7

p The historical horizon of the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries is mostly a symbolical event, non plus ultra, yet it still makes us stop, and plunge in thought. It is not long till people will be saying: "That was in the.20th century", a century of rapid social changes, revolutions and wars, of impetuous scientific and technological progress. It has been a century in which a new social system—- socialism—has taken shape and developed, offering a real alternative to bourgeois civilisation; a century of the comprehensive and deepening crisis of capitalism, which continues to bring mankind wars, suffering, starvation and spiritual emptiness. Its crisis is evident, but the system still retains resources for survival. It has been a century in which the colonial system has disappeared from the Earth, and nuclear weapons capable of destroying civilisation itself have appeared, active use being made of this fact by the ruling circles of imperialism to blackmail mankind.

p The century has been permeated to an unprecedented degree by deep and fundamental shifts in the productive forces, social organisation and man’s cognitive possibilities. The 20th century has raised before civilisation probably the most difficult question, requiring a direct and honest answer: what are the long-term consequences of the actions of people, governments, parties, mass movements, workers and peasants, scholars and writers, when, at the end of the 20th century, the chief problem for all mankind has been placed on the agenda—that of life and death.

p The world is not, of course, stationary. All its component parts are evolving, both material and intellectual, man’s practical possibilities and his intellectual horizon, social structures and international relations. Some are evolving more slowly, others faster, but in any case the progressive, revolutionary forces of the age are striving to bring social practice into optimum correspondence with social benefit and social consciousness. The realities of the end of the current century are such that world social relations burdened by the threat of nuclear annihilation, as well as the rapid 8 development of scientific and technological thought and techniques, moulding, as it were, mankind into an integral whole, into an interconnected and interdependent organism, have necessitated new thinking, new approaches, rejection of outdated dogmas and stereotypes, harmful traditions and prejudices.

p Proceeding from the Marxist-Leninist analysis of the new conditions of world development and its component parts, the 27th Congress of the CPSU presented a realistic picture of the world today and drew conclusions corresponding to the drastically changed situation. Mikhail Gorbachev’s Political Report to the Congress put forward fundamental propositions of a political and theoretical character arising both from the situation that has taken shape in the world and from the tasks facing all forces of progress and democracy. Two theses may be identified as special ones in the creative analysis of the contradictions and trends in world development. These are, first, the thesis of the dialectical integrity of the world, its growing interconnections, the interdependence between the processes taking place in it and the fate of countries and people. The second is that concerning the need for new political thinking in the nuclear age. These two precepts go back ideologically and morally to the deepest traditions of communism as a social movement, the traditions of continuous and bold search, of a creative attitude to life.

p When philosophy ceases only to observe or even just explain the world and begins to take an active part in its transformation, its categories become political ones. The dialectics of real life lie in its complex, contradictory character, in the fact that the contradictions of social development and progress cannot be artificially sorted onto shelves, however capacious these might be. To seek new, non-standard ways and means of managing the vital activities of society, rethinking the seemingly already known and familiar, and revealing additional features and qualities of it, dictated by the times and the course of events—this is a constant demand of, and condition for, effective policy.

p There are more than enough examples of the dialectics of life, and these were presented at the Congress. Human genius and man’s labour have created unprecedented production opportunities, but they are also capable of destroying civilisation. Man is armed with knowledge and weapons that would allow him to wipe out hunger in the world today, but the social conditions in a substantial part of the world prevent this. All the material preconditions are available for waging an immediate battle against poverty, backwardness, and disease, but the burden of outdated ideas and social orders here constitute an obstacle that is extremely difficult to surmount.

p The first step in any direction, including along the longest and most difficult path, is made in man’s consciousness. The new political thinking that the Congress of Soviet Communists indicated was needed and for which it called, is becoming, in the eyes of people today, just such a first step and is acquiring material force.

p The new thinking is rightly identified primarily with questions 9 of international security, with eliminating the constant threat of a nuclear war, of the senseless and increasingly dangerous arms race, with the search for non-trivial approaches, bold and far-sighted solutions. The new political thinking is not confined to just this, however. The movement of social forces, the forces of history, cannot be halted, and this must be recognised in theory, in practice and in policies. The problems of man and mankind are resolved primarily by labour and creation, certainly not by force, especially military. Practical conclusions must also be drawn from this. The Earth’s resources are not infinite, so today extreme care must already be taken in their use. The new political thinking means awareness on the part of people who think and act in a mature manner and realise their own might, and in whose interests, for what purposes and in what forms this might is used, and what fruits it may bring. It is the end of the age of the egoistic interests that were cultivated for centuries on the basis of the private- property system.

