Contribution to the 15th International Communist Seminar

Contribution to the 15^th International Communist Seminar
"Present and past experiences in the international communist movement".
Brussels, 5-7 May 2006
www.icsbrussels.org , ics[at]icsbrussels.org

Socialist Party of Latvia

Author of article: Martians Bekasovs

Sixteen years have passed since the day of the declaration of independence of the Latvian government, and therefore I would like to look back at what happened since that period, at what is necessary to improve the situation of the unfortunate impoverished people.

A few words about the history of the USSR. I think that in the former union there was a lack of socialism in the Marxist – Leninist sense, because there was a lack of dictatorship of the proletariat. Factories, companies and land did not belong to the workers and farmers, and councils of workers and farmers were not leading the workers groups. Inside the communist party there was no democracy.

The interests of a rank-and-file communist on the level of the regional party committee and the city party committee were not taken into consideration, not to mention on the level of the central committee of the CPSU. From the moment that J. V. Stalin came into power, there was set up a tough system of centralisation of power. Therefore all instructions of the CC had to be implemented strictly without any discussion. Where the party commissioners couldn’t manage, the workers of the former KGB, who considered every attempt to leash a discussion about the more important issues of the government of state and the attraction of a broad mass of workers and farmers to the governing of production groups, as sabotage of the Soviet power, there were juridical consequences or administrative measures were taken, which led to the alienation of a broad mass of workers from the participation into the government of the state.

In this way the developed socialism changed into a governmental capitalism with a centralised state power in the shape of a party nomenclature. The dictatorship of the proletariat as in the Marxist-Leninist theory was changed into a dictatorship of party, and governmental civil servants. And the common state property, the factories, the companies, the earth resources became with the constitution of 1937 the exclusive property of the state, which was governed by the civil state apparatus. If the workers and farmers would have spoken out their opinion to their immediate superiors, their brigade-leaders and their bosses, then their opinion would not have reached further than this level, where it remained.

When afterwards in 1985 M. Gorbachev, A. Yakovlev, G. Shevardnadze, B. Yeltsin and E. Ligachev came into power positions of the CC of the CPSU, they made declarations about the reforms, without having in their hands the theses about what would be reformed and in which spheres of activity. This main issue about the future of the USSR was not discussed, not with the people, nor on a congress of the CPSU. And when, after the meeting with the prime minister of England M.Thatcher and the president of the USA B.Clinton, the course to a market economy was taken, it became clear that this way would lead to a counter-revolution and it would overthrow the communist structure (a governmental capitalism, with features of socialism) and the transition to a many party system and a bourgeois democratic structure with all its insufficiencies, to the ultimate alienation of the workers and farmers from the political power and the cruel exploitation and violation for miserable working salaries.

Latvia went de-jure over to a bourgeois democratic structure on the 4^th of May 1990 after adopting the declaration "about the independence" by 134 deputies of the Upper Soviet of the People’s Front. These were the bunch of shouters of the People’s Front, that wanted revenge and they longed for the partition of the financial means and properties, created by the people in the years of the Soviet power. In that period they belonged to the state, but under the new power, there was a legal vacuum and they belonged to nobody in a bourgeois government. After that numerous privatisations ("grabisations") were set up, linked with a well–thought programme of grabbing from the population. The financial capital was grabbed away, more than 16 milliard USD, nowadays in Latvia there are more than 600 millionaires. More than a thousand strong Soviet companies disappeared, in which worked 500 to 16000 people, which is more than 40 % of the working population. Today in the industry only 13% of the population are able to occupy a working place in the industry, 3,7% of the population are farmers, 6,3 % work in the construction industry and 73,8 % work in public services. There are 42,5 thousand companies from which 97,5 % in the private sector, but 95,5 % employ only from 5 to 50 people. Thus Latvia has changed from a developed industrial state, occupying the 32^nd place in the world by its gross national product per inhabitant, into a very impoverished and undeveloped country on the territory of the European Union. The average salary is about 3799 EUR a year, or 388 EUR a month. The lowest salaries are about 122 EUR a month, which is 8,2 % lower than the minimal subsistence wage.

The activity level is about 57,8 % of the working population, 10 % are immigrants working in Latvia, more than 150 000 young people are working abroad. The death rate is higher than the birth rate, in some regions it is even twice as high as the birth rate.

In 16 years the population of Latvia diminished with 18%.

With these figures I wanted to show you what the result is of the unsuccessful policy of brainless politicians of the former USSR, we have to evaluate their work and begin with a new stage in the development of a communist and workers movement. We have to create a united workers and broad anti-fascist front, a broad block of popular forces and this movement should be headed by the communist Marxist parties. We have to think about a programme of activities and practical actions, that are acceptable for all participators of the people’s front. There is no success in a struggle for one’s own private purposes, but there is in a struggle for the real actual social needs.

Marxists have to be very decisive warriors for the interests of the community, and in this way they have to lead the workers to the socialist goals.

In regard to this we have to remind the comment of F. Engels in the English publication of the "Manifest" in 1988.

Being a worker - as a profession - does not necessary mean belonging to the class of workers.

The proletarian psychology is organised on the production, the ability to common activities, and there is a particular role for strong production groups, led by a political party. This is the main task of the communist and workers parties.

The proletariat is the class of the actual hired workers, who are bereaved of their own means of production, and are forced to sell their own working strength in order to survive.