The Red Flag: A History of Communism
Page 2
I arrived in the sinister gloom of Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport burdened with teenage intellectual as well as physical baggage – an ill-thought-out jumble of preconceptions and prejudices. Though I was sceptical of Reagan’s rhetoric, I was also apprehensive of finding the grim and fearful dystopia of Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four or John le Carré’s spy novels. From childhood I had been aware of the moral objections to nuclear weapons; my mother had joined the Aldermaston marches in the early 1960s. But at the same time I found the triumphalist demonstrations of military hardware in Red Square, shown proudly on Soviet TV, frightening enough to justify a defensive response.
My sojourn in Moscow merely increased my confusion. Orwell had, in some ways, been right. I did encounter fear. Some of the Russians I met smuggled me into their apartments, terrified lest their neighbours hear my foreign accent; the atmosphere in Moscow was drab – under Gorbachev these years were to be dubbed the ‘period of stagnation’. I also encountered cynicism about the regime, and criticisms of its hypocrisy and corruption. Nevertheless in many ways Russia could not have been more different to the world portrayed by Orwell. Everyday life for most people was relatively relaxed, if devoid of creature comforts. I also sensed a genuine nationalist pride in Russia’s strength and achievements under Communism, and a real emotional commitment to world peace and global harmony.
My first visit to Moscow answered few of the questions that bothered me, and on my return to Britain I read all that I could find about Russia and Communism. A few years later, it seemed that I would have a real chance of understanding this enigmatic society. I was a graduate student at Moscow State University for the year 1987–8, studying (in secret) that most mysterious event of Soviet history, Stalin’s Terror fifty years before, with a room high up in Stalin’s massive ‘wedding-cake’ skyscraper on the Lenin Hills. I lived at the ideological centre of a curious Communist civilization: my neighbours had come from all corners of the Communist world – from Cuba to Afghanistan, from East Germany to Mozambique, from Ethiopia to North Korea – to take degrees in science or history, but also to study ‘Scientific Communism’ and ‘Atheism’, the better to propagate Communist ideology back home. Moreover this was an extraordinary period in Russian history. Gorbachev’s glasnost’ (openness), whilst still limited, was encouraging debate and the expression of a wide range of opinions. If there was a time to discover the attitudes that underlay Communism, at least in its mature phase, this seemed to be it. The system was unravelling and revealing its secrets, but it was still Communist.
Again, what I saw left me confused. Russians’ reactions to the idealistic Gorbachev and his reforming policy of perestroika (‘restructuring’) were myriad. Some of my Russian friends believed that Communism was fundamentally flawed and they could hardly wait to join the capitalist world. Yet I found others far from ready to hold a wake for an alien ideology, but optimistic that Russia had finally found a path to a reformed ‘Communism’ and a better and more just society. Communism, some seemed to believe, was a positive, moral force which, though sadly corrupted by bureaucrats, could yet be reformed and harmonized in some obscure way with liberal democracy. It seemed that a version of the Communist ideal had established real roots in Russian life.
Now traditional Communism is all but dead. Mao Zedong still gazes serenely over Tian’anmen Square, but the Chinese Communist Party has jettisoned most of its Marxist principles, and Vietnam and Laos have followed its example. Yet the sudden demise of Communism merely added to the mystery. Which impression of Communism was the right one? Was it the nationalism I saw in 1984, the socialist idealism of 1987, or just the conservative authoritarianism of an ageing generation, manifest in the dwindling band of pensioners we see demonstrating in Moscow on the anniversary of the October Revolution?
III
A great deal has been written about Communism, addressing these and other questions, but efforts to understand it have sometimes been hindered by the highly politicized nature of the literature and the large number of contradictory interpretations this has yielded. At root, though, the various approaches may be reduced to three powerful, competing narratives.
