A New Political Situation

...It would be naive to suppose that after shaking off the communist dictatorships, with their misappropriation of the socialist vocabulary, people will quickly turn to new social innovations and experiments...

...Remove such political constraints even partially and the inherent contradictions and flaws of the command economy are revealed...

...But remember also that it is only some twenty years since several of the major capitalist nations (the United States, France) were wracked by severe social crisis...

...Most powerful of all: the two combined...

...But we are still suffering from the massive sleeping sickness that is a Reagan legacy...

...9• Within Poland and to a lesser extent Hungary there has been a notable shift to the right among former dissidents...

...If the developments that I've tried to sketch out occur in Europe, then there is a possibility that a new generation of thinkers will emerge to give the idea of democratic socialism a new urgency and strength...

...But we shall persist in trying to advance and develop fresh versions of the socialist idea, now often called "market socialism" —though that is a concept which needs study and elaboration, we must not reduce it to a mere slogan...

...Or it can mean a mixed economy, with a "social market" —some state-owned segments, some cooperatives, some private enterprise...

...Partial would be enough, and then there might be new leaders, new forces propelling the Soviet Union toward greater freedom...

...Well, he was, but in the best sense of that term...

...One detects a nasty Schadenfreude among certain "sophisticated" analysts, even in some liberal publications, regarding the likely failure of Gorbachev's reforms—to say nothing of a sinister desire/expectation in some Washington circles (Eagleburger, Cheney) who prefer the known evils (to them comforts...

...Who today can believe the United States is the leading political force in the world...

...Let's be clear: Gorbachev is not "our" man...

...everything is in flux...

...4. A coup removing Gorbachev would be a disaster for the Soviet people and for the world at large...

...It One possible—by now, probable—consequence of all these developments is a new alignment of political forces in Europe...

...German Social Democrats have made an interesting proposal for a federation of the two Germanies as a transition to unity...

...Let us bear in mind that the partly real and partly apparent strength of capitalism today is a relative one...

...In Hungary, the CP has rechristened itself as a "Socialist party," while losing a large portion of its membership...

...He is not, so far as we can tell, a liberal or a democrat...

...In the United States there are terrible social problems: decaying cities, a growing underclass, large-scale poverty, the drug epidemic, social pathology and dislocation, and so on...

...The very fact that an interesting discussion is taking place in the Soviet Union on whether or not it can or should be called socialist, with some bold theorists asserting that it should not be, indicates that there may be some basis for my speculation...

...It looks healthy by comparison to the communist states...

...The question of a reunified Germany takes on a new urgency, not immediately perhaps, but within several years...

...There's not much use in applying the usual politicalsociological labels...

...that dissident political organizations have been formed throughout the country—all remarkable...

...The reconstruction of shattered economies will require the shutting down of obsolete industries, with major loss of employment...

...Europe is going through a postrevolutionary or post—counterrevolutionary period (it's not always possible to tell one from the other...

...that political-intellectual debates concerning the Soviet past, including the role of the once untouchable Lenin, rage in the Soviet press...

...They have a right to their skepticism...

...The changes now occurring in the Soviet Union—these constitute the enabling basis for the changes in Eastern Europe—are of a magnitude such as no one predicted...

...About none of these has the Bush administration made the faintest effort at solution—its only urgent socioeconomic proposal has been to cut the capital gains tax, which would further widen the already scandalous maldistribution of income and wealth...

...Notions about the permanent stabilization of liberal capitalism (to say nothing abut the nonsense regarding "the end of history") are wildly optimistic at best, and simply fatuous at worst...

...Despite all the theories positing a dark night of the soul in Stalinist and post-Stalinist Russia—and there was plenty of darkness!—it now seems as if, somehow, a strand or a trace of socialist and/or democratic idealism survived there through the decades...

...Meanwhile, as we watch the events in Europe with amazement and hope, there is plenty of work to do...

...but right now there is a groundswell of sentiment rejecting "socialism" because of its alleged failures in Eastern Europe...