p This thinking is, however, called new precisely because it is only just beginning to consolidate itself in international and interstate relations. It faces many obstacles in its path, the main one being imperialism, with its cult of brute force and egoistic morals, with its readiness to risk anything, including all mankind, for the sake of its own privileges.

p The goal of the study is to determine the potential of modern capitalism as the chief obstacle to socialist liberation and renewal, to progress. The authors strive to provide a multifaceted picture of the world today. Since the study is comprehensive in character, scholars in various fields have taken part in it—economists and philosophers, historians and sociologists.

p The capitalist system has created and is continuing to create many material and intellectual values. It is still able to hold back the development of trends and phenomena of its collapse at one stage or another. Its final demise is, however, inevitable. The laws of history are inexorable. Communists believe that the source of the inevitable transition to a new type of civilisation is to be found within every society and not outside it. The bourgeois civilisation is to be replaced by one of a higher type—the communist, socialism being a stage in its establishment. This objective law, which has become a reality, increases the fear felt by the ruling forces of imperialism in the face of the impending disappearance of the system that has so conscientiously and successfully served the interests of the rich, self-seeking minority. Imperialism is resorting more and more frequently to self-preservation by using force, but nuclear weapons have changed the situation fundamentally, and this restrains imperialism from making the fatal step from poll-, tical confrontation to nuclear war. It is becoming increasingly understood that a nuclear war would mean the end of mankind, its hopes and aspirations, kindness and genius, everything that is life.

p In the context of the preliminary results of the development of bourgeois society in the 20th century, an active discussion is still going on concerning how capitalism at the end of the century 10 differs from that at the beginning and in the middle of it; how serious and justified are the assertions made by bourgeois theoreticians to the effect that it has changed fundamentally and found its "second wind"; what, in fact, the system and methods are for its adaptation to the changing historical conditions, and the prospects for the revolutionary process in the world of capital or the latter’s evolution under the impact of the socialist experience of social development; which important economic, social, political and cultural processes are currently and will be under way in the capitalist world and how they might reflect on the life of coming generations; what in the development of the liberated countries objectively furthers the strengthening of capitalism and what undermines it; what threat for the world community is contained in the spread of modern American mass culture and the bourgeois way of life in general.

p This book is not a history of recent decades, but the end of the Second World War was a natural point of departure for analysing the processes. In the same way, this work is not an experiment in futurology or forecasting, but in virtually all the chapters the reader will discover certain ideas concerning the course of the probable development of the situation until the end of the century, and in some cases even beyond.

p In the West a veritable mountain of literature has been published on the state of, and prospects for, world capitalism, both serious research works and primitive apologetics. To varying degrees, however, both are official in character, have a clear class essence and thrust. The monopolistic bourgeoisie has raised apologetics for its system to the rank of state policy and has created a multifaceted front for defending it: science and mass culture, the mass media and thousands of right-wing organisations, terrorism and subversive activities against everything progressive, democratic and revolutionary.

p A hundred years ago, the productive forces of capitalism were on the rise. The World Exhibition in Paris in 1889 and its symbol— the Eiffel Tower, demonstrated the impressive technological achievements of the 19th century. The bourgeoisie’s age of dominance seemed endless. In the middle of these boiling rapids of development, however, Marx and Engels, on the basis of scientific analysis, realised that the system was doomed and recognised the social forces fated to overcome it. "The monopoly of capital becomes a fetter upon the mode of production, which has sprung up and flourished along with, and under it," Marx wrote back in 1867.  [10•1  Capitalism surged ahead, mercilessly crushing the conservatism, ignorance and resistance of the Middle Ages. It revelled in its triumph. The further this system went, however, the more cramping it became for the productive forces fettered by capitalist relations of production, while the foreign and domestic policies of the bourgeois class gained strength and increased their reactionary principles. Such a situation could not go on for ever.

