DOUBTS DR. PERERA CAN SUCCEED --
An instructive analysis of the new coalition government in Ceylon, which includes three former Trotskyists headed by Dr, N.M. Perera, appeared in the September 8 issue of the Wall Street Journal, Sent from Colombo by correspondent Robert Keatley, the article is — evidently based on information provided by top government circles,
The motive for the coalition is explained quite succinetly to readers of the well~known American capitalist newspaper. Thebeleaguered" ruling Sri Lanka Freedom party of Mrs, Sirimavo Bandaranaika "hopes its new allies can bail it out of the political and economic morass into which it has led potentially prosperous Ceylon,"
Aocording to Keatley, "many critics have their doubts," That's on the economic side,
"Politically, however, the move already has paid off for the strong-willed Mrs, Bandaranaika, the once-reluctant prime minister who is now her party's undisputed boss, Taking on Trotskyite allies shattered an opposition coalition of Ceylon's half-dozen squabbling Marxist parties, which generally claim her socialism isn't radical enough, It also gives her a clear parliamentary majority, And it even split the Trotskyite Lanka Sama Samaja Party itself; a splinter group criticizes LSSP leaders for !collaborating with the bourgeoisie!t rather than fomenting world revolution as preached by party
hero Leon Trotsky," _.
The Wall Street Journal notes that the "Fourth International, parent organization of the world's remaining Trotskyite parties, has expelled Ceylonese leaders for joining the local government rather than trying to destroy it."
Despite its oynscat approach, the Wall Street Journal finds the “newly appointed Finance Minister Dr. N.lMl.Perera™ a congenial figure. "Dr, Perera, called by many Ceylon's most capable economist, refutes the stereotype of Trotskyites as bearded bomb-throwers and pamphlet-printers who inhabit dark alleys in obscure capitals, Wealthy and British-educated, he is considered scrupulously honest, dedicated and hard~working, rare qualities among Ceylon's political leadership," we,
The Manhattan periodical quotes "one political authority" on Dr. Pererats political characteristics: “He is a gradualist, not a revolutionary." :
The Wall Street Journal takes note of Dr, Perera'ts initial moves without much alarm. although: its own sympathies are with the. .. far right in Ceylon. Here is what it says about the possibility of". saving the SLFP regime:
"Whether the three new Marxist ministers can help Mrs, Bandaranaika bail the nation out of its economic mess. seems doubtful. Many worried Ceylonese fear the country is moving from stagna~ tion -.to rapid decline and see little prospect of reversing this trend soon. Foreign exchange reserves, at about $80 million, are at a postwar low, Imports, ranging fram factory spare parts to razor blades, have been sharply restricted, thus promoting a busy black market, Per capita income actually. declined some 10% last year to about $130 annually. And this agricultural nation must import half its rice needs despite underutilized farmland and rural unemployment,"
Other problems of crisis proportions are noted. In a popu. lation of 11,000,000, some estimates "put unemployment at 800,000, though the government places the figure at only 160 000."
The "basic problem" in Ceylon is "disinvestment"; i.e., the allocation of export earnings to "consumption rather than basio agricultural and industrial projects." This includes rice imports, half of which are subsidized by the government. Another item is education, "free for everyone," Lo
"Many doubt," says the Wall Street Journal, “whether Dr, Perera, whatever his intentions, could afford the political risks involved in trying to revise such programs. The ruling coalition must call national elections within a year and faces formidable com~ petition from both the left and right,"
THE TESTAMENT OF PALMIRO TOGLIATTI
By Pierre Frank
The document that has been called the “political testament" of Palmiro Togliatti was drawn up by the late leader of the Italian Communist party in preparation for a discussion with Khrushchev, This discussion did not take place. The publication of the document by the party leadership has now opened a new stage in the international orisis of the official Communist movement . . .
Up to this time the public side of the crisis was most visible in the Sino-Soviet conflict. The Chinese and the Russians, Mao Tsetung and Khrushchev, represent the two poles in the crisis, It was known, of course, that the two camps were not homogeneous, It was known that on the side of the pro-Khrushchevists the leaderships of some Communist parties systematically refrained from aping the French Communist. party leadership, who, under Thorez, took their cues from the Kremlin, Knowledgeable observers of the Communist movement were certain that in the pro-Khrushchevist camp there was a wing that could be considered much more consistently rightist than Khrushchev himself, However, before Togliatti's document was published, the differences were visible only obliquely in the hauling and tugging. — over what tactics to follow in relation to the Chinese, It is probable that Togliatti wrote the memorandum for confidential use and would have reached some compromise with Khrushchev, But publication of the document, the wide circulation it will inevitably be given, the repercussions among the Communist parties -- all this creates. a new situation, since the document goes far beyond a tactical disagreement with Khrushchev in the ‘struggle against the Chinese Communist party. On some of the key issues in the current situation, this document offers. a platform different from Khrushchev!s, It represents the platform of a third tendency within the Communist parties.
