THE TAX IN KIND

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    The question of the tax in kind is at present attracting very great attention and is giving rise to much discussion and argument. This is quite natural, because in present conditions it is indeed one of the principal questions of policy.

    The discussion is somewhat disordered, a fault to which, for very obvious reasons, we must all plead guilty. All the more useful would it be, therefore, to try to approach the question, not from its "topical" aspect, but from the aspect of general principle. In other words, to examine the general, fundamental background of the picture on which we are now tracing the pattern of definite practical measures of present-day policy.

    In order to make this attempt I will take the liberty of quoting a long passage from my pamphlet, The Chief Task of Our Day. "Left-Wing" Childishness and the Petty-Bourgeois Mentality. It was published by the Petrograd Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies in 1918 and contains, first, a newspaper article, dated March 11, 1918, on the Brest Peace, and, second, my polemic against the then existing group of Left Communists, dated May 5, 1918. The polemic is now superfluous and I omit it, leaving what appertains to the discussion on ,"state capitalism" an the main elements of our present-day economy, which is transitional from capitalism to socialism.

    Here is what I wrote at the time:

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    Let it be said in parenthesis that this is the very theoretical mistake which misled the best people in the Novaya Zhizn and Vperyod [103] camp. The worst and the mediocre of these, owing to their stupidity and spinelessness, tag along behind the bourgeoisie, of whom they stand in awe; the best of them have failed to understand that it was not without reason that the teachers of socialism spoke of a whole period of transition from capitalism to socialism and emphasised the "prolonged birth pangs" of the new society.[104] And this new society is again an abstraction which can come into being only by passing through a series of varied, imperfect and concrete attempts to create this or that socialist state.

    It is because Russia cannot advance from the economic situation now existing-here without traversing the ground

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which is common to state capitalism and to socialism (national accounting and control) that the attempt to frighten others as well as themselves with "evolution towards state capitalism" is utter theoretical nonsense. This is letting one's thoughts wander away from the true road of "evolution", and failing to understand what this road is. In practice, it is equivalent to pulling us back to small proprietary capitalism.

    In order to convince the reader that this is not the first time I have given this "high" appreciation of state capitalism and that I gave it before the Bolsheviks seized power, I take the liberty of quoting the following passage from my pamphlet, The Impending Catastrophe and How To Combat It, written in September 1917.

    "Try to substitute for the Junker-capitalist state, for the landowner-capitalist state, a revolutionary-democratic state, i.e., a state which in a revolutionary way abolishes all privileges and does not fear to introduce the fullest democracy in a revolutionary way. You will find that, given a really revolutionary-democratic state, state-monopoly capitalism inevitably and unavoidably implies a step . . . towards socialism. . . .

    "For socialism is merely the next step forward from state-capitalist monopoly. . . .

    "State-monopoly capitalism is a complete material preparation for socialism, the threshold of socialism, a rung on the ladder of history between which and the rung called socialism there are no intermediate rungs" (pp. 27 and 28).

    Please note that this was written when Kerensky was in power, that we are discussing not the dictatorship of the proletariat, not the socialist state, but the "revolutionary democratic" state. Is it not clear that the higher we stand on this political ladder, the more completely we incorporate the socialist state and the dictatorship of the proletariat in the Soviets, the less ought we to fear "state capitalism"? Is it not clear that from the material, economic and productive point of view, we are not yet on the "threshold" of socialism? Is it not clear that we cannot pass through the door of socialism without crossing the "threshold" we have not yet reached? . . .

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    The following is also extremely instructive.

    When we argued with Comrade Bukharin in the Central Executive Committee, he declared, among other things, that on the question of high salaries for specialists "they" were "to the right of Lenin", for in this case "they" saw no deviation from principle, bearing in mind Marx's words that under certain conditions it is more expedient for the working class to "buy out the whole lot of them''[105] (namely, the whole lot of capitalists, i.e., to buy from the bourgeoisie the land, factories, works and other means of production).

    That is a very interesting statement. . . .

    Let us consider Marx's idea carefully.

    Marx was talking about the Britain of the seventies of the last century, about the culminating point in the development of pre-monopoly capitalism. At that time Britain was a country in which militarism and bureaucracy were less pronounced than in any other, a country in which there was the greatest possibility of a "peaceful" victory for socialism in the sense of the workers "buying out" the bourgeoisie. And Marx said that under certain conditions the workers would certainly not refuse to buy out the bourgeoisie. Marx did not commit himself, or the future leaders of the socialist revolution, to matters of form, to ways and means of bringing about the revolution. He understood perfectly well that a vast number of new problems would arise, that the whole situation would change in the course of the revolution, and that the situation would change radically and often in the course of the revolution.

    Well, and what about Soviet Russia? Is it not clear that after the seizure of power by the proletariat and after the crushing of the exploiters' armed resistance and sabotage -- certain conditions prevail which correspond to those which might have existed in Britain half a century ago had a peaceful transition to socialism begun there? The subordination of the capitalists to the workers in Britain would have been assured at that time owing to the following circumstances: (1) the absolute preponderance of workers, of proletarians, in the population owing to the absence of a peasantry (in Britain in the seventies there where signs that gave hope of an extremely rapid spread of socialism among agricultural labourers); (2) the excellent organisation of the proletariat

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in trade unions (Britain was at that time the leading country in the world in this respect); (3) the comparatively high level of culture of the proletariat, which had been trained by centuries of development of political liberty; (4) the old habit of the well-organised British capitalists of settling political and economic questions by compromise -- at that time the British capitalists were better organised than the capitalists of any country in the world (this superiority has now passed to Germany). These were the circumstances which at the time gave rise to the idea that the peaceful subjugation of the British capitalists by the workers was possible.