...Sympathetic as we are to the aspirations of national and ethnic groups oppressed by Moscow, we hope that their agitation will not reach a point where it sets off armed conflict or Russian chauvinist backlash...

...By the time you read these remarks, we will know better whether the East German regime can survive the crisis...

...What will replace the communist regimes is an open question...

...It can be a code word for pureandsimple capitalism such as exists nowhere in the world...

...the present politicalideological atmosphere could easily be transformed in a few years...

...Theories of totalitarianism that were valuable or suggestive a few decades ago are of little use today...

...That a proposal for a multiparty regime should even be discussed by a committee of the Soviet legislature, though it's not likely to be enacted right away...

...today, however one rates the prospects for perestroika, it is at least a significant possibly...

...I say more-or-less because even modest economic improvement should suffice to preserve the dynamic of Gorbachev's changes and to prevent the muchrumored military-bureaucratic coup...

...of the cold war to the unmeasured possibilities of a more-or-less successfully reformed Soviet Union...

...The White House shows no interest in trying to cope with domestic social problems, and it shows little capacity for recognizing the enormous historical opportunities offered by recent European events...

...For vast numbers of people in Europe "socialism" means what they have lived under or seen in Russia and Eastern Europe...

...If it does, that will be possible only through deep-going reforms that must undermine its monopoly of power...

...Hundreds of thousands of 88 • DISSENT Glasnost Watch people have been demonstrating in the East German cities, with a deeper spontaneous energy than anything shown elsewhere...

...Several years ago this would have seemed a sheer fantasy...

...economic power, as the success of the Japanese economy poses an immediate threat...

...No one knows what the economic outcome will be in the Soviet Union, but if we had an administration in Washington not committed in about equal parts to conservatism and somnolence, it would be doing its best to help Gorbachev with the Soviet economy—if for no other reason than that such a policy would almost certainly be conducive to world peace...

...wild and sterile takeovers in place of economic development...

...No economic or social policy ever succeeds entirely: not in the East, not in the West...

...more probably, the current talk about the "free market" mirrors confusion and uncertainty as to what should be done next...

...But, as Leon Wieseltier has remarked, President Bush is not in the mood for history, and his advisers are busy watching his popularity ratings in the polls...

...Pitiable is the word for the nostalgia expressed by some in the Bush administration for the good old days of the cold war...

...One would accordingly hope that the Bush administration would show WINTER • 1990 • 89 Glasnost Watch a greater responsiveness to the possibilities for mutual reductions of arms and for cutting a swollen military budget...

...It seems—so far—the most widespread of the popular revolts in Eastern Europe...

...Also on the agenda is the idea of a federation, formal or informal, of Central European states...

...A sense of timing is required here...

...There is much talk in Poland and Hungary, as also in the West, about a "free market...

...A good question, but one that needn't be answered right away...

...but liberals and democrats, as well as democratic socialists, have a stake in at least his partial success...

...We may cry out—as we have and will continue to—that this is not socialism, it is a violation and travesty of socialism...

...in the USSR, the resumption of the cold war and the arms race, and the breakdown of efforts toward a united, democratic Europe...

...But socialists would also need to argue against such a choice and to warn of likely pitfalls...

...But if anything like laissez-faire is actually undertaken, severe social strife is bound to follow...

...As the cold war winds down, the tensions and conflicts within "the West" (in which category Japan must now be included) will probably intensify...

...There may instead be a strong desire for stability, peace, rest...

...Right now, it serves as a portmanteau term for a variety of possible social arrangements...

...Expectations that "Third World" ideologiesCastroite or populist-nationalist—would exert a powerful appeal have been disappointed...

...There is still, thank heaven, surprise in history...

...For people on the democratic left there are grounds for both optimism and pessimism...

...The two most powerful political ideas these last few decades have been democracy and nationalism...

...And Viva Prague q WINTER • 1990 • 91...

...11• Whatever the new political alignments in Europe, and whatever the rapidity with which the two main blocs—NATO and the Warsaw Pact— come to seem irrelevant, we can say with a certain confidence that as long as there isn't a coup in Moscow, the threat of a nuclear war is not, of course, eliminated, but greatly reduced...