11

p At the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries, mankind is living in an incomparably more complex world, and we can be absolutely sure that it will continue to gain in complexity. The social processes in modern capitalist society are distinguished by their diversity, too. While retaining its essence, this society differs greatly from capitalist society in the past—both in the level of development of the productive forces and in the mechanism by which the crisis in relations of production operates. In recent times a situation has developed that is in many ways unprecedented.

p In the Political Report of the CPSU Central Committee to the 27th Congress of the CPSU, Mikhail Gorbachev identified the chief characteristics of modern capitalism, defining the situation in its individual spheres and regions, countries and social groups.

p Above all, modern capitalism is monopolistic capitalism, or imperialism, which took shape back at the turn of the 20th century. There are basic rules, discovered by Lenin, operating within it. The specific conditions and forms of manifestation of these rules have, of course, changed and are still developing before our very eyes.

p The bourgeoisie as a class is experienced enough to understand the social sense of the revolutionary alarm raised in 1917. The October 1917 Revolution struck a blow at the very basis of the capitalist system, undermined its economic, political, ideological and spiritual foundations, and dispersed the legends concerning the unshakable economic and political power of the bourgeoisie. The myth of the eternal values of capitalist society and their perfection was refuted. A new age began. That which previously has seemed to be a “spectre”, a bold theory, a dream, became reality. The October Revolution showed that the advent of the new formation to replace capitalism was not only theoretically possible, but historically inevitable, irrespective of whether this took place a few decades earlier or later and in which form, for it would do so on the basis and in parallel with the maturing of the internal conditions for sharp social changes in the given country.

p Imperialist governments reacted in a dual way to the appearance of the new social system. First, their entire arsenal of force was brought into use: intervention, counter-revolution, blockade, various types of provocation—both military and economic. The impact of the socialist revolution in Russia proved so powerful, however, that the ruling circles of imperialism were forced to seek ways to adapt to the new situation, to draw lessons for themselves, to smooth over the most obvious monstrosities of their own system, and adjust international behaviour, taking account of the new balance of forces.

p Destructive force against the USSR, and then against the other socialist countries was applied in vain, though it did inflict considerable damage on them. The intervention, economic blockade, political isolation, the attack made by Nazi Germany, the USA’s postwar aggressive policy have all required the Soviet people to make all the necessary defence expenditures. Now a multitude of plans for the nuclear destruction of the USSR have come to light: Charioteer, 12 Cogwill, Gunpowder, Fleetwood, Dropshot are the code names of the scenarios for nuclear war against the USSR from the 1950s to the 1970s. The counter-revolutionary actions organised by imperialism in Hungary in 1956 and in Czechoslovakia in 1968 came to nothing.

p Yet a struggle is a struggle. Defeats are sometimes suffered, too. The revolutions in Germany and Hungary in 1918 were put down by the gun and the bayonet. The people’s regimes in Chile and in Grenada were uprooted by imperialism in 1973 and 1983 respectively. The people of Africa, Asia and Latin America have suffered many casualties in anti-colonial revolutions.

p The list of imperialism’s crimes is much longer. Indeed, the very existence of such facts, the way tragic new examples are always being added to them, indicate the main thing—that the most aggressive imperialist circles still hope to destroy socialism and the liberation movements by force.

p This destructive policy is not, however, capable of halting the progressive improvement in the world. Socialism as an economic and socio-political formation has continued to develop and gain strength. Major changes have taken placfe on the socio-economic map of the world, too. A large group of states has withdrawn from the world of capitalism and set out on a new course; a socialist system has taken shape. Under the new balance of forces, capitalism could not maintain its former structure: virtually the entire system of classical colonialism has collapsed.

p The meaning of these historical lessons could not but influence the ruling military-economic and political elite of imperialism. There has been a sharp rise in its cosmopolitanism and class solidarity, which has also been promoted by shifts in the development and character of the productive forces. There has also been a change of tactics used in the struggle. Without in any way rejecting military pressure on the world of socialism or ceasing to take the arms race to new heights in order to slow down the development of socialism and weaken the impact of its example, capitalism began, in the early 1960s, to rely markedly on adaptive elements in its class strategy, especially the mobilisation of internal reserves.

p Manoeuvring and adaptation were inherent in capitalism always, since its very inception, both in its internal and external policies. A special period in this respect was ushered in, however, by the victory of the Great October Socialist Revolution. The struggle against socialism alone, irrespective of whether it was waged by military means, or measures of economic pressure, or psychological warfare directly against the USSR and the other countries of the new world, or by means of socio-economic policy, propaganda and cultural impact against the working people of the capitalist states —this struggle alone required that capitalism make changes both in the content of its policy, and in the forms, methods and mechanisms for its implementation.

