p Socialist orientation is the movement towards socialism of countries which have not reached the capitalist stage of development, a path leading to socialism, bypassing 346 capitalism altogether or the stage of developed capitalism, in conditions of the dictatorship of the proletariat or victory of socialism in other countries.

p We know that the transition to socialism takes place as a result of the socialist revolution which requires certain material and class prerequisites (a high enough level of economic development, the existence of mature, politically active working class guided by the Marxist party, etc.). These preconditions usually mature during the capitalist stage of development, and that is why there can be a direct transition to the socialist revolution in advanced capitalist countries.

p Things are different in pre-capitalist countries such as the majority of the young sovereign states are. The prerequisites for solving the tasks of a socialist revolution have not yet ripened in them. Therefore, in order to begin moving towar-ds socialism they need a certain period of time to create the necessary material and class conditions. This period in the course of which they launch decisive socialist transformations is an intrinsic feature of socialist orientation.

p The socio-economic processes occurring in that initial period (economic development and the corresponding regrouping of the class forces in favour of the labouring masses, the working class in the first place) are in some respects similar to the processes characteristic of capitalist development. But in a socialist-oriented state they take place at a much faster pace and the masses, which is most important, undergo far less hardships than in the course of capitalist development. At the same time socialist transformations (curtailment of private capital and exploitation, the establishment of people’s control over some of the means of production, economic planning, etc.) take place at this initial stage of non-capitalist development alongside changes of a bourgeois-democratic nature, even though their significance is not decisive and they do not determine the socio-economic image of society as a whole. But whatever their depth or form, socialist transformations are an essential feature of socialist orientation. If there are no changes of this kind it means that society is developing along the capitalist road.

p The unitial stage is followed by a stage of cardinal 347 socialist changes in all fields of social activity, a stage of direct transition to socialism.

p Socialist changes become of decisive importance, noncapitalist development becomes fixed and society firmly follows the socialist path. The national liberation revolution develops into a socialist revolution.

p How soon this new stage sets in depends on the activity of the masses in the revolution, the depth of the democratic transformations in public and state affairs, the growth of the role of the working class and the consolidation of its alliance with the peasantry and on how quickly the leadership of the revolution begins to express the aspirations of the working people.

It is important to note that the path of socialist orientation has become a reality only in the present epoch of mankind’s transition from capitalism to socialism and the existence of the world socialist system whose unselfish and all-round assistance bulwarks the countries following the non-capitalist road. “The backward countries can emerge from their present stage of development when the victorious proletariat of the Soviet Republics extends a helping hand to these masses and is in a position to give them support.”  [347•*