Translator's Introduction
The following material is a report presented to a European cadre school of the Fourth International on the problems of the degenerated workers' states of East Europe. The original was presented in Czech, but this is translated from the French version, with occasional references to the original. The real 14th congress of the Czech Communist Party took place in a Czech factory in September 1968. The congress referred to here would therefore be the 15th if it were to be recognized as valid at all. The analysis presented here is not "Sovietology". Study of the dreary liturgies of the bureaucrats is worth while if it is undertaken in the light of an understanding of the contradictions specific to the development of bureaucratically degenerated transitional societies, which are not the same as those of capitalist societies, nor clarified by the convolutions of state capitalist "theory". The reader is referred to three publications by Ernest Mandel—Marxist Economic Theory, Vol. 2. Ch. 15: On the Bureaucracy (shortly to be published by I.M.G. publications); and a forthcoming article based on the main report to the cadre school which will appear in Critique de l'Economie Politique. the economics journal of our French Section, the Ligue Communiste, which we shall translate in due course.
R. Davis
Oct. 1971
"Fourteenth" Congress of the Czech Communist Party
Introduction
The so-called 14th congress of the Czech Communist Party can be summed up as having stabilized the power of the bureaucracy. It has taken more than 2 years to normalize the situation in Czechoslovakia, or more precisely that of the Czech party. In order to do it, 1/5 of the party members according to official figures, 1/3 in actuality were expelled. The party has recovered its "leninist character", that is to say the bureaucratic order has been restored to that it is once again "ready for action".
We shall attempt, using official reports to analyse the manner in which the bureaucracy has safeguarded its positions, and to deduce whether the stabilisation is transitory or of more or less long duration. Such an analysis is very important in assisting us to choose a strategy for our action.
The Strengthening of the Technocracy as the Basis of the Reconstruction of the Czech Economy
The crisis of the Czech economy, which led at the beginning of the 60's to the critiques of economists like Ota Sik in regard to the inadequacies of bureaucratic planning, underlies all the political changes in Czech society. If the intervention of the Warsaw pact troops did have as its object, as the official stories go, the safeguarding of "socialist" relations of production, it cannot be denied that it has solved nothing in terms of the cause of the problem, the crisis of bureaucratic planning. As Strugal's report to the congress shows, the principal problem of the Czech economy remains the profitability and efficiency of production in world terms. "Our success to come depends above all in knowing at what point we succeed in profiting from our accumulated material and intellectual resources and in what manner we will increase the efficiency of and return from our economy."
Party bureaucrats have never been able to organize planned production in a really competent manner. Now with the presence of the Soviet troops they have reinforced their political positions, but if the economy runs as badly as ever, a new menace to their positions coming from the activity of discontented masses is only a question of time. The economic reform has been given a new and specific form as a result of the lessons of the Prague Spring. At that time the economic reform completely escaped from bureaucratic control, and threatened to transform itself into a general mobilization of workers, and thus to an eventual political revolution, supposing the Revolutionary Socialist Party or another organization had been able to play its avant garde role.
First of all the objectives of the party should be noted. "The development of the national economy depends above all on the degree in which we are able to increase the efficiency of the whole machinery of production," repeated Strugal, and he cited 5 main points which required "daily attention":-
1. To make better use of scientific and technical innovations, to introduce them more rapidly in practice, to increase the efficiency of our own scientific-technical base.
2. To use the potential of production better by increasing the level of qualification of our workers.
3. To improve the quality of the management of our economy at every level.
4. To make changes in the structure of production in the direction of greater concentration and greater specialization.
5. To deepen and improve the degree of international economic integration.
What organizational methods were proposed to realize these general objectives?
For Strugal's type of bureaucrat only one possibility exists; the support of factory directors at every level, the provision of economic benefits to individual enterprises, and a hierarchical scale of payment for work in each area of activity. Thus, in respect of science; . . .
"Not only the process of research, but also that of direction ought to have a creative character. It is regrettable that scientific workers have ceased in their scientific development and in participating in creative work. Our support ought to be directed towards those leaders and creative scientific workers who take on the risks of the struggle for new inventions, and who, passing all obstacles, create and put to work".
