WE publish below the programmatic resolution adopted by the founding congress of the Party of
Labour, held in Moscow
October 12, 1992.
DOCUMENT
UR country is now passing through one of the most dramatic periods of its history. In the course of the events of
August 21, 1991, the people demonstrated their unwillingness to live in the old ways and their readiness to defend democratically elected organs of power. Nevertheless, the collapse of the old system of totalitarian rule has not led to the expected triumph of democracy. The people strug gled against the old regime, rose up in demonstrations and built barricades, but they were not permitted to enjoy the fruits
Despite the differences between them, the forces which came to power in Russia and in the other parts of the former Soviet Union are united in arguing that the crisis can only be overcome through the broadest possible privatization and through attracting massive quantities of foreign
These new ruling forces defend the rights of the entrepreneurs and of the new property owners, who in most cases have emerged from among the old nomenklatura. The bureaucratic oligarchy is being allowed to secure its privileges in a new form, to legalize them, and to redistribute power and property among the various groups within the ruling elite. The property of all the people, which never belonged to the people in more than name, is now being directly appropriated by the same circles which bear prime responsibility for the crisis in our society.
In their haste to build the shining capitalist future as quickly as possible, the ruling circles reject everything even vaguely connected with socialism. This includes even such elementary social guarantees as the right to work, along with free education and health care. Social tensions are exacerbated by the threat of widespread bankruptcies and mass unemployment, by galloping inflation, by the collapse of living standards, and by the quashing of the first signs of workplace democracy that were permitted under earlier legislation.
The destruction of the system of social guarantees is leading to a new growth of discontent and to a political instability that is pregnant with dictatorship. Civil rights are being restricted; elected organs of power are being disbanded; opposition publishing houses are being shut down, and the powers of representative bodies are being curtailed in favour of a concentration of authority in the executive bran-
Those who suffer as a result of these policies are not only the workers. They also include the independent entrepreneurs, who cannot compete freely with the monopolistic organizations of the bureaucratic bourgeoisie, the new social layer which has emerged as a result of the privatization of state property, and which controls the structures of power. Instead of the ideologically neutral state which was promised, a new system of power has
It has replaced communist slogans with anti-communist ones, but it has preserved its bureaucratic basis. The promised triumph of law over arbitrary exercise of power has not occurred either. The country risks repeating the darkest pages of its
Unanimity of the victors
The unanimity of the victors is especially dangerous, since without opposition, without the representation of dissident views in the organs of power, democracy ceases to be democracy.
Decades of totalitarian rule by the Communist Party have discredited socialist values and the very concept of the libera-
December 21, 1992 tion of labour. But these values and ideas did not arise out of drawing-room discussions; they represent real necessities of the defense of workers' interests. The collapse of the Communist Party has finally made it possible to create a genuine democratic left movement that expresses these needs. This is why we now view it as essential to form a broad Party of
Labour, a party-movement constructed on the basis of initiatives from below.
We reject the idea of a vanguard party.
The Party of Labour must become a party of political support to the trade unions and the workers' movement. Without trying to bind the mass workers' organizations to its leading role, the party must help them to acquire their own voice in the organs of power, and to become the decisive force in our social development. Only a party of this type can meet the real needs of working people in our country and become an organic part of the international left movement.
If the parties of today's ruling layers see their aim as defending the interests of the entrepreneurs, we declare our intention of defending the interests of hired workers above all.
Our society needs a party that campaigns:
• For the right of all workers to a job;
• For reform of the system of social guarantees;
• For economic democracy, for the participation of workers in making economic decisions that affect their material position and conditions of work;
• For the independence of the trade union movement; for the guaranteed right of trade unions to exist and operate freely in all enterprises no matter what the form of property; for the ratification by our country of the Convention of the International Labour Organization;
• For the development of collective and municipal forms of property; for the transformation of the state sector of our economy into a modern, efficient, decentralized social sector capable of leading our country out of economic crisis;
• For an end to the uncontrolled bureaucratic privatization of the former
"property of all the people"; against the conversion of state monopolies into priva-
• For the rights of consumers and of independent national entrepreneurs;
• For the democratic regulation of the economy as an indispensable condition for establishing civilized forms of the market;
• For integration into the world economy on a basis that ensures the development of national production and exchange, instead of serving the interests of transnational corporations;
• For self-management and a strong representative power as counterweights to the centralization of executive authority;
• For honest government, guaranteed by a strict demarcation of state from commercial activity and by a clear division between the social and private sectors within the framework of the mixed economy;
• For genuine equality of women; for the effective right of women to participate fully in the life of society, without being forced to renounce family responsibilities;
• For the rights of national, cultural, and religious minorities.
