Gorbachev bankrupt on
no experience of organising with others.
Rather than begin to find ways of seriously tackling these problems, Militant would ap pear to prefer that we put all our eggs into one basket. Their disproportionate concentration upon defence against bailiffs, ignoring the fight for trade union action, could potentially leave many campaigns paralysed when the local Council opts for wage arrestment as the initial form of debt recovery.
"Mass non-payment will win!" Militant tells us; and they no doubt hope it will, because it cuts out the more complex business of building a genuine line-up of forces across the workers' movement as a whole that can defeat the poll tax - but may also lay down roots for the emergence of an ongoing mass movement.
The movement at the moment is volatile. It is rooted in the working class more by inevitability than by design (it was inevitable that the working class would be the hardest hit by the tax). Coping with the pressures and the contradictions of a mass movement of this kind, a movement organised around a single economic issue, is no easy task.
No one on the left has a monopoly of wisdom on how to solve these problems let alone any real experience of a movement of this kind or of how to tackle the challenges that have been thrown up.
What is required is a unity of purpose; a unity between the different areas of struggle against the Poll Tax and an ability to integrate new experiences and struggles into the overall character of the movement.
The effects of capping, along side an emergent financial crisis in a number of previously "clean" councils underlines the necessity of a "twin-track" strategy of building mass non-payment action alongside the fight in the unions, especially the local government unions, for action around wage arrestment, non-collection and the cuts.
The target of the poll tax is to force cuts in jobs and services. Through the intermediary of compliant councils the Tories hope to pass the cost of non-payment on to the workforce, and through cuts in services, back on to the community. The fight against the poll tax - as a defence of living standards and of democratic rights - will become inseparable from the fight against cuts.
This is the strategic thread to what we have been arguing for some time. The majority of the anti-poll tax movement exists on the outside of the organised labour movement. The existence of over 14 million non-payers offers a lead to thos fighting for trade union action against the threat of wage arrestment and potentially, in the specific unions concerned, against the implementation of the tax and against cuts.
Mass non-payment will not win on its own. his does not mean that its importance should be underestimated. It is a form of direct political action that needs to be brought in to the very heart of the existing organisations of the working class. SOCIALIST OUTLOOK no 27, October 1990
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Landsbergis casts his vote for independence in the Lithuanian parliament national question
Armenia has become the latest Soviet republic to declare its independence. The only surprise is the length of time Armenia has taken, given the character of its conflict with Azerbaijan over the territory of NagoroKarabakh and Moscow's patent failure to recognise Armenia's just demands.
Nine other republics had preceded it in claiming varying degrees of autonomy from Moscow. The degree to which the USSR's constituent republics would rather get out than implement central directives reveals the extent of the crisis afflicting the Soviet Union.
For decades most of the USSR's constituent republics acquiesced in their own desecration at the hands of the centralised bureaucracy. Corruption among local Party leaders was rife, and ecological disaster looms in a number of republics as a result of centrally-imposed economic policies.
Perestroika and glasnost have changed all of that. Perestroika was a set of policies designed to transfor the Soviet economy while maintaining the bureaucracy's hold on political power within the unitary Soviet state.
Glasnost was a fool to assist the forging of an alliance to implement perestroika in the face of bureaucratic opposition. The political liberalisation which glasnost entailed meant, however, unleashing unpredictable forces. As the inability of the central bureaucracy to deal with the mounting economic problems became apparent, and broad popular movements with a nationalist orientation took an increas ing hold on the political life of the republics, with demands that links with the centre should, to one degree or another, be severed.
The nationalist currents drew succour from the fact that none of the non-Russian republics felt that they were voluntary members of the Soviet Union in the first place. This tendency was particularly prevalent in the Baltic
By Rick Simon republics of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, which had been forcibly incorporated into the USSR as part of the Stalin-Hitler Pact in 1939 and, enjoying a generally higher standard of living than the rest of the Soviet Union, felt they had nothing to lose through independence.
The nationalists have set the pace, while the Soviet Communist Party's leadership has simply prevaricated when faced with demands for greater autonomy. A crucial Plenum of the Central Committee to discuss the nationalities question was repeatedly postponed; expressions of popular feeling were brutally suppressed in Georgia; and in Azerbaijan a pogrom against Armenian inhabitants, probably instigated by the local Party bosses, served as a pretext for the use of Soviet troops to suppress the Azerbaijani Popular Front.
The republics are now in turmoil. In the past year, more days have been lost through strikes for nationalist than for oconomic demands - even including last year's gigantic miners' strike. The Congress and the republics
The drive towards the establishment of more autonomous national republics has been accelerated by two major factors. Firstly, the new, more "democratic", state bodies provide only an illusory advance on the previously rigged electoral process.
The Congress of People's Deputies is at least partially elected through genuine multicandidate elections, but one third of the deputies are "elected' by social organisations including the CPSU, and trade unions. The Congress in tum elects the Supreme Soviet, which was formerly (in name only) the supreme law-making body.