    In our country, at the present time, this subjugation is assured by certain premises of fundamental significance (the victory in October and the suppression, from October to February, of the capitalists' armed resistance and sabotage). But instead of the absolute preponderance of workers, of proletarians, in the population, and instead of a high degree of organisation among them, the important factor of victory in Russia was the support the proletarians received from the poor peasants and those who had experienced sudden ruin. Finally, we have neither a high degree of culture nor the habit of compromise. If these concrete conditions are carefully considered, it will become clear that we now can and ought to employ a combination of two methods. On the one hand, we must ruthlessly suppress the uncultured capitalists who refuse to have anything to do with "state capitalism" or to consider any form of compromise, and who continue by means of profiteering, by bribing the poor peasants, etc., to hinder the realisation of the measures taken by the Soviets. On the other hand, we must use the method of compromise, or of buying out the cultured capitalists who agree to "state capitalism", who are capable of putting it into practice and who are useful to the proletariat as intelligent and experienced organisers of the largest types of enterprises, which actually supply products to tens of millions of people.

    Bukharin is an extremely well-read Marxist economist. He therefore remembered that Marx was profoundly right when he taught the workers the importance of preserving the organisation of large-scale production, precisely for the

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purpose of facilitating the transition to socialism. Marx taught that (as an exception, and Britain was then an exception) the idea was conceivable of paying the capitalists well, of buying them out, if the circumstances were such as to compel the capitalists to submit peacefully and to comeover to socialism in a cultured and organised fashion, provided they were paid well.

    But Bukharin went astray because he did not go deep enough into the specific features of the situation in Russia at the present time -- an exceptional situation when we, the Russian proletariat, are in advance of any Britain or any Germany as regards political system, as regards the strength of the workers' political power, but are behind the most backward West-European country as regards organising a good state capitalism, as regards our level of culture and the degree of material and productive preparedness for the "introduction" of socialism. Is it not clear that the specific nature of the present situation creates the need for a specific type of "buying out" operation which the workers must offer to the most cultured, the most talented, the most capable organisers among the capitalists who are ready to enter the service of the Soviet power and to help honestly in organising "state" production on the largest possible scale? Is it not clear that in this specific situation we must make every effort to avoid two mistakes, both of which are of a petty-bourgeois nature? On the one hand, it would be a fatal mistake to declare that since there is a discrepancy between our economic "forces" and our political strength, it "follows" that we should not have seized power. Such an argument can be advanced only by a "man in a muffler", who forgets that there will always be such a "discrepancy", that it always exists in the development of nature as well as in the development of society, that only by a series of attempts -- each of which, taken by itself, will be one-sided and will suffer from certain inconsistencies -- will complete socialism be created by the revolutionary co-operation of the proletarians of all countries.

    On the other hand, it would be an obvious mistake to give free rein to ranters and phrase-mongers who allow themselves to be carried away by the "dazzling" revolutionary spirit, but who are incapable of sustained, thoughtful and

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deliberate revolutionary work which takes into account the most difficult stages of transition.

    Fortunately, the history of the development of revolutionary parties and of the struggle that Bolshevism waged against them has left us a heritage of sharply defined types, of which the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries and anarchists are striking examples of bad revolutionaries. They are now shouting hysterically, choking and shouting themselves hoarse, against the "compromise" of the "Right Bolsheviks". But they are incapable of understanding what is bad in "compromise", and why "compromise" has been justly condemned by history and the course of the revolution.

    Compromise in Kerensky's time meant the surrender of power to the imperialist bourgeoisie, and the question of power is the fundamental question of every revolution. Compromise by a section of the Bolsheviks in October November 1917 either meant that they feared the proletariat seizing power or wished to share power equally, not only with "unreliable fellow-travellers" like the Left Socialist Revolutionaries, but also with enemies, with the Chernovists and the Mensheviks. The latter would inevitably have hindered us in fundamental matters, such as the dissolution of the Constituent Assembly, the ruthless suppression of the Bogayevskys, the universal setting up of the Soviet institutions, and in every act of confiscation.

    Now power has been seized, retained and consolidated in the hands of a single party, the party of the proletariat, even without the "unreliable fellow-travellers". To speak of compromise at the present time when there is no question, and can be none, of sharing power, of renouncing the dictatorship of the proletariat over the bourgeoisie, is merely to repeat, parrot-fashion, words which have been learned by heart but not understood. To describe as "compromise" the fact that, having arrived at a situation when we can and must rule the country, we try to win over to our side, not grudging the cost, the most efficient people capitalism has trained and to take them into our service against small proprietary disintegration, reveals a total incapacity to think about the economic tasks of socialist construction.

