This article attempts to present the question of the economic shortages and their connection with the alienation of labour in the post-capitalist bureaucratic regimes in Soviet Union and Poland. To analyse the problem I start with material conditions which were basis for the reproduction of the Stalinist power, that is bureaucratic planning, control over the labour and production process by the party apparatus, and I also try to describe the impact of these factors towards the working class. The main sources for my study are the writings of the Hungarian economist János Kornai to analyse the roots of the phenomenon of the good hunger and its social costs, and also the Trotsky's analysis of Stalinist bureaucratism. To show the problems of the alienation of labour I use the works of Bob Arnot (about the “negative workers' control”), or Vladimir Andreff (arrhythmical production process). The Polish authors, such as Małgorzata Mazurek or Błażej Brzostek, were also helpful.
PL
Niniejszy artykuł jest próbą przedstawienia problematyki niedoborów gospodarczych i ich relacji ze zjawiskiem alienacji pracy w postkapitalistycznych reżimach biurokratycznych na przykładzie Związku Radzieckiego i Polski. W celu dokonania analizy wychodzę od przesłanek materialnych, które złożyły się na funkcjonowanie władzy stalinowskiej, m.in. biurokratycznego planowania, kontroli nad procesem produkcji i siłą roboczą pracowników najemnych przez aparat partyjny, jak i staram się opisać skutki tego typu mechanizmów dla klasy robotniczej. W pracy posługuję się elementami analizy „gospodarki niedoborów” autorstwa ekonomisty węgierskiego Jánosa Kornaia, by przedstawić strukturalne źródła fenomenu braków towarów, jak i jego skutki społeczne, a także analizą stalinizmu dokonaną przez Lwa Trockiego. By zaprezentować problematykę alienacji pracowniczej, skorzystałem z prac takich autorów jak Bob Arnot („negatywna kontrola robotnicza”) czy Vladimir Andreff (arytmia procesu produkcji). Pomocni byli także współcześni polscy badacze rzeczywistości fabrycznej PRL (Małgorzata Mazurek, Błażej Brzostek).
This article attempts to present the question of ideas of Polish heterodox economist Michał Kalecki on the planned economies and general problems with capitalist and post-capitalist systems. To analyze the problem I start with Kalecki’'s theory of capitalist crisis, question of effective demand and full employment, and then describe the quasi-model of democratic planned economy. Next, I focus on relations of workers’' self-management with central planning and motivation problems under state-run economy. I also put on agenda the so-called shortage problem, analyzed by the Kalecki’'s supporter, Andrea Szego, in opposition to neo-classical approach of Hungarian economist Janos Kornai.
The aim of the article is to present the creation and the decline of workers’ councils asdemocratic bodies in post-Stalinism Poland. The period analyzed starts with their formationin 1956 and ends with the 1958 final neutralization of the councils by the ruling party-statebureaucracy of the Polish People’s Republic and the incorporation of workers’ councils intoa pseudo-democratic collective body called the “Working Class Self-government Convention”(Konferencja Samorządu Robotniczego – KSR). The new law on the “working class selfgovernment”successfully absorbed the workers’ councils under crisis, resulting from theobstacles posed by the bureaucratic system, into the economic system and factory regimecontrolled by the “nomenklatura”. In the beginning, workers’ councils represented the workingclass’ aspirations in establishing democratic control over the work process and assuring theimprovement of factory work conditions, however, thanks to the KSR they became a part of athree-part decision-making committee, whose aim was to manage the factory, thus replacingthe workers’ councils in their original role. In KSR ranks the only democratic organizationwere the workers’ councils and their representatives constituted a minority. Representativesof the ruling bureaucracy held the majority of votes allowing them to reject any decision in conflict with the ruling party’s arrangements, agreements, and social relationships. Thefinal result of the KSR existence was a decline of interest in workers’ councils exhibited byworkers and bringing their meaning down to that of a substitute of a trade union and not a ofa powerful ruling body in a workplace.Key words: workers’ councils, working class self-government convention, PZPR, workprocess, bureaucracy.
The aim of the article is to present the creation and the decline of workers’ councils asdemocratic bodies in post-Stalinism Poland. The period analyzed starts with their formationin 1956 and ends with the 1958 final neutralization of the councils by the ruling party-statebureaucracy of the Polish People’s Republic and the incorporation of workers’ councils intoa pseudo-democratic collective body called the “Working Class Self-government Convention”(Konferencja Samorządu Robotniczego – KSR). The new law on the “working class selfgovernment”successfully absorbed the workers’ councils under crisis, resulting from theobstacles posed by the bureaucratic system, into the economic system and factory regimecontrolled by the “nomenklatura”. In the beginning, workers’ councils represented the workingclass’ aspirations in establishing democratic control over the work process and assuring theimprovement of factory work conditions, however, thanks to the KSR they became a part of athree-part decision-making committee, whose aim was to manage the factory, thus replacingthe workers’ councils in their original role. In KSR ranks the only democratic organizationwere the workers’ councils and their representatives constituted a minority. Representativesof the ruling bureaucracy held the majority of votes allowing them to reject any decision in conflict with the ruling party’s arrangements, agreements, and social relationships. Thefinal result of the KSR existence was a decline of interest in workers’ councils exhibited byworkers and bringing their meaning down to that of a substitute of a trade union and not a ofa powerful ruling body in a workplace.Key words: workers’ councils, working class self-government convention, PZPR, workprocess, bureaucracy.
This article attempts to present the question of the co-called transition period, which according to Marxist theoreticians, emerges after the overthrow of capitalism by the workers’ revolution. The main sources for my study are the views of those Marxists who, directly or indirectly, participated in the three “great debates” about socialist economics (calculation debate, debates about planning in the Soviet Union and in revolutionary Cuba). To present how Marxism describes the question of Post-capitalist reality, I rely on the writings of Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, Leon Trotsky and Ernest Mandel, and I try to create an outline of social-economic model. Description, which emerged from writings of the aforementioned authors, presents a society based on workers’ democracy in the workplace (economic) and state (political) levels and democratic planning, whose aim is to satisfy the needs. Such a description of the Post-capitalist society is radically different from the reality of the Stalinist bureaucratic regimes.
PL
Niniejszy artykuł jest próbą przybliżenia problematyki „okresu przejściowego”, jaki zdaniem teoretyków marksistowskich, powinien nastąpić po obaleniu kapitalizmu przez rewolucję robotniczą. Podstawowym odniesieniem są dla mnie poglądy, jakie prezentowali marksiści podczas trzech „debat ekonomicznych” na temat „budowy socjalizmu” (debata o kalkulacji, debata o planowaniu w ZSRR i na Kubie po rewolucji). W celu opisu, w jaki sposób marksizm podchodzi do kwestii postkapitalistycznej rzeczywistości, bazowałem głównie na pismach Karola Marksa, Fryderyka Engelsa, Lwa Trockiego i Ernesta Mandela, w oparciu o które próbowałem stworzyć zarys modelu społeczno-gospodarczego. Opis, jaki wyłania się z prac wymienionych autorów, przedstawia społeczeństwo oparte na demokracji robotniczej w miejscu pracy (aspekt ekonomiczny) i na poziomie państwa (aspekt polityczny) oraz planowaniu demokratycznemu, mającemu na celu sukcesywne zaspokajanie oraz bardziej złożonych potrzeb społecznych. Tak opisany model postkapitalistycznego społeczeństwa stanowi radykalnie zaprzeczenie rzeczywistości, jaka istniała w (post)stalinowskich reżimach biurokratycznych.
JavaScript is turned off in your web browser. Turn it on to take full advantage of this site, then refresh the page.