TheGeneralCrisisofAdministrativeCentralizedSocialism.

ASketch towardsaTheoryofReproduction
TheGeneralCrisisofAdministrativeCentralizedSocialism.ASketchtowardsa TheoryofReproduction

byMichaelBrie

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Source: PRAXISInternational(PRAXISInternational),issue:1/1991,pages:6577,onwww.ceeol.com.

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THE GENERAL CRISIS OF ADMINISTRATIVE CENTRALIZED SOCIALISM A SKETCH TOWARDS A THEORY OF REPRODUCTION*
Michael Brie

The essence of real-existing socialism the ideologically distorted reflection of the administrative system.

Those who are serious about the renewal of socialism in the GDR must know that our country is in a crisis. And they must say it. What has led to this crisis is not the mistake of two or three replaceable individuals in the last two or three years rather, it is the crisis of centrally and administratively organized socialism. All attempts to breathe new life into those structures artificially long declared to be dead by the people are in vain. Essentially, the crisis resulted neither from the inflexibility of old age, nor from the temporary fatigue of actual democratic forms of life, nor from a thoroughly common lag in the relations of production and superstructure in respect to the new requirements of internationally changing productive capabilities. It resulted above all from the fact that administrative, centralized socialism in principle exhibits developmental limits. These limits can no longer be addressed through a series of reforms internal to the system itself. What is required is its revolutionary removal. Until recently, one could still hear arrogance in the voices of those who spoke of other socialist countries and their crises. The signs of the times were misread. For this crisis was already, and is certainly today neither national, nor partial in some other way; it is general and comprehensive and characterizes the present international developmental phase of socialism as such. And it seems clear that this will be the last crisis of this particular type of socialism. Our system experienced crises in 1953 and 1956, 1964 and 1968, 1970 and 1971, 1980 and 1985 and additional years could be listed. During these years, many European socialist countries, individually or together with other socialist countries, went through developmental cycles which were more or less drastic in their character. Each of these cycles included four phases: 1. From within a state of crisis calls were made for fundamental change, and a turning point was [officially] proclaimed. Individualism, the lack of a sense of community, and the personality-cult were criticized. And with their
* This article first appeared in Initial. Zeitschrift fr Politik und Gesellschaft, vol. 1. No. 1 (1990). It was completed by December 1989. Praxis International 11:1 April 1991 0260-8448

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backs against the wall, the authorities finally turned away from the image they had created of socialism in the media, and turned toward the masses. 2. This turning point led to a series of partial reforms. These were followed by a series of more or less thorough adjustments to new conditions. But the basic structure of this type of socialism was always only modified, never given up. 3. Thus, what resulted was a tendency toward stagnation; and this tendency affected increasingly broader social spheres. This phase of stagnation resulted in (4) a new crisis. Such a description of the development of hitherto existing socialism, which would have to be substantiated with concrete historical data, has, for the time being, at best heuristic value. It suggests that it is necessary to address the essential structure of this type of socialism. This essence must be sought in the reproduction of that fundamental, contradictory context of relations into which the primary subjects of a society enter in the course of the production of their lives. And it is to be sought in those driving social forces and alternative developmental possibilities which originate from this context. In my opinion, it has nothing to do with Marxism and the materialist understanding of history that, for a long time, one defended a conception of socialism that was based on the construction of an essence of socialism. Increasingly, this conception found itself in striking contradiction with actual significant social processes. This essence of socialism, like a magic box, seemed to yield everything worth desiring: peace, environmental protection, solidarity, social and humanitarian progress, the development of forces of production superior to those of capitalism, higher labor productivity and efficiency, popular sovereignty, and the highest degree of successful planning. It is nonsense to attempt to understand actual historical development as a series of deformations of an essence constructed in this fashion. And it would be just as hopeless and miscarried an enterprise to attempt to free this notion of an essence of all simplifications, deformations, and utopian ideas, which have resulted from various causes in the past, in order, in the light of new knowledge, to obtain a modern theory of socialism.1 In doing so, one would at best repeat a procedure, already carried out in the fifties, sixties and seventies, in which administrative, centralized socialism reacted by projecting a distorted image of itself. This distortion is by no means as innocent as it seems at first sight. It reflects the world of administrative, centralized socialism in such a way that at least the top administrators could move around in it as if this were a world where socialist ideals had been realized. What really functions as state property appears to be public property [Volkseigentum]. Where in reality an ever diminishing number of politicians wield power, constituting an increasingly uncontrolled class, ceremonies are held to celebrate popular power [Volksmacht]. Where it is often merely the ideas of the ruling class which are promulgated a class that constantly revels in declarations of the success of its own activity these ideas are stylized as expressions of consciousness and scientificness. The mass media mobilization and the so-called testimonies of the hundred thousands [Bekundungen der

