1978/No. 41 by Dennison I. Rusinow Notes from a Yugoslav Europe [DIR-4-'78] Party Congress

A stable in an unstable world, in Congress's 6 commissions, of whom 412 did general self-confident even in self-criticism at and the remainder submitted their remarks in home but worried about the potential conse- writing for inclusion in the record.) The reality, quences of revived Superpower confrontation for as this observer has experienced it in the four the security and independence of smaller coun- Congresses held in the 1960s and 1970s, was tries and for world peace---this is the message more aptly described at a pre-Congress press that the League of Communists of Yugoslavia conference by Aleksandar Grlikov, the able (LCY) and its amazingly unflagging President Macedonian who is the Party's principal spokes- were projecting from the Party's man on international Communist affairs. Eleventh Congress, which met in Belgrade from Answering a skeptical resident journalist who June 20 to 23, 1978. asked how "various views" within the Party ever really become public knowledge, Grlikov said: "You yourself know how every Yugoslav, when Yugoslav Party Congresses, as pointed out in he makes a speech and from whatever position he A UFS Reports from earlier ones, do not actually makes it, devotes one-third of it to reporting make policy decisions or choose the Party's positive developments, then he puts in a 'how- leaders, although theory and the Party Statutes ever,' and then in two-thirds he makes his criti- say they do. These things are done elsewhere and cism. That Yugoslav 'however' is universal, as beforehand. Party Congresses are important, you'll see at the Congress Everyone will say however, in providing a deadline for the conclu- something about what he thinks is really success- sion of these other more or less private debates, ful, then he'll use two-thirds of this time for that since a Congress must endorse a platform and a 'however.'" With some important qualifica- roster of top officials and these, although not un- tionssome never get that far; Tito, the prin- changeable, will be influential in subsequent ciples of self-management and nonalignment, months or years. Yugoslav foreign policy in general, the Army, and a select number of basic Marxian tenets In addition, although there is little of the head a list of uncriticizable subjects; and one is "open dialogue" claimed by official handouts, a not supposed to attack individuals by name who Congress provides a setting for a series of mono- have not been officially damned (embarrassing logues, actually listened to by others, that are not exception: in 1958 one senior Party functionary always the uninteresting, monotonous repetition used the Congress podium to attack an even of successes and exegesis of "the Party line" that more senior and distinguished colleague for inexperienced observers expect and that seems to allegedly seducing his wife)---this is a fair de- be confirmed by a casual reading of first para- scription. graphs in the hundreds of speeches delivered in plenary sessions and in "working" commissions Party Congresses therefore deserve at least (663 delegates asked to speak in the Eleventh somewhat detailed analysis. This, it should be 2/DI R-4-'78 said hastily, is not the purpose of this Report. the then brand new Sports Center near the Too much time would be needed, and in two Panevo bridge for the Tenth Congress (1974), senses: time to read all the verbiage and sort out and now Sava Center--this was undoubtedly the the wheat from the chaffof which, pace the most elegant, attractive, and practical, including above, there is a great deal!and time for subse- a large and well-equipped press center and quent events to grant some wisdom of hindsight despite a size and complexity that sometimes in order to know what was really important. (A made it difficult to track down the people one recent series of articles in a Yugoslav periodical wanted to talk to. Signs of the times on both by Duan Bilandi, a political scientist and scores? Party official whose writing always merits atten- tion, reanalyzes speeches made at the Eighth The Congress's dominant theme was provided Congress in 1964, picking out passages that were by a recently published book by , usually overlooked at the time by those who re- the regime's perennial chief ideologist who is ported a basically no-change Congress, but that generally considered its number two person and in retrospect clearly anticipated the dramatic Tito's likely successor as Party President unless policy changes that occurred during the following Tito outlives him (Kardelj is known to have had two years.) With this in part cowardly excuse, two operations for cancer and was clearly in poor what follows is at best a preliminary to such health at the Congress). Entitled Directions in analysis" random notes, with emphasis on atmos- the Development of the Socialist Self-Manage- phere and "color," by an eyewitness who was ment Political System and officially declared "an experiencing his fourth such event. integral part of the Platform for the preparation of the Eleventh Congress" by the Party Presi- Setting and Themes dency, Kardelj's study offers a more complete and mature version of his vision of For this the Yugoslav year's Congress 2,291 delegates, socialist than of its several hundred domestic democracy any prolific guests, guest delega- author's earlier works and was clearly intended tions from 120 Communist, Socialist, Social- to be more than a political pamphlet for a Con- Democratic, and other "progressive" parties The basic described in around the and over 240 gress year. argument, world, foreign plus more detail in a previous A UFS Report, is that about 1,200 domestic journalists had a new site the and behavior of the Party and for organization their deliberations and observations. This was the political system as a whole must be more con- the ultra-modern Sava Center, an enormous, sistently and conscientiously adapted to a demo- attractive, and generally efficient conference cratically organized "pluralism of self-manage- complex on the banks of the Sava River in Novi ment interests" that are legitimately socialist and Beograd, built in two frenetic stages, between must be the primary participants in all public February and June of 1977 and 1978. Stage one decision-making. For this to happen, there must was completed just in time to house the prepara- be more intra-Party democracy and a more open tory and then the main sessions of the Belgrade "dialogue with non-Communist Yugoslavs" who "follow-up" Conference on Security and Coop- accept the basic principles of Yugoslav socialism. eration in Europe that met here from June 1977 Grlikov, using what he apologetically called a to February 1978 to review implementation of the "journalistic phrase" in his pre-Congress press Helsinki CSCE agreements of 1975. Stage two, a conference, described Kardelj's and the Con- separate building containing additional audi- gress's thesis as "a general political philosophy of toriums, the largest seating 4,000 persons, was searching for democracy in socialism and similarly completed only days before the Con- socialism in democracy." The Eleventh Congress, gress opened and despite a fire that destroyed Grlikov said, would draw its agenda of unfin- much of the new roof only two weeks earlier. Of ished business from this philosophy: the three Congress locales I have known in my years in Yugoslaviathe early postwar Trade Union Hall in downtown old Belgrade, site of the In this task the lastfouryears have been devoted, Eighth and Ninth Congresses (1964 and 1969), above all, to the economic system. The economic DIR-4-'78/3