The Supreme Soviet is composed of two chambers: the Soviet of the Union, with representation from across the USSR based on
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population size; and the Soviet of Nationalities, in which all republics have equal representation. The Supreme Soviet now has some distinct power, but it is ultimately subordinate to the Congress,
From the point of view of the republics' bureaucracies, the new Supreme Soviet is a step backwards from the old arrangements. Under the old system, the republics had equal representation in the directly-elected Soviet of Nationalities, which had equal legislative status with the Soviet of the Union. But now all legislation is the ultimate preserve of the Russian-dominated Congress.
As if all this were not complicated enough, Gorbachev has now been voted extensive powers as an executive President. Despite the fact that this could mean that the interests of the republics would be over-ridden still further, many republic leaderships welcomed the move, if only in the hope that it would get things moving. Gorbachev assembled around him a Presidential Council, which has effectively by-passed the Politburo and to a certain extent the Supreme Soviet.
Perestroika and the republics
The other factor has been economic. Perestroika promised greater autonomy at enterprise, regional and republic levels. Despite the laws on individual and cooperative economic activity and the Law on State Enterprise, little has changed.
A new Law on Foundations of Economic Relations in the USSR is being introduced. This will grant all republics economic autonomy by 1991. This will entail the ability to set a budget, levy some taxes, establish a separate banking system, and manage industries formerly under central control.
The aim was to establish autonomous relations in an expanding economy in which the reforms were working In fact, the very reverse is the case. The autonomy of the republics is being established in conditions of chronic shortage, in which all attempts at reform have so far foundered. Republics are therefore reluctant to continue economic links to Moscow on the old basis, and are withholding supplies until new contractual arrangements are worked out. This is most noticeable at the moment with cigarettes: but such conflicts can only exacerbate centrifugal tendencies.
The question of autonomy is now inextricably bound up with the moves toward marketisation of the Soviet economy. Radicals both in Russia and in the republics see the development of a market as a means of equalising relations between the USSR's constituent elements and placing them on a voluntary basis.
The Baltic states
The Baltic states have been the most advanced in seeking firstly to establish stronger ties among themselves - leading to a Baltic common market by 1993. They have also strengthened their political co-operation. The Page 12
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Yeltsin wrongly sees the market as the method for true independence Baltic Assembly which took place in May 1989 led to the so-called "Baltic Way' on August 23 1989, when millions of Balts joined hands in a gigantic human chain on the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Stalin-Hitler Pact.
Since then there have been monthly meetings of the Baltic Council coordinating the popular fronts in the three states, an intergovernmental gathering, and the meeting of the chairs of the states" Supreme Soviets. On June 12 the three states met with Gorbachev for the first time.
The declared goal of the Baltic states is *self-determination and independence in a neutral and demilitarised zone of Europe'. Lithuania has, however, been the most forthright in declaring independence, while Estonia and Latvia have adopted a more cautious tone.
Lithuania's declaration led to Moscow imposing an economic blockade on the republic, which has had a crippling effect on the Lithuanian economy in terms of energy sup plies. The other effect was to force Lithuania, apart from developing closer ties with the other Baltic republics, to pursue external economic links with the West.
According to the Lithuanian President, Vytautas Landsbergis, while the blockade has cost Lithuanian industry 102 million roubles, 344 million roubles worth of goods has been imported, and 563 million roubles worth exported through barter with producers.
A new Union treaty?
Gorbachev's solution to the nationalities* problem is to draw up a new Union treaty. Initially, he was opposed to this, and the delay exacerbated the situation. Nevertheless, a working group of the Council of the Federation was established on June 12 to draw up a first draft.
Discussions have concentrated on two things. First, the type of association that the Soviet Union should be: confederal (with the emphasis on relations between sovereign states); federal (with the emphasis on rights ceded to the centre); or a combination (some
republics having a confederal, others a federal relationship).
Gorbachev talks of a confederation but in reality he is anxious to maintain the integrity of the existing USSR.
The second focus has been on developing a mechanism for secession from the Soviet Union - always a theoretical constitutional right, but never before tested. The suggested mechanism envisages three phases. First, a referendum of the entire population of the republic concerned; second, if a vote is positive, a five-year waiting period; and third, massive reparations from the republic to the Union for daring to leave the fold.
In Lithuania's case, reparations would not just entail monetary penalties (21 billion roubles) but also protracted squabbles over competing territorial claims. Not surprisingly. such an attitude has pushed republics even further towards taking unilateral action.
There is no simple solution to the national question in the Soviet Union. The existence of a unitary Soviet state for 70 years has led to considerable interpenetration of nationalities and enormous economic interdependence.
Nor is this just a case of the "imperialist" Russian centre's "colonisation" of the periphery. Unquestionably, a policy of Russification has been pursued in an attempt to establish the dominance of the Russian language and culture. In many republics, however, a majority of ethnic Russian workers are in inferior jobs and in some instances other, smaller nationalities have been the victims of oppression.
Marxists support the right of nations to self-determination, but secession from the USSR is, in itself, no answer to the dire economic, ecological and social problems confronting the nationalities. It only becomes part of the solution if it permits the genuine popular will to be expressed in determining voluntary relations with the remainder of the USSR and with other states, and enables steps to be taken towards genuine economic in tegration and democratic planning.
SOCIALIST OUTLOOK no 27, October 1990