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Citizen Demands and the Soviet Political System*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2014

James H. Oliver
James H. Oliver*
Affiliation:
University of Maryland
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Extract

Political scientists interested in non-Communist systems have paid considerable attention to demands (expressions of opinion that an authoritative allocation with regard to particular subject matters should or should not be made by those responsible for doing so) coming from the intra-societal (domestic) environments of these political systems. The importance of intra-societal demands, including citizen demands, for non-Communist systems is well established. Researchers interested in the Soviet political system have paid relatively little attention to intra-societal demands, especially demands coming from those whom David Easton would call citizen gatekeepers, i.e., citizens who convert their wants into demands by articulating them.

The reasons for the neglect of research in this area are obvious enough. Quite apart from the problem of gathering useful data, there exists the question of whether demands from the intra-societal environment, and in particular citizen demands, are really important for a “totalitarian” system. Nothing like the politically autonomous interest groups of the Western democracies exist in the Soviet Union. Whatever demands come from the intra-societal environment are therefore largely grassroots demands from the populace, and there is reason to doubt that Soviet authorities feel compelled to heed such demands when formulating policy. Lenin's assertion that the Party is the vanguard of the proletariat was clearly a rejection of the idea that the masses should direct the Party. His successors have continued to assert that the Party leads the masses, and not the masses the Party.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 63 , Issue 2 , June 1969 , pp. 465 - 475
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1969

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Footnotes

*

I would like to thank Prof. John A. Armstrong for his valuable comments on an earlier version of this paper. I would also like to express my gratitude to the Inter-University Committee on Travel Grants for their support of my research in the Soviet Union.

References

1 I will use the term “demand” only in this restricted sense. For a full discussion of the concept see Easton, David, A Systems Analysis of Political Life (New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1965), Part IIGoogle Scholar.

2 For a discussion of citizen gatekeepers see Easton, op. cit., pp. 93–94.

3 Stalin, J. V., “Foundations of Leninism,” Problems of Leninism (New York: International Publishers 1928), p. 73 Google Scholar, as quoted in Fainsod, Merle, How Russia is Ruled (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1963), p. 137 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 Program of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, reproduced from a supplement of New Times (No. 48), 29 November, 1961, in Schapiro, Leonard (ed.), The U.S.S.R. and the Future (New York: Frederick A Praeger, 1963), p. 310 Google Scholar. Emphasis in the original.

5 Compare Merle Fainsod, op. cit., p. 205; Scott, Derek J. R., Russian Political Institutions (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1961), p. 54 Google Scholar; and Leonhard, Wolfgang, The Kremlin Since Stalin, trans. Wiskemann, Elizabeth and Jackson, Marion (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1962), pp. 11–15 Google Scholar. See also Armstrong, John A., The Soviet Bureaucratic Elite (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1959), Chapters I and IIGoogle Scholar.

6 Easton, op. cit., p. 110.

7 Ibid., p. 93

8 ibid, pp. 93–95.

9 These archives were captured first by the German army during World War II and subsequently by U.S. forces. They are the only party archives open to non-Communist scholars.

10 Fainsod, Merle, Smolensk Under Soviet Rule (New York: Vintage Books, 1963), Chapter XXGoogle Scholar.

11 Ibid., p. 408.

12 Moscow and Leningrad are divided into a number of raions (city boroughs). Each raion has its “popularly” elected legislative assembly (soviet); executive committee (borough council), which is “elected” by the soviet; and numerous governmental administrative agencies. According to the legal theory of dual subordination, the raion soviet is subordinate to its electors and the “popularly” elected city soviet. The raion city executive committee is subordinate to its soviet and the city executive committee, and the raion administrative agencies are subordinate to their executive committee and the corresponding city administrative agency. Similar dual subordination exists for city organs and agencies, the next higher level for Moscow and Leningrad being the RSFSR.

In each raion there is a raion party organization consisting of the large raion party committee (raikom), which is “elected” by the larger raion party conference; the bureau of the raikom, which is “elected” by the raikom; and the party administrative agencies. The raion party organizations are subordinate to the city party organization, which also have a conference, city party committee (gorkom), bureau, and administrative agencies.

At each level the governmental organs and agencies are subordinate to their appropriate party organs and agencies. Candidates to governmental offices are selected, or at least approved, by the appropriate party organizations and by higher state organs and agencies. Party officials must be approved by higher party organizations.

13 Decision of the Moscow Executive Committee of 29 June 1962 in Biulleten' ispolnitel'nogo komiteta Moskovskogo gorodskogo Soveta deputatov trudiashchikhsia (Bulletin of the Executive Committee of the Moscow City Soviet of Working People's Deputies), No. 15 (August, 1962), p. 9. Hereafter this publication will be referred to as M.B.