The first – derived from Marx’s writings – became the official credo of all Communist regimes: in one country after another, the story went, heroic workers and peasants, led by visionary Marxist thinkers, overthrew an evil and exploitative bourgeoisie, and embarked on the path to ‘Communism’. Communism itself was an earthly paradise where humankind would not merely luxuriate in material plenty, but would also live in the most perfect democracy, harmonious, self-regulating and with no man subordinate to another. It was also a rational system, and would come about as the result of the laws of historical development. This story, the centrepiece of Marxist-Leninist ideology, remained inscribed in the dogma of all Communist states right up to their sudden demise. As late as 1961, for instance, the Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev predicted that the Soviet Union would reach the promised land of ‘Communism’ by 1980.3
Since the beginning of the Cold War, few outside the Communist bloc or Communist parties have been convinced by this story, and Western commentators have preferred, in its stead, one of two alternatives. The first, most popular amongst the centre-left, might be dubbed the ‘modernization’ story, in which the Communists were not so much heroic liberators as rational, technically minded modernizers, committed to developing their poor and backward countries. Though undoubtedly and regrettably violent in their early stages (as was inevitable given the resistance they faced and the enormous economic and social changes that they proposed), they swiftly abjured extreme repression. Indeed, Khrushchev’s foreswearing of terror following Stalin’s death proved that Communism could reform. And in the 1960s and 1970s some even talked of the gradual ‘convergence’ between the now modernized Communist East and the Social Democratic West around a common set of values based on welfare states and state-regulated markets.4
The second account might, perhaps, be called the ‘repression’ narrative, and is popular amongst harsher critics of Communism.5 For them, Communism was a dark horror story of extreme violence, followed by continuing repression, inflicted by an unrepresentative minority on a cowed majority. Within the ‘repression’ story there was some disagreement over the nature of the Communist minority. For some, they were essentially non-ideological political bosses who sought to recreate a version of the conservative bureaucracies and tyrannies of old under the guise of ‘modern’ Communism. Stalin’s butchering of his opponents in the party, is seen, therefore, not so much as the work of a Marxist ideologue as that of a new tsar.6 A version of this account became especially popular on the anti-Stalinist left. It was most fully developed by Trotsky in his famous denunciation of Stalinism, The Revolution Betrayed, and was most successfully popularized in Orwell’s fable Animal Farm.7 For others more hostile to socialism, however, the Communists were not reincarnations of the strongmen of the past, but were genuinely driven by Marxist-Leninist ideology.8 They were imposing an unnatural order on their populations, seeking to indoctrinate ‘new socialist men and women’ and establish totalitarian control. Violent repression of anybody who refused to submit was the inevitable result of this utopianism.9
The modernization account is justly unfashionable, and many today stress the role of ideology. Some Communist parties did genuinely seek to develop their countries and, at times, attracted significant support. But few won an electoral majority, and Communist regimes often desired the total transformation and control of their societies; they could also resort to extreme violence to further their ends. However, ideology does not explain everything. It is clear that many Communists were not the cool-headed technocrats of the modernization story: the archives show that some lived and breathed Marxist-Leninist ideology, and many of their more disastrous policies were driven by a real commitment to it, not by pragmatic calculation. But, as will be seen, Marx’s ideas could be used to justify a number of widely divergent programmes, and Communists adapted Marx
ism to the specific conditions and cultures of their own societies. Also, we need to understand the specific contexts in which Communism emerged. War, sharp international competition and the emergence of modern nation states were especially important. We therefore require an approach that understands both the power of utopian ideas and the violent and stratified world in which the Communists lived.
