CUBANS COME TO CLOSER GRIPS WITH THE BUREAUCRATIC DANGER»
By Joseph Hansen
The problem of the. struggle against bureaucratism in a,workers state arose early in Cuba, reaching its first crisis with the battle against the grouping headed by Anibal Escalante, a functionary inherited from the.Communist party of the prerevolutionary period. The successful outcome of this particular struggle in 1962 testified to the capacity of the Cuban leadership to recognize the problem and their concern about coping with it. Besides the immediate effect on the Cuban Revolution, which was altogether favorable, the militant attitude of the Cuban leaders with regard to this crucial question served to give fresh encouragement and inspiration to friends and supporters of the Cuban work~ ers state everywhere. However, the measures instituted in 1962 proved to be inadequate. This testified not only to the stubbornness of the problem but also, perhaps, to an incomplete appreciation among the Cuban leaders of the nature of bureaucratism and what to do about it.
In the past year, Fidel Castro has returned to the problem in a rather emphatic way. His recent speeches reveal a certain worry about the persistence of the phenomenon and the difficulty of counteracting it. Granma, the official organ of the Central Committee of the Communist party of Cuba, has recently taken up the question in a vigorous way. One of the most interesting aspects is the effort to find a theoretical understanding of bureaucratism. This alone marks a considerable advance in view of the well~—known tendency of the Cuban revolutionists to rather disparage theory and to consider action alone to be sufficient to solve all problems.
A good example of the current thinking in Havana on the problem of bureaucratism is provided by the lengthy editorial in two parts which appeared in Granma and which was made available to the English-speaking world in a translation in the March 5 number of the English-language edition of the Cuban newspaper. World Outlook has reprinted the editorial below in its entirety.
The editorial is well worth studying. Of special interest is the obvious reflection in part II of living experience with the development of bureaucratism in a workers state.
Various limitations in the two parts of the editorial will not escape those familiar. with the contributions of Leon Trotsky on the subject. In part I of the editorial, for instance, the editors of Granma fail to explore how the ruling class in capitalist society is able to keep its bureaucrats under control normally. The editorial leaves the impression that it is due to psychological conditioning. This aspect, however, is secondary. The basic means are economic and political. The ruling class can hire and fire and use bribery of the most varied nature, the ultimate in awards being inclusion into their own ranks of occasional individuals from the "lower" levels of society.
If the editors of Granma were to pursue this line of inquiry, they would find the illuminating case of a fascist state, where the bureaucratic servant assumes the. prerogatives of the ruling class. A study of fascism is particularly instructive in gaining a basic theoretical appreciation of the complex problem of bureaucratism in capitalist society.
In part II of the editorial, we note a parallel limitation. Nothing is said about the reasons making it so difficult for the ruling class in a workers state -- the ruling class, of course, being the workers -~ to keep the bureaucrats under control. One of the main reasons pointed out by Trotsky is the comparative lack of political experience among the workers in contrast to the centuries of experience accumulated by the bourgeoisie and carefully handed down from generation to generation.
Again, it would prove instructive for the editors of Granma to inquire into the specific case of the Soviet Union where the bureaucracy actually crystallized into a hardened caste and usurped power. The basic material on this is readily available in the works of Trotsky.
The final point to be made is that just as the capitalists find it easier to control their bureaucrats under the conditions of bourgeois democracy, so the workers find it easiest to control their bureaucrats under the institutions of proletarian democracy. This was not the least of the reasons why Lenin was a strong advocate of proletarian democracy. Lenin's theory, of course, did not exist in a vacuum. His approach to the question, particularly as worked out in State and Revolution, should be considered in the light of the practical experience of the first great socialist revolution. Proletarian democracy was one of the essential means by which the Russian workers carried
forward their struggle in both 1905 and 1917. The specific institution, in addition to a revolutionary party that practiced genuine democracy as well as centralism, was soviets. Moreover -~ the Cubans should appreciate this -- the soviets provided a means of effective struggle in areas which most guerrilla fighters consider the most difficult of all: cities.
After the 1917 Revolution, the soviets continued to serve in Russia as the organs of power, the key institution of workers government. They were among the chief vehicles in fighting the bureaucratic danger and thus became one of the main targets of those seeking to usurp power. They were liquidated under Stalin.
It is to be hoped that the Cuban revolutionists will continue their dual approach to this problem; that is, both on the practical and theoretical level. If they maintain complete objectivity in probing all aspects of the question and do not hesitate to examine what history can really teach in this respect, there is no doubt as to the ultimate conclusions they will reach. Cuba, having opened the socialist revolution in the Western Hemisphere, may yet provide it with an example of proletarian democracy superior to that given the world by the Bolsheviks, who, as the pioneers blazing the trail, faced incomparably greater difficulties.
"The Struggle Against Bureaucracy: A Decisive Task"*
I.
"A PURELY AND EXCLUSIVELY BOURGEOIS INSTITUTION"
The struggle against bureaucracy is of decisive importance in the progress of the Revolution. Fidel Castro has given this definition: "The struggle against the bureaucratic mentality is almost as difficult as the struggle against imperialism itself. More difficult than the struggle against the landowners, of course, since these were the minority, and there are many more people with bureaucratic mentalities than there were landowners in this country."
This is a long and complex struggle that cannot be won in one day. The mere establishment of revolutionary measures and laws is not enough. Action is necessary on the part of the masses and the Party, as well as the constant application of a policy based on the principle of maximum reduction in numbers and maximum increase in efficiency. As Fidel has said, "...the only way to lend dignity to administrative work is to liberate it from bureaucratic concepts and methods..." Bureaucracy is a legacy from the capitalist system.. Its complete and radical elimination is fundamental in achieving the complete triumph of the Revolution.
Only if we are clearly aware of the danger posed by the existence of the pettybourgeois mentality within the state apparatus can we properly understand, in all its magnitude, the importance of this key struggle in a country such’as ours that proposes to achieve the maximum aims of revolution: the construction of the communist society. This is why we cannot detain ourselves in a mere struggle against the most obvious quantitative aspects of this evil. We could make the mistake of reducing all of the personnel in a given place without taking their methods of work into consideration, thereby, even with a minimum of employees and functionaries, permitting bureaucratic work to continue, allowing obstacles to action, divorce from the masses and from the real problems at hand, to prevail. This is well known by all who have thought over this matter. What does this ideological origin reveal? It reveals that the problem of bureaueracy has ideological origins, that it originates in a concept and a mentality, not only of excess administrative personnel. Fidel Castro expresses this clearly when he says, "...the principal cause is the petty-bourgeois mentality, the lack of awareness of the importance of a country's human resources, of a country's material resources.
Since this is the case, we must complement the struggle against bureaucracy's external manifestations -- such as the proliferation of administrative personnel, inertia, red tape, the "run-around," etc. -- with ideological