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    Take a third form of state capitalism. The state enlists the capitalist as a merchant and pays him a definite commission on the sale of state goods and on the purchase of the produce of the small producer. A fourth form: the state leases to the capitalist entrepreneur an industrial establishment, oilfields, forest tracts, land, etc., which belong to the state, the lease being very similar to a concession agreement. We make no mention of, we give no thought or notice to, these two latter forms of state capitalism, not because we are strong and clever but because we are weak and foolish. We are afraid to look the "vulgar truth" squarely in the face, and too often yield to "exalting deception''.[106] We keep repeating that "we" are passing from capitalism to socialism, but do not bother to obtain a distinct picture of the "we". To keep this picture clear we must constantly have in mind the whole list -- without any exception -- of the constituent parts of our national economy, of all its diverse forms that I gave in my article of May 5, 1918. "We", the vanguard, the advanced contingent of the proletariat, are passing directly to socialism; but the advanced contingent is only a small part of the whole of the proletariat while the latter, in its turn, is only a small part of the whole population. If "we" are successfully to solve the problem of our immediate transition to socialism, we must understand what intermediary paths, methods, means and instruments are required for the transition from pre-capitalist relations to socialism. That is the whole point.

    Look at the map of the R.S.F.S.R. There is room for dozens of large civilised states in those vast areas which lie to the north of Vologda, the south-east of Rostov-on-Don and Saratov, the south of Orenburg and Omsk, and the north of Tomsk. They are a realm of patriarchalism,

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and semi- and downright barbarism. And what about the peasant backwoods of the rest of Russia, where scores of versts of country track, or rather of trackless country, lie between the villages and the railways, i.e., the material link with the big cities, large-scale industry, capitalism and culture? Isn't that also an area of wholesale patriarchalism, Oblomovism[107] and semi-barbarism?

    Is an immediate transition to socialism from the state of affairs predominating in Russia conceivable? Yes, it is, to a certain degree, but on one condition, the precise nature of which we now know thanks to a great piece of scientific work[108] that has been completed. It is electrification. If we construct scores of district electric power stations (we now know where and how these can and should be constructed), and transmit electric power to every village, if we obtain a sufficient number of electric motors and other machinery, we shall not need, or shall hardly need, any transition stages or intermediary links between patriarchalism and socialism. But we know perfectly well that it will take at least ten years only to complete the first stage of this "one" condition; this period can be conceivably reduced only if the proletarian revolution is victorious in such countries as Britain, Germany or the U.S.A.

    Over the next few years we must learn to think of the intermediary links that can facilitate the transition from patriarchalism and small production to socialism. "We" continue saying now and again that "capitalism is a bane and socialism is a boon". But such-an argument is wrong, because it fails to take into account the aggregate of the existing economic forms and singles out only two of them.

    Capitalism is a bane compared with socialism. Capitalism is a boon compared with medievalism, small production, and the evils of bureaucracy which spring from the dispersal of the small producers. Inasmuch as we are as yet unable to pass directly from small production to socialism, some capitalism is inevitable as the elemental product of small production and exchange; so that we must utilise capitalism (particularly by directing it into the channels of state capitalism) as the intermediary link between small production and socialism, as a means, a path, and a method of increasing the productive forces.

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    Look at the economic aspect of the evils of bureaucracy. We see nothing of them on May 5, 1918. Six months after the October Revolution, with the old bureaucratic apparatus smashed from top to bottom, we feel none of its evils.

    A year later, the Eighth Congress of the Russian Communist Party (March 18-23, 1919)[109] adopted a new Party Programme in which we spoke forthrightly of "a partial revival of bureaucracy within the Soviet system " -- not fearing to admit the evil, but desiring to reveal, expose and pillory it and to stimulate thought, will, energy and action to combat it.

    Two years later, in the spring of 1921, after the Eighth Congress of Soviets (December 1920), which discussed the evils of bureaucracy, and after the Tenth Congress of the Russian Communist Party (March 1921), which summed up the controversies closely connected with an analysis of these evils, we find them even more distinct and sinister. What are their economic roots? They are mostly of a dual character: on the one hand, a developed bourgeoisie needs a bureaucratic apparatus, primarily a military apparatus, and then a judiciary, etc., to use against the revolutionary movement of the workers (and partly of the peasants). That is something we have not got. Ours are class courts directed against the bourgeoisie. Ours is a class army directed against the bourgeoisie. The evils of bureaucracy are not in the army, but in the institutions serving it. In our country bureaucratic practices have different economic roots, namely, the atomised and scattered state of the small producer with his poverty, illiteracy, lack of culture, the absence of roads and exchange between agriculture and industry, the absence of connection and interaction between them. This is largely the result of the Civil War. We could not restore industry when we were blockaded, besieged on all sides, cut off from the whole world and later from the grain-bearing South, Siberia, and the coalfields. We could not afford to hesitate in introducing War Communism, or daring to go to the most desperate extremes: to save the workers' and peasants' rule we had to suffer an existence of semi-starvation and worse than semi-starvation, but to hold on at all costs, in spite of unprecedented ruin and the absence of economic intercourse. We did not allow ourselves

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to be frightened, as the Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks did (who, in fact, followed the bourgeoisie largely because they were scared). But the factor that was crucial to victory in a blockaded country -- a besieged fortress -- revealed its negative side by the spring of 1921, just when the last of the whiteguard forces were finally driven from the territory of the R.S.F.S.R. In the besieged fortress, it was possible and imperative to "lock up" all exchange; with the masses displaying extraordinary heroism this could be borne for three years. After that, the ruin of the small producer increased, and the restoration of large-scale in dustry was further delayed, and postponed. Bureaucratic practices, as a legacy of the "siege" and the superstructure built over the isolated and downtrodden state of the small producer, fully revealed themselves.