Paradoxically, perhaps, the most helpful inspiration for new insights into Communism lies not in the contemporary but in the ancient world, and in the drama of fifth-century BCE Athens. Greek tragedies dramatized a set of fundamental transitions in human society – from a hierarchical order of fathers and sons, to an egalitarian community of brothers; from an aristocratic polity of kingly warriors, to a more ‘democratic’ one, in which all male citizens took part in politics and fought as equals in people’s armies; and from a fragmented society of clans and feuds, to one more integrated and governed by law.10
Aeschylus’ Prometheus trilogy offers an especially striking dramatization of this journey from paternal to fraternal politics, and also from ‘backwardness’ to knowledge. According to Greek mythology, Prometheus, one of the old ‘Titan’ gods, stole fire from Zeus and the newly powerful ‘Olympian’ gods, as a gift to mankind. In so doing, he brought knowledge and progress to humanity, but at the cost of angering Zeus, who was intent on keeping men in their place and preserving the old order. Prometheus is harshly punished for breaching the hierarchy to help mankind: he is shackled to a rock in the Caucasus mountains where daily an eagle feasts on his ever-regenerating liver. In Prometheus Bound, the first and only surviving part of Aeschylus’ trilogy, four characters dominate the play: Power and Force, the servants of the tyrannical father-god, Zeus; Hermes, the messenger (and god of communication, merchants, tricksters and thieves); and Prometheus (literally ‘Foresight’), who is both a rational thinker and an angry rebel. Prometheus is presented sympathetically, transformed by Zeus’ intransigence and Hermes’ cowardice from a humanitarian into a furious rebel. He is determined to resist Zeus, even at the cost of unleashing terrible violence:
So let fire’s sharp tendril be hurled
At me. Let thunder agitate
The heavens, and spasms
Of wild winds. Let blasts shake
The earth to its very roots…
Me will he in no way kill.11
Prometheus and Zeus are still confronting each other as the play ends, although in the final part of the trilogy (which does not survive) Aeschylus probably showed his disapproval of Prometheus’ anger. It is likely that Prometheus made his peace with Zeus, and that both admitted their extreme behaviour.
In Prometheus Bound, then, we have a brilliant dramatization of the seemingly insoluble tensions between hierarchy and tradition on the one hand, and equality and modernity on the other. The play recognizes the appeal, and the dangers, of the Promethean message, especially to intellectuals in a repressive, archaic world; for whilst Prometheus does desire to help mankind, when opposed his anger can also ‘shake the earth to its very roots’.
The Communists can be seen as the heirs of Prometheus, but there were several elements to his legacy. ‘Communism’ literally means a political system in which men live cooperatively and hold property in common, and it was originally a broad and diverse movement. Some Communists placed most value on Prometheus’ commitment to liberation. Coming from a more ‘Romantic’ Marxist tradition, they were more interested in human authenticity and creativity than in taking political power and building modern states. However, this outlook became increasingly marginal to the Communist tradition; it was Prometheus’ hostility to inequality and his commitment to modernity that came to characterize the mainstream of the Communist movement.12 But there was one aspect of Prometheus’ legacy Aeschylus did not explore: his anger at those ordinary men and women who rejected the ‘fire’ of knowledge and Enlightenment. Communists could be as angry at – and violent towards – the ‘backward’ peasants and religious believers who rejected their vision as they were towards lords and merchants.
It is not surprising that it is Aeschylus’ heroic but angry Prometheus who should have emerged as a key symbol of emancipation amongst the poet-critics of Europe’s monarchies – from Goethe to Shelley. But it was Karl Marx who embraced the Promethean metaphor most fully. For Marx, Prometheus was ‘the most eminent saint and martyr in the philosophical calendar’. He quoted his hero in the preface to his dissertation: ‘In sooth all gods I hate. I shall never exchange my fetters for slavish servility. ’Tis better to be chained to a rock than bound to the service of Zeus.’13 Marx went on to forge from Prometheus’ belief in reason, freedom and love of rebellion a powerful new synthesis that would be both ‘scientific’ and revolutionary.
