Landscape before a
THE historic all-union referendum on March 17, in which 76% of the 80% turnout voted in favour of keeping the Soviet Union together as a "renewed federation of sovereign republics", now increasingly looks like a pyrrhic victory for Gorbachev and the
Kremlin leadership. In the aftermath of the referendum the challenges to the central bureaucracy have been mounting rapidly with the democratic movement, dominated by followers of Boris Yeltsin, gaining renewed momentum, the miners' strike now entering its fifth week and the price rises, which took effect on
April 2, likely to dramatically sharpen the
Gorbachev escaped a humiliating defeat in the referendum, but a close look at the circumstances surrounding the vote, as well as a more detailed break-down of the results, reveals the fragility of the yes-vote.
battle
confrontations in Soviet society. POUL FUNDER LARSEN
P RIOR to the referendum there
had been a long period of manocuvring among the different factions of the bureaucracy, in the centre and in the republics. to secure the maximum support for the proposal. The first draft of a new union treaty (replacing the one from 1922) was published last November and debated at the Congress of Pcople's Deputies in December. Further negotiations between the majority of the republics and the centre secured for the latter some concessions in the version drafted shortly before the vote (March 6).
This draft included the right for republics independently to establish direct diplomatic relations and trade relations with other states, and a rather vague statement on the right of the republics to leave the union.!
The draft also made some concessions on another major disputed point, the right of the republics to dispose of their own natural resources and land. But the main thrust of the proposed treaty remained the maintenance of a strong centre deciding on a serics of vital matters, including defence and security, foreign policy and foreign trade relations, strategic choices on economic development and the control of decisive economic sectors.
Ultimately this was not acceptable to six republics with strong national movements opting for independence, and therefore the Baltic Republics (Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia), Moldavia, Armenia and Georgia stayed out. Efforts by the Soviet authorities to carry through polling in these republics did not meet with much success — mobilizing some hundred thousand Russians (many of them connected to the Soviet army) in the Baltic States and far less in Transcaucasia.?
Strong will to break with
Union
Independent referenda carried out in the Baltic States prior to March 17 and in Georgia on March 31 confirmed the strong will in these republics to break away from the Union. A perspective which, in the case of the Baltic States, was supported by a not insignificant number of Russians living in those republics. Armenia has scheduled its own referendum for September 21, while Moldavia has not yet arrived at a decision.
In the weeks preceding the referendum the central Soviet media launched a strong campaign for a yes vote. This drive featured a variety of both liberal and nationalist themes. For example, on the eve of the referendum (March 16) Pravda carried on its front page a long appeal by liberal favourite Alexander Yakovlev supporting a yes, while Gorba-
USSR chev in his TV speech the day before struck the chauvinist chord in calling for "the preservation of the unity of our thousand-year-old state" and citing the instance of Yaroslav the Wise, a Russian knight from the 11th century.
This plunge into Great Russian imperial rhetoric is not likely to have had a decisive effect, given the widespread scepticism towards Gorbachev and the general understanding among the Russian population for the demands of, for example, the Baltic Republics, but it is nonetheless an illustration of one option open to parts of the bureaucracy facing increasing pressure.?
The strongest "yes" came from the Central Asian republics, with 93 to 98% in favour of the Union on turnouts around 90%. This was based on fears that a dissolution of the Union would leave them alone with enormous social and ecological problems, and condemn them into sinking into a third world position. But also conservative Byelorussia. Azerbaiian 1. But Anatoly Lukyanov, chairman of the Supreme Soviet, ruled out the possibility of a republic seceding from the Union through a simple "no" vote in the March 17 referendum (Komsomol' skaya Pravda, March 13, 1991). 2. On March 17, some 250,000 people participated in the referendum in Estonia and around half a million each in Latvia and Lithuania. The exact number of Soviet military personnel in the Baltic States in unknown, but estimates run around 700,000. 3. Another instance of this appeal to Great Russian chauvinism was given by the chairman of the conservative Russian Communist Party, Ivan Poloskov, who at the March 6 plenary meeting of the RCP declared: "Doubt is arising about the future of our fatherland, as to whether its thousand year old history will continue." 4. This is already partially the case. The national income per head is 2593 rubles in Russia, 1580 in nizk, 7/2991nd 1008 in Tadjikstan (Ekonomika i 3
Zhizn', 7/1991). April 15, 1991 • #204 International Viewpoint
USSR and rural areas of the Russian Federation and (eastern) Ukraine came out clearly in favour of the Union. However, in a series of the big cities and major industrial centres, the proposal was rejected or only carried by unconvincing margins.