system has been adapted to this political philoso- of "reality": changes in Party structure and phy,.. [but] there was not enough time and prob- "leading cadres," or who's where in this year's ably not enough intellectual energy for a simul- round of Yugoslavia's perennial political game of taneous, parallel, and consistent adaptation of musical chairs. This, too, led to no very definitive the other sphere of public life, and that is the conclusions, although more will be said about it political system. So this Eleventh Congress, later. following the recommendations of the Tenth Congress, will hare to elaborate a rision of the Perhaps more significant, therefore, than political system that will eliminate possible con- minor changes of proclaimed policy and rota- tradictions between the economic and political tions of personnel was the relaxed and self-con- systems, which normally and by their nature can fident atmosphere that pervaded the Eleventh lead to political, economic and social tensions in Congress and what it indicated. Like the focus on any society, including our own. "dialogue" within the Party and with the country and on the need to "tolerate disagreements," this In international affairs the dominant theme, atmosphere and associated emphasis on the influenced by recent developments, was a country's political and social stability (if others pox-on-both-your-houses criticism of the Soviet will leave Yugoslavia alone) and on the appro- Union and the United States--with the Soviet priateness of current institutional arrangements Union implicitly accused of greater responsi- (except the role of the Party) were in marked bilityfor a retreat from detente that can lead to contrast to the themes and atmosphere prevailing a new world war, as Tito warned in a solemn at the last Congress, in 1974. Then, recently appeal to both Superpowers to think again. More emerged from a series of crises that had shaken specifically, there was repeated sharp criticism the regime and with many familiar faces missing, of the Soviet Union (under the code word the delegates were nervous and more cautious in "hegemonism" and never by name) for de- their speeches. The basic theme then was that a stabilizing and anti-"nonalignment" adven- recentralized and redisciplined Party must turism and sphere-of-influence politics in the reassert its direct control over all aspects of Third World and particularly in Africaan an- Yugoslav life, and Soviet journalists were the ticipation of the Yugoslav-Cuban duel for the happiest and in their evaluations the most posi- soul of the nonaligned movement that took place tive of all foreign observers. This time, despite conference in at the nonaligned foreign ministers a constant repetition that the Party's "leading the same Sava Center the following month, role" is and will remain essential, there was more talk of too much than of too little direct Party As in party congresses everywhere and espe- control. This time it was the turn of resident cially in one-party states, there was an element of Soviet correspondents to ask provocative ques- unreality, or at least of one-dimensional, tions and shake their heads in sadness or dis- abstract, and therefore highly conditional reality, belief at the answers. in the way the Congress's domestic theme was handled. It is worth recalling, in particular, that In this atmosphere there was also more every postwar Yugoslav Party Congress except pointed criticism of the economic situation, two---the Fifth in 1948 and the Tenth in 1974-- which is not rosy if better than that of many has been more "liberal" in its pronouncements southern European countries, and of the func- (meaning more talk of intra-Party democracy, tioning (but not the principle) of "self-manage- freedom for criticism and participation by non- ment," the regime's ultimate sacred cow. These Party Yugoslavs, and "withering away" of state and the Party's continuing inability to find a and Party roles in public affairs) than current or viable formula for running the country, without subsequent developments have warranted. Pre- ruling it will undoubtedly prove more trouble- sumably conscious of this, many observers and some in the future. For the moment, however, a even participants at the Eleventh Confess con- quiet Congress, boasting of stability and preach- centrated their attention on a second dimension ing the message of more "democracy in social- 4/DIR-4-'78 ism," seemed an accurate reflection of a quiet Enrico Berlinguer, head of the Italian Commu- Yugoslavia, at least temporarily stable and ready nist Party and leading "Eurocommunist," who for another swing of the pendulum in the direc- had received conspicuously more applause than tion of more freedom and participation. any other visiting delegation chief when Kardelj read the list at the plenary session. On the third Tito... day Tito was back in public, briefly listening to Presiding over it all, still and perhaps omi- the debates going on in three of the six commis- nously the principal symbol and guarantor of the sions into which the Congress had divided for its' stability and self-confidence that he and the working sessions. The same evening he presided Congress were proclaiming, was Josip Broz of over a gala reception for foreign guest delega- Kumrovec, called Tito--veteran of the October tions and journalists, and stayed so long that a Revolution, maker of his own, father of his re- subsequent reception for the same foreign created country and its regime, triumphant journalists, with Executive Committee Secretary heretic and doyen of international Communism, Stane Dolanc as host, started late and was a cur- last survivor of those who led their peoples in the tailed anticlimax. The following morning he was Second World War, last of the founders of non- again present at the final plenary sessions, where alignment, elder statesman of the world. In he received repeated standing ovations and made honor of the past and in apprehension of the his traditional closing remarks. In these he future, all eyes turned to him whenever and several times departed from his prepared text to wherever he was present. make ad lib additionstypically syntax-mur- dering Titoesque admonitions and parenthetical Despite his 86 years, occasional use of a cane, observations punctuated by his characteristic and the recent estrangement from his wife that "ovaj, kako da kazem..." and "i tako dalje" leaves him more alone in the isolation of power ("that what-do-you-call-it..." and "etc."). It was and high office than ever before, Tito looked as though he were deliberately demonstrating to healthier and more likely to be around for the watchful foreigners that he is still mentally "with next Congress, presumably in 1982, than many of it" and not, like Mao Tse-tung and Franco in his senior associates who are in fact 20 years his their last years, a senile automaton capable at juniors. His appearance and his emotional state- best of reading a speech prepared by ment at the very end, when he said that the ova- otherswhich, incidentally, he has always done tion he had received was "such a recognition that badly. one would be happy to work another 50 years," were reminders of a popular Belgrade joke: Tito may indeed be mortal, but there is so far no evi- A word of caution after such a description is dence to support such a hypothesis. obviously in order. It and others like it by other observers, both foreign and domestic, are At the plenary session on the first day, fresh inspired by justifiable astonishment in view of his from a long stay at his favorite retreat on the yearsand justifiable caution in memory of rash Brioni Islands, and again as at the last Congress colleagues who were already describing the the only delegate to defy the No Smoking signs in Eighth Congress, in 1964, as a then septua- the auditorium, he read the traditional hour-long genarian Tito's "last Congress." He is noticeably set of excerpts from his 86-page Presidential Re- and hardly surprisingly older than in 1964 or port in a strong voice and with a chair placed even in 1974, his previously most recent "last before the massed microphones as his only con- Congress." At his age, after all, any day now may cession to advancing age. After the session he re- render the above description "inoperative"... ceived and talked at length with the heads of the but not, as an observation in June 1978, inaccu- most important foreign guest delegations, rate. beginning with Fjodor D. Kulakov, a member of the Politburo of the Soviet Party who was con- President Josip Broz Tito signs the party-membership sidered a possible successor to Leonid Brezhnev cards of some young delegates, as he attended the session until his sudden death the following month, and of one of the XI Congress Commissions. DIR-4-'78/5

and Tito's Lieutenants that multinational fraternity whose American The gala reception on the third evening, held chapter is confusingly called the Secret Police. in the vast public rooms of the Federal Executive Thus protected from unwanted approaches but Council building, was one of those increasingly not from observation, the leadership sits, chatting rare occasions when almost the entire Yugoslav and joking and pretending to ignore the rest of leadership is collectively and quasi-informally the company until Tito leads them out again, "on view," gathered around Tito in a ritualized signaling the end of the reception. Frequently, if and calculatedly semiprivate atmosphere that is he is in a convivial mood as he seemed to be this reminiscent of a royal leve6 in times past. As the time, he will stay longer than scheduled or than ritual prescribes, Tito and his entourage (but now more easily wearied colleagues apparently would without wives, since Tito's Jovanka no longer have preferred. Sometimes, when "royal" favor is appears with him) make their entrance promptly to be demonstrated, outsiders to the leadership at the moment the reception is scheduled to will also be at the table. (I recall one such occa- begin and pass through the applauding throng of sion, several years ago, when the Patriarch of the guests to seats arranged around a table in a corner Serbian Orthodox Church was seated next to of one of the rooms. Access to them is restricted, Tito and his wife and was the object of their very politely, by men whose dress, sturdy build, special and friendly attention, signaling an im- and watchful eyes identify them as members of provement in church-regime relations). The 6/DIR-4-'78

