Civil War as a volunteer and, after serving in the US Army in World War II, had become one of the principal editors of the American Communist organ Daily Worker. Sentenced in 1950 to a five-year term in prison, he was still serving his sentence in March 1953, when Stalin died. In his later-published autobiography,10 Gates writes:

I had enormous regard and admiration for him [Stalin], and his death left a void in my scheme of things. But developments after his death forced me to question whether my absolute faith in Stalin had been justified. Immediately following his death, the Soviet government launched a peace offensive that resulted a few months later in the settlement of the Korean war. Soviet foreign policy had a new quality now, different from when Stalin had been alive. Had he been at all responsible for the Korean War? Had he been an obstacle to its settlement? The strange phrase, “cult of the individual,” began to appear in the Soviet press. What did it mean? Who was the anonymous “individual”? To me it was obvious that the reference was to Stalin.

Communist Officials Abroad

Among Communist officials serving their govern. ments outside their own countries, there were some to whom, for different reasons, Stalin's dealth brought a sense of relief, if not joy. Nikolai Khokhlov, for example, was a trained agent of the Soviet state security service and at the time of Stalin's death was stationed in East Berlin on a special assignment. He had, however, already begun to dislike the work of a secret police agent and had made repeated attempts to get out of the network, with only temporary success. For him, Stalin's death was an unexpected reprieve, for Beria, now in full command of the Soviet secret service, immediately began a reorganization and ordered most of the agents stationed abroad back to Moscow. Khokhlov, who later defected to the West and wrote of his experiences, describes his reactions on that occasion:11

When on March 8 I called up [my wife] Jana again and informed her that I would be back home the following day, the joy in her voice signified more than merely joy at our reunion. . . . She and I, all of us, millions of Russians, hoped in those days that Stalin's death would bring about changes in the Soviet system.

Pawel Monat, a former Polish Communist military intelligence officer who was then serving as a political

military attaché in North Korea, also had the feeling that Stalin's death might change things for the better -at least so far as the Korean war was concerned. After receiving the news from Moscow, he recalls:

We sat around the embassy that night, drinking vodka and saying out loud how sorry we were that the great, beloved leader of communism was gone. But somehow we felt that the end of the war was now in sight. Later that month we learned that both sides had agreed to a tentative first step: they would trade their sick and wounded prisoners as a token test of good will. I was playing checkers with Colonel Nikolai Smirnov, one of the Soviet advisers, when the word came. "That's it," said Smirnov. "In a week or so we will be driving into Pyongyang with our lights on."

9912

In China and Vietnam

At the Chinese Communist Party's international party school on the outskirts of Peking, which served as a training center for Communist cadres from other Asian countries (in particular, Indonesia, Burma, Japan, Vietnam, and Thailand) and from Australia, the news of Stalin's death evoked genuine grief. According to Keith McEwan, a former Australian Communist who at that time had already been studying at the Chinese party school for nearly two years, "the whole institute mourned his death. Tears ran down the cheeks of many comrades, including some Australians, so great was our grief at the loss of our then beloved leader."

99 13

The former American Communist and longtime foreign political editor of the New York Daily Worker, Joseph R. Starobin, has provided us with an eye-wit ness account of how Stalin's death was received in another corner of Asia-at the jungle headquarters of the Viet Minh, then battling the French for control of Vietnam. Starobin, who reached Vietnam by a long and circuitous journey via East Berlin, the Soviet Union, and China, met with Ho Chi Minh a few days before Stalin's death and again saw him just after that event. He writes:

I saw the President again several evenings later. He was in a preoccupied mood. The news of the death of Stalin had come to the jungles. It was Minh who had told us, saying simply: "Le camarade Staline n'est plus [Comrade Stalin is no more]." And that evening there was to be a funeral ceremony at which Ho would make the main address. . . . That evening, he spoke to a gathering of the ministers and cadres assembled in that part of the

10 John Gates, The Story of an American Communist, New York, Thomas Nelson & Sons, 1958, p. 152.

11 Nikolai E. Khokhlov, Recht auf Gewissen, Stuttgart, Deutsche Verlagsanstalt, 1959, pp. 260-61. (Published in English as In the Name of Conscience, New York, McKay, 1960.)