Impasses and Alternatives
The crisis which afflicts our country is not only the result of the collapse of the old system of rule. Our productive technology has become obsolete, as has the whole structure of our economy. Our country, which not long ago was among the world leaders, is increasingly being transformed into an outdated and depen dent periphery of world capitalism.
Our economy must now be rescued from chaos. Normal economic ties must be re-established between the various regions and enterprises. The consumer market must be saturated with goods. The people must complete the work, left unfinished by the totalitarian regime, of creating the conditions for a modern industrial society, establishing an infrastructure,
RUSSIA creating modern means of communication, and so forth. At the same time, our society must begin the transition from the old basis of industrial production to new, post-industrial structures. The experience of Eastern Europe and of our own country during the 1980s provides convincing proof not only of the bankruptcy of the old administrative methods of rule, but also of the futility of seeking "pure" market solutions and of mechanically combining elements of bureaucratic-administrative planning with the free market.
In Western countries, developed market forms took several centuries to evolve, and after this a whole arsenal of regulato-
Try mechanisms arose in a natural historical fashion. A mechanical transferring of these methods onto our soil is impossible, since our problems are qualitatively different from those which the Western economies have traditionally confronted. Under conditions of an extreme deficit of goods and services, and of economic disorganization, attempts to unleash elemental economic processes will only intensity the crisis. The impossibility of free competition is bound up with a historically determined structure of production in which practically all branches are dominated by one or a handful of huge monopolistic enterprises. In principle, antimonopoly legislation can yield nothing in such conditions. In order to subject enterprises to genuine competition, a complex programme of economic restructuring must be implemented. This needs to include longterm investment programmes, involving the creation of new enterprises and the reorganization of existing ones. Imports must be controlled, and certain controls must also be exercised over exports. All this in turn is impossible without strong and effective planning of economic processes. This planning must ensure that the basic needs of the population are supplied while not limiting the initiative of enterprises and not undermining the stimuli for their development. During the period when the crisis is being overcome, these ends may be achieved by using directive methods to set the minimum basic levels of output, and by setting favorable tax levels for production over and above state orders. Simultaneously, heavy fines must be imposed in cases where enterprises 29 which have failed to fulfill state orders
International Viewpoint # 241 • December 21, 1992
RUSSIA sell their produce through channels and at prices which are not foreseen in the state orders.
The development of a commodity market is an indispensable condition for the formation of an efficient economy. The official propaganda implicitly suggests that the market and private property are identical. We are convinced, however, that the universal introduction of private property can no more guarantee economic efficiency than total nationalization can
In a country where Western traditions are absent and where there is no such bourgeoisie, whose formation in Europe and America required centuries, a spontaneously arising market can take on only the most primitive and barbaric forms.
Without the conscious transformation of the existing structure of the economy any large-scale privatization leads automatically to replacing state monopoly with private, with the additional problem that private monopolies are even more difficult to control.
The development of entrepreneurship
"from below", the establishment of new firms, and the creation of new jobs and products must be encouraged in every way possible. Cooperatives and small private businesses must be given access to cheap credits, to premises, and to raw materials. The creation of private supermonopolies on the basis of the old centralized state property constitutes one of the most serious obstacles to achieving this.
### Soviet property
The only force which can serve as a locomotive capable of dragging the country out of its crisis is a transformed and democratized social sector of the economy. The state enterprises which carry out economic tasks on various levels must be the property of the respective soviets. Democratic organs of power must be given control of their own investment funds, so that they can use these accumulated assets to create jobs, to modernize production and make it environmentally safe, and to retrain workers.