experienced ordinary guest, by standing in the be sorely missed when the time comes for a post- right places, can discreetly enjoy a prolonged Tito transition that men and women of their age close-up examination of these proceedings and of and experience could smooth. the interplay of personalities, in which rank and standing are defined by postures that reveal Musical Chairs 1978 individually graduated mixes of intimacy and Changes in the organization of the Party obsequiousness. summit endorsed by the Eleventh Congress were not as extensive or significant as those carried out Much "Belgradology" results from such ob- at the last two Congresses,4 but as usual con- servations. Most of it is as dubious as most stituted an implicit critique of recent perform- "Kremlinology." On this occasion, however, two ance. more general and "atmospheric" aspects of the scene made an identical impression on both foreign and middle-rank Yugoslav fellow-guests The Central Committee remains as it was, with with whom I compared notes. The first, already 165 members: 20 from each of the 6 republics and described in more general terms, was that Tito's 15 from each of the 2 autonomous provinces energy and apparently robust health (enhanced, including the presidents of the republican central to be sure, by dyed hair, Brioni tan, and heaven committees and provincial committees as ex knows what medical assistance) made him seem officio membersand 15 from the Party organi- more endurable, and sometimes even younger, zation in the Yugoslav People's Army. On the than the survivors in his inner circle of those who other hand, the Presidency of the Central Com- had called him "the Old Man" (Stari) in the mittee, which is more powerful in fact although intimacy of the Partisan army's Supreme Head- not in theory, has been cut from 38 to 23 members: quarters some 35 years agowhen he was in his 3 from each republic, 2 from each province, and 50s and they in their 20s. This was true not only one from the army, again including the presidents of Kardelj, whose drawn face and trembling ofthe republican and provincial parties ex officio. hand shocked his Yugoslav and foreign admirers (Tito is not elected to or formally listed as a and indicated an at least temporary recurrence of member ofeither of these bodies, but as President the illnesses that had seemed stabilized at the of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia he time of his American visit last year. Others like convenes and presides over both and in the words Vladimir Bakari and Petar Stamboli, still or of the Party Statute "supervises their work." For again the leading figures of the Croatian and this reason both bodies are frequently referred to, Serbian regimes, also bore the visible marks of even in Yugoslav sources, as having one more age and apparent poor health. The second member than stated here.) general impression, more striking because of the first, was the conspicuous age gap separating this The Executive Committee of the Presidency inner circle, with the sole exception of Stane emasculated in 1967, eliminated by the "decen- Dolanc (who is only 53, but whose shocking over- tralizing" Ninth Congress in 1969, and restored by weight and chain-smoking may counterbalance the "recentralizing" Tenth Congress in 1974---has his youth), from the regime's second rank as it again been abolished. Stane Dolanc, whose power- was represented at the reception and at the Con- ful position formerly carried the cumbersome title gress. Most of the latter are under 45 and many of Secretary of the Executive Committee of the are in their 30s. The middle generation, once the Presidency of the CC of the LCY. It should be youngest Partisans, now age 45-59 and in normal noted that he has not been given the title of circumstances the present leadership's imme- "General Secretary" and the implied increase in diate successors, was conspicuous by its rank and power that would go with it, as errone- absence---or, more accurately, by its presence ously reported in the New York Times and almost entirely in the form of colorless non- several other newspapers,s Dolanc's formal entities. Decimated by the crises of the early status is unchanged, except that in place of an 1970s, in which most of its leading figures were "Executive Committee" of largely first-rank on the losing sides, this missing generation may politicians he is now to be assisted by nine DI R-4-'78/7

"Executive Secretaries" drawn from the broader session. Since 1969, when republican, provincial, CC and delegated by the republican, provincial, and army Congresses preceded rather than fol- and army Party organizationsnew and formally lowed the federal one, the all-Yugoslav Congress less authoritative functionaries whose impor- has merely "confirmed" the members of its tance and powers are not yet clear. (Those named Presidency and other organs, who had already to these posts range in age from 41 to 55 and been elected at these regional meetings.7 There include former federal ministers and top-of- were, however, some changes of personnel or of second-rank republican or provincial function- balance of some interest beyond the narrow circle aries.) of connoisseurs of Yugoslav politics.

One declared purpose of these changes, which One that attracted the attention of old hands are ostensibly designed to make the Party center among foreign observers was the unexpected more efficient rather than either more or less underrepresentation of Bosnia's Muslims in the powerful, is to encourage a re-activation of the new federal Party leadership and even, to a lesser Central Committee. In theory the Party's extent, in that of Bosnia-Herzegovina, their own supreme policy-making organ between Con- republic. Now officially counted as a separate gresses, the outgoing CC had been singularly South Slav nationality, equal in status with inactive, sometimes meeting only once in a year, Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, Macedonians, and as its functions shifted to a combination of the Montenegrins, these Serbo-Croatian-speaking large Presidency created in 1969 plus the descendants of Bosnians who converted to Islam 12-member Executive Committee created in under Ottoman rule number more than 1.7 1974. The only other feature of this reorganiza million, 1.5 million of whom live in Bosnia- tion worth noting is that the principle of repub- Herzegovina. This makes them the largest lican parity---equal representation regardless of national community in their own multinational population or Party membership, on the Central republic (just ahead of 1.4 million Orthodox Committee and its Presidency and among the Christian Serbs in a total population of 4 million new Executive Secretarieshas been recon- also including 800,000 Catholic Croats) and the firmed as an enduring legacy of the Party's "fed- third largest in Yugoslavia as a whole (where 8 eralization" in the late 1960s. While this means million Serbs and 4.5 million Croats are in first that the smallest republican Party (the Montene- and second place). Of these, 105,569 are members grin, with about 60,000 Party members out of a 3f the League of Communists, in which they con- population of about 560,000) has the same repre- stitute 6.51 percent of total, Yugoslav-wide mem- sentation at the federal Party summit as the bership, again more than any other nationality largest ( with more than 700,000 and except the Serbs (46.68 percent) and the Croats Croatia with nearly 300,000 Party members),6 it (15.04 percent). In addition to such numerical is based on the overriding principle of national significance, they have lately seemed to be (and therefore republican) equality, also gaining in political importance both within their respected in the composition of state organs, that republic and at the federal level, where one of is the regime's answer to Yugoslavia's eternal them, Demal Bijedi6, served as Yugoslavia's central problem, the "national question." first Muslim prime minister from July 1971 until his death in an airplane crash in January 1977. There were no startling changes in the roster of This increase in apparent political weight has those named to federal Party organs at the 1978 generally been interpreted as a consequence of Congress to compare with those confirmed at the their "ethnically neutral" position between Tenth Congress in 1974, when leaderships from Bosnia's and Yugoslavia's rival Serbs and Croats four out of the six republics and from the (who both claimed them, as Islamicized Serbs or Vojvodina Autonomous Province were almost Islamicized Croats, until they were proclaimed a entirely manned by new people as a result of the separate "nation" and began to take the purges of 1971-1973. (The composition of the proclamation seriously), enhanced by Bosnia- new Presidency and Central Committee was in Herzegovina's analogous status as the only offi- any case not news when announced at the closing cially multinational and hence "ethnically 8/DI R-4-'78 neutral" republic in the federation. Their and Now, however, none of Bosnia-Herzegovina's Bosnia-Herzegovina's political strength have also three positions on the Yugoslav Party Presidency been viewed with mixed feelings elsewhere in the will be held by a Muslim. The republic will in- country, in part because of ethnic prejudices stead be represented by two SerbsCvijetin Muslims of all kinds are fairly low in Yugo- Mijatovi6, 65 and a veteran of the old Partisan slavia's ethnic pecking orderand in part be- generation, and Nikola Stojanovi6, 45 and the cause of the Bosnian Party's reputation as a new President of the Republican CCand by one bastion of "hardline" conservative communism, Croat, Branko Mikuli6, 50, the leading Bosnian which is often linked to the Muslims' importance political figure of recent years and generally there. This last, it should be added, is unjustified. considered a leading Yugoslav "hardliner." Even Leading Bosnian officials usually identified as in the Bosnian Party Presidency there will now be "hardliners" are mostly Croats or Serbs, and 8 Serbs, 7 Muslims, and 4 Croats. No explanation several leading Bosnian Muslim functionaries for this apparent downgrading of the Muslims have been among Yugoslavia's most prominent has been offered, and it is interesting that "liberals." Yugoslav Party officials and senior journalists President of the Yugoslav League of Communists Josip attending the Congress seemed genuinely sur- Broz Tito [(seen in left center) while attending a session prised, claiming they had not noticed that it had of one of the XI Congress Commissions. DIR-4-'78/9