. . . Thus centrally at the level of production:-
"The success of our economic politics is absolutely linked to the quality of the leading cadres, their political maturity, their decision making capacity, their responsibility, and their skill in competent political direction of their work collectives Directors cannot fulfil their role except on condition that they are tied to the party and its objectives. . ."
"The increase of political maturity, of competence and of authority of those leaders who act directly with workers is very important. It is particularly necessary to put on the order of the day the position and the role of foremen."
The leaders, that is to say the industrial and scientific technocracy, have become the principal object of the party's interest. If Strugal mentions the workers it is only to draw the attention of the leaders to the fact that they have to work with them in a particular way. It is clear that technocratic cadres, fully supported by the bureaucracy have a surveillance role to play in production in order to achieve greater profitability. In return they will receive total political support:-
"The function of a leader will require that more than once he will [have] to put into practice measures which are delicate and unpopular. In his decisions not everything will be clear in advance, and the leader has to take responsibility even for risks. . . We have said, and we repeat to this Congress, that active and capable leaders in their efforts to increase the efficiency of enterprises and to improve the output of workers will receive our complete and entire political support."
More than this, it isn't a question of political support alone. Much more important, especially in its material aspect is the economic support. By hierarchical payment levels for workers there is a bureaucratic "solution" for several problems at once.
— The possibility of the activisation of workers and the development of their class consciousness is made more difficult by the wage hierarchy. (Attempt to atomise the working class).
— The introduction of market and monetary relationships leads to the obscuring of relations of production and increases alienation.
—High payments to technocrats and low ones to workers leads to a recreation of a labour aristocracy.
— By wages hierarchy and inequalities of income a type of competition between workers is introduced, the so-called "discipline freely agreed to". This does not derive from a conscious decision but from external mechanism—competition.
To introduce these devices, it is necessary to change the entire system of payment." The consolidation of discipline in work, in technology, in norms of work; requires the transformation of the system of payment. and the strengthening of the relationship between output and payment. . . Its aim is to make more effective the realization of the socialist aim of payment according to work done and at the same time assist in the separation of the labour force in accordance with the objectives of the plan."
"The fundamental principle will remain payment according to work. We must make a clear distinction between workers who are stable, efficient and who have initiative and those who don't carry out their task. We have to eliminate with greater strength elements of disruption and misconceived egalitarianism."
But it is not merely a question of establishing the "healthy atmosphere of competition within the enterprise alone, but also in regard to relations between enterprises:-
"We naturally support rewarding scientific and technical effort, and those enterprises which introduce innovations. At the same time, those enterprises which don't modernize their products, are technically backward, have to submit to the economic consequences. The leaders of the enterprise have to show proof of social responsibility and to become the motive force of technical progress".
The resemblance of these proposals to the objectives of Sik's reforms is undeniable, and this is no matter of change. We have also to draw attention to the way that the economic support given to the technocrats is limited by the bureaucratic apparatus so that it will not [escape control]. [Strugal is] but clear on this matter:
"On the basis of what we have achieved in the national economy it is possible to go on with economic reform, purified of its revisionist aspects."
As we can see from the quotations from Strugal's speech, what is to be eliminated from the reform, the deepest revisionism, is the activity of the mass of workers, and their organization. Even if the councils proposed by Sik would have more or less functioned as an alibi for the autonomy of each enterprise, it would be wrong to deny the role they could have had in the political activisation of the workers. Even if the reason Sik proposed workers' councils in 1968 was to use them in the struggle against the stalinist wing of the bureaucracy, he was obliged, without wishing it, to allow a mobilization of the workers. In 1971, Strugal does not find the least need to mention workers when he discusses the system of management: "For this reason we think it worth while pointing out firmly that no system, whatever its qualities, can replace the direct organizational and managerial work of the leaders of the enterprise, those who are made responsible for practical results, and not a council of any sort." (applause).
