisation of industrial management is not even mentioned. Even the few modest rights given in the last few years to the unions to supervise the bureaucratic management of the economy are not referred to. On the contrary the bureaucracy says in effect "It is necessary for us to remain in power for twenty years yet to fulfill all our prom-. ises".
The "daft programme" speaks it is true on three occasion about the "participation of the management of enterprises": on page 77, at the end of the chapter which deals with the economic tasks to be achieved; on pages 89-90, where it is a question of the increased role of the "organisations of the base" in the elaboration of draft programmes and of the local organisms in "economic planning"; and on page 110 where it is a question of unions as a "school of economic management". The most striking element in these three passages is their extreme vagueness. There is no concrete proposal which envisages any institutional modification, involving any change in the system actually in being. There is a striking contrast between these insignificant formulas and the concrete proposals concerning the soviets, the "social organisations" and the Party. Even more:
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL there is no question of "collective direction" in the enterprises, there is no question of associating the unions in this control, this is totally passed over in silence on the list of unions obligations, and the only practical formula used is the following "It is right to promote to leading posts the best elements in the factories" (p. 91). That is all; it is little enough. Many workers think it is one of Interven in little. Some even will say it. Many will say it, workers councils have been created in Yugoslavia as soviet organs of the management of the economy, the bureaucracy displays veritable neurosis on this question. A neurotic repression because it is necessary to oppose this system, whatever might be the advantages and results. A guilt complex also, since Lenin - and the programme of 1919 — are very explicit on the matter, and it suffices to compare the two to see clearly where lies the revisionism when not even for the future a communist society where the difference between manual and intellectual work will have disappeared... is there suggested the producers management of production.
If there is today one transitional demand which is vital side by side with that for the reestablishment of freedom for tendencies and freedom to demands a return to democratic management of create other soviet parties, it is that which enterprise by the creation of workers' councils who at first participate in management until they have finished their apprenticeship, before taking complete control, and by introducing within these councils the same principle of rotation which has been introduced into the soviets and the ing organisms of the party and the "social organisations"
Assessing the balance of all these pressures, this "programme" is not a definitive document; it will see numerous transformations, modifications and refutations in life and practice, in the USSR as in he rest of the world. Differentiation in the international communist movement has given rise to no than tendencies: the "Chinese" tendency; the Krushcher tendency; the Yugoslav tendency and the trotskyist tendency. Other tendencies will arise. Each approves certain parts of the "draft" - or at least the evolution which they imply - just as it rejects others. Discussion among these tendencies will continue to be favoured by the evolution of events whatever the efforts of the bureaucrats to prevent discussion. At the conclusion of these debates there is for us trotskyists only one possible conclusion: A FRANK, SINCERE, COMPLETE RETURN TO THE PRINCIPLES OF LENIN, WHICH ENRICHED BY EXPERIENCE, REMAIN MORE THAN EVER THE ONLY SURE GUIDE FOR THE WORLD VICTORY OF SOCIALISM.
20 September 1961.