Marx’s Prometheanism appealed to many critics of inequality, but it was especially compelling to the opponents of ancien régimes such as that of tsarist Russia. This paternalistic order presided over not only economic, but also political and legal inequalities, granting privileges to aristocratic elites and discriminating against the lower orders. It was also ideologically conservative and suspicious of modern ideas. By the nineteenth century it was increasingly evident that such stratified societies had created weak, divided states, which struggled to maintain their status in a world dominated by more unified powers. So, for some of the Tsar’s educated critics, the Promethean synthesis of liberation, modernity and equality promised to solve all problems at once: it would bring equality in the household, overcoming the patriarchal subjugation of women and the young; it would achieve social equality within the nation state, creating citizens in place of lords and servants; and it would level international hierarchies as the revivified regimes developed sufficiently to hold their own abroad. At the same time, it would bring the latest discoveries of science to mankind and fortify the nation.
Russian conditions, and especially political repression, also helped to create the institution that would further the Promethean project: the conspiratorial vanguard party. Designed to seize power and forge ‘new socialist men and women’, the party’s culture encouraged the more repressive and violent elements of the old Prometheanism. The Bolshevik party’s quasi-religious desire to transform its members, and its Manichean division of the world into friends and enemies, combined with conditions of war to create a politics very different from that envisaged by Karl Marx.
It was this project, and the means of achieving it, that was to become so appealing over the course of the twentieth century, especially in the colonized and semi-colonized world, for it promised an end to the humiliating subjugation brought by European imperialism, whilst modernizing divided, agrarian societies. Revolution alone, many Communists believed, could destroy the imperialists and their local collaborators who were holding their nations back; planned economies would then propel them into modernity, finally giving them dignity on the world stage.
Once Communists were in power, Romantic ambitions were rapidly overshadowed by technocracy and revolutionary fervour, though in practice even these proved difficult to reconcile, and Communists tended to stress one or the other. ‘Modernist’ Marxism was an ideology of technocratic economic development – of the educated expert, the central plan and discipline. It offered a vision that appealed to the scores of technicians and bureaucrats educated by the new institutes and universities. ‘Radical’ Marxism, in contrast, was a Marxism of the mobilized masses, of rapid ‘leaps forward’ to modernity, of revolutionary enthusiasm, mass-meeting ‘democracy’ and a rough-and-ready equality. It could also be a Marxism of extreme violence – of struggles against ‘enemies’, whether the capitalists, the so-called ‘kulaks’ (rich peasants), the intellectuals, or the party ‘bureaucrats’. Radical Marxism came into its own during war or fears of war, and suited a military style of socialism, similar to the workers’ militias of the Russian revolutionary period, or the partisans and guerrillas of the post-war world.14
Each form of Marxism had its particular advantages and disadvantages
for Communists. Radical Marxism could call forth deeds of self-sacrifice, inspiring heroic feats of productivity in the absence of the market and money incentives. However, by encouraging persecution of ‘class enemies’, it could bring division, chaos and violence. It encouraged the persecution of the educated and expert, and its militant commitment to ‘Enlightenment’ alienated the religious and the traditional, particularly in the countryside. Modernist Marxism, in contrast, established the stability necessary to embark on ‘rational’ and ‘planned’ economic modernization. But it could also be uninspiring and, more worryingly for an ostensibly revolutionary regime, it created rigid bureaucracies ruled by experts.
Both of these approaches to politics had little purchase in the societies they sought to transform, and it was difficult to sustain them for long periods of time. Communists therefore soon began to seek compromises with broader society.15 Some became more pragmatic, seeking to combine central planning with the market, abjuring violence and embracing greater liberalism. This kind of Marxism became dominant in Western Europe in the later nineteenth century and, from the 1960s, was increasingly influential in Soviet-controlled Central and Eastern Europe. Others adopted a more ‘humane’, Romantic socialism. Still other Marxists, however, particularly in poor agrarian societies, took a very different course and inadvertently adapted Communism to the old patriarchal cultures of the past, whilst using versions of nationalism to mobilize the population. This form of Communism, developed by Stalin from the mid-1930s, began to resemble in some ways the hierarchical states the Communists had once rebelled against. As Cold War tensions lessened, the system became less military in style and more concerned with social welfare, but its paternalism and repressiveness remained. It was this system that Gorbachev sought to reform, and ultimately destroyed.