happened, when the absence of a Muslim on the powerful patron of all, is willing to intervene: Party Presidency was pointed out to them. then all other rules, including Constitutional or statutory limitations on tenure (which should Another apparent downgrading, this time have but did not affect Secretary of Defense individual, was not overlooked by these same General Nikola Ljubii6 this year) are in Yugoslavs, who invariably regretted it in private abeyance. Gligorov's "sin" is that almost his conversation. , a 61-year-old entire career has been as a federal official. He has Macedonian, has been one of the architects of no base or leverage in Skopje, the Macedonian Yugoslav economic policies for more than 10 capital. Nor does he enjoy Tito's particular favor years, is widely known and respected in both or Grlikov's special untouchability because of Yugoslav and international commercial and his brilliant performance on the international banking circles, and from 1974 to 1978 was both Communist scene before, during, and since the President of the Assembly of Yugoslavia (the East Berlin conference of European Communist federal parliament) and a prominent member of Parties in 1975. So, for the moment at least, the Party Presidency. In this writer's opinion he Gligorov is reduced to the second rank, not even is one of the ablest political figures in Yugoslavia a member of his republican Party Presidency today. Now, however, at almost the same moment although still on the 16S-member Yugoslav that his term as Assembly President ended with Central Committee. the election of a new Assembly this spring, he has also been excluded from the more important At least many delegates to the Party Congress Party Presidency, where Macedonia will be repre- apparently disapproved and would like to see sented by Lazar Koligevski (64 and an old Party Gligorov back in an important role. There is one warhorse who made a comeback over the aspect of a Yugoslav Party Congress that is gen- political corpses of Macedonian "liberals" after uinely spontaneous and that permits ordinary 1972), Aleksandar Grlikov (55, the Yugoslav delegates to do a kind of "voting" in the security Party's chief spokesman in international Party of collective anonymity: no one can control the affairs, as noted, and incidentally Gligorov's way they apportion or withhold the applause they close personal friend and political associate), and give to speakers in debates, guest delegations Angel (emerski (55 and President of the Mace- when they are introduced, or members of their donian CC). new Party leaderships when the lists are read. In Gligorov's at least temporary demotion is re- one such demonstration of sentiment, when not only because his talents and prag- Gligorov went to the podium to address the grettable commission concerned with economic matism are otherwise in short supply at the Party Congress and state summits, but also because it is the problems, he was the only speaker in that session to receive a round of result of a rule of contemporary Yugoslav applause, distinctly warm, before as well as after he political life that has almost invariably had sim- spoke. ilarly deplorable consequences. One of the effects of the new degree of genuine decentralization of Several other individual "demotions" that governmental and to a considerable extent even attracted the attention of some foreign observers Party authority that has taken place since the were not in fact that, although the changes in later 1960s--creating what is almost a confedera- function that led to this conclusion were in most tionis that senior and even middle-rank federal cases also consequences of the rule of political functionaries really are sent to Belgrade (and life that sidetracked Gligorov and others before recalled from Belgrade) by the political appa- him. The lesson of the rule is that an ambitious ratuses of the republics and provinces. This politician should limit his time at the federal means, among other things, that no one who does center, periodically abandoning even the highest not have a political base or powerful patrons in offices there to return to his own republic and his own republic enjoys security of tenure at the cultivate his political base. Those who have now federal center, no matter how well he functions or done this should usually be described as smart how highly he is regarded there. The only excep- rather than demoted. A conspicuous example-- tions are those for whom Tito himself, the most supposing that his move is voluntary, as it seems 10/DIR-4-'78

