Building Up Socialism/Chapter 1
BUILDING UP SOCIALISM
BY NIKOLAI BUKHARIN
Chapter I.
OLD PROBLEMS AGAIN.
A NUMBER of cardinal and fundamental questions concerning our revolution have been raised again in an acute manner. It is not possible here to explain in detail the causes of this, but one cannot refrain from pointing out that the fundamental reason lies in the fact that we are living in a period of transition from the so-called process of restoration to the process of building up.
This terminology, in our opinion, is not quite exact and correct; for to define the past phase of development of our economics as a process of restoration is to assume—if we accept the strict meaning of the word—that the revival of our industry and our economic revival generally are proceeding along the same lines as those along which they proceeded prior to the revolution. Only if we assume this can we speak of a process of restoration in the strict sense of the word.
As a matter of fact, after the October Revolution, our economy, particularly and primarily its State sector, revived in such a manner that parallel with the restoration of economy there proceeded an uninterrupted alteration in the relations of production. Our development proceeded upon quite another basis compared with that upon which the economy of the country developed prior to the October victory of the working class. For that reason, when we speak of the process of restoration we must bear in mind that this expression is used conventionally. By it we mean to say that our output has reached the pre-war level, that the material basis of production has been restored to pre-war dimensions. Only in this sense can we speak of the process of restoration; only in this way can we speak of the transition from the period of restoration to the period of building up.
Thus, beyond a doubt there now arises before us in all its breadth the task of the reconstruction of our economy, the task of transferring it to a new technical basis.
This depends primarily upon our success in acquiring and applying capital, resources to be employed for the expansion of the basis of production, for the construction or the laying down of new enterprises, to a considerable extent upon a new technical basis. It is not hard to realise that this is a task of the greatest difficulty, and the difficulty does not lie merely in the sphere of practice. No, even taken in its theoretical aspect it represents a "hard nut to crack." The difficulty of the task gives rise to wavering in our ranks. It compels us to take up again the fundamental questions of the revolution.
It will not be superfluous to mention that the question of basic capital was raised before, comparatively a long time ago (for example the question of electrification raised by Lenin); and it has been raised before by certain of our opponents. In this connection one may mention a work by P. P. Maslov, namely the book he published in 1918 entitled "A Summary of the War and Revolution." Maslov at that time stood entirely on the Menshevik position and in the book referred to he advocated the Menshevik point of view. Of course, he denied the possibility of a Socialist revolution in Russia and this denial in a large measure was based on the alleged impossibility of solving the problems of the new technique owing to the general backwardness of the technico-economic basis of our country. This is what he wrote:
"It is sufficient to know what is the prevailing type of enterprise in agriculture and in home handicraft industry, which employs the largest number of workers in industry, to come to the conclusion that the workers cannot bring into being the Socialist system until capitalist production creates for it the material conditions. In the first few years the Great Russian Revolution will only split off industry from agriculture, will split it off by means of capitalism and only 'in the more or less remote future' will Socialism again unite them in a harmonious whole. Unless it breaks away from agriculture and petty production, industry can never become transformed technically into social production, for the primitive technique of the handicraftsman cannot be preserved, while the change in technique will break up the semi-agricultural economy. Even the revolution, in spite of the tremendous creative power it commands, cannot create new enterprises on a new technical basis out of nothing."
The most characteristic and curious thing in this quotation is the last sentence in which the writer combines the idea of the impossibility of a Socialist revolution in Russia with the idea that there are no sources from which we can obtain the means to establish a new technical basis for our economy.
By what means can we establish the new technical basis? That is the problem. This problem, i.e., the "problem of basic capital," to use a modern expression, is precisely the problem which P. Maslov puts in the forefront, and as, m the opinion of the Menshevik Maslov, it is idle to think of new methods, this serves him as the decisive argument generally to deny the Socialist character of our revolution.
From this it follows that the problem of transferring our economy to new lines, the problem оf basic capital, brings us right up against the question of the character of our revolution, the question of the possibility of establishing Socialism in a single country; in a word, it brings us up against the series of questions which at the present time are the subject of controversy in our Party. For this reason it will be useful to glance back and to recall what has been said before as to the Socialist revolution generally and what has been said concerning the possibility of a Socialist revolution in our country. Such an historical reference will bring to light a whole series of arguments which will help to explain the present controversy and will make it possible to trace the intellectual sources of the ideas of the respective sides in the controversy. Here it is necessary, if only briefly, to deal with the question of the "maturity" of modern and primarily of world capitalism in the manner in which that question is presented by the Bolsheviks.