    We must learn to admit an evil fearlessly in order to combat it the more firmly, in order to start from scratch again and again; we shall have to do this many a time in every sphere of our activity, finish what was left undone and choose different approaches to the problem. In view of the obvious delay in the restoration of large-scale industry, the "locking up" of exchange between industry and agriculture has become intolerable. Consequently, we must concentrate on what we can do: restoring small industry, helping things from that end, propping up the side of the structure that has been half-demolished by the war and blockade. We must do everything possible to develop trade at all costs, without being afraid of capitalism, because the limits we have put to it (the expropriation of the landowners and of the bourgeoisie in the economy, the rule of the workers and peasants in politics) are sufficiently narrow and "moderate". This is the fundamental idea and economic significance of the tax in kind.

    All Party and Soviet workers must concentrate their efforts and attention on generating the utmost local initiative in economic development -- in the gubernias, still more in the uyezds, still more in the volosts and villages -- for the special purpose of immediately improving peasant farming, even if by "small" means, on a small scale, helping it by developing small local industry. The integrated state economic plan demands that this should become the focus

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of concern and "priority" effort. Some improvement here, closest to the broadest and deepest "foundation", will permit of the speediest transition to a more vigorous and successful restoration of large-scale industry.

    Hitherto the food supply worker has known only one fundamental instruction: collect 100 per cent of the grain appropriations. Now he has another instruction: collect 100 per cent of the tax in the shortest possible time and then collect another 100 per cent in exchange for the goods of large-scale and small industry. Those who collect 75 per cent of the tax and 75 per cent (of the second hundred) in exchange for the goods of large scale and small industry will be doing more useful work of national importance than those who collect 100 per cent of the tax and 55 per cent (of the second hundred) by means of exchange. The task of the food supply worker now becomes more complicated. On the one hand, it is a fiscal task: collect the tax as quickly and as efficiently as possible. On the other hand, it is a general economic task: try to direct the co-operatives, assist small industry, develop local initiative in such a way as to increase the exchange between agriculture and industry and put it on a sound basis. Our bureaucratic practices prove that we are still doing a very bad job of it. We must not be afraid to admit that in this respect we still have a great deal to learn from the capitalist. We shall compare the practical experience of the various gubernias, uyezds, volosts and villages: in one place private capitalists, big and small, have achieved so much; those are their approximate profits. That is the tribute, the fee, we have to pay for the "schooling". We shall not mind paying for it if we learn a thing or two. That much has been achieved in a neighbouring locality through co-operation. Those are the profits of the co-operatives. And in a third place, that much has been achieved by purely state and communist methods (for the present, this third case will be a rare exception).

    It should be the primary task of every regional economic centre and economic conference of the gubernia executive committees immediately to organise various experiments, or systems of "exchange" for the surplus stocks remaining after the tax in kind has been paid. In a few months' time practical results must be obtained for comparison and study.

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Local or imported salt; paraffin oil from the nearest town; the handicraft wood-working industry; handicrafts using local raw materials and producing certain, perhaps not very important, but necessary and useful, articles for the peasants; "green coal" (the utilisation of small local water power resources for electrification), and so on and so forth -- all this must be brought into play in order to stimulate exchange between industry and agriculture at all costs. Those who achieve the best results in this sphere, even by means of private capitalism, even without the co-operatives, or without directly transforming this capitalism into state capitalism, will do more for the cause of socialist construction in Russia than those who "ponder over" the purity of communism, draw up regulations, rules and instructions for state capitalism and the co-operatives, but do nothing practical to stimulate trade.

    Isn 't it paradoxical that private capital should be helping socialism?

    Not at all. It is, indeed, an irrefutable economic fact. Since this is a small-peasant country with transport in an extreme state of dislocation, a country emerging from war and blockade under the political guidance of the proletariat -- which controls the transport system and large-scale industry -- it inevitably follows, first, that at the present moment local exchange acquires first-class significance, and, second, that there is a possibility of assisting socialism by means of private capitalism (not to speak of state capitalism).

    Let's not quibble about words. We still have too much of that sort of thing. We must have more variety in practical experience and make a wider study of it. In certain circumstances, the exemplary organisation of local work, even on the smallest scale, is of far greater national importance than many branches of central state work. These are precisely the circumstances now prevailing in peasant farming in general, and in regard to the exchange of the surplus products of agriculture for industrial goods in particular. Exemplary organisation in this respect, even in a single volost, is of far greater national importance than the "exemplary" improvement of the central apparatus of any People Commissariat; over the past three and a half years our central

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apparatus has been built up to such an extent that it has managed to acquire a certain amount of harmful routine; we cannot improve it quickly to any extent, we do not know how to do it. Assistance in the work of radically improving it, securing an influx of fresh forces, combating bureaucratic practices effectively and overcoming this harmful routine must come from the localities and the lower ranks, with the model organisation of a ''complex", even if on a small scale. I say "complex", meaning not just one farm, one branch of industry, or one factory, but a totality of economic relations, a totality of economic exchange, even if only in a small locality.