p There were also other major reasons for strengthening the policy of adaptation. One of them was the significant scale assumed by the working-class movement in the capitalist world in the 1920s, 13 which developed under the decisive impact of the ideological, moral and socio-economic example of the building of socialism in the USSR. Another reason was the world-wide capitalist economic crisis of 1929-1932, the depth and scale of which clearly showed that, without an internal restructuring, capitalism would be unable to counteract the establishment of the new social relations and to function effectively under the new conditions.

p The Great Depression was followed by the formation of the system of state-monopoly regulation. Its development took place unevenly, zig-zagging and in constant clashes between the interests and views of the various monopolistic groupings. This process received a new impulse after the last war from the formation and development of the world system of socialism, as well as the virtually total collapse of the former colonial system of imperialism.

p This objectively faced capitalism with totally new tasks. Alongside the old social system which, though still strong, had already passed the peak of its might, a new dynamic system developed that, overall, was successfully resolving the age-old problems facing mankind. Each of its achievements reminded capitalism that it was doomed historically, so imperialism could not but react to such a turn of events.

p At the same time, the collapse of the colonial structures raised the problem of how to compensate the metropolitan countries’ possible losses, to retain the former colonies if not in the political, then at least in the economic orbit of capitalism. This was, of course, achieved by the creation of a system of neocolonial exploitation, which is distinguished not only by new forms of economic relations between the centres of imperialism and the developing states, and new instruments of imperialist plunder of these countries’ peoples, but also through the ousting of the old masters by new ones. The key role in the entire complex of neocolonialism, on the economic, political, ideological and military planes—- especially the last—is undoubtedly played by the USA.

p All these processes have developed under the conditions of the retention and intensification of inter-imperialist contradictions. Major changes have followed in the internal content and functioning of the mechanism of capitalist domination where it still exists. The laws governing the development of capitalism can no longer operate in their “pure” form; they have been modified under the impact of the world of socialism, under that of the changes in the balance of forces in the world arena. We are now dealing with developed state-monopoly capitalism, and this determines many socio-economic, political and other elements of bourgeois society today.

p The phenomenon of the adaptation of the modern bourgeois system to the new situation is clearly manifested in the evolution of state-monopoly capitalism. The trend itself towards adaptation is still making its way through complex internal political clashes, is developing under the impact of a large number of factors. In the prewar period, state-monopoly capitalism appeared in two main forms: the American, with the corresponding course being pursued 14 by state institutions of the traditional, bourgeois-democratic type, and the fascist, which became established in Italy, Germany and Spain. The former stressed, in internal policy, mainly the practice of buying off certain strata of the working people, social manoeuvring, resorting, however, in situations of sharp class contradictions, also to repressive measures; the latter stressed the use of the most extreme, terroristic methods of coercion and suppression, to the kindling of chauvinism.

p The outright defeat of fascism in the Second World War, and the disclosure of its monstrous crimes, including those against its own people, which became known to everyone, predetermined to a decisive degree the fact that the development of state-monopoly capitalism has, in the leading imperialist centres, followed the course of using the traditional institutions of bourgeois democracy, but with a simultaneous steady movement towards reaction. A new phenomenon is now taking shape: the adaptive and reactionary trends in the policies of the imperialist states are at first combined, as it were, and then merged. This has been manifested to the maximum and in the most extreme forms in Washington’s domestic and foreign policies. At first, however, attempts at adaptation predominated, but this policy relied increasingly on the self- opinionated belief oh the part of the ruling circles of the USA and the country’s dominant class in their exclusiveness, undisputable might and military invulnerability, and the missionary role of the United States.

p One modern specific of this phenomenon is that the adaptive and reactionary power trends are being manifested in different forms under different lines of imperialist policy. That which, for some reason or other, has outlived itself within the capitalist states or in the relations between them, is being transferred to the zone of the developing countries, where it might still be applied for some time. One more major aspect of this specific, however, is that the policies of imperialism in all directions, its various lines and the chief centres of imperialism are being more and more closely coordinated. It is another matter that such a co-ordination is not always, in fact, effective, must make its way through inter- imperialist and other contradictions, and itself often becomes a means for the leader of capitalism, the USA, to achieve its own egoistic goals. In spite of this sort of shortcoming, however, an understanding of the need for such co-ordination as a condition for ensuring the class strategy in the world today has now evidently become irrevocably established among the dominant classes in the West.

p The accents and priorities in the chief lines of imperialist policy are obviously different. In the leading centres of imperialism they are social manoeuvring, the development of anti-crisis state- monopoly regulation and stimulation of scientific and technological progress. However, capital is always prepared to make a resolute attack on the rights and interests of the working people, and elaborate and adopt corresponding state legislation to this end.