Some results could hardly be seen as anything other than votes of no confidence in Gorbachev. In Sverdlovsk, the third biggest city in the Russian Federation, only 37.6% voted in favour of the Union, and in the Ukraine the yes votes were outnumbered both in the capital Kiev (44%) and in Lvov in western Ukraine (16.4%). In the Kusbass mining area in Siberia, 60% voted yes, but on a turnout of 67%. The overall tendency within the big cities seems to be that the
• particularly hard hit by the current crisis — voted against the Union
After the referendum there are differing opinions within the leading circles of the bureaucracy on how to build the "renewed federation". In an interview shortly after the vote, Gorbachev left a door open to possible independence for at least some of the rebellious republics, citing the example of eastern Europe and the "principle of freedom of choice", but went on to say: "we have constitutional mechanisms for the secession of republics from the Union. Personally, I would favour their self-determination within a renewed federation - a union of sovereign states."S
Re-building the Union from below
Certain key figures, including the influential president of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nasarbajev, have been promoting the concept of re-building a new Union "from below". That is, a Union which would begin by including the Russian
Ukraine, Byelorussian and the Central Asian republics. But given the centrifugal forces at work in Soviet society in general, and the strong proindependence tendencies in, for example, resounding no to the Union on March 17, this is hardly a miracle cure.
Other voices have not surprisingly been calling for Gorbachev to take maximum advantage of his "victory" and use it to apply the iron fist. The hardliner Colonel Nikolai Petrushenko put this bluntly: "The referendum has given Gorbachev a mandate for bold, determined and consistent action against separatist and nationalist forces. History won't forgive him if he doesn't use this opportunity."
The period following Gorbachev's conservative turn last autumn and particularly the months after the attacks in Riga and Vilnius this January, has seen a revival of democratic mass mobilizations in the Russian Federation. The huge demon4 ies on March 10 directed against the draft strations in Moscow and several other citInternational Viewpoint #204 • April 15, 1991
Union treaty and Gorbachev, and the hundred thousand people who took to the streets in Moscow on March 28, in spite of the threat of a severe crackdown, bears witness to that.
Though the liberals, spearheaded by Yeltsin, are still leading the movement, signs of the fragility of this coalition are multiplying. While in the media Yeltsin has been going on the offensive with a series of strong attacks on Gorbachev, and still retains strong popular support, his political base could rapidly erode due to growing fissures in the democratic
Yeltsin, who left the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) at its 28th Congress last summer, is now clearly opting for the formation of a new party to consolidate his position. Such a move would, by all accounts, create deep divisions within the ranks of the democratic movement, where numerous parties have been founded, none of which has so far been able to establish itself as a major force (although Nikolai Travkin's Russian Democratic Party is still the strong-
Unimpressive record of Russian parliament
The achievements of the Russian parliament, Yeltsin's stronghold, could not be characterized as impressive, serving largely as a podium for the liberals, but without real powers to implement policy. The city councils where the democrats won the majority last year (as in Moscow and Leningrad) are facing the same problem, which could increasingly weaken the credibility of the whole liberal project.
In the referendum held in the Russian Federation at the same time as the all-Union one on the question of a directly elected Russian president, the Yeltsinites won a comfortable, but not immense majority of 70%. However this proposal was blocked by the Russian Congress of People's Deputies at the end of March. Practically, the situation inside the Russian parliament seems to have reached a with Yeltsin and his supporters unable to rule and the Communist faction, for numerical and political reasons, unable to topple Yeltsin.
At the same time the centre, and its "super-President" Gorbachev, with numerous and far-reaching powers, is itself disunited and in a state of confusion. Outright totalitarian measures such as the ban on all demonstrations in Moscow until April 15 and the call for a suspension of the miners' strike go together with more conciliatory calls for a dia-
It is increasingly clear that neither of the main factions within the bureaucracy is able to mobilize the necessary strength by itself. But the polarization of the liberal and conservative currents within the bureaucracy has rendered the idea of a compromise (like the "left-centre" alli championed by Moscow mayor Gavril Popov) obsolete
However, for the time being, the most serious challenge to Gorbachev comes not from Popov, or Yeltsin, but from the strike of 300,000 miners which started at the beginning of March. A walkout in 18 in the Donbass in Ukraine on March 1 was shortly afterwards followed by the Karaganda mines in Kazakhstan and mines in the Rostov area, Vorkuta and the radical Kusbass district in west-
By March 23 the strike had spread to several other coalfields from Sakhalin in the Far East to Chelyabinsk in the Urals and Inta in the north, with 165 of the country's 600 or so coalmines on strike A variety of economic and political demands have been put forward by the different mines involved in the struggle, in most places including demands for higher wages and better pensions. Even though miners are better paid than many other workers, social conditions in the mining areas are miserable.
Miners put forward political demands
Other demands being put forward, including calls for a rise in the price of coal, independence of the mines from the state and a transfer of the mines from the Union authorities to the jurisdiction of be granted more administrative and economic independence), combine economic and political elements.