...We will continue to offer fundamental criticisms of the status quo, drawing upon socialist values though not necessarily confined to socialist positions...

...that the Soviet foreign minister should openly declare the invasion of Afghanistan to have been illegal and immoral (can you imagine a U.S...

...But what does that actually mean...

...That for half a century now we socialists have been persistent and principled critics of the totalitarian states and their command economies— who except a few people on the left and some scholarly types know this...

...So let me here put down some quite obvious points, with no pretense to originality or comprehensiveness, in order to provide a basis for discussion...

...2. A major consequence or accompaniment of these developments is the virtual winding down of the cold war...

...Why...

...It is only a few years since the United States suffered a recession not very different from a depression...

...It is a bitter irony that we should continue to pay for the crimes of Stalinism...

...Theories can wait...

...Probably, the mixed economy is the most realistic option...

...The optimism concerns the future of Europe...

...Perhaps...

...Imagine a Soviet Union that has managed to solve some of its economic problems, perhaps with help from the West, and which has taken a few more steps toward democracy...

...If, through free elections, the people of Poland or Hungary—who, it should be recalled, never chose communist rule but had it imposed on them by force—were to opt for a return to capitalism, socialists would regret this choice but would support the right of these peoples to make it...

...And if indeed that is socialism, they are quite right to reject it utterly...

...And it's quite clear what the outcome of the cold war has been: a decisive victory for the West (in part for democratic capitalism, in part for social democratic welfare states, with the relative weights of these two still to be determined...

...In the European parliament, soon to have enlarged powers, the largest political bloc will consist of the Social Democrats in tacit alliance with the Italian Communists...

...In Italy the CP, while suffering major problems, has transformed itself into something close to a social democratic party...

...deterioration of the industrial base, and so on...

...One can understand why, after decades of suffering from a sclerotic command economy...

...O. In Poland and Hungary the communists, until recently possessing absolute power, have now ceded significant portions of their rule—though in both countries the nomenklatura (party-state-industrial bureaucracy) still survives as a force...

...Still, we should be honest about this...

...Breakdown, conflict, struggle: all are intrinsic to social life, and even if tomorrow communism were wiped off the earth, these would still be with us...

...My short-run pessimism concerns the idea of socialism...

...These upheavals, at a moment when the opposition in East Germany still has to create itself as an organized force, will remind some of us of Rosa Luxemburg's theory of spontaneity—that in certain historical circumstances the masses act on their own, with little or no leadership and without the dubious blessings of a "vanguard...

...If you believe in democracy, you must accept its outcomes...

...We have lived to see the end of Stalinism/communism as a serious political force, everywhere except in a few underdeveloped countries...

...All of this suggests that there is a good possibility for a social democratic path in Europe—toward the spread and strengthening of welfare states, even if some of the participants use other political labels...

...Without a utopian element, there can be no useful politics...

...But let me venture a speculation...

...Imagine, again, the possibilities for some sort of compact in behalf of incremental social progress across the European continent, marked first of all by major disarmament, and then by help to Third World nations, protection of workers threatened by multinational corporations, ecological steps shared by many nations, and so on...

...But will circumstances allow this...

...In America we are saddled with an administration that seems to be without any serious convictions—apart from the need to cut capital gains taxes...

...5. A major change in European politics now seems final: The communist movement is exhausted, in a state of extreme, probably terminal crisis, torn apart by inner divisions and major defections...

...This means that, fairly soon if not immediately, there should be new opportunities for social democratic parties...

...Right now, democratic capitalism is in a relatively advantageous position, and for many people in Eastern Europe it has an understandable appeal...

...but think of the enormous changes that have already occurred these past few years...

...3. Much—in a sense, just about everything— depends on the outcome of perestroika, and this, of course, is very chancy...

...the sensible thing is to watch without preconceptions...

...The latter are apparently seeking closer informal relations with the Socialist International— as may a number of East European groups in the next few years...

