YUGOSLAVIA STOP THE REPRESSION AGAINST Ever since December 1971, the Titoist bureaucracy has been engaged in a vast operation aimed at "regaining a grip" on all political, economic, and social life in the country. At the same time, the economic reform of 1965 has not been challenged explicitly. The background of the increase in social tensions (which reached a new stage as long ago as the end of 1971, when the "Croation crisis" broke out) is the combination of the contradictions of any burecucratized society and the specific contradictions of Titoist "economic liberalism. " These contradictions have led to growing regional inequalities, the development of unemployment, (1) and significant price increases (of about 20 percent in 1973). These crucial problems have in turn fueled many conflicts: between nationalities, between the federal bureaucracy and the bureaucracies of the various republics, between the political functionaries and the leaders of the banking and financial sectors. There have been strikes by workers demanding wage increases and respect for their right of self-management. The Titoist bureaucracy has dealt with these tensions in the trom the OLI corners For its part, the World Bank recently postponed once again its meeting that had been set for June 5 at which aid to Saigon had been scheduled to be discussed. Certain governments that have lent money in the past, such as Canada, have rejocted the new projects proposed by Washington. According to François Nivalon (writing in the June 8, 1974, Le Figaro), Thieu's advisers are pessimistic about incoming aid ond Thieu hes issued economizing orders to his army and administration. The budgetary conditions that will prevail for Saigon in 1974 (for which year Saigon will maintain an army of more than 1 million) threaten to be even more drastic than they were in 1973. (See Far Eastern Economic Review, April 15, 1974.) Obvicusly, financial and military aid is still pouring in, and it will continue to fuel the puppet machine. But the social crisis in the zones under Thie's control has been confirmed once again (see the articles by Patrice de Beer in Le Monde, May 8,9, and 10, 1974) and will certainly tend to worsen still more.
- by C. VERLA_ only way consistent with maintenance of its own privileges. Far from confronting the causes of the inequalities and social tensions, it has instead sought scapegoats that could be socrificed to assuage the anger of the masses (hence the well-known campaign Tito waged against those who had "abusively enriched themselves") and has repressed all opposition, trying to remodel the League of Communists of Yugoslavia (LCY) to make it a more suitable instrument for regaining a grip on -Yugoslav societyBut the decentralization that was more and more widely introduced after the 1950s has hod some effects. The cultural and political life of Yugoslavia is unparalleled in the "peoples democracies" of Eastern Europe. The philosophical review Praxis and the Korcula cadre school have achieved on international fame that also corresponded to an image that the Titoist bureaucracy wanted to preserve. But beyond these expressions of Yugoslav Marxist philosophers, the breadth of the student movement and the themes of struggle that it took up in June 1968 ("The revolution is not over! Self-manage-
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YUGOSLAVIA ment from the bottom up!") testified to the development of revolutionary-Marxist ideas among militant youth. So "regaining a grip" has not been accomplished, nor will it be easy for the bureaucracy to accomplish it, especially if it wants to preserve both the appearance of democracy and its autonomy from the Kremlin bureaucracy, which it apparently does. The number of internal purges in the League of Communists of Yugoslavia since 1971 has been large (more than 55,000 people have been demoted). The repression has struck at both "pure and hard" neo-Stalinists who are taking advantage of the present conflicts to press for a retum to total centralization and "liberals, " "anarchists, " and "various sorts of restorationists, " who are sometimes real advocates of extending the laws of the market but are often simply hostile to the repressive course of the LCY and the new role that has been assigned it. In foct, the brunt of the attack is now being directed against those who have best expressed the rejection of bureaucratic centralism and the gains of self-management but who af the same time want these gains to be mode a reality: the Marxist professors who have worked with the review Praxis and the students who are actively working not only for the freedom of expression and work of their professors, but also for developing a genuine socialist struggle. For several months the Yugoslay authorities have been trying in every way to expel eight professors from the philosophy Faculty at Belgrade University. All eight are collaborators with Praxis. (2) All kinds of pressures -- withdrawal of passports, press campaigns, letters from "workers" who have suddenly acquired an interest in philosophy - have been brought to bear to fire them. But the legal bodies of the faculty resisted. The bureaucrats then tried to change the laws! They tried to set up a new faculty council, half of whose members would be named by the authorities. New "moral and theoretical" criteria for certifying professors qualified to teach were defined. But for the time being, the resistance has been too strong. The professors are still at their posts. Their students have organized to support them. Solidarity has spread to the philosophy faculties in Zagreb and Ljubljana. In January 1974 the three faculties established coordination and adopted a resolution that, in addition to supporting the professors, called for a common struggle with the students for a socialism that would really put power in the hands of the workers. The resolution called for coordination of all socialist efforts to struggle against bureaucratic privileges, against social inequality, and against the exodus of workers from the country. This represented a militant program that could only be met with repression from the bureaucracy. Already in March one student, Vladimir Plancinin, was arrested "for having read such a resolution. " Indictments are pending against eleven students from three campuses. The bureaucracy is threatening to stage trials to step up repression during the summer months when political activism and mobilization will be less intense, especially since the LCY congress has reaffirmed the leadership's control. The Titoist bureaucracy will run up against the solidarity that Editeur responsable: Rene Groslambert, 34 rue Nothomb, 1040 - Bruxelles Imprimerie spéciale de l'éditeur 32 revolutionaries throughout the world will offer to the Marxist professors and communist students of Yugoslavia. At the very moment that the bureaucracy is demagogically affirming its desire to strengthen self-management, it is repressing those who want to put such promises into effect. Once again it has taken to road of trials and repression against the real socialists, for the time has come when the Yugoslav proletariat may well find in the calls of the students and professors the rood that the bureaucracy has closed to them: the road that leads to power. Footnotes: 1. There are more than a million Yugoslav workers living abroad and some 300,000 unemployed in Yugoslavia itself. 2. The professors under attack are: Mihailo Markovic, Ljubomir Tadic, Svetozar Stojanavic, Miladin Zivotic, Zaga Pesic-Golubovic, Dragdjub Miconovic, Nebajsa Popov, and Trivo Indjic.