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Hunderttausenden] needed to maintain this image are becoming unbearable. The overpowering, objective law that Rosa Luxemburg formulated more than 70 years ago, in the face of the development of the Russian revolution, and as a result of her experiences with the German Social Democratic movement, will never again be allowed as a possibility:
Without general elections, without unrestricted freedom of press and assembly, without a free struggle of opinion, life dies out in every public institution, becomes a mere semblance of life, in which only the bureaucracy remains the active element. Public life gradually falls asleep, a few dozen party leaders of inexhaustible energy and boundless experience direct and rule. Among them, in reality only a dozen outstanding heads do the leading, and an elite of the working class is invited from time to time to meetings where they are to applaud the speeches of the leaders, and to approve proposed resolutions unanimously at bottom, then, a clique affair.2

Inevitably, this clique affair is in danger of moral and intellectual decay through corruption, mediocrity, and fatigue. Where the state monopoly on property, power, and consciousness is declared the property, power, and consciousness of the people, administrative socialism is portrayed from the perspective of the central bureaucratic apparatus. Here, communicative discourse is transformed into a monologue of the apparatus with itself, mediated by the news agencies. Paraphrasing Marx, one can say that the hitherto existing orthodox theory of socialism, with its construction of an essence of socialism, in fact does nothing but translate the ideas of the agents caught under the social conditions of administrative, centralized socialism in a doctrinaire fashion; it also systematizes and defends them. We should not be surprised that this orthodox theory extends to the most estranged forms of social life which form total contradictions. And we should also not be surprised that orthodox theory feels completely at home here, and that from the perspective of the theory, these contradictory social conditions appear all the more natural the more their inner structure is hidden from the theory3 itself, while the theory remains accessible to the ordinary understanding of these conditions. A. P. Butenko rightly points out that the understanding of socialist property, planning, and democratic centralism, etc., that were dominant in the USSR before 27th Communist Party Congress took on the character of a theoretical foundation and intellectual defense of bureaucratic centralism. He sees in this conception of socialism the natural product of the everyday activity of the bureaucracy. . . , the sum of the opinions it continually supports opinions that are connected to the essence of its professional and social endeavors, that complex of ideas that are generally not transcended by its everyday activity.4 At the same time however, Butenko overlooks the fact that, to a certain extent, the administrative, centralized system tries to place all social subjects in hierarchical bureaucratic relationships, and by doing so, tends to transform each into a civil servant. Thus, it must be added that although the

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conceptions of socialism mentioned above are first and foremost those of a particular class [i.e. the ruling class], they can at the same time become important for the orientation of society as a whole, insofar as the masses inevitably identify with the system for a substantial period of time. The Basic Structure of the Reproduction of Administrative Socialism Every attempt to give a full account of the actual essential structure of really existing socialism, and not just of the structure postulated by the ideology, is necessarily bound up with a high degree of abstraction. Especially in an article such as this, which can at best provide a sketch of the reproduction and the crisis of this kind of system, one must resort to the use of a basic model. This requires radical abstraction from historical and national particularities, and a turn to particularly classic forms of administrative, centralized socialism namely the Stalinist and the GDR variants. But even this can be done only rudimentarily. In respect to method, a clear reference to the first volume of Marxs Capital will be apparent; in particular to Marxs account of the fundamental relation of capitalism, the relation of surplus-value, and its reproduction in the immediate process of production, i.e. via the process of capital accumulation. Here, Marx makes very clear what high degree of abstraction is required to grasp the essential structure of this kind of reproduction.5 Today we know, of course and I mention this only in passing - that multiple models are necessary to give a more or less adequate description of a real object. The crisis-ridden cycle of reproduction and development in administrative, centralized socialism is grounded in this systems basic structure. The two opposing poles of this basic structure are, on the one hand, the structure of the reproduction of the continual concentration of control over all crucial functions of production, property-ownership, and all important positions of power in society, in the administrative center of the state and the party. The other pole is constituted by the expropriation of working people [Werkttige], depriving them of precisely those functions, positions, and powers. It is not possible to explore here the original accumulation of this structure of reproduction. It is inseparably bound to the revolutionary enthusiasm of the Russian revolution, as well as to the overlapping of proletarian and pre-capitalist peasant protest, and the cultural backwardness of absolutism, and the like. It also has intellectual origins which can be found partly in the various branches of the international socialist movement, and partly in the tradition of the Russian community, namely the mir.6 The tendency to relinquish all social power in economics, politics, and ideology to a highly centralized apparatus has its origin in precisely this revolutionary enthusiasm and in revolutionary necessity. This tendency represents the quite conscious attempt to organize society according to the model of gigantic administrative hierarchies. American trusts and the postal service of the German Empire were the intellectual godfathers of this attempt. Lenin saw in this form of [social] organization a necessary transition stage, and by no means the ideal or a final goal.7 And according to Lenin, the