...When Kirkpatrick acknowledges that she was mistaken, Dissent will be among the first to let the world know...

...Meanwhile, the internationalization of capital makes it increasingly difficult for unions to protect workers and calls into question the continued effectiveness of the Keynesian financial measures and social democratic reforms upon which the prosperity of the West during the post-war years has in part been based...

...Secretary of State saying that about Vietnam...

...In France the Communist party (CP) has been driven into a sectarian corner...

...The decline of the Soviet and East European economies suggests that a centralized command economy can function with even a modicum of success only if it employs outright terror or a severe authoritarianism...

...Remarkable transitions in these countries are occurring peacefully, thereby calling into question the neoconservative (Kirkpatrick) thesis that there could not be a peaceful transition from communist power to democracy such as occurred from fascist to democratic regimes in Spain and Greece...

...Workers' rights could thereby be protected against an increasingly mobile international capital, but still more, a whole new socio-political climate might emerge...

...Two rightwing administrations in the United States have left a legacy of enormous structural deficits and trade imbalances...

...7. As these notes are being written, the upheaval in East Germany grows in extent and depth...

...The question may therefore arise: What kind of society is the Soviet Union today...

...if Solidarity, either through the government or as a union, fails to provide a safety net for these displaced workers, it will suffer serious losses, possibly to the former "official" unions, which, in the new circumstances, have already made some gains and displayed a certain militancy...

...that the Donetz miners were able to strike and win...

...If the European Social Democrats show even a touch of imagination, they will see that the ferment in Eastern Europe offers them fresh opportunities for creating a continentwide bloc of the democratic left (Social Democrats, Greens, new groups in Eastern Europe whatever their names...

...that national minorities in the Soviet republics can freely agitate for independence...

...8. One likely consequence of the remarkable events in Poland and Hungary, especially among younger people, may be a turning away from politics entirely, in favor of "American-style" diversions: sports, music, clothes, all accompanied by a deep skepticism and disdain for political agendas and ideas...

...Today Castroite Cuba, once admired by many naive leftists, is one of the most regressive communist nations...

...This marks one important difference of origins between the Nazi and Stalinist forms of totalitarianism...

...There are some hopeful signs—the recent election of a number of black mayors, the growing assertiveness of American women in defending their right to choose whether or not to have abortions...

...It can refer to schemes, not very precise at this point, for "market socialism" — an idea not likely to flourish in the present East European climate, especially in poverty-stricken Poland...

...Grim as the current economic situation is in the Soviet Union, it would be quite as foolish to suppose disaster there to be inevitable as it was a few decades ago to declare that capitalism had entered its "final crisis...

...It would probably signal a return to authoritarianisin (party/military junta...

...These parties are intellectually discredited, politically bankrupt— and what's more, recognize themselves as such...

...Imagine further an Eastern Europe that (except for Albania) follows the paths of Poland and Hungary...

...I will number them for easy reference...

...Does this seem far away...

...Seven or eight years ago the Hungarian writer George Konrad suggested this in a conversation, and I thought he was being "utopian...

...moods change quickly...

...Perhaps there is no "final crisis...

...Alas, we continue to pay for the crimes of Stalinism...

...The emergence of the European Economic Community poses a potential challenge to U.S...

...that laws proposing the abolition of censorship are on the agenda...

...Some Polish intellectuals are evidently infatuated with the notion of a Thatcherite laissez-faire economy...

...In several of the capitalist democracies, unemployment continues at intolerable heights...

...In Poland Solidarity is almost certain to be torn—perhaps torn apart—between its presence in the new government and its obligations as a trade union...

...90 • DISSENT glasnost Watch Politics in the modem world is extremely volatile...

...Quite understandable: people are fed up with rhetoric, slogans, programs...

...The Western economies, despite recurrent WINTER • 1990 • 87 Glasnost Watch (sometimes severe) crises, have shown considerable resilience...

...In part, this is due to social democratic reforms and Keynesian measures often initiated by the European democratic left...