to have beenis Jure Bili, the leading figure of are the federal Prime Minister (Veselin Djurano- the post-1971 leadership in Croatia and a vi6) and the federal Secretary of Defense (General member of the outgoing Yugoslav Central Com- Ljubii). At the same time, names mentioned in mittee Presidency and Executive Committee; the press before the Party Congress as candidates now he is not even in the new Yugoslav Central for membership in the next incarnation of the Committee but is quite definitely a member of his State Presidency (to be named by the new Federal Republic's Party Presidencyunlike Gligorov in Assembly elected this spring) are generally those both cases and as an indicator of which post of second rank and frequently almost unknown matters. people. Since then, some people have apparently been having second thoughts about the implica- One other aspect of the personnel changes in tions of a State Presidency comprised, except for Party and state organs following the Congress Tito, of nonentities. Its election has not yet taken and this spring's general elections deserves men- place, and several republics are reported to be tion. The Theses for the Congress and Kardelj's reconsidering their nominations. This, however, study, like Yugoslav theory since as early as 1951, could lead to further violations of the rule emphasized the importance of a separation concerning the separation of Party and state between Party and governmentspecifically functions, since virtually all those who could give meaning that no one (except, of course, Tito) the new State Presidency the prestige of the old should hold both high Party and high state func- one are now already members of the Party Presi- tionsif the "deformations" of "Stalinism" are dency. to be avoided and a genuine "socialist democ- racy" based on a "pluralism of self-management Either outcome---union of functions or a state interests" is to be achieved. As Kardelj puts it, leadership conspicuously less distinguished than "the personal union of Party and state executive the Party'swill also run counter to the more apparatuses" in Yugoslavia's past and in other general principle, endorsed by the Congress, of a Communist-ruled states has been "the real cause Party operating "within self-management" of the bureaucratization of society and of the rather than a separate institution "outside and ''a Communist Party itself. To this end, for above self-management," a Party that has example, it was explicitly decreed in the early adapted itself to the search for "democracy in 1970s that no one (except Tito) should simul- socialism and socialism in democracy." taneously be a member of the collective State Presidency (created in 1971 in premature prepa- Since General Ljubii6's name has been men- ration for Tito's departure) and the Party Presi- tioned twice in this section, it is also appropriate dency or its Executive Bureau (the latter elimi- to note that the army's role inside the Party and nated in 1974). Later, to enhance the prestige and LjubiiCs role in both and in the government, all power of the State Presidency, it was reduced in of them unchanged, are still important and worth size from 23 to 9 members, who were Tito and watching. With 77,791 members, probably each republic's or province's most senior and including all career officers, the Party organiza- usually leading political personality: Kardelj for tion in the armed forces accounts for 4.8 percent , Bakari for Croatia, Stamboli6 for of total Party membership. Since 1969, when it Serbia, Mijatovi6 for Bosnia-Herzegovina, was first separately represented at the federal Koligevski for Macedonia, Vidoje .arkovi for Party summit alongside the eight republics and Montenegro, Stefan Doronjski for the Vojvodina, provinces, it has been in effect a ninth and almost and for Kosovo. coequal member of the federally organized LCYand by its membership and definition the Now, in unacknowledged defiance of these only explicitly all-Yugoslav one. Ljubicid, as rules, the trend is in the direction of either re- General of the Army the second-ranking officer newed union of Party and state functions or a in Yugoslavia after Marshal Tito, as Secretary for downgrading of the state ones. All 9 members of Defense in the federal Executive Council (the the outgoing State Presidency are members of the cabinet) since 1967, and as the army's repre- new, 23-member-plus-Tito Party Presidency, as sentative on the Party Presidency since that D R-4-'78/11 organ was created in 1969, is also personally in "apparatchiks" and "technocrats" (when other an interesting position. He is in addition a Serb, relevant but smaller categories are added in) than which is also true of a preponderance of the "proletarians." Private farmers, the other generals and officer corps as a whole, but not of priority target and in 1945 the largest group in the High Command, where Croats unexpectedly the Party, still account for only 4.8 percent of outnumber Serbs.9 Interpretations vary, with membership! some observers seeing this situation as a good point of departure for army (and Serb?) In addition to at least lip service to continued supremacy in state and Party after Tito's de- efforts to improve this "social structure," the parture and others seeing it as part of a strategy revised Party Statute that the Congress approved of integration and "cooptation" that will success- took two other concrete steps designed to democ- fully maintain civilian Party control over the ratize the organization and adapt it to life in a armed forces. History, beginning with the pluralism of self-management interests. Both of effective fusion of the two institutions under the them were more discussed and opposed in pre- Party Politburo as the military's Supreme Com- Congress discussion than their effects will mand in Tito's revolution and lack of evidence of probably warrant. any subsequent army pretensions to an inde- The first, fulfilling a demand voiced in the pendent role in policy-making or politics, favors later 1960s but silenced in the earlier 1970s, the latter of these. The question is nevertheless liberalized the Yugoslav interpretation of the open as well as important. Marxist concept of "democratic centralism" (in theory the fullest democracy in adopting policies Making a Party Safe for Democracy? and the most rigidly enforced unity in carrying Membership in the LCY on the eve of the them out; in practice, by Communist Parties Eleventh Congress stood at 1,623,612, an in- almost everywhere, only the latter and with many crease of some 547,000 or 50 percent since just examples of severely punishable insubordination before the preceding Congress in 1974, more even here). Now it is official in the LCY's than ever before in the Party's history, and nearly Statute: a Party member who finds himself in the 7.5 percent of the total population. Of the minority on a specific issue when it comes to the 681,679 new members admitted in the 1974-1977 vote is entitled to keep his opinion, and by im- period, youth (defined as up to 27 years of age) plication to argue for a subsequent reversal of the accounted for 72 percent, women for 29 percent, decision he opposed, although he is still obligated and t.hose classified as workers for 31.2 percent. to do his part, loyally and energetically, in imple- These three categories (and, rather hopelessly, menting it as long as it stands. private peasants) had been given priority in re- cruitment criteria set by the Tenth Congress and The second, in the form of a largely dejd vu designed to improve "the social structure" of an series of minor organizational and procedural embarrassingly old, male, and nonworking-class changes and exhortations intended to strengthen organization. The results: those classified as the autonomy of the Party's local and lowest- workers, up 160,000, are now 29.2 percent of ranking "basic organizations" and their relation- total membership and the largest occupational ships with "self-managing" economic and social category; 23 percent of Party members are institutions, was more important for what was women, and 35 percent are less than 27 years old. rejected than for what was accepted. "You all All of this was praised at the Congress as know," Kardelj himself told the Congress com- splendid progress, but not yet enough. With mission debating these issues, "that during the "administrative personnel" the second most discussion concerning amendments and addi- numerous occupational category (11.4 percent) tions to the Statute of the LCY there was a whole and "leaders and officials" tied with "engineers series of proposals, and from all over Yugoslavia, and technical personnel" and pensioners for that basic organizations of the League should be third place (6.7 percent each), the LCY is not only linked vertically, from League organizations in far from the "workers' majority" idealistically work organizations [presumably meaning proclaimed as a goal in 1974 but still has more 'BOALs,' the basic work units that comprise 12/DIR-4-'78

Yugoslav enterprises, etc.] through complex tended and commonplace language: organizations [enterprises, conglomerates, etc.] and so on." These proposals had been rejected as What we are really looking for is the answer [to totally contrary to current objectives, which seek the question oj] how, with existing various inter- a Janus-like basic Party organization, inward ests and in the context of a one-party system, to looking and fully integrated (and influential) in prevent any possibility of stifling pluralism of the "self-managed" institutions whose Commu- interests by a ruling party on the one hand, and nists comprise it and simultaneously outward on the other hand to make it impossible for it to looking toward the rest of the League and its turn itself into a marginal appendage to social mission, which means a detached attitude to and political processes in the country. local and sectional interests in order to speak for "higher" social and socialist ones. Or, as Kardelj As you see, this problem is very important for us, put it in speaking of the rejected proposals, although as such it is not unknown to the world In seeking an answer, the conviction if I wanted to be malicious, I would say that with which we are going into the Congressmgen following such logic would lead to an organiza- eralizing and simplifying and to be clear and tional structure built up to the very largest pro- convincingforyou--is that we shah not renounce ducing entities and to the banks, so that in the the leading role of the League of Communists. end the Party [pyramid] would "end" in the Every political party in the world, in power or banks. Thus the LCY would be transformedfrom seeking power, wishes to be the leading force in an ideological and political organization into a order to realize its mission ofchanging things. kind offederation ofbusiness organizations. This or a similar organizational structure would mean We do not want the LCY to stifle the pluralism of losing not only the links between the basic socialist self-management interests by its method organizations and the communal and republican of operating What the Eleventh Congress organizations of the League of Communists and hopes to do in this area is to redescribe [osmisli] with the central organs of the LCY in general democratic centralism, to give it a democratic but also with what is happening in society as a content through readiness of the League of Com- whole. The LCY would not be the ideological munists on two fronts---[first] that it tolerates a engine of the revolution but rather an adjunct of democratic dialogue within itself that in the technocracy. process ofpolicy-making it tolerates majority and minority. And second, readiness of the League of Earlier in the same speech, in a passage quoted Communists to retreat in a dialogue with non- by the leading Yugoslav daily, Politika, as its Communists from what it has offered as a pro- front page lead for its report on that day at the posal or a concrete solution whenever a better Congress, Kardelj had again restated his and the solution is found in the course ofsuch a dialogue. LCY's official view of how and how not to be an "engine" at this stage of the revolution (emphasis The intention and the values on which it is in the original)" based are indeed clear. Although they are not new, their restatement at this time is significant, The League of Communists will not be the since the "democratic" thread in the dialectic of leading force by monopolistically ruling over Yugoslav "socialist democracy" had been less society through its own or the state's bureauc- visible than more orthodox views of the leading racy. It can be that only if it is capable of seeing role of the Party since before and at the Tenth furthest, if it is capable of indicating paths of Congress in 1974. On the other hand, phrases development that are objectively, historically like Grlikov's "we are looking for the answer" (how of imminent, that is, if it is the most progressive and reminiscent the phrase that the first most dynamic creativeforce in the society. Member of the Praesidium of the CC of Yugoslav League of Communists, Edvard Kardelj presides over one of the plenary sessions of the XI Congress, President Josip Broz At his pre-Congress press conference, Grli-kov Tito attending {/eft), at right, Stane Dolanc, secretary of had addressed the same questions in more ex- the Praesidium. DIR-4-'78/13