    Those of us who are doomed to remain at work in the centre will continue the task of improving the apparatus and purging it of bureaucratic evils, even if only on a modest and immediately achievable scale. But the greatest assistance in this task is coming, and will come, from the localities. Generally speaking, as far as I can observe, things are better in the localities than at the centre; and this is understandable, for, naturally, the evils of bureaucracy are concentrated at the centre. In this respect, Moscow cannot but be the worst city, and in general the worst "locality", in the Republic. In the localities we have deviations from the average to the good and the bad sides, the latter being less frequent than the former. The deviations towards the bad side are the abuses committed by former government officials, landowners, bourgeois and other scum who play up to the Communists and who sometimes commit abominable outrages and acts of tyranny against the peasantry. This calls for a terrorist purge, summary trial and the firing squad. Let the Martovs, the Chernovs, and non-Party philistines like them, beat their breasts and exclaim: "I thank Thee, Lord, that I am not as 'these', and have never accepted terrorism." These simpletons "do not accept terrorism" because they choose to be servile accomplices of the whiteguards in fooling tbe workers and peasants. The Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks "do not accept terrorism" because under the flag of "socialism" they are fulfilling their function of placing the masses at the mercy of the whiteguard terrorism. This was proved by the Kerensky regime and the Kornilov

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putsch in Russia, by the Kolchak regime in Siberia, and by Menshevism in Georgia. It was proved by the heroes of the Second International and of the "Two-and-a-Half"[110] International in Finland, Hungary, Austria, Germany, Italy, Britain, etc. Let the flunkey accomplices of whiteguard terrorism wallow in their repudiation of all terrorism. We shall speak the bitter and indubitable truth: in countries beset by an unprecedented crisis, the collapse of old ties, and the intensification of the class struggle after the imperialist war of 1914-18 -- and that means all the countries of the world -- terrorism cannot be dispensed with, notwithstanding the hypocrites and phrase-mongers. Either the whiteguard, bourgeois terrorism of the American, British (Ireland), Italian (the fascists), German, Hungarian and other types, or Red, proletarian terrorism. There is no middle course, no "third" course, nor can there be any.

    The deviations towards the good side are the success achieved in combating the evils of bureaucracy, the great attention shown for the needs of the workers and peasants, and the great care in developing the economy, raising the productivity of labour and stimulating local exchange between agriculture and industry. Although the good examples are more numerous than the bad ones, they are, nevertheless, rare. Still, they are there. Young, fresh communist forces, steeled by civil war and privation, are coming forward in all localities. We are still doing far too little to promote these forces regularly from lower to higher posts. This can and must be done more persistently, and on a wider scale than at present. Some workers can and should be transferred from work at the centre to local work. As leading men of uyezds, and of volosts, where they can organise economic work as a whole on exemplary lines, they will do far more good, and perform work of far greater national importance, than by performing some junction at the centre. The exemplary organisation of the work will help to train new workers and provide examples that other districts could follow with relative ease. We at the centre shall be able to do a great deal to encourage the other districts all over the country to "follow" the good examples, and even make it mandatory for them to do so.

    By its very nature, the work of developing "exchange"

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between agriculture and industry, the exchange of after-tax surpluses for the output of small, mainly handicraft, industry, calls for independent, competent and intelligent local initiative. That is why it is now extremely important from the national standpoint to organise the work in the uyezds and volosts on exemplary lines. In military affairs, during the last Polish war, for example, we were not afraid of departing from the bureaucratic hierarchy, "downgrading", or transferring members of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Repub]ic to lower posts (while allowing them to retain their higher rank at the centre). Why not now transfer several members of the All-Russia Central Executive Committee, or members of collegiums, or other high-ranking comrades, to uyezd or even volost work? Surely, we have not become so "bureaucratised" as to "be ashamed" of that. And we shall find scores of workers in the central bodies who will be glad to accept. The economic development of the whole Republic will gain enormously; and the exemplary vo]osts, or uyezds, will play not only a great, but a positively crucial and historic role.

    Incidenta]ly, we should note as a small but significant circumstance the necessary change in our attitude to the problem of combating profiteering. We must foster "proper" trade, which is one that does not evade state control; it is to our advantage to develop it. But profiteering, in its politico-economic sense, cannot be distinguished from "proper" trade. Freedom of trade is capitalism; capitalism is profiteering. It would be ridiculous to ignore this.

    What then should be done? Shall we declare profiteering to be no longer punishable?

    No. We must revise and redraft all the laws on profiteering, and declare all pilfering and every direct or indirect, open or concealed evasion of state control, supervision and accounting to be a punishable offence (and in fact prosecuted with redoubled severity). It is by presenting the question in this way (the Council of People's Commissars has already started, that is to say, it has ordered that work be started, on the revision of the anti-profiteering laws) that we shall succeed in directing the rather inevitable but necessary development of capitalism into the channels of state capitalism.