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following is true for this stage: All citizens become employees or workers of one state, syndicate, that embraces the people as a whole.8 With the transition to the New Economic Policy, a fundamental revision of this conception of socialism began. Yet this revision ended with preliminary, inconsequential steps which left the centralized, war-communist political system essentially untouched. And it was precisely this political and intellectual superstructure that created society, at the end of the 20s, in its image. Administrative concentration of the most important social functions means, as was stated above, that the actual subjects at the basis of societys material and intellectual life deprive themselves, or let themselves be deprived of, precisely those forces that make them self-interested, individually responsible subjects who create their own productive and life processes. The attempt to unify the functions of the producer, the property owner, and of political power by consolidating them at the top of the administrative hierarchy, in the development of a more or less extended historical process leads to its exact opposite although this might seem paradoxical on first sight. A system tends to arise in which all become civil servants, and no one behaves like an actual producer, property owner, or political authority. This is the case because the expropriation of all crucial functions of social subjects, which constitutes one pole of the structure of administrative centralized socialism, leads to the destruction of the fertile ground necessary for development in modern society. This fertile ground is characterized by self-interest, individual responsibility, and self-realization [Selbstgestaltung]. Socit civile, a sphere where citizens act relatively independent of the state, is dissolved. The various spheres of life, such as those of economics, politics, law, education, science, community development, etc., become specialized departments of one and the same bureaucratic hierarchy. The law-like regularities [Gesetzmigkeiten] inherent to these spheres are ignored, and thus they lose their capacity for growth. At the beginning of administrative, centralized socialism it could still be thought that these negative effects would be more than compensated for through the enormous concentration of all social forces at the top of the apparatus. And precisely this at least the ideology of administrative socialism promised would make a kind of social progress possible which was superior in quality and pace to that of anarchic, bourgeois society of atomized individuals. Back then, according to Mikhail Gorbachev, one had a firm belief in the universal efficiency of strict centralization. It was thought that command was the fastest and best way to solve any problem.9 Such centralization of social forces proves to be productive only in extreme situations however, and neither under normal conditions nor in the long run, for it is unable to renew the conditions necessary for its own activity. It can bring the subjects at the basis of society to relinquish their powers [Krfte] to the state only if and to the degree to which it wins their enthusiasm. (This was the case during the Russian revolution, and to a certain extent during the early 30s and the Second World War.) Or it can force them to do so through