We can conclude this section with a brief outline of the "new economic reform" as presented by Strugal and Co. There are new aspects of the consolidation of the political power of the party bureaucracy. The completely compromised old guard of the Novotny type has been partially replaced by a new generation which has drawn the lessons of the Prague spring on the one hand and from the experiences of the East German and Hungarian bureaucrats on the other, and is trying to build its politics on the basis of two fundamental principles,
1. The reinforcement of monetary and market relationships labelled as "socialist" to justify their existence.
2. Tensions between the technocracy, bureaucracy and proletariat are handled by political organizational measures on the part of the party apparatus. The first objective is the depoliticization and fragmentation of the workers in a careful and well organized way.
By these two measures, as the East German experience confirms, it is possible to ensure for a relatively long period,
a) an adequate functioning of the transitional economy;
b) that the power of the bureaucracy is not directly menaced.
The solution arrived at is very "centralist". It neutralizes the conflicts and consciously isolates them in place of solving them, and the maintenance of the status quo affects the inner life of the bureaucracy as well as its relations outside the party. The basic character of the economic reform resembles very closely that proposed by Sik. Only the "liberal" consequences deriving from the decentralization of authority in production are removed by every means possible. (see below). Czechoslovakia rejoins the other societies in transition, confirming once more that the solution of its problems does not lie in one country alone, but is a common problem of the working class in the East, as in the West.
The Organizational Consequences of the New Economic Reform (1971)
As we have shown, the support from the bureaucracy to the technocrats is a double edged weapon. On one side it will make production profitable, essential to overcome the actual crisis of the Czech economy. On the other side efforts to make things profitable by means of economic stimulants involves decentralization, and, by making enterprises partially autonomous, the possibility that the decentralization will escape from bureaucratic control. To avoid this, the party is concentrating all its efforts to destroy the activity of all the organizations which in 1968 were used by the working class to defend its justified claims. Thus, the trade union organization has become once more, as it was in the 50s, a party instrument for implementing the directives of the so-called 14th congress. For example, the trade union president, Karel Hofman:
"The trade union organizations must struggle openly against every disorder and indiscipline among the work force. They must not keep quiet in situations where weak management devalues the results of the labour of consciencious workers."
The role of the union, according to Hofman, is thus to assure work discipline, in this aiding "improvement of the level of management and organization of work". This is a formulation of the interests of the bureaucracy, but certainly not those of the workers:
"One of the most important aspects of the solution of these problems consists in the correct application of the socialist principles of remuneration. We must make a clear distinction between payment for those who work well and conscientiously and for those who are dilettantes."
To infer what role the trade union ought to play to become an organization of workers struggle, it is only necessary to consult the self-criticism of the old president of the Czech unions, Karel Polacek, who, up to around April 1969, defended the reform politics, then switched to Husak's side. This didn't stop him from losing his post. In the Party paper Rude Pravo he recently listed his "errors"; "As for me, I succumbed to the illusion that the union could be an independent political force in the state. My erroneous opinions had the result of disorienting numbers of officials. Because of my mistakes the effort of the party to consolidate society was slowed down. I wish, by honest work to make up for my mistakes." The size of the purge in the Czech trade unions at every level (central, regional, local, and at the enterprise) is indicated by the fact that since January 1970, 51,490 officials were removed in Bohemia and Moravia, and 13,740 in Slovakia.
These figures indicate the massive size of the purge, and leave no doubt as to the methods used. Before passing on to the analysis of the main organization of the bureaucracy, the communist party, we may add something on the views of the present bureaucracy on the role of the State. Husak, certainly not the most dogmatic, said:
"We are going to reinforce our Czech State, make real its different components and functions so that it can fulfil in every respect its mission of the development of society. We give great importance to the perfectioning of socialist legislation so that it corresponds with the actual needs of the development of the state. Respect for the law should become a natural thing in our society."
If Husak, in the light of his personal experience, wishes to insinuate by this statement that framed trials are not possible today, the recent trial of the Revolutionary Socialist Party denies it, and gives the real sense to Husak's words. "The actual needs of the development of the state" refers to the legislative changes judged necessary by the bureaucracy.
In the same way as the communist party is nothing but a caricature of the proletarian vanguard, so the state is not more than a tool for carrying out bureaucratic interests, and not those of the working class. It follows that the strengthening and development of the state means the consolidation and development of the power of the bureaucracy.