12 Pawel Monat with John Dille, Spy in the U.S., New York, Harper & Row, 1961, p. 173.

13 Keith McEwan, Once a Jolly Comrade, Brisbane, The Jacaranda Press, 1966, p. 36.

forest. Everyone sat on rude benches illumined by candles set in a makeshift candelabra made out of bamboo; at the front of the large shed was a portrait of Stalin, wreathed in flowers. Two violins played softly. The President's speech was brief and devoted to a recollection of Stalin's leadership in helping to defeat the fascist Axis. Then he stood there in the half-light, and walked to the doorway, his frail figure etched against the black night.14

Some Observations

So much for some of the published recollections of persons who themselves experienced and observed the impact of Stalin's death within the sphere of world communism, though in widely varying situations. The different reactions to that event, ranging all the way from unbounded joy and prayers of thanks, through hope for improvement and change in the system, uncertainty, confusion, and shock, to deepest grief, show just how diverse were the inner feelings, opinions, and views of people behind the seemingly monolithic unity of world communism.

Of course, the single example studied here the varying reactions to Stalin's death-does not of itself suffice to justify this conclusion. However, this example is nevertheless a typical one. Analysis of more than a hundred memoirs of former participants in the Communist world movement from twenty countries reveals that there were similarly diverse reactions to other important events, including for example Hitler's attack on the Soviet Union in June 1941, the conse

14 Joseph R. Starobin, Eyewitness in Indo-China, New York, Cameron & Kahn, 1954, pp. 115-16.

quent reversal of the general line for all Communist parties, the dissolution of the Comintern in July 1943, the end of the war in 1945, the reestablishment of the Cominform in 1947, and Yugoslavia's break with Stalin's leadership in 1948.

Interestingly enough, this wealth of material bears witness to the fact that only in the rarest instances were the varying reactions related to the nationality of the person concerned. Rather they depended primarily on the function of the particular individual, his duties, his political career, his political philosophy, and the degree of loyalty he felt to the Communist ideology at the time of the event described. Time and again it was found that Communists in the same situation and phase of belief—even if they were of different nationalities and were in different parts of the world when a certain important event occurred-displayed astoundingly similar and sometimes even identical reactions to it. On the other hand, persons of the same nationality in the same country who learned of the same event at the same time often displayed completely different reactions if they were in different situations or functions, or in different circles of the party apparatus.

This is not to underestimate or deny the national element, which has undoubtedly played an important part in the process of differentiation evident in the Communist world since Stalin's death. But there does appear to be some danger in advancing this factor as the only or the predominant one. The differentiation, in this writer's view, is to be traced to trends, tendencies, differencies, and divergencies of opinion long active beneath the surface during the Stalin leadership -tendencies and divergencies which can by no means be ascribed solely to the factor of nationalism.

NOTES & VIEWS

EDITORS' NOTE: Readers are welcome to comment on matters discussed in this journal. Letters should be addressed to the Editors, Problems of Communism, US Information Agency, 1776 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, Washington, DC, 20547.

Ferment in Czechoslovakia

TO THE EDITORS: Prof. Schwartz's examination of interest group theory in Czechoslovakia, as the first of the series "Politics in Flux" (Jan-Feb 1967), is an apt beginning. The last several years of Czechoslovak political development have witnessed an explosion of social and political criticism and proposals for reform unmatched in any other country which calls itself an ally of the Soviet Union. Michal Lakatos' article in Pravny Obzor of January 1965, which initiated the public discussion, remains the definitive theoretical critique of one-party misrule, and Mr. Schwartz is justified in treating him as a central figure in the debate. Dr. Lakatos' later articles and book, and the contributions of such CC functionaries as Pavel Auersperg and Zdenek Mlynar, are no more than commentaries or criticisms of this basic contribution.

It is unfortunate, however, that Mr. Schwartz deals neither with the evolution of institutions in Czechoslovakia nor with the forces which have stimulated this development. More than this: by examining the theory largely in isolation from the political reality, he fails to see that the theories of Lakatos and others are a prismatic reflection of that reality, not merely the musing of liberated intellectuals. Programs for political reform in contemporary Czechoslovakia have grown up, in part, as a rationalization of changes which have

already taken place and, in part, as proposals for their institutionalization. Mr. Schwartz correctly states that Czechoslovak reformers espouse concepts which would give institutional reality to conflicting interests because the suppression of conflict and the artificial harmonization of interests lead to the adoption of unrealistic and inefficient policies. But if only this were so, why should they win support, even in limited form, within the Central Committee? Constitutional reform has come to be debated in the CC and secretariat because the authority of the Czechoslovak CP has started to wane.