p The main thing for imperialism in the relations between these centres (all together and each individually) and the young 15 developing states is to ensure the politico-economic infrastructure of neocolonialism, called on to replace traditional colonialism, to intensify exploitation of the peoples of the liberated countries and retain them in the orbit of capitalism. All the “whips” and “sticks” at imperialism’s disposal are always at the ready: constant interference in the internal affairs of other nations, the kindling of conflicts and strife, and direct military aggression.

p The policy of manoeuvring has, in general, ensured certain results for capitalism, giving it time to rest and try to find room for a new manoeuvre. A degree of adaptation has proved acceptable to this system; it has preserved and, in some ways, strengthened the fabric of capitalist relations. In different directions, however, the dividends of this course are quite diverse. They are most effective for capitalism in the leading imperialist centres. In fact, this was to be expected: here the positions of capitalism were stronger right from the start. Social manoeuvring allows the bourgeoisie, at times, to take the heat out of the class struggle, reduce the attack potential of the anti-monopolistic forces by splitting them and, when necessary, by means of persecution and repression.

p Unemployment, which has grown substantially in scale, has been turned into a powerful means for blackmailing the working class. By means of refined machinations by business, the police and special services, it is primarily the politically active working people who are cast out into the ranks of the unemployed, with the result that some of them break down and leave the political struggle. Job dismissals and acceptances are increasingly dependent on political motives.

p The development of state-monopoly regulation has reduced the amplitude of crisis fluctuations and, in combination with the progress in science and technology, has provided the dominant classes with new material means not previously at their disposal.

p Imperialism has been able, over two and a half decades, to create a system of neocolonialism allowing it to pump out of the Third World more than was even dreamed about by the colonisers of the past. Taking advantage of the economic dependence of the developing countries, it is using new methods to pursue the old policy of "divide and rule", is hampering these countries in overcoming their socio-economic backwardness, and thus also in increasing their role in world development. Moreover, it has turned out that the web of colonial relations has, to a certain extent, also held back the development of capitalism itself. Their removal has stimulated, for some time, the economic situation of imperialism.

p The nature of capitalism and its internal instability have, however, made themselves felt. In no sphere has capitalism managed to overcome its inherent contradictions. The social and other illnesses of the society have merely been hidden deep within it. This had to be, for the policy of social manoeuvring, having reduced somewhat the fierceness of class battles, could not resolve such explosive problems as crisis, unemployment, poverty, backwardness, lack of rights, hunger, crime, and spiritual degradation. Virtually the entire developing world has become an enormous calamity zone. New 16 knots and complexes of capitalism’s contradictions have taken shape, as disclosed and profoundly analysed by the 27th Congress of the CPSU.

p The anti-imperialist revolutions in the late 1970s in Angola, Afghanistan, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Nicaragua and other countries constituted a result and confirmation of the deepening and intensification of the general crisis of capitalism. In this period, the internal contradictions reached an unprecedented intensity in the very centres of imperialism. Three circumstances deserve particular attention. First, even under the conditions of the exceptional plundering of the developing countries and peoples, the leading capitalist powers, above all the USA, have been unable to maintain economic growth rates allowing them to expand their policy of buying off sufficiently broad strata of the population in these states, as happened in the 1960s and early 1970s. This has become one of the chief motive forces for capital’s mass onslaught on the rights of the working people since the end of the 1970s. Second, crisis phenomena have deeply damaged the currency and finance sphere—the holy of holies of capitalism, the area providing the chief means of state-monopoly regulation. Third, a "reverse side" to colonialism has manifested itself: the tremendous debt of the developing countries, the serious and increasing problems of this group of countries have become a burden on the modern capitalist economy. A plunderous policy inevitably has a boomerang effect.

p Imperialism has not managed to achieve what it intended in relation to the socialist countries either. The arms race imposed on the socialist world, the economic and military pressure, and subversive activities do, of course, have a negative effect on the growth rate of the new world. Even so, socialism is advancing, overcoming the obstacles—objective, subjective, and others—raised by the class opponent. After rebuffing the military provocations and triumphing in the wars imposed on it by imperialism, socialism reached equality with imperialism in the sphere of strategic weapons, and this created a fundamentally new situation in the world, precluding the establishment of an imperial dictatorship of the USA. In its pursuit of the chimera of military supremacy, American militarism has, by its actions, virtually created a situation in which the territory of the USA has finally and irrevocably ceased to be invulnerable to retaliation. By striving to make the whole world its nuclear hostage, the militarism and military-industrial complex of the USA have made the people of America itself just such a hostage. Moreover, by their actions geared to expanding and accelerating the arms race and extending it into space, they are further exacerbating the already difficult and dangerous situation, and increasing the degree of their own irresponsibility and guilt before all mankind, including the American people.