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physical and psychological terror and strong demagoguery. However, it is unable to generate positive interest on the part of the working people, enterprises, communities, or scientific communities rather, it continually destroys this interest. Moreover, the center of such an administrative system is unable to set its own positive goals. It either tries to realize, more or less effectively, already established goals, or the administrative system posits itself, i.e. its own selfpreservation as the practical goal of social development. Growth of the apparatuses, the organization of social production toward the generation of official reports of success (bumagotwortschestwo*), the transformation of all social spheres of production into the subordinated branches of central agencies are some of the symptoms of such a developmental tendency. In the long run, insofar as this system is unable to generate driving social forces, such as positive interest of the people, and is unable to reproduce, not to mention create progressive goals, the erosion of all potential for growth is a necessary consequence of its essential structure. The tendency toward stagnation and decay is immanent to the essential structure of administrative socialism! Therefore, its history continually exhibits tendencies toward decreasing productivity and efficiency, the emergence of nobodys property [Niemandes-Eigentum], as well as a general political impotence of the masses and the top functionaries. Stalinist and Popular Republican Variants Administrative socialism existed in a number of national and historical versions. The systems potential for variation, within which these versions lie, is determined by two basic variants. The first is a form whose past and present existence many communists still want to deny in horror, for it is a terrible perversion of all their individual efforts. The historically first variant of administrative socialism is Stalinism. Stalinism is a system of general terror and the violent destruction of all independent social forces. The liquidation of the peasantry, the old bolschewiki, the critical intelligentsia, and the highly qualified military leadership was not the product of an evil megalomaniacal genius, but rather the consistent expression of certain tendencies which stem from administrative socialism itself. The interests of society as a whole, which recklessly render themselves independent of the people, and the self-interest of the apparatus come to dominate development entirely. Only the resurrection of enthusiasm during the Great Patriotic War, and the resulting revitalization of the system, gave it a tragic second wind after the crisis which had already begun in the late 1930s. Nevertheless, there is a variant of administrative socialism in which other tendencies are dominant, tendencies that are specifically opposed to Stalinist socialism. These tendencies realized themselves partly as a result of the developmental logic of the system itself which will be dealt with later and partly as the result of certain national and historical conditions which made
* The author means the administrative, centralized equivalent of newspeak. Trs.

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possible more or less strong resistance to the totalitarian tendency. Central European countries, such as the German Democratic Republic and Czechoslovakia, or Hungary in particular since the late 60s, have been examples of the conscious and relatively consistent development of this second tendency. Under these latter conditions, the system of administrative concentration of social forces and the expropriation of the subjects at the basis of society were established in a more or less modified form. It was attempted to organize the system toward the satisfaction of the real, given, existential needs of the people themselves. Thereby quite an impressive standard for the provision of foodstuffs, appliances, housing, and the like was achieved. The construction of schools, preschool institutions, and hospitals, as well could stand comparison internationally. The social right to a secure existence and heavy state subsidizing of goods necessary for life were part of this arrangement. As a result of this development, millions of people identified positively with administrative socialism for quite some time. Many honest, self-sacrificing, and courageous efforts were invested. For this developmental variant of socialism the following phrase wasnt just empty words: Everything for the welfare of the people. This can be called the popular republican [volksstaatliche] variant of administrative socialism. For many who have contributed often selflessly to this system, it is very difficult to understand the present crisis. How did sense become nonsense, and good evil? Why the strict refusal to recognize the achievements of this system for its citizens as achievements of socialism at all? I want to give a brief illustration of the problem using housing construction in the GDR as an example. Since 1970, the housing situation has improved for two thirds of the citizens of the GDR. This remarkable economic achievement for the citizens was mediated by central decisions as to locations, types of housing units, cost considerations, priority, etc. In this way the free needs of concrete persons were domesticated in a sense, insofar as they were converted into the bureaucratized demand for the creation of housing-units, service-units, spaces in kindergarten, and the like. While every individual must coordinate housing, work, shopping, recreation, and childrens education in daily life, the respective state services appeared as separated, independent departments, and were entered into the books as case numbers dealt with [erfllte Kennziffern]. The neglect of city centers and the construction of large sleeping towns was the necessary result of this process, which, however, one also continually tried to counteract -with varying success. In a sense, the administrative structure of planning and leadership found its spatial objectification in our cities. Where city planning is not the responsibility of the popularly elected representatives of a community who proceed democratically and publicly with community funds, but is the task of bureaucratized state apparatuses, it is unavoidable that living situations will be created, with great efforts, which are the direct opposite of those that would satisfy the comprehensive needs of the people. The following are only a few of the symptoms of this kind of city