The classical tools of control through political directive and ideological education have been dulled from contact with competing vested interests. The worker feels threatened by the party campaign against "equal stomachs" and by the loss of job security. The party's economic advisors feel that reform is proceeding too slowly, that the party is bartering reform for workingclass support. At the same time, while various economic interests have to be appeased, the political institutions are being scrutinized by political thinkers who see themselves as either selfless democrats or spokesmen for an as yet unsatisfied Slovak nationalism.

...

As one example of a pressure group, the economic institute of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences-Ota Sik's domain has an influence on policy far out of proportion with either its number or ostensible political positon. (Of its members, only Sik sits in the CC.) The State Planning Commission, another lobby group, competes with the institute, each struggling for the acceptance of its articulated economic policies. Both groups boast of partisans in the Presidium: Premier Josef Lenart for the economic institute and Oldrich Cernik for the SPC. Lenart and Cernik have publicly divided on the issues of consumption vs. investment, rapid growth vs. saving, and long

term vs. short-term foreign (Western) investment. The present economic policy, some aspects of which are yet to be decided, bears all the signs of compromise which the leadership has negotiated, not arbitrated.

The danger to the continuity of party policy which, in Communist societies, is always posed by intellectual dissidents is redoubled in the Czechoslovak environment because these artists, writers, and journalists enjoy the protection of their professional unions. The Union of Slovak Journalists, speaking with the voice of a revived Slovak national conscience, echoed the first criticism of former Premier Viliam Siroky in 1963. ... Leading Communists within the professional artists' unions, who are responsible for the discipline of members, have recently been threatened with expulsion if they did not police their colleagues in the spirit of the party line. The party can no longer trust control of the unions to its leading workers because they cannot or will not act as executors of cultural policy. The editorial policies of such journals as Literarny noviny and Kulturny zivot, which are published under the imprimatur of writers' unions, are testimony to this defiance.

To take another example, the party no longer speaks even theoretically of the trade unions as transmission belts of policy to the working class. Nor, realistically speaking, can it any longer. In the face of factory closures and unemployment, created by economic reform, there has been hostile reaction from some trade union organizations. Some component units demanded retraining programs and unemployment insurance. (Such programs were eventually established.) "Work stoppages" have been reported, and some TU representatives have been dismissed for demanding higher wages. Like the intellectuals, but for different reasons, their allegiance to the party line is being tested by other loyalties. . .

forest. Everyone sat on rude benches illumined by candles set in a makeshift candelabra made out of bamboo; at the front of the large shed was a portrait of Stalin, wreathed in flowers. Two violins played softly. The President's speech was brief and devoted to a recollection of Stalin's leadership in helping to defeat the fascist Axis. Then he stood there in the half-light, and walked to the doorway, his frail figure etched against the black night.14

Some Observations

So much for some of the published recollections of persons who themselves experienced and observed the impact of Stalin's death within the sphere of world communism, though in widely varying situations. The different reactions to that event, ranging all the way from unbounded joy and prayers of thanks, through hope for improvement and change in the system, uncertainty, confusion, and shock, to deepest grief, show just how diverse were the inner feelings, opinions, and views of people behind the seemingly monolithic unity of world communism.

Of course, the single example studied here the varying reactions to Stalin's death-does not of itself suffice to justify this conclusion. However, this example is nevertheless a typical one. Analysis of more than a hundred memoirs of former participants in the Communist world movement from twenty countries reveals that there were similarly diverse reactions to other important events, including for example Hitler's attack on the Soviet Union in June 1941, the conse

14 Joseph R. Starobin, Eyewitness in Indo-China, New York, Cameron & Kahn, 1954, pp. 115-16.

quent reversal of the general line for all Communist parties, the dissolution of the Comintern in July 1943, the end of the war in 1945, the reestablishment of the Cominform in 1947, and Yugoslavia's break with Stalin's leadership in 1948.

Interestingly enough, this wealth of material bears witness to the fact that only in the rarest instances were the varying reactions related to the nationality of the person concerned. Rather they depended primarily on the function of the particular individual, his duties, his political career, his political philosophy, and the degree of loyalty he felt to the Communist ideology at the time of the event described. Time and again it was found that Communists in the same situation and phase of belief- even if they were of different nationalities and were in different parts of the world when a certain important event occurred-displayed astoundingly similar and sometimes even identical reactions to it. On the other hand, persons of the same nationality in the same country who learned of the same event at the same time often displayed completely different reactions if they were in different situations or functions, or in different circles of the party apparatus.