p The USA’s imperialist policy still poses a tragic danger. The historical circumstances in the second half of this century are such that, as a result of the Second World War, which was profitable to US imperialism both economically and politically, it has since succeeded in concentrating in its hands tremendous economic and 17 military might, and this has engendered the extremely dangerous illusion of the possibility of achieving world domination, an illusion that is both fatal and suicidal. The fact that this fancy provides the basis for American policy in practice creates a real threat of a world catastrophe, a threat proceeding from the USA, the metropolis of modern imperialism.

p Mankind is facing the possibility of the end of civilisation. In principle, people long ago considered this possibility, back in ancient times, but mainly in a religious-mystical sense. Closer to our times, in the 19th century, many scientists considered the possibility of a finale to history as a consequence of some natural calamity from natural scientific and philosophical positions. "Who has guaranteed us that the planet will be eternal?" asked Herzen.  [17•1 

p Yet even the most outstanding thinkers could not foresee that the threat to man’s existence as a biological species would arise as a consequence of his own activities and that great scientific and technological achievements would be made to serve the selfish interests of the monopolistic bourgeoisie.

p This was first understood by the scientists who discovered the satanically destructive forces of the atom and created on this basis a weapon that hung death over mankind’s head, trying its nerves and reason, but at the same time engendering the necessity to rise above the irrationality of the situation. Politicians gradually began to realise the impending danger, but far from everyone in the bourgeois world has yet realised it. People who see the possibility of continuing their existence and conserving their power by force, militarisation and wars are still quite influential. This circumstance largely determines the international situation at the close of the 20th century. One convincing example of the struggle between the forces of the old world—the world of wars, violence, and the arms race—and those that have assumed the historic mission of saving mankind from a nuclear death, is provided by the current international situation, the chief characteristic of which is the battle for the future.

p Yet there is also another aspect to the current situation. Having faced the world with the possibility of nuclear destruction, imperialism has thus laid the very foundations for the formation of a truly world-wide coalition, capable of uniting all those who do not see the future through the contours of nuclear explosions and who are becoming more and more aware of the need to halt the slide into the chasm. This coalition is objectively inevitable and objectively anti-imperialist. The self-confidence and immorality of force, taken to the extreme, give rise to inevitable and growing resistance on the part of peoples, and come up against increasing condemnation even in the capitalist world. This is confirmed by the unprecedented rise in the anti-war movement in the West; by the reluctance of even the USA’s closest allies to tie themselves too firmly to their senior partner’s policy; by the Irangate disclosures, 18 which have illuminated not only the traditional and blind adventurism of the ruling circles in Washington, who are infected by the disease of anti-communism, but also the weakness of their claims to leadership of the capitalist system.

p The consequences of the events of the 1970s for the policy pursued by imperialism have proved to be dual. The possibilities of capitalism, its achievements in the scientific and technological sphere, the extreme mobilisation of chauvinism and militarism gave reaction new hopes in the early 1980s and allowed it to count on using power factors in the struggle against social progress.

p For all this counting on force and the military-economic exhaustion of socialism, imperialist policy has had to take the true situation in the world into account. Life has dispersed the apologetic myths of capitalism in the 1960s, myths in which the captains of the capitalist ship and its admirers from science, information and culture revelled. Representatives of the dominant classes in the West, who are still capable of facing the facts, admit the scale of the problems that have revealed themselves in modern capitalism, and the inadequacy of the means available to it for overcoming these problems. Members of the realist camp are coming increasingly to understand that military solutions are not applicable today, that force tactics testify not to strength, but to weakness that can and does bring capitalism and its policy only new difficulties, defeats and contradictions.

p Such are the dialectics of the general crisis of capitalism. Its historical choice has narrowed to the extreme. At the beginning of this century, imperialism essentially moulded the socio-economic and socio-political face of the world at will, but on the eve of the 21st century only two possibilities remain to it: either to continue adapting to more and more new realities, or to doom the whole world, including its own system, to catastrophe. This constitutes the chief expression of the total crisis of the social system that gave civilisation so much in the past, but has already become historically bankrupt in that it has brought mankind to a terrible state—the threat of its demise.