The representative organs of power cannot and should not be involved in direct economic management and must not be forced to rely on profits from economic activity. The only appropriate source of income for popular power bodies is officially imposed taxes. The tasks of the democratic soviets, in our opinion, must include defining the priorities of development and the basic directions in which the use of social funds should proceed. We consider that the direct 30 management of each enterprise should be carried out both by its work collective, which should elect or hire the managers, and by the enterprise administration, which should be independent in its actions while remaining responsible to the soviet for the use of the social funds invested in the enterprise. The workers should also be guaranteed the opportunity to participate in controlling production.
The plurality of forms of property and administration within the social sector
(including property ownership by work collectives) makes it possible to create a flexible decentralized economic mechanism that combines democracy in production with democracy in civil life. This will ensure that the rights of workers are respected and that social guarantees are provided "on the spot", without the cumbersome and inefficient centralized bureaucracy which has proven disastrous under both Communist and capitalist regimes.
Viable Democracy
We are firmly convinced that the soviets which now exist in our country, irrespective of who constitutes the majority in them, are incapable either of carrying out the tasks of economic development or even of ensuring that the normal process of decision-making goes ahead.
The collapse of the single monolithic bureaucratic pyramid has led to the rise of a multitude of local bureaucracies on all levels. These local bureaucracies are conducting a confused struggle among themselves for power and privilege, and over the division of the former "property of the whole people".
Despite the formal proclamation of democratic freedoms, of multi-party pluralism, freedom of the press, and so forth, the country lacks the elementary conditions for the formation and development of civil society. The social groups which have arise n
(with the exception of the bureaucracy)
are still not fully conscious of their interests, and have not acquired the habits of self-organization. In essence, what is taking shape at the moment is not a democratic state but something closer to feudalism.
In such circumstances it is entirely natural that many "liberal" politicians both in the centre and in the various regions should try to put an end to the anarchy in the country by installing an authoritarian regime, overturning the few democratic freedoms we possess, dissolving the political parties and soviets, and setting in place a system of personal power.
These policies are presenting an acute threat to the future of our country and of its peoples. The suppression of initiative from below and the repression which would inevitably follow the installation of a group or individual dictatorship threaten to undermine the possibility of any renewal of society.
The alternative to "liberal" authoritarianism, which is thrusting us back toward barbarism under the cover of beautiful phrases about "the free market" and "the return to civilization," can only be the struggle for the democratic reform of power. This must include the creation of new, viable soviets and of a new democratic majority within them, the development of culture, and improving workers' qualifications and raising the quality of their labour.
Both in the state and in the productive sphere, only a functioning and not merely declarative democracy can solve our problems. Only the creation of new, viable organs and structures at all levels can aid the formation in our country of a system of power which is responsible before society and before the law. Without the effective, democratic reform of power at the local level there can be no resolution of the national question; Russia cannot be reconstructed, and there can be no reliable guarantees of independence for the peoples who are striving to create their own national states.
We are convinced that the only way such a power can be created in our country is through the rise of the labour movement, through the acquisition by the mass of working people of an understanding of their interests, and through struggles by workers to defend their rights.
Only the solidarity of working people can provide an alternative to divisions between nationalities. Only forces which are not tied to the interests of bureaucratic oligarchies, which are not participants in the quarrels between regions and republics, can alter the course of events. Such forces, in our view, must place at the center of their activity the interests and
December 21, 1992
RUSSIA huge technological potential.
It is clear that the socialist perspective in these countries will assume very different forms from those it will take on in Eastern Europe, beset by crises on all sides and trying at any price to overcome its growing technological lag behind the
12 3456789
West, or in the countries of the Third
World, which suffer both from the most barbaric forms of traditional capitalist exploitation and from bureaucratic totali-
100 A Russian privatization coupon demands of the people, their welfare and dignity.
Our Values To make human beings the masters of their fates, independent in the highest degree of external forces not under their control, whether these are the power of the state or the power of capital; to overcome the alienation of the worker from the means of production and of the citizen from the taking of social or governmental decisions; to transform a society of hired workers and state subjects into a society of citizens with equal rights, who freely choose their destinies - these are the traditional aims of the socialist movement to which we strive to remain loyal.