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planning: great distances to travel; the common impossibility of living near ones parents, grandparents, or friends without giving up ones own apartment; the separation of areas designated for housing from those for leisure activities; the concentration of many urban functions like theater, cinema, or shopping areas as well as of ones place of employment at great distances from ones home. Opportunities for better living conditions, and chances for a humane and economical way of life characterized by solidarity have thus been missed. This brings out a fundamental feature of administrative socialism. It represents a specific variety of modern mass-society in which the concentration [Vermassung] and dispersion [Parzellierung] of people in individual and familial living spaces are strikingly opposed. The autonomous creation of ones cultural life is here more complicated than in other modern societies, although a high level of social security insures that very few people drop out of the social process of reproduction, due particularly to the administrative integration of the people into this process of reproduction. The reason for the emergence of two basic variants of administrative socialism lies in the fact that the polar structure of the state centralization of social forces, and the corresponding expropriation of the subjects at the basis of society do not permit this contradiction to function as a developmental antagonism. In principle, the antagonism cannot become productive because administrative socialism is based on the negation of the subjectivity of those who are the actual producers of material and intellectual wealth in society; consequently, the center of the hierarchical system cant recognize the subjects at the basis of society as such. Where this is the case, only two alternatives remain. Either the state can try to suppress every kind of self-interest or individual creativity directly (as in Stalinist totalitarian socialism), thereby keeping the level of need of the working people, the communities, etc., as low as possible. In this way, the development of social subjectivity as such is counteracted and a system of general impoverishment and culturelessness is established. Or the state decides to take over the responsibility and authority for having these subjects themselves produce the conditions for the satisfaction of their own needs but under orders from the state. In the name of their own needs, those who produce are excluded from leadership functions in production, propertyownership, and political authority. At the same time, workers, scientists, artists, and individuals pursuing hobbies, etc. are given the opportunity to develop their own initiative and individual responsibility, but only where this is at least neutral in respect to the system, i.e. where it doesnt generate socially significant forces opposed to the administrative system. For example, in the social sciences especially those areas are highly developed which are the least important in the present situation of radical change. Initiatives in private niches or in clubs are tolerated. The development of these two forms, in which the subjects at the basis of society are subordinated to the system, also has a major impact on ideology. Stalinist totalitarian socialism presupposed unconditional subordination to

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state interests. The interests of the state alone were considered properly socialist. Popular republican socialism on the other hand was based on the thesis that the fundamental correspondence between the interests of society as a whole, collective interests, and individual interests was the new main driving force. Both conceptions were in fundamental contradiction with the ABCs of the Marxist dialectic, but they were ideologically necessary correlates of the respective variants of socialism. Because the system of administrative socialism acknowledged only the administrative form of authority and subordination as the genuinely socialist mode of social organization, all features of the modern market, the law, democracy and publicity [ffentlichkeit] were essentially alien to it. Any existing non-administrative economic, judicial, and democratic structures were always reduced to a formal outward appearance, behind which and sometimes even quite openly different and much more powerful structures were at work. An actual multi-party system, for example, couldnt develop under these conditions. Communist parties degenerated largely into associations of administrators who enforced their leaders instructions through their power to command in the state and in state-controlled society. To give an objective evaluation of virtually all socialist countries one must consider the specific overlapping of Stalinist totalitarian and popular republican developmental tendencies in each country. In addition, one must take into consideration other developmental variations of this system yet to be sketched out. Developmental Cycles and the General Crisis of Administrative Socialism Administrative socialism is characterized by recurring phases of stagnation which end in crisis. These crises forcefully show that administrative socialism destroys the driving social forces and that this system posits itself as an end in itself. This is due to the increasingly extreme and widespread antagonism between the centralization of social forces and the expropriation of the social subjects. The result is moral decay in the form of corruption, decreasing motivation at work, and the decline of socialist behavior in everyday life. Each time such a crisis broke in on the leadership, like a natural disaster in the true sense of the word, the leadership tried to make the system more flexible, and adjust it to the new developmental necessities through the use of specially manufactured props. To paraphrase Marx again, one could say: during these crises, as soon as the system of administrative socialism begins to conceive of itself as an obstacle to development it takes refuge in forms which appear to consolidate its control, but simultaneously, through restraining and modifying the administrative hierarchy, announces its own dissolution and the dissolution of the system of production which rests on it.10 Inevitably, the way out of the crisis is seen in the building in of certain forms of social association [Vergesellschaftungsformen] into the [otherwise unchanged] basic system of concentration and expropriation. The economic,