p The events of the mid-1980s indisputably confirm this assessment. It was during this period that the ruling circles of the USA and the NATO allies gave the go-ahead to a new spiral in the arms race, this being the biggest, most expensive and most dangerous so far. They did everything possible to prevent any limitation or cuts of weapons, especially nuclear ones.

p The motive forces behind this overt Sabbath of militarism have been the traditional motives of imperialist policy: the drive for unprecedented, “cosmic” profits; the striving to restore the lost military supremacy over the USSR and the socialist community; and the equal striving to impose on socialism a military-economic rivalry that would hold back its development for decades, would break off the implementation of socio-economic transformations in the Soviet Union and the other socialist countries.

p There is no need here to remind the reader that it was the socialist world that heeded the warnings on time. It is socialism that has 19 profoundly analysed what is happening and what is possible, and has set an example of a resolute, innovative, bold struggle against the anti-humane strategy of militarism. At the 27th Congress of the CPSU, in his speeches and discussions, including with the President of the USA, Mikhail Gorbachev has firmly stated in a wellgrounded way that the approaches that emerged in the pre-nuclear age are no longer admissible, that they conflict with the new realities and constitute a danger.

p The general crisis of capitalism today constitutes an unprecedented accumulation, intertwining and intensification of all the contradictions of the private-property formation. This is a manifestation of acute new contradictions in response to the attempts to overcome or soften the old ones. It means capitalism lacks any historical prospects: both objectively, for it cannot cope with the problems it has itself engendered, and subjectively, since its dominant classes and many politicians are concerned only with maintaining their own positions, while not seeing ways to solve the real tasks facing mankind or wishing to do so.

p Capitalism is still a strong, powerful system, in both economic and military terms. It is necessary, however, to distinguish between the strength of the young, growing social organism, consistently revealing its possibilities, and that of the ageing society, fearing for its future, feverishly seeking reserves to help it retain what it has achieved and extend its existence. It is steadily losing its former attraction. Its egoism, the thirst for profits, soullessness, and the entire way of life are becoming increasingly intolerable. Its entire path is washed with blood and tears, and marked with indifference to the working man.

p Capitalism is now developing under the conditions of the new stage in the scientific and technological revolution, with its major social consequences. The 21st century will be one of informatics, computers, robots, biotechnology and thermonuclear energy, of unprecedentedly effective means of communications and transport. What awaits mankind?

p The scientific and technological revolution gives a new material and technical face to militarism, which, in recent decades, has become a true calamity. It threatens to cast mankind into war, undermines economies, leaves its imprint on all aspects of the life of society.’In the imperialist countries, above all the USA, a military-industrial complex has taken shape that acts as an alliance between the arms-producing monopolies, the top brass, the state bureaucracy, militarised science and its subordinate ideological apparatus, above all the mass media. This evil union serves as a bulwark for extreme reaction in social life and totalitarian police methods of government, and is a constant source of military danger, a weapon for oppressing the peoples of the developing countries.

p It is becoming increasingly obvious that the character and specifics of the USA’s military-political course can largely be explained by the role played in its elaboration and implementation by the military-industrial corporations. It is they that provide the specific material and technical facilities for this course, provoking more and 20 more new spirals of the arms race. And this also predetermines the possibilities of, and limits to, the USA’s foreign policy course, the evolution of militaristic doctrines. Militarists are also greatly tempted by hopes that the USSR will, in the future, prove economically or technologically incapable of keeping up with the new qualitative spiral of the arms race.

p One of the determining characteristics of modern capitalism is the transformation of the USA into its military-economic metropolis. It is not only the main and direct source of military threat for the whole world. It is also the motive force behind the formation of the material potential and infrastructure of what might be called the aggregate might of imperialism and reaction. The global military-police machine, relying on a union of the national militaryindustrial complexes of the capitalist countries, is more and more often appearing as an instrument of US imperialism, a means for ensuring Washington’s interests, including in relation to its allies and competitors.

p The formation of such an infrastructure is seen by the militarist circles of the USA as virtually the only reliable means for maintaining the USA’s “leadership” of the capitalist world in the future. The hegemony of the USA will, in this case, be ensured by a combination of American military-technical supremacy over the other capitalist states, political leadership and diktat by Washington and the system of transnational corporations—an instrument for the neocolonial plunder of many peoples of the developing countries, and all this under the slogan of unity in the struggle against the “communist” and "Soviet threat". Taking the force trend in interimperialist relations to its logical conclusion, this would mean nothing else but the military-political enslavement of the entire capitalist world by the USA and an unprecedented heightening of the war danger.

