Page:Building Up Socialism - Nikolai Bukharin (1926).pdf/9

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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