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political and cultural developmental capacity of modern societies depends upon these forms of social association, like a socially responsive market, a judicial system, political life, and publicity.11 Each of these crises harshly brought to the attention of society the fact that the system of state control of production which characterizes administrative socialism does not provide sufficient driving social forces, or adequate humanistic goals, or wellfunctioning mechanisms for controlling itself. During each crisis, the pressured leadership chose to resort to elements of the commodity-moneyrelationship, to admit a modest expansion of individual rights, to attempt to stimulate political organizations, and to allow to a certain extent democracy and publicity. As a result, the realm of action of social subjects was often significantly enlarged. This made it possible to modify the basic structure of the reproduction of centralization and expropriation, and to reinforce tendencies on the part of individuals to take responsibility for social development. Ideologically, this was long interpreted as an inevitable integration of blemishes [Muttermalen], or of forms of mediation which are alien to the essence [of socialism] into the genuinely communist and socialist, i.e. state centralized relations of property, power, and consciousness. For example, for decades socialist political economists were entirely preoccupied with finding an explanation for how commodity-money-relations originate where property is owned by the state.12 In this way, each of the crises of administrative, centralized socialism created conditions for the mediation of its basic structure through forms of association [Vergesellschaftungsformen], which on the one hand were subordinated to the goal of maintaining the system, while at the same time they made possible developments that transcended the system. This opened significant space for progressive and humane activity within the system. Also from a theoretical perspective, it would be entirely incorrect to deny administrative socialism any historical potential for progress, and by doing so to reject out of hand the entire struggle of several generations as a fully unsuccessful and meaningless enterprise. Especially the increasing integration of aspects of economic accounting [Rechnungsfhrung], law, democracy, and the elements and space of publicity - in this way the arts expanded their sphere of activity - made it possible to realize the possibility inherent to the system to a greater extent, i.e. the possibility that the system might be shaped not only in the interest of the people but also partly by them. One cannot and should not overlook the fact that every day reasonable measures were taken, and that many measures were avoided which, from a humane perspective, would have been nonsensical. And this was only possible due to the waves of those who, committed to humanist goals, limited and modified the basic structures of administrative socialism through hard struggle, and among them, above all, members of the communist parties. These were the people who minimized the Stalinist excesses and crimes in our country; who time and again oriented our economy toward the fulfillment of social needs; who fought - against all the obstacles created by this system for education, health, and culture; who made compromises

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and in this way realized the possible. Without these people, this systems dangerous logic of comprehensive expropriation and alienation could have unfolded fully. Without them it would not have been possible to rise out of the present crisis into a new socialism. At the same time it is necessary to emphasize the importance of those who through their often harshly suppressed protests against the existing basic structures were essentially the ones to initiate changes, and to stir the conscience of society. Each attempt to make the previous socialism function more efficiently, through more or less serious modifications, brought us after a period of limited progress into an even deeper, more painful and hopeless crisis. This is the result of the growing contradiction between, on the one hand, the development of productive forces, and human needs and values within the system itself, and on the other hand, the basic structure of the centralization of social forces, achieved through the expropriation of the subjects at the basis of society. The more they were able to develop themselves, the less were they willing to play a positive role in their own expropriation. Because of the restrictive nature of the existing power structures, the accumulated energies were inevitably directed towards social niches or even fed parasitic behavior. For this reason one should by no means believe that, through a new set of adjustments to the basic structure of the former system, administrative socialism could in any way achieve significant progress. This type of socialism has definitively exhausted its capacity for progress. That administrative socialism must be superseded stands, especially as seen from the perspective of contemporary global problems, on the worldhistorical agenda. The basic structure of social reproduction, characteristic of administrative socialism, made it impossible for this variant of socialism to give a progressive and, in the best sense of the word, attractive answer to the problems of maintaining peace, protecting the environment, and international development. First, because the unity of producer, property-owner, and political authority within the system was not brought about through economic and politically democratic means, but was rather posited by the state administration, administrative socialism couldnt provide a basis for a persuasive democratic peace, and answer to the relevant external threat (despite strong counter-forces within the communist movement). Rather, it supported the formation of camps and global blocs, the politics of isolation and military power. Secondly, because natural and social resources were subject to central administrative distribution, no one had a personal interest in acting like boni patres familias (good heads of households) toward our inherited natural resources and cultural goods, i.e. in leaving them to future generations as accumulated wealth. The substantial consequences are by no means accidental. And they could not be compensated for by the motivation of many citizens and several top functionaries who showed particular interest in important buildings or great projects for the sake of prestige. Third, the administrative socialist system of reproduction itself has a tendency toward underdevelopment. In fact, it was unavoidable that this

