For a Lasting Peace, For a People’s Democracy!
No. 20 (23), Friday, October 15, 1948
The question of the nationalisation of industry and its development on a socialist basis has been solved successfully in the new democracies. The working class has once again demonstrated its ability to run the state and the economy better than the capitalists. In the sphere of the development of industry the new democracies have made a serious step forward along the path to Socialism.
The Communist and Workers’ Parties in these countries are focussing their attention on the practical application of the new methods to strengthen the alliance of the working class and the working peasantry. Experience has shown that, as a result of consolidation of people’s power, the major successes in rehabilitating the developing national economy, the basic changes in the balance of class forces in favour of the working class and the strengthening of its leading role have made it possible for the new democracies to lay the foundations of Socialism.
From this there arises the urgent need for a new solution to a number of questions linked with the further development of the countryside.
The agrarian reform gave land to the peasants, raised the living standard of millions of working peasants and agricultural labourers and abolished the landlord class. The correct policy of the Communist and Workers’ Parties very largely contributed to the consolidation of people’s power and its basis – the alliance of workers and peasants, to the successful rehabilitation of the national economy.
It resulted in a growth of political consciousness and greater activity among the broad peasant masses and enhanced the influence of the Marxist parties among the peasants and extended their organisational bases in the countryside.
The Communist and Workers’ Parties set themselves the task of securing the results of the agrarian reform and going forward to a new stage of development of the countryside. They are fighting to achieve progressive methods of agriculture, to raise the productive forces of the countryside to serve the vital demands of a rapidly developing industry.
The realisation of these vitally important tasks demand that the struggle against the capitalist elements in the countryside should be intensified, that the kulak should be deprived of his privileged position in the village. It demands a consistent policy of restricting and dislodging the capitalist elements and giving all-round assistance to the poor and medium peasant. This is all the more necessary since the agrarian reform did not, and could not, prevent class differentiation in the countryside nor the growth of the kulaks.
The working peasantry know from their own experience how the kulaks exploit a considerable part of the workers in the countryside, how they impede the development of the village cooperative which is designed to protect the poor and medium peasants against speculation and usury; how by slander and threats they intimidate and disorganise the rural population in an attempt to disrupt the measures the people’s power has taken in the interests of the working peasantry. The kulaks actively supported the Mikolajczyks, Nagys, Manius and Petkovs and their like and today the foreign imperialists base themselves on the kulaks in their subversive struggle against the people’s power.
Only the Tito clique, which has betrayed the cause of Marxism-Leninism to side with the kulaks, even in the face of the experience of the new democracies and of Yugoslavia herself, is endeavouring to deny the fact that capitalist elements in the countryside are growing and the class struggle sharpening as a result.
An important condition for successful struggle against the kulaks and for consolidating the alliance of the working class and the working peasantry is strengthening of the leading role of the working class, securing the leading role of the town in the socialist reorganisation of the countryside.
The Information Bureau Resolution on the situation in the Communist Party of Yugoslavia is of exceptional assistance to Communist and Workers’ Parties in defining correctly the important tasks in the countryside in this new phase. The Resolution states:
“The experience of the CPSU (B) shows that the elimination of the last and biggest exploiting class – the kulak class – is possible only on the basis of the mass collectivisation of agriculture, that the elimination of the kulaks as a class is an organic and integral part of the collectivisation of agriculture”.
“To eliminate the kulaks as a class, and hence, to eliminate the capitalist elements in the countryside, it is necessary for the Party to engage in detailed preparatory work to restrict the capitalist elements in the countryside, to strengthen the alliance of the working class and the peasantry under the leadership of the working class, to make socialist industry capable of producing machinery for the collective administration of agriculture. Haste in this matter can only lead to irreparable harm”.
“Only on the basis of these measures, carefully prepared and consistently carried out, is it possible to pass over from restriction of the capitalist elements in the countryside to their liquidation”.
The Information Bureau Resolution denounced as adventurism the demagogic attempts of the Tito faction to solve in haste and by means of decrees, the task of liquidating capitalism in the countryside, which is a long process of work and struggle.
Guided in their policy and in all their practical activity by the Resolution of the Information Bureau, the Communist and Workers’ Parties are constructively applying the world historic experience of the C.P.S.U. (B) in the struggle for socialist construction in the Soviet Union. They take into account the historical peculiarities of the development of their country, critically drawing lessons from their own experience so as to work out guiding principles of socialist reorganisation of agriculture.
The recent plenums of the Central Committees of the Polish Workers’ Party and Bulgarian Workers’ Party (Communists) adopted a number of decisions on work in the countryside. The Plenum of the Central Committee of the Polish Workers’ Party outlined a big programme for helping the poor and middle peasant in restricting their exploitation by the kulak. A number of steps have been taken to develop and reorganise the work of the machine-hiring stations, to make differentiations in the tax policy and to ensure that the credit policy in the countryside is approached from a class angle. The Central Committee of the Polish Workers’ Party stressed the need to extend distributive and consumer cooperatives in every way, to reorganise the economic and administrative apparatus in the countryside, purging it of kulaks and their hirelings. The Central Committee of the Polish Workers’ Party considered it most important to give every possible assistance to peasants wishing to form producers’ cooperatives. It stressed that the change-over from individual economics to collective farming was the only way which could lead to a really rapid growth of well-being of the countryside, to freeing the working peasantry from exploitation by capitalist elements. The Central Committee warned the Party against undue haste in solving this historical task.
The Plenum of the Central Committee of the Bulgarian Workers’ Party (Communists) also adopted a decision to give every possible assistance to peasants in forming and strengthening agricultural cooperatives. The successful work of these cooperatives is evoking increasing interest among the Bulgarian peasantry. The Central Committee of the Bulgarian Workers’ Party (Communists) stated that alongside the policy of restricting kulak influence, building machine-tractor stations, strengthening State-run farms and developing the production of agricultural machinery and artificial fertilizers, the establishment of agricultural cooperatives was an important factor in the reorganisation of agriculture on socialist principle.
In its decisions the Central Committee of the Rumanian Workers’ Party stressed the need to put into effect more vigorously the policy of restricting and dislodging the capitalist elements in the countryside, of making greater class differentiations in tax policy, in the sphere of grain deliveries, and so on.
The Communist and Workers’ Parties of the new democracies are drawing practical conclusions from the Information Bureau Resolution. They are carrying out a number of measures to strengthen the parties ideologically and organisationally. They pay special attention to consolidating the rural Party organisation, to purging their ranks of kulak elements; they are raising the class vigilance of the rural Party organisations and their ability to head the struggle of the poor and medium peasants against the kulaks and to successfully carry out all measures of the peoples’ power in the countryside.
By strengthen in every way the militant alliance of workers and
peasants – this true guarantee of victory – the Communist and Workers’
Parties of new democracies are confidently advancing to new successes
in the struggle to strengthen the forces of democracy and Socialism.
Click here to return to the
index of archival material.