Freedom is impossible unless there is civic accountability and unless people have equal rights. Modern civilized society features a juridical equality, in formal terms the law is the same for everyone, and the government proclaims that citizens have equal political rights. But full equality of political rights is unattainable under an economic system which divides people into owners of property on the one hand, and on the other, hired workers who are forced to sell their labour power. The road to human freedom lies through overcoming economic and social alienation, and through the liberation of labour.
It is impossible to overcome alienation either in society where state-bureaucratic forms of property predominate, or in one where market relations provide the setting for rule by big capital. Modern Western capitalism has achieved a very advanced form of development, and has shown clearly what is and what is not possible on
But although capitalist society has brought about a very high level of prosperity in a few Western countries, it has proven incapable of fully solving the problems of poverty and alienation and has also given rise to new contradictions, the global environmental crisis and the division of the world into a dependent, ever more backward "periphery"
developed industrial "centre," whose prosperity is linked to an ever greater degree with maintaining the backwardness of the rest of the world. Thanks to the liberal reforms, Russia is more and more becoming a part of the dependent periphery. Along with the other republics of the former Soviet Union, our country is about to experience the injustice of this system in full measure.
The world is becoming more and more crowded; it is too small for us to allow these problems to remain unsolved. Humanity will move forward, and the current state of the world will not remain unchanged. Before us is the beginning of humanity's transition to a qualitatively new stage of its development; our country must take part in this transition together with all the other peoples, and not transform itself into a brake on history.
Socialism as we understand it is a society of economic democracy, a society which guarantees people and national groupings the maximum degree of freedom on the basis of equal rights. These include the right to take part on an equal basis in economic decision-making, and the right to participate equally in the administration of public property. This does not involve an attempt to make everyone identical, to force everyone into the same mold. On the contrary, socialism creates the possibility for everyone of showing their individual face, and of realizing their potential to the maximum degree.
Socialism for us is not some finished ideal, which must be realized once and for all, but a prolonged historical process involving the evolution of old social forms and the rise and development of new ones, based on the combining of economic and
In different countries the socialist perspective may take on quite distinct forms, depending on the concrete economic, political, and cultural conditions and the general level of development. The highly developed countries of the West stand on the threshold of the post-industrial era and are trying to overcome the environmental crisis and to find worthwhile uses for their tarian dictatorships.
We reject utopias, but hold strongly to the values and ideals which we have embraced. Attempts at realizing the consumer utopia of the "perfect society," based on equal distribution of goods, lead in practice to the complete opposite of what was originally promised. Instead of a society without shortages or problems, there emerges a system which exacerbates to an extreme degree all the problems which need to be overcome. The totalitarian utopia not only reproduces the worst features of early capitalism, the lack of rights for working people, the alienation of the individual, social inequality, but also undermines people's faith in the possibility of full liberation, and discredits the very idea of the new society. However, an unprincipled political approach oriented solely toward the needs of the present day would be just as devoid of prospects.
In the final instance the crisis of utopian consciousness gives rise to just such a political position, of defending the power of rulers who no longer believe in their own utopia, who laugh at their promises and who pride themselves on their cynicism. This political consciousness, which prevailed in our society until recent times, has nothing in common with genuine political realism. It, too, is based on illusions and can have results that are totally unexpected.
### Against political cynicism
Political cynicism and the lack of principles are the reverse side of the totalitarian utopia and bear witness to its crisis.
Such attitudes cannot form the basis for genuine renewal. This is why we reject cynicism: so that our society can reestablish its values. It is essential for our society to regain a belief in itself, for people to have the opportunity to rely on their own strengths, to maintain a genuine cultural succession that includes a continuity with the revolutionary traditions of the past.
People must have the opportunity finally to reject the totalitarian utopia.
The essence of socialism lies in the movement of society toward more democratic forms of self-organization. This must be brought to fruition by society itself in the process of long and difficull 31 labour. *
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OUR FUTURE series of IV.
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A
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