We may now attempt to situate the role of the Party and its politics, using the reports of government head Strugal and control commission president Jakes as well as the modifications made to the statutes of the Czech party. It follows from the concessions necessarily made to the technocrats by the bureaucracy that the main task of the party is to retain the technocracy as well as the working masses in the framework of its control. Jakes makes no attempt to hide this. "To regulate the achievement of the main tasks adopted by the 14th congress, to transmit information on the results of this regulation to the appropriate party organs, to participate in the general strengthening of the job of party control, observing the principle of Lenin by which people are checked and what they have done is regulated, that and that only is the essence of all political work." Thus, the old "avant-garde" of the working class has degenerated in a 20 year process into a regulatory institution whose parasitic character can no longer be hidden.
Jakes report on internal party training indicates the way the party fills its ranks and recruits new cadres.
"In the period since the 13th congress, 891 people have finished the higher political school of the Party control commission. 6757 have passed through short courses. Training has developed intensively since 1970. For example. from September 1970 to February 1971 more than 6000 people passed through the party regional schools. Considerable assistance in this work has been given to us by the Soviet Communist Party."
This makes it easy for us to imagine the level of political development of party members. In the same way, a representative picture of the degeneration and deformation of democratic centralism is given by the recently modified party statutes. Para. 22, article 3 (Internal party democracy) is particularly striking. Its aim is to stifle every embryonic activity of workers in the party, by allowing the dissolution of any base organization by a higher organization without other control.
"The establishment and dissolution of a base organization is ratified by the regional committee of the party. If the activity of an organization of the base is in contradiction with the party's politics, infringes the statutes, does not fulfil the decisions of the congress and the central committee of the party, or shows serious passivity, the regional committee can, after consultation with the area committee, dissolve the base organization. The area committee must make judgement on the attitudes of each member or candidate member, and draw conclusions in conformity with the party statutes as to their eventual placement in other base organizations of the party."
The total power of the bureaucracy in the whole society is present in this conception of "internal democracy" in the party. The way the bureaucrats can manipulate as they want according to the needs of the moment is shown by the appearance in the party statutes of the idea of cooptation:
"In the election of party committees from base organizations up to the central committee, it is necessary to make sure of a constant introduction of new forces, while conserving continuity of leadership. Party organs, elected at conferences and congress have a right between elections to co-opt in exceptional cases up to 10% of the number of elected members. Co-option is to be ratified by a higher organ of the party (at first by the area committee and the area control commission. The party central committee and the central control commission will decide on cooption to their own ranks,"
As we have shown, the present party bureaucracy is trying to eat it's cake and have it. The fear of a new Prague spring and of a worker's uprising, like that of 70-71 in Poland has led it to a massive purge of the party, lifting the average age of members to nearly 50, and limiting internal democracy in a manner with no precedent in the history of the Czech party. These measures alone indicate that the Czech bureaucracy is less sure of its power than might appear at first sight. It's insecurity derives initially from the special contradictions of all transitional societies (plan-market). The limited possibilities of bureaucratic planning are not able to satisfy the growing requirements of the technocratic layers. At the same time demands of the workers grow, giving the whole bureaucratic system insuperable problems.
It is thus clear that the stabilization and the domination of the bureaucracy cannot have a long term character. However, we must not forget the concrete experiences and lessons to draw from the way the bureaucracy maintains and defends its positions. There is no chance that workers discontent will automatically grow over into organized political resistance. That is where the job of the revolutionary groups begins. We have to politicize the masses, make use of contradictions between bureaucracy and technocracy in the struggle for political revolution. We think that the programme for political revolution elaborated in 1964 by the Polish comrades Kuron and Modzelewski in their "Open letter to the Polish workers party" remains appropriate. We conclude with one section:-
"Our ally against the intervention of Soviet Tanks is the Russian, Ukrainian, Hungarian and Czech working class. Our ally against the pressure and threats of imperialism is the working class of the industrialized West and the developing colonial revolution in the underdeveloped countries. Against the understanding between the international bureaucracy and the international imperialist bourgeoisie, which maintain systems of anti-popular dictatorship in their respective spheres of influence, we proclaim the traditional working class slogan—proletarians of all lands unite!"