AUFS observer of the Yugoslav scene, Fred Debate in Commissions, and an Atypical Warner Neal, heard so often when these same "However" intentions were first proclaimed ca. 1953: "We Perhaps to spare Tito or because such an are searching for our way!") are revealing as well extension of ritual finally seemed unnecessary, as endearingly self-critical. Like Kardelj's vague there was not even the traditional symbolic mini- if sublime definition of how to be a "leading mum of "discussion" at the plenary sessions with force" without "ruling over society," most of the which the Eleventh Congress opened on Tuesday rest of what was said at the Congress on this sub- and closed on Friday morning. The first of these ject was singularly unhelpful to real life and began with a panegyric by Kardelj in honor of the mostly quite ordinary Communists who might be hundredth anniversary of the birth of Filip willing to try if they knew how, but whose careers Filipovi6, a founder in 1919 and first head of the and other personal and collective goals can more Yugoslav Communist Party who was killed in the safely be furthered by more traditional means. Soviet Union in 1938, a victim of Stalin's purgesas Kardelj noted. The further agenda of With great sympathy for the difficulty of the the two plenaries was then limited to Tito's question and the intractability of society and opening report and closing speech, formal state- human nature, one must say that it was all very ments and greetings, and the business of the familiar. Congress required by the Statute: various votes 14/DIR-4-'78 and "confirmations" of elections and the brief about re-employment opportunities for youthful presentation and acceptance of reports. "retirees"or for valuable insights into the func- tioning and malfunctioning of the system at the All "debate" was therefore carried on in six local level. "working commissions" that met Tuesday after- noon and both mornings and afternoons on Once the real garbage in the fulsome report Wednesday and Thursday: one to consider eco- category has been put aside, this observer's prin- nomic matters, the second concerned with the cipal complaint concerns style and delivery more political system in general, the third for Party than uniformity of opinion or lack of content. As matters (including organization, membership, in one-party Communist states farther east and and revision of the Statute), the fourth for culture despite Yugoslavia's more open politics and and education, the fifth for foreign affairs and many politicians' interest in inspiring mass sup- foreign policy, and the sixth for national defense. port and enthusiasm, it is still generally the rule All were open to the domestic and foreign press that even public political speeches before mass and guests of the C0ngressunlike equivalent audiences should be dull, full of popularly in- sessions of the Congresses of some Communist comprehensible jargon ("Western" social science Parties or the first postwar Yugoslav ones. The as well as Marxist), and read in a monotone, mimeographed stenographic reports of the 663 often stumblingly as though the speaker does not speeches made in these commissionstranscibed understand it either, and with minimum ges- from tapes and usually available within an hour tures. Is it petty and irrelevantor merely an of each speech's delivery, no mean accomplish- impermissible subjective reaction to an alien ment with 6 simultaneous meetings in which political culture--to note this and to wish that speakers often depart from their texts or fail to unnecessarily gray functionaries, especially when deliver a copy on their way to the podium as re- they have something interesting to say, could also questedmake a pile over 3 feet high. be lively and interesting in the way they say it? Or is dullness of phrasing and delivery an important Some start their "howevers" earlier, some indicator, a rational style for politicians in a sys- later, and some not at all. Speeches by delegates tem in which position in the hierarchy is more who are all-Yugoslav or regional senior func- important than persuasiveness as a source of tionaries tend to be global or topical--e.g., infla- power and influence, and not giving offense to tion or investment problems, the functioning or superiors through untoward statements or flam- malfunctioning of the new parliamentary boyance is more important than the response of "system of delegations and delegates," school mere peers and electors in the maintenance of reform in general, etc. Speeches by delegates that position? And what does this tell us about from Party organizations in enterprises, com- the Party's formal (and in some of its leaders munes, schools, hospitals, youth or women's undoubtedly sincere) aspiration to operate organizations and the like tend to focus on local "within self-management" and through "demo- or special interest issues and generally fall into cratic persuasion" rather than as an institution two categories" self-advertising by the speaker or of power "outside and above self-management"? those who sent him in the form of a fulsome report, with minimal or no "howevers"; or, after either a perfunctory or lengthy introduction of On the other hand, it must be admitted that that kind, a series of complaints, criticism, the Yugoslav style has one advantage. It is easier and/or appeals for change that may concern for a political speaker to be substantive and as behavior, policy (but not principle!), the func- intelligent as he can be when he does not have to tioning of some aspects of the system, or even the entertain and popularize to the point of over- way some parts (but not the whole!) of it are simplification and distortion. Even as it is easier made. The latter may be interesting for some for him to say hard and unpopular things, or, piquant aspect--for example, a delegate from with due caution, to criticize his own Party's the state security service (the political police, policies or performance if there is no organized commonly called UDB ), where there has lately opposition with an institutional interest in using been a heavy turnover of personnel, concerned what he has said against him and his Party. DIR-4-'78/15