Togliatti, it should be stated, carefully avoided prosenting things in this way. He singled out for criticism merely the way in which the Chinese are being fought. But from this point of departure, he brought in a whole series of differences of prime importance.
"Polycentrism"
The first thing he places in question is the leading role of the Communist party of the Soviet Union, offering in its place -although without employing the term -- t polycentrism, " the concept he advocated for a time in 1956. He does this by contending that holding an international conference would be either useless or dangerous even if no danger existed of a formal split, and he proposes that regional conferences be held instead,
If in weighing the meaning of this proposal one also notes that he is against blanket condemnation of the Chinese (he repeats
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several times that he is opposed to general condemnation and that he is for using concrete arguments), it becomes clear that what he seeks is.to avoid any kind of debate over doctrines. It is to be noted, however, that he does condemn the Chinese on general issues and says absolutely nothing about their concrete policies in what, for him, is their sector,
It could even be concluded, to judge from certain sentences, that he does not share Khrushchev'!s perspective on the possibilities of an over-all deal with American imperialism: "It is with. a certain pessimism that we evaluate the perspectives of the present situation on the international plane and in our country. The situation is worse than it was two or three years ago... "
His ooncolusion on this point is based on Khrushchev!s own | view; namely, that within the imperialist camp there are those who favor war and those who do not (in contrast to the Marxist view that imperialism as a whole generates war), But from his appreciation of the perspectives, which he himself characterizes as pessimistic, Togliatti deduces two things: .
(a) That there must be no break with the Chinese in view of the potentiality of dangerous crises. On this point, Khrushchev's international policy leads one to think that his hope is to buy an agreement with imperialism, going so far as to pay for it in advance .by breaking with the Chinese,
(b) That the Communist parties must follow a policy of liquidating "every form of dogmatism." The examples he cites show that his own political position is rightist to.the core, | cof
Warmed-Up Bernsteinism
He takes up first of all, and rather lengthily, the Communist parties in the capitalist countries of Western Europe. We will take up only what he says about the need to abandon atheistic propaganda. and the need to open up a dialogue in all cultural fields, In reaction to Zhdanovism [extreme Stalinist policing of the cultural domain], he completely abandons the class viewpoint in the most important areas of the superstructure, He is for "mutual understanding." Such eclecticism is characteristic of all revisionists, But revisionism is openly proclaimed on the political level itself in Togliatti!s dooument. : -
He recognizes that "the crisis of the bourgeois economic world is very profound," that "the ruling classes are no longer succeeding by traditional methods in resolving" the new problems that have arisen in the monopolistic structure of today, He sees the capitalists com= pelled to resort to a certain amount of "planning" (he uses the term "programning"), He notes that this implies "a substantial element" of "income policies," He observes that this interferes considerably with
trade-union struggles ' ‘which can no longer be conducted only in an isolated way, in each country." He condemns the World Federation of Trade Unions for conducting only general propaganda and not taking "any worthwhile initiative for united action against the policies of the big trusts,"
But from all this does he conclude that the task of the Com. munist parties in the countries of western Europe is to open up a socialist perspective for the broad masses? That their task is to point to the real possibilities in these countries of the West to construct a socialist world on the basis of an economic and cultural level higher than that in the countries that have already broken out of capitalism? Does he propose to formulate a transition program including a series of ways and means capable of mobilizing the broad working masses for the conquest of power by a workers and peasants government? Does he say that western Europe is more than ripe for socialism? Not at all. Some quotations from the document will show exactly where he stands:
"This requires development and co-ordination of immediate labor demands and proposals to reform the economic structures (nationaliza~ tions, agrarian reforms, etc.) within the general framework of a plan of economic development in opposition to capitalist programming, This will certainly not yet be a socialist plan, because it lacks the conditions of such a plan, but it is a new form and a new means of struggle to advance socialism, The possibility of a peaceful road for this advance is strictly linked today with the understanding of and solution to this problem, .. .
"More profound reflection on the possibility of reaching socialism by a peaceful road compels us to define what democracy in a bourgeois state means for us, How can the frontiers of -freedom and democratic institutions be widened, and what are the most effective forms for participation of the working and toiling masses in economic and political life? This is the way the question is posed on the possibility, for the working classes, to conquer positions of power within the framework of a state which has not changed its character of a bourgeois state, and on the possibility of struggling for progressive transformation, from within, of this character of a bourgeois state,"
Thus Togliatti, unlike strictly obedient Stalinists of the Thorez stripe, raises the issue of the road to socialism under present conditions. fe seeks to work out a plan, a kind of transition program, but it is not a plan to overthrow the | bourgeois order, To do that, he says, “the conditions are lacking." This categorical affirmation is not proved, One would very much like to know what he considers these conditions to be. In particular, what conditions were lacking at the time of the Liberation, following World War II, when the Communist parties of France and Italy had behind them not only the great majority of the proletariat but also broad layers of the middle class and tens of thousands of armed workers,
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The plan outlined by Togliatti is as follows: win "positions of power" within the framework of the bourgeois state, and struggle for its progressive transformation, from within, into a state of a different social character. What Togliatti claims to offer in a new situation -- this deepening and this development -- is nothing but a rehash of the old concepts. advanced by Bernstein at the beginning of the twentieth century.