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    Of course, it is easy to be cleverer than conceited simpletons like Chernov, the petty-bourgeois phrase-monger, or like Martov, the knight of philistine reformism doctored to pass for Marxism. Properly speaking, the point is not that Milyukov, as an individual, has more brains, but that, because of his class position, the party leader of the big bourgeoisie sees and understands the class essence and political interaction of things more clearly than the leaders of the petty bourgeoisie, tbe Chernovs and Martovs. For the bourgeoisie is really a class force which, under capitalism, inevitably rules both under a monarchy and in the most democratic republic, and which also inevitably enjoys the support of the world bourgeoisie. But the petty bourgeoisie, i.e., all the heroes of the Second International and of the "Two-and-a-Half" International, cannot, by the very economic nature of things, be anything else than the expression of class impotence; hence the vacillation, phrase-mongering and helplessness. In 1789, the petty bourgeois could still be great revolutionaries. In 1848, they were ridiculous and pathetic. Their actual role in 1917-21 is that of abominable agents and out-and-out servitors of reaction, be their names Chernov, Martov, Kautsky, MacDonald, or what have you.

    Martov showed himself to be nothing but a philistine Narcissus when he declared in his Berlin journal[111] that Kronstadt not only adopted Menshevik slogans but also proved that there could be an anti-Bolshevik movement which did not entirely serve the interests of the whiteguards, the capitalists and the landowners. He says in effect: "Let us shut our eves to the fact that all the genuine whiteguards hailed the Kronstadt mutineers and collected funds in aid of Kronstadt through the banks!" Compared with the Chernovs and Martovs, Milyukov is right, for he is revealing the true tactics of the real whiteguard force, the force of the capitalists and landowners. He declares: "It does not matter whom we support, be they anarchists or any sort of Soviet government, as long as the Bolsheviks are overthrown, as long as there is a shift in power; it does not matter whether to the right or to the left, to the

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Mensheviks or to the anarchists, as long as it is away from the Bolsheviks. As for the rest -- 'we', the Milyukovs, 'we', the capitalists and landowners, will do the rest 'ourselves'; we shall slap down the anarchist pygmies, the Chernovs and the Martovs, as we did Chernov and Maisky in Siberia, the Hungarian Chernovs and Martovs in Hungary, Kautsky in Germany and the Friedrich Adlers and Co. in Vienna." The real, hard-headed bourgeoisie have made fools of hundreds of these philistine Narcissuses -- whether Menshevik, Socialist-Revolutionary or non-party -- and have driven them out scores of times in all revolutions in all countries. History proves it. The facts bear it out. The Narcissuses will talk; the Milyukovs and whiteguards will act.

    Milyukov is absolutely right when he says, "If only there is a power shift away from the Bolsheviks, no matter whether it is a little to the right or to the left, the rest will take care of itself." This is class truth, confirmed by the history of revolutions in all countries, and by the centuries of modern history since the Middle Ages. The scattered small producers, the peasants, are economically and politically united either by the bourgeoisie (this has always been -- and will always be -- the case under capitalism in all countries, in all modern revolutions), or by the proletariat (that was the case in a rudimentary form for a very short period at the peak of some of the greatest revolutions in modern history; that has been the case in Russia in a more developed form in 1917-21). Only the Narcissuses will talk and dream about a "third " path, and a "third force".

    With enormous difficulty, and in the course of desperate struggles, the Bolsheviks have trained a proletarian vanguard that is capable of governing; they have created and successfully defended the dictatorship of the proletariat. After the test of four years of practical experience, the relation of class forces in Russia has become as clear as day: the steeled and tempered vanguard of the only revolutionary class; the vacillating petty-bourgeois element; and the Milyukovs, the capitalists and landowners, lying in wait abroad and supported by the world bourgeoisie. It is crystal-clear: only the latter are able to take advantage of any "shift of power ", and will certainly do so.

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    In the 1918 pamphlet I quoted above, this point uas put very clearly: "the principal enemy" is the "petty-bourgeois element". "Either we subordinate it to our control and accounting, or it will overthrow the workers' power as surely and as inevitably as the revolution was over thrown by the Napoleons and the Cavaignacs who sprang from this very soil of petty proprietorship. This is how the question stands. That is the only view we can take of the matter." (Excerpt from the pamphlet of May 5, 1918, cf. above.)

    Our strength lies in complete clarity and the sober consideration of all the existing class magnitudes, both Russian and international; and in the inexhaustible energy, iron resolve and devotion in struggle that arise from this. We have many enemies, but they are disunited, or do not know their own minds (like all the petty bourgeoisie, all the Martovs and Chernovs, all the non-party elements and anarchists). But we are united -- directly among ourselves and indirectly with tbe proletarians of all countries; we know just what we want. That is why we are invincible on a world scale, although this does not in the least preclude the possibility of defeat for individual proletarian revolutions for longer or shorter periods.

    There is good reason for calling the petty-bourgeois element an element, for it is indeed something that is most amorphous, indefinite and unconscious. The petty-bourgeois Narcissuses imagine that "universal suffrage" abolishes the nature of the small producer under capitalism. As a matter of fact, it helps the bourgeoisie, through the church, the press, the teachers, the police, the militarists and a thousand and one forms of economic oppression, to subordinate the scattered small producers. Ruin, want and the hard conditions of life give rise to vacillation: one day for the bourgeoisie, the next, for the proletariat. Only the steeled proletarian vanguard is capable of withstanding and overcoming this vacillation.