There are some exceptions to this rule of dull- Although he soon rambled, Tempo began with ness. Tito, when he departs from his text, can be his own perennially favorite theme, which lively in style and delivery, a slogan-coining happens to be a question of central political and popularizer and oversimplifier, and a great economic importance in any system. Who crowd-pleaserlike Krushchev, of blessed decides about the distribution of income memory in this respect, in another country of national, sectoral, enterprise, and personaland even duller and more dishonest political by what criteria and rules? For personal income speeches. Another is the irrepressible Svetozar the Yugoslav translation of the Marxist principle Vukmanovi6-Tempo, a former senior Party "to each according to his work" has long been (in warhorse and sometime Politburo member, once effect) "to each according to the results of his the incompetent tsar of the economy and then work as measured by an imperfect market energetic head of the trade union federation, a economy and qualified to compensate for bear of very little brain but considerable integrity unequal conditions," but how can this be done, sidelined from any position of authority since the especially for units and individuals in jobs where late 1960s. the contribution to final market value is hard or impossible to measure? At the Eleventh Congress as at the Tenth Vukmanovi predictably spoke (in the commis- This is what Tempo had to say: sion for economic questions) and predictably said what he hoped were provocative things in what was undeniably a lively stylecolloquially, with Again at the Tenth Congress Comrade Tito gestures rather than jargon, and without a text or said that income distribution, the material even notes, another great rarity. He woke the receipts of workers, must be made dependent on audience up and enlivened a dull session, even in the real results of their work. This thought, anticipation, when the chair recognized him and especially the key phrase "'real results of work," he came to the podium, since everyone knew impelled me to speak at the Tenth Congress and what to expect. What he said, however, seemed to to set down a whole list of questions that must be inspire more amusement or embarrassment than answered if this is to be realized in practice. I nods of agreement. In a way the audience was submitted that list of questions, composed in right, and only partly because of the pretentious- haste and taking over 30 pages, to the Congress. ness of the "study" he said he was making. The But when I look to see if any questions have been two more pedestrian speeches that happened to answered? No. And still we tend to maintain that follow, by Kiro Gligorov on problems of techno- the measurement of the work of a worker be logical dependence, productivity, and political found in the working place. To be sure, it is said sources of economic inefficiency, and by ]akov that this is linked to the income of the enterprise, Sirotkovi on imperfections of the system as a but in essence it consists ofmeasuring work, even reason for inefficient investment, undoubtedly now in this campaign that is being carried out in contained more specific, substantive, and useful the country, it still comes back to measuring "howevers." With and despite this caveat, I have work in the working place. So when I looked at elected to quote Vukmanovi's speech as a how that is going in practice, I looked at and conclusion to these notesnot because it was began to follow how preparations for the typical, profound, or original, for it was none of Eleventh Congress were being carried out. It was these things, but because the man who was nick- being said that everything was clear, that answers named Tempo for his Partisan haste had once have been given to all questions, but there it is, again and in ordinary language covered at least some things aren't functioning right. But they the economic waterfront in voicing the gripes of aren't functioning right because people don't the man-in-the-street (or the Communist-in-the- want to work, to fulfill norms, etc. And so we street). In so doing he momentarily shattered the kind of come around in a circle. Because, if all glass wall of the one-dimensional reality that was questions have been given a clear answer, but still said in the introduction to this Report to charac- something doesn't work in practice, if practice terize this and any other Congress of any Party still doesn't give results, then we cannot and must anywhere. not look for solutions in things like mobilizing 16/DIR-4-'78

Communists to push it through, etc. First we remember when we were barely able to manage must start from the beginning, from the real 10 metric cents per hectare, or 11 at best, and sources ofthe state ofrelations in production and were satisfied. Today we get 50-60 and even 70. distribution, relations in planning and coordina- Today we have practical examples of our whole tion, in order to get the answer to the question agriculture of how to get bigger results. We why don't workers behave the way we think they didn't know, then, we only knew that we had to ought to behave? try. Look, we can follow--here now in the discus- This means, Comrades, that our potentialities sion I've seen--how consumption repeatedly goes are enormous. Let me take one official statistic above production, above our possibilities. Who we utilize [only] 70 percent of capacity. We go on spends it all? Who? Who takes the decisions and buildingjudging by the presshundreds and who spends? Are those Communists? Are those hundreds offactories precisely in those branches workers, or are those someone else? There is no where utilization of capacity is around 50 answer to that question. I looked at this, and it percent. That means we still follow the line that drove me, just to explain, drove me to get to the some of our needs are unsatisfied, a line that bottom ofthese questions, andfor year and three [means] we do business nonrationally. Who months now I have been writing _an analysis makes those decisions? Who is in charge of in- of every single problem in relations among vestment? Let's analyze that a little, let's talk people, and I'm submitting that to the Central openly about it. Are those workers? No, nobody Committee. I've already been writing a year and asks them about it. Were they asked, if they are three months and already have 600 pages of unemployed, then they are ready even to go along analysis in typescript That's probably not with minimum utilization ofcapacity just to have relevant, but it does seem to me that we must get some earnings. This means that someone else is into that analysis, that we must even accept that in charge of investment, despite the fact that we not all will agree with what comes out now, that here and in all our documents proclaim that the we will be, or some will be, in the minority. Let us workers are in charge. Yes, we have proclaimed be in the minority. But, ifpractice shows this was that, but do we realize it in practice? And how right, it will have to become a majority.., and go many funds are committed in advance? What before the leadership. As I see it, there's no way funds, what is there to decide, who decides, etc. to get awayfrom a situation by being reluctant to etc. Come on, let's talk about it openly, honestly, look into the relations, real relations in let's look at the sources, because otherwise we'll production and in society, that are happening never get to the bottom, we'll always have the and that are the basic reasons why the situation is same things happening again and again. not what it should be. So our capacities are poorly utilized. Person- As you see, I will not and have not started my ally I reckon 70 percent. But in the press I read remarks with successes. Our successes are great. that utilization of working time is 50 percent. So I remember when we began building the if you put it all together, both poorly utilized economy in those hard years of the [Soviet] capacity and poorly used working time, etc., we blockade, when we built Zvornik [an early major are losing the use of a third of 40 percent of our industrial project] we began with one technician potential. What are the results? Low personal and two trucks. Today our engineers and tech- incomes. And what do low personal incomes lead nicians are building all over the world. At to, they lead to moonlighting. People have to Trepca, our largest mine, we had one engineer. moonlight. That works for those who have land Today our engineers include unemployed ones, to in the village. They will work in the village but our shame, and a serious indictment... [but they will also take a job in a factory and not show up also] work all over the world. From a small un- regularly, not make an effort because they are developed country we have risen to the ranks of guaranteed the [legal] minimum monthly per- the developed. And in agriculture we have also sonal income, social security, health insurance, made a great advance, practically a revolution. I and additional income in the village. There are DIR-4-'78/17

about 40-50 percent of these from the village. But those who don't have, whose conditions of And then those in the city who have a skilled business operation are poorer, we help with craft, they will work privately on the side, etc., credits, but credits have to be paid back. Thus etc. There are no statistics for this, but social they are in a worse situation, a continually wor- property gets eaten up this way. And the worker, sening situation. Think about these relations, what situation is he in now, what are "production how they happen in our reality. Some in difficult relations" like now? He looks at his pay, his conditions and others in easier positions, whole earnings, the minimum personal income. He branches, groups, not to mention individual looks at that. He practically cannot decide, can- enterprises. Fine, that's o.k., one enterprise not influence general economic policy. We say works better, the other works poorer, that's that he has an influence in matters of income. another question. Great, equal opportunity for What influence? Who decides about customs everyone, and ifyou want to work, please do and duties, administration.., no longer the federation [have] the largest income and larger personal like we once did it, but now the republics incomes. But if there is unequal opportunity, if together at the level of organs of administration. conditions vary, some can in some branches be But a customs duty lowers incomefor some raises sure of three times, four times larger average incomefor others, likefrozen prices. I notice that personal incomes, larger profits, those profits can when prices are frozen, some places they are on the principle of "past work" be placed unfrozen, some places they are allowed 15 wherever, etc., while others can't but have to wait percent, and all that through some agreements, for someone to offer credits that have to be paid etc., etc. Everyone makes these agreements, but back, etc. Differences in average profit rates by who decides them, are those workers, do they branches are very great, and I don't see how to have influence in creating the conditions for their determine whether that is because of the results business operations? They don't of work or because of conditions for business operations that we have created. For in the last That social relations are not brought in line is analysis it is we who create the conditions for seen in the fact that credits dominate in all our business operations investments. Here they say 50 percent, as far as I am 50 banks. But the informed percent by That is, Comrades, it seems to me that it would second source, collectives who from working be very important us to see the question and work under more advantageous business condi- for not just mobilize Communists. [We shall tions, who have rates, and who also high profit mobilize Communists, and easily when they are to others in the credits, that is little, give form of placed in a position in production relations that 3 It is that is apparently percent insignificant, are such that they have to go increased produc- true, the is the same for but principle if only [finan- tion and productivity. That will be a completely cial] means are pooled. The question is how different situation.] And instead of singing pooling is done, is it pooled as capital or not, etc. hymns, better that we get on with an analysis of the sources in society that lead to all this. Be- Therefore we arrived at thefollowing situation, cause, look, it is commonly saidmfine, we have that credit relations dominate. But what do achieved great results. Indeed, an industrial pro- credit relations mean? Credit relations mean the duction [growth rate] of 7.5 percent, that's no following: there is the one who gives credits and small thing, that's a big thing. But, Comrades, who gets because he gives, he gets in terms of the let's look at whether that is enough now and how distribution of income, or better said profits, that rate of growth was achieved. That rate of since there's nothing else to get except profit, growth was achieved at the cost of[international] guaranteed earnings ofworkers, etc., etc. indebtedness of a billion to $2 billion a year, two billion dollars have to be paid back. Ifyou don't This means that the distribution ofprofit mar- insure greater production, then the living stan- gins is such that those who have, who are in more dards offuture generations will have to go down, advantageous positions, they always have and there is no alternative. That means it would be even have the possibility to appear as creditors. better to analyze how those billions that we get in 18/DIR-4-'78