This is not to underestimate or deny the national element, which has undoubtedly played an important part in the process of differentiation evident in the Communist world since Stalin's death. But there does appear to be some danger in advancing this factor as the only or the predominant one. The differentiation, in this writer's view, is to be traced to trends, tendencies, differencies, and divergencies of opinion long active beneath the surface during the Stalin leadership -tendencies and divergencies which can by no means be ascribed solely to the factor of nationalism.

NOTES & VIEWS

EDITORS' NOTE: Readers are welcome to comment on matters discussed in this journal. Letters should be addressed to the Editors, Problems of Communism, US Information Agency, 1776 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, Washington, DC, 20547.

Ferment in Czechoslovakia

TO THE EDITORS: Prof. Schwartz's examination of interest group theory in Czechoslovakia, as the first of the series "Politics in Flux" (Jan-Feb 1967), is an apt beginning. The last several years of Czechoslovak political development have witnessed an explosion of social and political criticism and proposals for reform unmatched in any other country which calls itself an ally of the Soviet Union. Michal Lakatos' article in Pravny Obzor of January 1965, which initiated the public discussion, remains the definitive theoretical critique of one-party misrule, and Mr. Schwartz is justified in treating him as a central figure in the debate. Dr. Lakatos' later articles and book, and the contributions of such CC functionaries as Pavel Auersperg and Zdenek Mlynar, are no more than commentaries or criticisms of this basic contribution.

It is unfortunate, however, that Mr. Schwartz deals neither with the evolution of institutions in Czechoslovakia nor with the forces which have stimulated this development. More than this: by examining the theory largely in isolation from the political reality, he fails to see that the theories of Lakatos and others are a prismatic reflection of that reality, not merely the musing of liberated intellectuals. Programs for political reform in contemporary Czechoslovakia have grown up, in part, as a rationalization of changes which have

already taken place and, in part, as proposals for their institutionalization. Mr. Schwartz correctly states that Czechoslovak reformers espouse concepts which would give institutional reality to conflicting interests because the suppression of conflict and the artificial harmonization of interests lead to the adoption of unrealistic and inefficient policies. But if only this were so, why should they win support, even in limited form, within the Central Committee? Constitutional reform has come to be debated in the CC and secretariat because the authority of the Czechoslovak CP has started to wane.

The classical tools of control through political directive and ideological education have been dulled from contact with competing vested interests. The worker feels threatened by the party campaign against "equal stomachs" and by the loss of job security. The party's economic advisors feel that reform is proceeding too slowly, that the party is bartering reform for workingclass support. At the same time, while various economic interests have to be appeased, the political institutions are being scrutinized by political thinkers who see themselves as either selfless democrats or spokesmen for an as yet unsatisfied Slovak nationalism. . . .

...

As one example of a pressure group, the economic institute of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences-Ota Sik's domain has an influence on policy far out of proportion with either its number or ostensible political positon. (Of its members, only Sik sits in the CC.) The State Planning Commission, another lobby group, competes with the institute, each struggling for the acceptance of its articulated economic policies. Both groups boast of partisans in the Presidium: Premier Josef Lenart for the economic institute and Oldrich Cernik for the SPC. Lenart and Cernik have publicly divided on the issues of consumption vs. investment, rapid growth vs. saving, and long

term vs. short-term foreign (Western) investment. The present economic policy, some aspects of which are yet to be decided, bears all the signs of compromise which the leadership has negotiated, not arbitrated.

The danger to the continuity of party policy which, in Communist societies, is always posed by intellectual dissidents is redoubled in the Czechoslovak environment because these artists, writers, and journalists enjoy the protection of their professional unions. The Union of Slovak Journalists, speaking with the voice of a revived Slovak national conscience, echoed the first criticism of former Premier Viliam Siroky in 1963. ... Leading Communists within the professional artists' unions, who are responsible for the discipline of members, have recently been threatened with expulsion if they did not police their colleagues in the spirit of the party line. The party can no longer trust control of the unions to its leading workers because they cannot or will not act as executors of cultural policy. The editorial policies of such journals as Literarny noviny and Kulturny zivot, which are published under the imprimatur of writers' unions, are testimony to this defiance.

To take another example, the party no longer speaks even theoretically of the trade unions as transmission belts of policy to the working class. Nor, realistically speaking, can it any longer. In the face of factory closures and unemployment, created by economic reform, there has been hostile reaction from some trade union organizations. Some component units demanded retraining programs and unemployment insurance. (Such programs were eventually established.) "Work stoppages" have been reported, and some TU representatives have been dismissed for demanding higher wages. Like the intellectuals, but for different reasons, their allegiance to the party line is being tested by other loyalties.