Renowned Russian Marxist Economist Aleksandr Buzgalin Dies

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TranscriptListenDonateSubscribeGuestMusic Paul"} Aleksandr Buzgalin, Russian Marxist, professor at the Moscow State University, and the coordinator of the Social Movement “Alternatives,” passed away on October 18, 2023. He was 69 years old. In his honor, we republish his interviews with host Paul Jay. Transcript Listen Donate Subscribe Guest Music Paul Jay Hi. Welcome to theAnalysis.news. I’m Paul Jay. In just a few seconds, I’ll be joined by Aleksandr Buzgalin to talk about the significance of the life of Mikhail Gorbachev. Please don’t forget there’s a donate button on the website. If you support what we do, please go and click. If you already have, thank you. If you haven’t subscribed on YouTube, please do or on one of the various podcast platforms. Most importantly, sign up for the email list. Be back in just a few seconds. On December 25, 1991, Mikhail Gorbachev resigned as the leader of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and dissolved the Soviet Union itself. With his death on August 30, Gorbachev has been mostly praised in the Western press for his vision of a social democratic Soviet Union within Europe, much like a Sweden or a Finland. Of course, that’s not what happened. What actually followed was a period of rapacious capitalism where public assets were looted by former leaders of the party and the bureaucracy. Aleksandr Buzgalin was a member of the Central Committee of the CPSU in its last year and fought for quite a different vision of a reformed Soviet Union. Buzgalin is currently a professor and director of the Center of Modern Marxist Studies at Moscow State University. He joins us now from Moscow. Thanks for joining us again, Aleksandr. Aleksandr Buzgalin  I’m very glad to be with you and discuss very important questions, as you know. Paul Jay The death of Gorbachev is, in some ways, more about the end of the Soviet Union than it is about the figure of Gorbachev. I know you had a very direct experience in the days and months before the end of the Soviet Union. You once told me the story about this. Maybe you could start there, and then we can get into the bigger question. You were not in the party, am I correct? But you went to a party congress, and you were part of a reform group that proposed certain reforms. Gorbachev didn’t agree with your reforms. What was that about? Aleksandr Buzgalin  It’s not exactly the model of my life. The logic is as follows. In 1985 the Soviet Union started some reforms. The first was very mild, and then it became deeper. In 1989, it became a real opportunity to be in a position officially without [inaudible 00:02:46].  Paul Jay By reforms, do you mean more openness in terms of how you could speak? Aleksandr Buzgalin  Different reforms. By the way, I want to talk about this a little later. Gorbachev is not only glasnost, freedom of speech, and political pluralism. It’s a much more complex problem in the economy and ideology. Later we will talk about this. In 1988, I think I became a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union because it was possible to be in a position inside the Communist Party. In the winter of 1989-1990, we created a so-called Marxist platform. It was democratic, socialist, and, I can say, even communist opposition to both Stalinism and Bourgeoisie reforms. Gorbachev, in that period, was the leader of social democratic reforms, but in a very pro-western style. It was more western social democracy than, let’s say, a social democracy of [Georgi] Plekhanov or even [Karl] Kautsky. It was a very pro-western model of social democracy, the center or right-wing model of social democracy. First and second, he was a leader of a huge bureaucratic machine, and he did not want to reform this bureaucratic machine. The Communist Party and Central Committee were organized very bureaucratically, and they could not react to very deep contradictions in the country. That’s why we established the Marxist platform. Paul Jay For people who don’t know too much about the period, what do you mean when you say organized very bureaucratically? What are some examples? Aleksandr Buzgalin  First of all, it was the same huge apparatus as the Central Committee. If you wanted to make any changes, it was necessary to go through different departments and sub-departments. In the region’s party, leaders could not make anything without permission from the center, and they didn’t have initiative. They were part of a machine, and they could not work without the machine. They could not work without the KGB. They could not work without the police, and it was very difficult to change this machine. We were talking about the necessity to radically reorganize the party-state on an anti-bureaucratic basis. The main question was about the development of real, not formal, self-management in enterprises. Real economic democracy. Real democracy, grassroots democracy. Gorbachev was playing with bourgeois forms of democracy. It was possible to say blah, blah, blah for intelligence. Still, there was no voice for the ordinary people and people who became poor in the Soviet Union Gorbachev period because of the shortage of commodities. Many real forms of democracy were not developing grassroots democracy. We were doing a lot in this sphere. It’s important, by the way. It was a movement of self-management, organs of enterprises, big enterprises, and small enterprises. In 1990 we had all of the Union, Soviet Union, Congress of the leaders of self-management. It was 1,000 people from all over the country. It was intelligent, very democratic people who wanted to have democratic socialism, but they didn’t have power. Real democratization– and the economy was not powered by workers or engineers. There was more power to the directors who started the underground privatization during the Soviet period. Workers and engineers were fighting against this, and they didn’t have support from the Communist party, and they didn’t have support from Gorbachev. Paul Jay Let me just highlight this. You said the privatization began underground even during the days of the Soviet Union. This is from higher-level party bureaucrats, am I correct? They were already trying to develop private ownership amongst that class. Aleksandr Buzgalin  They were not against it, I can say. If we are talking about party bureaucrats– it’s easier to explain. In the Gorbachev period, there appeared two wings of bureaucrats in the Communist party. One part was old-style bureaucrats who had communist, socialist illusions and formal socialist ideology in their brains. At the same time, they were very cynical. They were, let’s say, corrupt. Not because of bribes but because they wanted to go anywhere and have money. They were oriented on the transformation of their power to the property, to the capital, but not very radically. They were passive and not active, this whole generation of Communist party bureaucrats. We had young generations mainly in the Komsomol youth communist organization and also part of directors and leaders of formerly state enterprises. But because Gorbachev allowed so-called [inaudible 00:08:08] leasing, directors took enterprises in leasing. It was a strange situation when an enterprise with equipment for billion of dollars was in the leasing of a director who had, I don’t know, maybe a few thousand dollars. So it was a very unbeautiful story. I’m trying to find a polite way to say this. Paul Jay One, you don’t need to be polite. Two, what is the term you’re using? Aleksandr Buzgalin  Leasing. Rent. Paul Jay Oh, leasing. Aleksandr Buzgalin  I’m sorry for my pronunciation. Yes, leasing of enterprises. Also, it was the growth of separatism among regional leaders. It was not a liberation of people in different regions of the former...