credits can go for the more rapid development of you the truth, I turn it off. But there is something the economy. That's one thing. to be said. For years you have to wait to get an apartment, and one gets an apartment and Second, what kind is that level of industrial another does not, but why does one get it and the production? We are stagnating for years now other does not? This means, this system that we The question is why? If there are such unutilized have proclaimed, something is not right with it. possibilities in production, unutilized in the work Let us discuss basic things. This means there is force, in an unemployed workforce abroad? You no other task before Communists other than rela- know what it is. Our unemployment has gone up, tions in society, and contradictions in our society despite the fact that we have employed so many are big, beginning with that between those who workers in this period. I look at Montenegro [his work and those who decideand that is the situ- native region according to some informationmit ation todaythose who work in difficult condi- may be off2 percent or 5 percent more or lessmit tions and others in easier conditions, those who is 27 percent for little Montenegro Measure have a right to work and others who don't, etc., however you like, but of these 27, 000 people who etc. are without work, who come out ofschool and are without work and must wait for 7, 8 years to get Communists must b'e there. We do not need it, imagine, they finish their studies at 25 or 26 Communists who know from memory five and have to wait another 7, 8 years, so what will phrases from the classic ofMarxism or know the happen to their pensions, their working period, stages of a capitalist economy. No, relations in a etc. Not to speak about the present situation, how capitalist economy do not suit our relations. All they keep themselves, etc., etc. Obviously those of what we would adapt here, all that is false, rates are undesirable. Both economic rates and because there is no decision that you make, that relations to the schools are inappropriate. Why doesn't touch on relations among people. In do the schools deliver people we don't need, how capitalism that is easy, there it is a matter of long will we repeat that?...And so it goes on, I relations among capitalists. Or capitalists see no end if we do not look into the whole prob- negotiate there with their state, government, etc., lem area ofplanning. etc. That is their task, but our task must be such that we harmonize our relations so that decisions I have enough to say, but I know that hundreds that are taken for the sake of harmonization in ofothers must speak, that each has something to the economy, that there the workers participate say. I would only like to say thefollowing. and with regardfor the relations that are realized among the workers. Then we can expect both an I quote Comrade Tito, already 15, 20 years ago increase in production and an increase of pro- he said it to us in the trade unions, there is no ductivity and socialist relations, etc., etc. greater taskfor Communists in building a social- ist soqiety than to resolve relations in society, con- Yes, Tempo, etc., etc., etc. tradictory relations in society and whether they are in harmony with socialist principles of dis- (September 1978) tribution according to work, according to the real results of work. And I look around now, at [Photos by Fototanjug, Belgrade] least.., according to what the press says and the television, etc., there is nothing about these rela- tions, about the real reasons why these relations are the way they are, etc. Nothing. The only thing is: a meeting was held, it was attended by so and so, pictures were taken, etc., etc., and nothing more. And I turn off the television I tell DIR-4-'78/19

NOTES

1. The same hindsight also informs this reporter's similar 7. At the Ninth Congress in 1969 there was, however, but briefer re-examination of that Congress in my re- one surprise: the previously unannounced creation of a cently published study, The Yugoslav Experiment 1958- new body, an Executive Bureau of 15 members, above the 1975 {London and Berkeley, 1977), pp. 163-72. I did not Central Committee and Presidency. Again eliminated at report it that way in 1964, nor did any colleagues whose the following Congress, the Executive Bureau was one of accounts I read at the time. Tito's first efforts to recentralize authority and stop the "federalization" of the Party into rival republican-ethnic 2. D.I. Rusinow, "Yugoslav Domestic Developments" units that was one of the sources of the crises of 1971-72. [DIR-2-'78], A UFS Reports, 1978/No, 25, Europe. My version of this story is found in A UFS Reports at the time and in The Yugoslav Experiment, ch. IX. 3. A companion Report, "Yugoslavia and the World, 1978" [DIR-5-'78], A UFS Reports, 1978/No. 42, Europe, describes the foreign affairs issues discussed at the Con- 8. On this much disputed factual question, see Bogdan gress, the nonaligned meeting in July and Hua Kuo-feng's Denitch's convincingly documented analysis of the visit in August. national composition of the YPA in The Legitimation of a Revolution {New Haven and London, 1976), pp. 113-20. 4. Subheadings under "League of Communists" in the Index to The Yugoslav Experiment provide thumbnail 9. Directions in the Development of the Socialist Self- chronologies of the ups and downs {including dis- Management PoEtical System (second edition), p. 179. appearances and reinstatements} of LCY organs like the Central Committee, Executive Committee, Executive 10. The remaining categories: educationists and cultural Bureau, and Presidency. workers, 6.3%; economists, lawyers, scientists, artists and other professionals, 5.9%; doctors and other medical 5. Including a report under my by-line, in which an personnel, 1.9%; security services personnel, 2.3%; editor, presumably thinking I had missed an important private craftsmen, 0.3%; unemployed, 2.3%; housewives, point carried in other papers, inserted a paragraph re- 1.3%; students, 5.9%; secondary and vocational school peating this error. pupils, 2.9%; Army members, 4.8%; working abroad, 0.5%. {See note 6 for source.) 6. This is not strictly accurate for Serbia, because that republic includes the autonomous provinces of Vojvodina and Kosovo, whose parties elect their own representa- tives to the federal organs at their own congresses {called conferences) and then participate in electing Serbia's representatives at the all-Serbian Congress. Figures for the republican Party membership cited here are from the Yugoslav press at the time of the republican congresses and do not tally with other Party membership figures cited in this Report, which are from a mimeographed handout, entitled "LCY Membership Statistical Over- view," available at the Eleventh Congress. The handout includes breakdown of membership by nationality {and by occupation and the age and sex of recent new mem- bers}, but not by republic and province.