Bernstein envisaged socialism growing progressively in capitalist society with each gain of a legislative seat, municipal admin-~ istration, establishment of a co-operative, etc, Today, posts in government bureaus of all kinds, operating in the interests of capitalisn, are added, The conquest of these so-called "yositions of power" is substituted for the conquest of power,
To tell the truth, Bernstein could offer greater excuse than Togliatti, Bernstein formulated his revisionism at the apogee of capitalism, after close to twenty-five years of prosperity, before the world had seen the development of a fundamental crisis in the system, whereas Togliatti voices his revisionism after a half century in which the capitalist system has given us ten years of world war, years of fascism, of unemployment of tens of millions of men, of revolutionary uprisings that have ended capitalism in a third of the globe, That is the time chosen by Togliatti to propose "progressive transformation" of the bourgeois state from within} Cantt See the Colonial. Revolution
Togliatti'ts document is extremely succinct on the colonial rovolution although it is today in the forefront of the world-wide revolutionary struggle. He proposes that the Communist parties of the West establish relations not only with the Communist parties of the colonial countries but also with "all the forces struggling for independence and against imperialism, and even, where this is possible; with government circles in the recently freed countries that have progressive governments." At the same time, he adds, "we must probe more deeply the problem of the roads of development for the former colonial countries,:;in the sense of the socialist objective for these countries, and so on, It is a question of new contentions that have not been clarified up to now,"
On the first point, it is possible that Togliatti drew some conclusions from the attitude of the French Communist party during the war in Algeria or from. the fact that many anti-imperialist struggles are developing outside of any Communist leadership, But his manner of speaking shows that he is not thinking in class terms. This-is still clearer in his claim that problems concerning the socialist objective in these countries have not been clarified up to now,
_ It is impossible to believe that Togliatti has never read about the permanent revolution, whether in Marx's writings of 1850 or in
Trotsky'ts works or in recent Chinese texts, If the practical tasks in the underdeveloped countries are sometimes very difficult to carry out, it cannot be said that there is any ambiguity as to the socialist direction of development among the underdeveloped countries, What Togliatti writes on this subject testifies to his gradualist, Menshevik concept of the road to socialism, Here, too, he must think that "the conditions are lacking" as in the economically developed countries, However, the revolution moves forward, ..
In Togliatti's attitude, as it is expressed in the document, a contradiction is observable, He seeks to "deepen," to clarify new problems, But at the same time he bids Khrushchev not to take the discussion with the Chinese to a general level, but to concentrate instead on the "concrete":
"Wo have always won the best successes when the discussion shifted from the general level (character of imperialism and the. state, motor forces of the revolution, etc.) to the concrete field of our current policy (struggle against the government, criticism of the Socialist party, trade-union unity, strikes, etc.)., Here, the Chinese polemics remain completely disarmed and powerless,"
The Menshevik reveals himself in his disdain for the "gencral" and his preference for the "concrete." What meaning is there in a "concrete" that finds no place in a general view? Such a "concrete! is a thousand times more abstract than the most simple Marxist theories. Why study Capital, the theory of value, surplus value, etc., all these "abstractions" that are not included in the pile of economic statistics? How can what is happening in the colonial revolutions be understood if you leave out the character of imperialism, the state, the motor forces of the colonial revolution, etc.?
Togliatti'ts "Ignorance"
With regard to both the economically developed capitalist countrics and the colonial or former colonial countries, Togliatti'ts document constitutes a quite characteristic rightist platform. Class concepts are wiped. out; and it is on a vague "progressiveness" that hopes are placed for humanity to move forward,
With regard to the workers states, Togliatti takes a different tack. It is quite true that he raises questions and criticisms which we are hardly accustomed to hear from these Communist leaders, But it must not be forgotten that this document was designed for a highly limited audience; it was a memorandum prepared for a disous~ sion with Khrushchev and the exchange of opinions would most cer-~ tainly have remained confidential if unforeseen circumstances had not occurred,* Togliatti thinks that the Chinese criticisms have no SE ee eC “Khrushchev!s representative Brezhnov, it has been reliably reported, was unable to gct Luigi Longo, the new head of the Italian Communist
“o7~
appeal in Italy except among poor veasants in certain regions, But he ‘knows that questions have been zaised within the working class at least since the time of the Twentieth Congress.