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system due to its periods of stagnation remained underdeveloped in comparison with Western countries, and that in respect to the international division of labor it found itself in a subordinate and dependent position. The export of such problematic conceptions of development to Third World countries contributed in part to drastic stagnation, social and economic crises, and therefore to increasing underdevelopment in these countries. Administrative socialism is therefore unable to claim real success in solving any crucial global problems. The historical limits of administrative socialism are largely the result of the current scientific-technological revolution. This revolution definitively replaces the transition to mass-production, centralization, and concentration, dominant since the end of the 19th century, with an essentially different form of social association [Vergesellschaftung], which makes factory or state monopoly socialism appear historically outdated. Today, this kind of social association is increasingly realized through the coordinated co-evolution of qualitatively divergent types of individuals active in production [Produktivkraftsubjekte], each of whom has a very specific function, and cannot be reduced to any another. The following are some of the many forms this trend takes: major global and regional projects, transnational corporations for carrying out basic initiatives from basic research to the reconstruction of entire industrial and service branches as well as a huge number of small and medium sized businesses, with often limited life-spans and varying functions (small initiatives, supply, the establishment of a generally high technological standard, testing of the first cycle of important initiatives, etc.), and flexible collectives, the new importance of individuality, discipline, and the willingness to take risks of a large portion of the working people. The entire system of the structures of economic, political, legal, and intellectual development of society must correspond to this new type of the social formation [Vergesellschaftung] of productive forces, through the network of cooperation among diverse subjects of social development in the areas of industry, science, the service sector, and education. Culture becomes the primary developmental factor of modern societies, and diverse forms of public communication become the dominant mode of interaction. The internal development of administrative socialism, global problems, and, last but not least, the new revolution In productive forces have today brought the decade-long cycle of development and crisis to its historically final crisis. The way out of this crisis is either for socialism to hopelessly subordinate itself to an imperialistically dominated world market, or to cooperate in shaping international relations through a new socialist orientation grounded in a modern socialism. Those who want to overcome socialisms cycle of crises, who are interested in a new level of socialist development, who want a contribute to the solution of global problems and to the formation of a European community in line with its best traditions, must radically change the basic structures of this socialism. A revolution is necessary. We must finally part company with administrative, centralized socialism. But what the hour calls for is not a return to private

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property (and hence to exploitation), but rather to real social association [Vergesellschaftung], the true socialization [Sozialisierung] of property, power, and social consciousness. Translated from the German by Amy Baehr and Igor Jasinski

NOTES
1. See A. Kosing, Aktuelle Fragen der Gesellschaftskonzeption des Sozialismus, Urania-Mitteilungen 1989, Vol. 3, p. 4. 2. Rosa Luxemburg, Werke, Vol. 4, p. 362. [Translation from Rosa Luxemburg, The Russian Revolution, and Leninism or Marxism? (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1961). 3. See Marx/Engels, Werke, Vol. 25, p. 825. 4. A. P. Butenko, Teoretitscheskije problemy sowerschenstwowanija nowowo Stroja: o sozialno-ekonomitscheskoi Prirode Sozialisma Woprossy filosofii, 1987, Vol. 2, p. 27. 5. See Marx/Engels, Werke, Vol. 23, p. 590. 6. Thoughts toward the authors own position in respect to the causes of the emergence of administrative socialism are developed in M. Brie, Wer ist Eigentmer im Sozialismus? (Berlin, 1990). 7. See V. I. Lenin, Werke, Vol. 25, p. 488. 8. Lenin, Werke, Vol. 25, p. 488. [Translation our own - A.B./I.J.] 9. M. Gorbachev, Oktober und Umgestaltung: Die Revolution geht weiter, (Moskau, 1987), p. 24. [Translation our own - A.B./I.J.] 10. See Marx/Engels, Werke, Vol. 42, p. 551. 11. On Vergesellschaftungsformen, see H.-P. Krger, Die kapitalistische Gesellschaft als die erste moderne Gesellschaft, Philosophische Grundlagen der Erarbeitung einer Konzeption des modernen Sozialismus (Humboldt-Universitt zu Berlin, 1989). 12. It is obviously necessary to reconsider this problem, and to re-evaluate the discussion without simply negating the accurate insights of Marxist research.

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