The Kusbass miners, followed by other mining areas, are going one step further, stressing explicitly political demands — the de-politicization of the army and the KGB, dissolution of the Supreme Soviet and the resignation of Gorbachev - and calling for a union-wide political strike to topple Gorbachev and the Pavlov government. This was pinpointed by Vyacheslav Golikov from the Kusbass workers' committees: "The Soviet government is trying to portray our movement as a sausage riot, but our people are not swallowing the bait. We don't need a piece of bread, we need a change in the political system so we can earn our bread independently. Our demands are political demands."
This amounted to a rejection of the "relief package" for offered by vice-president Yanayev on March 14, consisting of additional funds for developing infrastructure, housing and culture in the regions as well as food 5. Pravda, March 18, 1991 6. One instance of the dilletantism and corruption prevailing in the Russian parliament is the recent resignation of the liberal vice-premier, Genadii Filsyin; Filsyin was, together with other ministers, involved in highly dubious transactions to buy 7-8 billion dollars for 140 billion rubles. When the aborted deal was disclosed the parliament decided to sack Filsyin 7. The Independent, March 20, 1991.
and medicines. But the miners have learned the lessons of the strike in 1989 where many of the agreements made with the government under "decision no. 608", which ended the strike, were never fulfilled.
During the strike the miners have taken on a series of responsibilities in the coalmining areas, holding public meetings and demonstrations, organizing shifts to keep the mines tidy and setting up teams to keep order in collaboration with the local militia. A union-wide coordination of the struggle has been set up with the different strike committees and the independent miners union participating. demanded that the strike should be suspended for two months but couldn't reach an agreement on how to punish the miners if they did not comply with this decision. However in some of the mining including Kusbass, Donbass and Karaganda, the local mining authorities have demanded that miners pay the losses inflicted on the mines by the strike. It seems at the moment unlikely that the central bureaucracy can break the strike by force, since this would create political uproar and probably a general strike.
also under strong pressure from the Yeltsinites, are trying to apply a carefully balanced carrot and stick policy. Miners leaders closely tied to liberals
As in 1989 the strike has received wide support, with people and workers groups from across the Union sending statements of support and different forms of material and economic aid. But the political limitations of the central leadership of the miners constitute a serious obstacle to a broadening of the movement and a link-up with other workers. The Kusbass leaders are closely tied in with the liberals around Yeltsin, who are trying to use the strike in their bid for power, therefore ready to subordinate the strike to the project of "Democratic Russia".
On March 21, the central Soviet press published the details of the price rises to take effect on April 2. The whole scenario of these price rises gives a sense of déjà vu on last summer, when the Ryzhkov government announced similar intentions creating panic buying and protests, which in the end forced them to withdraw the plan. But this time the government applied a more carefully prepared tactic, paying out compensation in advance to the different affected groups, cutting taxes and granting an extra 40% on bank accounts.
Nominally these compensations should account for 85% of the price rises. However, the draconian rises (between 150 and 300% on a series of goods, including basic food, consumer goods, clothing and public transportation) would over a short period eat up the compensations and dramatically lower the living standards of much of the population. It will have a particularly disastrous impact on the estimated 70 million Soviet citizens living on around 100 rubles a month, including pensioners, students, women on maternity leave and some white-collar workers. The immediate reaction until now has been one of confusion and despair, with people hoarding big amounts of cheap goods, but the measures could spark off open rebellion against the government.
One of the main aims of the reforms, from the government's point of view, is cutting back on subsidies and to seize some of the "excess money" in people's pockets. The economic consequences of the price rises are largely unpredictable given the general decay of the economy - GNP fell by 2% last year and an 11% slump is predicted for this year - but there is likely to be a boost to the inflationary spiral which is already hitting consumers through the food markets and the shadow economy.
To avoid organized protests against this attack on living standards, Gorbachev has resorted to authoritarian methods, introducing joint patrols by army and militia in the main cities earlier this year and banning all demonstrations in Moscow for three weeks. The liberals, headed by Yeltsin and Popov, have been criticizing the decision to raise prices in this fashion — they would prefer to implement their own free market recipe — but have not tried to organize action against it. The Moscow left, which does not have a mass following in any way comparable to that of the liberals, has been trying to organize activities to protest against the price reform. On April 1 a happening on the streets against the measures ended in arrests by the police. Some of the participants were fined.
Yeltsin's fragile alliance
After the momentous developments of the last few weeks the situation in the Soviet Union has reached a fever pitch with the popular support for the Gorbachev leadership hitting an all-time low. At such a time the absence of a mass opposition truly independent from the two main factions of the bureaucracy becomes ever more strongly felt. The protests against the country's political leadership and the disastrous social and economic consequences of its reforms could combine in a strong dynamic that would be able to sweep Gorbachev away and create a split in the fragile alliance have the strength to initiate such a process, but this would require a break with Yeltsin and his supporters, who are now aiming for power, to carry through their own pro-capitalist project. *
USSR / YUGOSLAVIA