February 18, 1991 • #200 International Viewpoint nev: today the centre has become almost as powerless as the people thembureaucracy, which is free to exploit its monopoly positions ways; restricting the volume of goods put on the market, cutting and raising prices. This is of an attempted "revolution from above" economic reform to the is to preserve the power and privilege of at least a part of the bureaucracy by transforming the mode of exploitation. requires bringing new elements into the ruling class and sacrificing some of the
The developments in the Soviet economy described above are forcing the liberals to come to terms with the unpleasant reality. Their standard argument that the deepening economic crisis and the "debauch of the mafia" are due to the absence of "real" reform has lost much of its force, since ordinary citizens have already experienced enough of the market to form a quite clear picture of what a "real" transition to the market holds in store for them.
In the words of the USSR Minister of Finance: "One can argue whether we are prepared or not for the transition to the market, if competition has been established among producers or if that still remains a very distant goal, but the reality is such that the market is already imperiously intruding into our lives. Over 60% of prices are not under control of the state. That means that they are rising, and very significantly...Monopolism in agriculture and transport has very strong positions. "25 This is quite an admission in view of the fact that there has been no official price reform. In the spring of 1990, Gorbachev solemnly promised that there would be no price reform without first consulting the population, itself overwhelmingly opposed to price rises.
Lumpen-bourgeois ethic
Liberal sociologist Leonid Razikhovskii argues that the Soviet economy is dominated by a "lumpen-bourgeois" ethic: the desire to increase one's own property at the expense of state property, which is "no one's property." This has yielded unique, historically unprecedented monster — a completely mafia-ized economy." All this, he attributes, of course, to the socialist revolution itself. But he is not far from the Marxists' analysis when he describes perestroika as "the privatization of the bureaucratic-mafia structure: the ministry becomes a monopolist concern and the city trade administration - an association of private shops." Nevertheless, he warns that it would be silly to believe that anything is possible, since the "mafia-nomenklatura" is where the power is.
Ethics by the millimeter
And so, however distasteful, one must hold the course since "only in conditions of open private property will it be possible to begin, drop by drop, to crush monand the mafia,...millimeter by millimiter to restore the common human ethic26 and to get rid of the lumpen bourgeoisie."2 In essence, Radzhikovskii is proposing to hold one's nose and support the revolution from above. He does not even mention the possibility of a popular revolution as an alternative. For the wresting of power from the "mafianomenklatura" by the people itself might jeopardize his goal of a capitalist restora-
Leningrad's social democrats, cates of a "mixed" (but predominantly capitalist) economy, have also recently come to the realization that "privatization will mean the transfer of property into the hands of the directors; and the introduction of a market economy — their freedom from any limitation whatsoever." The following are only the most striking of the developments along these lines in their city:
"The 26 largest enterprises, having the "Association of Industrial Enterprises' have now founded the bank 'Rossiya', in which they are investing millions of rubles. They have also creat25. Trud, December 30, 1990. 26. Soviet liberals oppose "common human values", societies to the "class values" which allegedly inspired Stalinism. This has prompted one Leningrad socialist to quip that the "common human values" of the liberals must surely be dollars. 27. L. Radzikhovskii, "Kapitalizm v otdel'no vzyatoi kvartire", Nedelya, no. 48, November 25, 1990, p. 7. 28. V. Dudchenko and A. Karpov "O vozmozhnykh posledsviyakh naibolee ochevidnogo i pryamogo puti
USSR ed the firm 'Nevskaya perspektiva, through which they will buy up...the consumer goods and food industry of the city along with the trade network - all this, naturally, to help the citizens and Leningrad Soviet. At the conclusion of these operations, the city will still be run by the same old administrative structure, only its elements will enjoy new opportunities, which hitherto were considered criminal."28 While this in itself is worrying to the social democrats, who want a "normal" Western-style economy for the Soviet Union, they clearly fear even more that "political instability" and "social unrest" will result. "People in the factories will not wait for long when they discover that society is being ruled by the same actors, leading the same kind of life, along with all their relatives and friends and with a part of the most amenable democrats, the only difference being that they will have exchanged their black Volgas for black
The Leningrad social democrats are fervent partisans of what they call the "parliamentary path". "There are two alternatives: try to use the extreme instability of the situation to destroy the remaining structures and on the wave of mass actions hope to become political leaders "expressing the interests of the people"; or try to prevent the social explosion by any methods available, preserving the parliamentary path of development of events. The Bolsheviks of 1917 were the most consistent partisans of the first option..... We know the consequences of trying to make a social revolution." Inevitable move to Mercedes
Consequently the social democrats see the bureaucrats' move from Volgas to Mercedes as virtually inevitable. All they can think to propose is to invite Western capitalists in the hope that they will introduce a "civilizing" element into Soviet business. Another proposal is for the Leningrad Soviet itself to go into business, as a counterweight to the mafia. But, they sadly note, in that case there would be no guarantee against the Soviet itself k privatizatsii", September 2, 1990 (unpublished document). The authors are leaders of the Leningrad social democrats. Karpov is a delegate to the Leningrad soviet and a member of its economic reform commission. 29. O. Savel'ev, "Politicheskaya situatsiya v Leningrade," August 25, 1990 (unpublished document); O. Savel'ev, "Obsluzhivanie demokratii," Informatsionnyi byulleten' Sotsial-demokraticheskoi assotsiatsii (Leningrad), no. 24, September 1990. This account is also partly based on conservations with social demo- 17 cratic leaders.