"The whole context. of problems of the economic and political construction of socialism is too summarily and even too sketchily known in the West. We lack knowledge of the differences between. the situations in the various countries, the different methods of plan~ ning and their progressive transformation, the methods adopted and the difficulties arising in the area of economic integration among the different countries, and go on, Certain situations are hard to understand, .. .
"It must not be concealed that the criticisms of Stalin left rather profound traces. The most serious is a certain amount of skepticism with which even elements quite close to us greet the news of new economic and political successes. In addition, it is generally thought that the problem of the origin of the cult of Stalin and the reason why the cult beoame possible has not been resolved. .. .
"There are many concrete facts we do nat know... "
. That ordinary Communist militants are largely ignorant of the problems facing the workers states, that they raise a number of ques~ tions -- of this there can be no doubt. But for Togliatti to invoke such arguments is a little too much, even if it is taken into oon- © sideration that he resorted to a good deal of diplomacy with Khrushchev in broaching these questions, In addition, Togliatti shows that he knows more than he cares to admit. when he says that. research should be done on these questions by "historians and qualified cadres of the party" to which he adds: "Nevertheless we counsel prudence in the conclusions,"
Prudence in the conclusions! Togliatti could be held to be a model of prudence: prudence toward Stalin for long years, prudence toward Khrushchev, prudence toward the Chinese. . . and also prudence toward the Italian bourgeois state, the Catholic church. It is understandable why the bourgeois world rendered homage to such a prudent "pevolutionary" chief. .. .
The document, however, is of exceptional interest due to the fact that it raises a burning issue: ,
party, to keep Togliatti's document under wraps. It can be concluded that its publication was mainly due to the existence of divergent political tendencies in the Italian Communist party leadership who found common ground in opposing a conference aimed at condemning the Chinese, Out of fear of one of the others seeking some kind of advantage through revealing the existence of the document if it remained concealed, the entire leadership preferred to publish it.
. _2B—
"Today, the problem that draws the most attention with regard to the Soviet Union and the other socialist countries is most especially the problem of overcoming the regime of the limitation and abolition of democratic and personal liberties that was installed by Stalin, The socialist countries do not all offer the same picture, The general impression is slowness and resistance to returning to the Leninist rules which would assure, inside and outside the party, wide freedom of expression and debate in the fields of culture and art and even on the political plane, We.do not understand this slowness and this resistance very well, above all if we take into account the present conditions where the encirclement of capitalism no longer exists and where economic construction has won immense successes,
The words "and even on the political plane" are rich =-- as if in Lenints day the party discussed culture and art most of the time and. only occasionally took up political topics, Once again, Togliatti. does not "understand." This may be evidence of his years of Stalin-= ist servility or evidence of maneuvering with Khrushchev; however — that may be, what is important is the admission that far from having returned to Leninist rules, the Soviet Union, that is, primarily the Soviet people, face resistance and obstacles on the road to regaining their liberties, The gradualism, the reformism of Togliatti in the sphere of the capitalist states and the colonial countries is replaced in the sphere of the workers states by "ignorance" of the bureaucracy as a social layer that gave rise to the cult of the personality yesterday and to resistance today to the real, deop-going democratization of Sovict society,
Consequences of Publishing the Testament
We lcave aside a series of interesting points in Togliatti'ts document to single out its main nature: it is the platform of a political ourrent that is to the right of the Stalinists and, accuratoly speaking, the successors of Stalin, But it is a very skilfully presented platform. Togliatti places the emphasis on the necessity to discuss all kinds of questions and problems -- those disturbing the - great majority of Communist militants -- and he displays a certain prudence here, too, in presenting his answers to these questions, his solutions to these * problems,
Togliattits document is important not only. for its political content but also for its timing in the crisis of the international Communist movement and for its possible repercussions,
Up to now, the rightist tendency whose views Togliatti voiced has refrained from publicly disclosing itself as a political ourrent distinot from Khrushchevism., It placed pressure on Khrushchev to give his policies a more rightist character. It is not certain, ~after publication of the document, that this rightist tendency will now show itself more clearly and openly ~~ in the workers statos there are persons who, because of the leading functions they fulfil, are not free to express themselves openly. But the publication of
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the dooument will not fail to increase Khrushchev'!s difficulties and to weaken his position in preparing for the conference of twenty-six parties scheduled for mid December, The Italians and probably others who are with them will stand pat on Togliatti's document in order to keep their distance from the Moscow leadership.
The document will have repercussions among the leaderships of many Communist parties. - After so many years of daily reformist polities, there is no lack among them of those who would like to be rid of a vocabulary still "encumbered" with vestiges of the period of Lenin and Trotsky. For them it is a godsend to be able to invoke the authority of a Togliatti, a veteran of that epoch,
It is not excluded that the Chinese themselves will seek to turn