    The events of the spring of 1921 once again revealed the role of the Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks: they help the vacillating petty-bourgeois element to recoil from the Bolsheviks, to cause a "shift of power" in favour of the capitalists and landowners. The Mensheviks and

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Socialist-Revolutionaries have now learned to don the "non-party" disguise. This has been fully proved. Only fools now fail to see this and understand that we must not allow ourselves to be fooled. Non-Party conferences are not a fetish. They are valuable if they help us to come closer to the impassive masses -- the millions of working people still outside politics. They are harmful if they provide a platform for the Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries masquerading as "non-party" men. They are helping the mutinies, and the whiteguards. The place for Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries, avowed or in non-party guise, is not at a non-Party conference but in prison (or on foreign journals, side by side with the white guards; we were glad to let Martov go abroad). We can and must find other methods of testing the mood of the masses and coming closer to them. We suggest that those who want to play the parliamentary, constituent assembly and non-Party conference game, should go abroad; over there, by Martov's side, they can try the charms of "democracy" and ask Wrangel's soldiers about them. We have no time for this "opposition" at "conferences" game. We are surrounded by the world bourgeoisie, who are watching for every sign of vacillation in order to bring back "their own men", and restore the landowners and the bourgeoisie. We will keep in prison the Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries, whether avowed or in "non-party" guise.

    We shall employ every means to establish closer contacts with the masses of working people untouched by politics -- except such means as give scope to the Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries, and the vacillations that benefit Milyukov. In particular, we shall zealously draw into Soviet work, primarily economic work, hundreds upon hundreds of non-Party people, real non-Party people from the masses, the rank and file of workers and peasants, and not those who have adopted non-party colours in order to crib Menshevik and Socialist-Revolutionary instructions which are so much to Milyukov's advantage. Hundreds and thousands of non-Party people are working for us, and scores occupy very important and responsible posts. We must pay more attention to the way they work. We must do more to promote and test thousands and thousands of

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rank-and-file workers, to try them out systematically and persistently, and appoint hundreds of them to higher posts, if experience shows that they can fill them.

    Our Communists still do not have a sufficient understanding of their real duties of administration: they should not strive to do "everything themselves", running themselves down and failing to cope with everything, undertaking twenty jobs and finishing none. They should check up on the work of scores and hundreds of assistants, arrange to have their work checked up from below, i.e., by the real masses. They should direct the work and learn from those who have the knowledge (the specialists) and the experience in organising large-scale production (the capitalists). The intelligent Communist will not be afraid to learn from the military expert, although nine-tenths of the military experts are capable of treachery at every opportunity. The wise Communist will not be afraid to learn from a capitalist (whether a big capitalist concessionaire, a commission agent, or a petty capitalist co-operator, etc.), although the capitalist is no better than the military expert. Did we not learn to catch treacherous military experts in the Red Army, to bring out the honest and conscientious, and, on the whole, to utilise thousands and tens of thousands of military experts? We are learning to do the same thing (in an unconventional way) with engineers and teachers, although we are not doing it as well as we did it in the Red Army (there Denikin and Kolchak spurred us on, compelled us to learn more quickly, diligently and intelligently). We shall also learn to do it (again in an unconventional way) with the commission agents, with the buyers working for the state, the petty capitalist co-operators, the entrepreneur concessionaires, etc.

    The condition of the masses of workers and peasants needs to be improved right away. And we shall achieve this by putting new forces, including non-Party forces, to useful work. The tax in kind, and a number of measures connected with it, will facilitate this; we shall thereby cut at the economic root of the small producer's inevitable vacillations. And we shall ruthlessly fight the political vacillations, which benefit no one but Milyukov. The waverers are many, we are few. The waverers are disunited, we

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are united. The waverers are not economically independent, the proletariat is. The waverers don't know their own minds: they want to do something very badly, but Milyukov won't let them. We know what we want.

    And that is why we shall win.

  [102] Lenin began to work on The Tax in Kind pamphlet at the end of March 1921, just after the Tenth Party Congress, and finished it on April 21. He attached great importance to its earliest publication and distribution, because it explained the necessity of transition to the New Economic Policy. In early May, it was published as a pamphlet, and was soon after carried by the magazine Krasnaya Nov No. 1; it later appeared in pamphlet form in many towns, and was reprinted in part and in full in central and local papers. In 1921, it was translated into German, English and French.
    A snecial resolution of the Central Committee instructed all regional, gubernia and uyezd Party committees to use the pamphlet to explain the New Economic Policy to the working people.    [p.329]

  ^[103] Novaya Zhizn (New Llfe ) -- a daily published in Petrograd from April 18 (May 1), 1917, to July 1918 by a group of Menshevik internationalists and the writers who contributed to the magazine Letopis (Chronicle ).
    Lenin said their prevailing mood was one of intellectual scepticism, which is an expression of and a cover up for lack of principle.
    The newspaper was hostile to thc October Revolution and the Soviet power. From June 1, 1918, it appeared simultanoously in Moscow and Petrograd but both editions were closed down in July 1918.
    Vperyod (Forward ) -- a daily published in Moscow from March 1917, first by the Moscow Menshevik organisation and then as the organ of the Moscow and Central Region Committees of thc R.S.D.L.P. (Mensheviks), and from April 2, 1918, as the organ of the Central Committce of the Mensheviks. L. Martov, F. I. Dan and A. S. Martynov were among its editors. On May 10, 1918 it was closed down by the All-Russia Extraordinary Commission (Cheka) for counter-revolutionary activity and its editors were committed for trial. On May 14, the paper resumed publication under the name Vsegda Vperyod! (Always Forward! ) and was finally closed down in February 1919 under an All-Russia C.E.C. decision.    [p.335]