14 Decision of the Leningrad Executive Committee of 7 August 1963 in Biulleten' isopolnitel'nogo komiteta Leningradskogo gorodskogo Soveta deputatov trudiaschikhsia (Bulletin of the Executive Committee of the Leningrad City Soviet of Working People's Deputies), No. 18 (September, 1963), p. 1. Hereafter this publication will be referred to as L.B.

15 Barabashev, G. V. and Sheremet, K. F., Sovetskoe Stroitel'stvo (Moscow: Iuridicheskaia literature, 1965), pp. 374–375 Google Scholar. See also Azovkin, I. A., Saforov, R. A. and Tikhomirov, Iu A., “Deiatel'nosf' deputatov mestnykh Sovetov v izribatel'nom okruge i na proizvodstve,” Mestnye Sovety na sovremennom etape (Moscow: Nauka, 1965), pp. 285–287 Google Scholar.

16 Barabashev and Sheremet, op. cit., pp. 375–376.

17 Ibid., p. 374.

18 Decision of the Moscow Executive Committee of 5 February 1960 in M.B., No. 6 (March, 1960), p. 10.

19 For a discussion of some of the difficulties that arise concerning the fulfillment of the electoral mandate see E. Sovershaeva (Senior instructor of the Leningrad Organization-Instructor Department) “O rabote po vypolneniiu nakazov izbiratelei,” in L.B., No. 12 (June, 1963), pp. 13–15.

20 Decision of the Moscow Executive Committee of 29 June 1962 in M.B., No. 15 (August, 1962), p. 9.

21 Decision of the Leningrad City Soviet of 24 June 1963 in L.B., No. 14 (July, 1963), pp. 1–2. As a result of an increase of 4.3 times in dry cleaning capacity between 1959 and 1961, the people of Leningrad could have their dry cleaning orders filled within twenty days in 1961. This was a considerable improvement over the sixty day period of 1959. However, according to the decision of the city soviet, demands in this area were still not being met. See the decision of the Leningrad City Soviet of 11 December 1961 in L.B., No. 1 (January, 1962), p. 4.

22 See decision of the Moscow Executive Committee of 18 December 1962 in M.B., No. 2 (January, 1963), pp. 19–21.

23 Decision of Moscow Executive Committee of 7 January 1964 in M.B., No. 2 (January, 1964), pp. 13–14.

24 Goncharov, A. Ia., “O praktike vovlecheniia obshchestvennosti v rabotu Leningradskogo raionnogo Soveta g. Moakvy,” Ot sotsialisticheskoi gosudarstvennosti k kommunisticheskomu samoupravleniiu, pp. 298–299 Google Scholar.

25 Ibid., p. 295.

26 See unsigned article, “O rabote obshchestvennykh otdelov po konotroliu ispolneniia reshenii,” in L.B., No. 10 (May, 1962), p. 13.

27 Decision of the Moscow Executive Committee of 21 February 1963 in M.B., No. 4 (February 1963), pp. 23–24. See also decision of Leningrad Executive Committee of 25 March 1960 in L.B., No. 9 (May, 1960), pp. 3–6.

28 See decision of the Leningrad Executive Committee of 4 June 1956 in Sbornik reshenii i rasporiazhenii ispolnitelnogo komiteta Leningradskogo gorodskogo Soveta (Leningrad, 1958), pp. 5–10 Google Scholar. See also decision of Moscow Executive Committee of 12 October in M.B., No. 20 (October, 1965), pp. 1–5.

29 A. Zhuravlev (Chairman of the Petroslaviansk Settlement Executive Committee), “Metodom narodnoi stroiki” in L.B., No. 16 (August, 1963), pp. 21–22.

30 Vechernii Leningrad, 26 November, 1964, p. 1.

31 Fainsod, , Smolensk Under Soviet Rule, pp. 378–379 Google Scholar.

32 For examples of such discussions see: Vecherniaia Moskva, 05 30, 1956, p. 2 Google Scholar; December 9, 1960, p. 1; and Leningradskaia Pravda, 02 28, 1961, p. 1 Google Scholar; April 25, 1961, p. 1.

33 The following discussion is based on an adaption of a “Simplified Systematic View of the ‘Collective Behavior’ Approach to a Theory of Institutionalism” presented by Buckley, Walter, Sociology and Modern Systems Theory (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1967), p. 138 Google Scholar.

34 For a discussion of this point in the context of high level disputes over agricultural policy see Ploss, Sidney I., Conflict and Decision Making in Soviet Russia, A Case Study of Agricultural Policy, 1953–1963 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1965), p. 84 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.