  ^[104] See Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme (Marx and Engels, Selected Works, Vol. II, Moscow, 1962, p. 24).    [p.335]

  ^[105] See Engels, The Peasant Question In France and Germany (Marx and Engels, Selected Works, Vol. II, Moscow, 1962, p. 438).    [p.337]

  ^[106] A paraphrase of Pushkin's words from his poem A Hero, in which he says that he prefers the stimulating falsehood to a mass of sordid truths    [p.349]

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  ^[107] Oblomov -- a Russian landowner from I. A. Goncharov's eponymous novel, personifying sluggishness, stagnation and inertia.    [p.350]

  ^[108] The reference is to the Plan for the Electrification of Russia worked out by a State Commission which consisted of the best scien tists and specialists. It was the first long-range integrated state plan for laying the material foundation of socialism through electrification. The plan was published as a pamphlet for the Eighth All-Russia Congress of Soviets and was approved by it.    [p.350]

  ^[109] The Eighth Party Congress, held in Moscow from March 18 to 23, 1919, was attended by 301 delegates with voice and vote, and 102 with voice only. They represented 313,766 Party members.
    The items on the agenda were: 1) Report of the Central Committee, 2) Programme of the R.C.P.(B.); 3) Formation of the Communist International; 4) The military situation and military policy; 5) Work in the countryside; 6) Organisational questions; 7) Election to the Central Committee.
    Lenin delivered the opening and closing speeches at the Congress, gave the report of the Central Committee, and the reports on the Party Programme, work in the countryside, and military policy.
    The key problem before the Congress was the new Party Programme, worked out under Lenin's guidance and with his participation. The Congress approved Lenin's draft Programme, and rejected Bukharin's anti-Bolshevik proposals.
    The Congress also supported Lenin's programme on the nationalities question and rejected Pyatakov's and Bukharin's proposals to exclude from the Programme the paragraph on the right of nations to self-determination.
    After Lenin's summing-up speech on the Party Programme, the Congress decided to "adopt the draft Programme as a whole" and refer it to a programme commission for final editing. The latter asked Lenin to write "The draft Third Paragraph of the Political Section of the Programme (For the Programme Commission of the Eighth Party Congress)", which it later adopted. On March 22, the Congress approved the final text of the Programme.
    Another key problem was the attitude to the middle peasants. In his speeches, specifically in his report on work in the countryside, Lenin substantiated the Party's new policy: transition from the policy of neutralisation to solid alliance between the working class and the middle peasantry, based on support from the poor peasants and struggle against the kulaks, with the proletariat retaining its leadership of the alliance. Lenin first put forward the slogan in late November 1918. The Congress adopted Lenin's "Resolution on the Attitude Towards the Middle Peasantry".
    While discussing the military situation, the Party's military policy and Red Army organisation, the so-called Military Opposition came out against the Central Committee's theses (the Opposition included former "Left Communists" -- V. M. Smirnov,

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G. I. Safarov, and G. L. Pyatakov -- and some independents). The Military Opposition favoured retention of some guerrilla methods, and opposed strict discipline in the arrmy and enlistment of the services of old military specialists. At a closed plenary session on March 21, Lenin spoke in defence of the C.C. theses, and was supported by most of the speakers, who denounced the Military Opposition. The mistakes and shortcomings of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic and its Chairman, Trotsky, were exposed and severely criticised in the military section and at plenary sessions.
    The C.C. theses were assumed as a basis by a majority of 174 against 95, and a co-ordination commission worked out a resolution on the military question based on Lenin's directives, which was adopted by the Congress (with only one abstention).
    Lenin's ideas on the military question were incorporated in tbe Party Programme and served as guidance in military organisation.
    The resolution on the organisational question denounced tbe Sapronov-Osinsky opportunist group, which denied the Party's leadership within the system of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
    The decision on Party organisation stressed the need to raise the standards for admission of non-worker and non-peasant elements into the Party, to maintain its social composition. It was decided to carry out a general registration of all Party members by May 1, 1919. The Congress rejected the federal principle of Party organisation and approved the principle of an integrated centralised Communist Party working undor the guidance of a single Central Committee.
    The newly elected Centrnl Committee was headed by Lenin. The Congress welcomed the establishment of the Third (Communist) International and adopted its platform.    [p.351]

  ^[110] An international association of Centrist parties and groups (temporarily made to leave the Second International by revolutionary-minded workers' masses) called the "Two-and-a-Half International". It was set up in Vienna in 1921 and broke up in 1923, when it rejoined the Second International.    [p.356]

  ^[111] The Menshevik émigré journal, Sotsialistichesky Vestnik (Socialist Herald ), was founded by L. Martov. It was published in Berlin from 1921, and later in Paris. It is now published in the United States.    [p.359]