p The nuclear era necessitates a new political thinking, not only new in contents but implying a closer link between thinking and acting, between word and deed. It calls for a different approach to developments in this increasingly interconnected and interdependent world. The new political thinking should first and foremost accept the paramount idea of our time: military force and peace, kon fist and social progress, shooting-from-the-hip style of the foreign policy and the very existence of mankind are no longer compatible. This incompatibility will become more vivid in the course of time. And the effect of militarism on political thinking and our life might be more dangerous.

p But merely to realize this is definitely not enough to-day. For a number of years official circles in the West have declared that a nuclear war is inadmissible and impossible to win. Some had a hard time accepting this. But they have done so—verbally. However, mere words will not fill a bushel. What we need is a real process of arms reduction, nuclear foremost, we need an end to the arms race.

p The INF Treaty signed and ratified by the USSR and the USA was the first step towards this goal. The sides exchanged instruments of ratification during President Reagan’s official visit to 21 Moscow in June 1988. However, fulfilment of the Treaty will take several years. It has just come into force but some Western politicians, in the USA and other NATO countries are already seeking ways and means to compensate the armaments that are to be destroyed and insisting on continuation of the earlier adopted military programs. Moreover, they are testing the missiles the days of which seem to be numbered.

p We speak here not of an absolute and irreversible process but of a dangerous tendency typical of imperialism in general and postwar American imperialism specifically. Still, it is a tendency. Alongside, there are other tendencies, opposing it in one way or another.

p Questions posed in Mikhail Gorbachev’s report on the 70th Anniversary of the Socialist Revolution in Russia did not emerge out of the thin air. Is there any objective influence on the nature of imperialism, in this increasingly interdependent world, which could block effectively its most dangerous and extreme manifestations? Is it possible for capitalism to exist and develop its economy without militaristic dope? Can we expect that the understanding by the ruling elite of the West, of the calamitous danger that might arise from the present situation will result in the corresponding changes of its political course?

p The very fact that these questions have emerged implies the possibility of an affirmative answer. But it still remains to be proved in practice. Currently a greater number of people, political parties and all sorts of movements take a more resolute antimilitaristic stand. This is also relevant for those in the ruling circles who are not directly involved in the military business, and for the US economic development of the late 1980s which is hindered by the burden of military expenditures.

p History offers mankind only two options. Either a universal nuclear abyss, which in fact is nothing to opt for, just a fatal surrender. Or a joint quest of a road to survival by all means. This is what new political thinking implies.

p The 1970s and early 1980s were marked by a qualitative shift in the development of the general crisis of the world capitalist system. The relative “prosperity” of the 1960s was replaced by a significant complication of the conditions of reproduction, by serious economic and political destabilisation of capitalism. Its economic machine began to slow down visibly. The rise in production lost impetus, the growth rate of labour productivity decelerated, capital returns were falling, unemployment reached an unprecedented scale, cyclical crises gained in frequency, intertwining with structural ones, and also in duration and destructive force. All this exacerbated the competitive struggle and rivalry between the imperialisms of individual states and their unions, intensified and strengthened the economic, social and political contradictions of world capitalism, and constituted a new obstacle to the solution of real problems arising before mankind.

p What are the prospects for the world capitalist economy and at what rate will it develop? Will it be able to adapt to the new 22 conditions of its existence, to realise the impending structural shifts? How wide will the rift become between the centres and periphery of the capitalist economy? Will it be possible for the levels of their economic and social development to draw gradually closer together? What direction will the differentiation of the developing countries follow, including their own social development? All these questions are of tremendous significance for all mankind and, of course, for socialism as the creative alternative social system.”

p Society is a live, pulsing and developing system. The structures forming it are infinitely diverse and complex. Modern bourgeois society differs substantially in its composition and balance of class forces from that at the end of the 19th century, a fact that bourgeois ideologists and social reformists do their best to use to refute the theory of scientific communism, as if this theory asserted society to be immobile and frozen. On the contrary,. Marxism- Leninism possesses a set of scientific instruments for analysing the modern balance of social forces, new conditions and forms of the class struggle between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, the role and place of intermediate social groups.

p The question concerning the prospects of the class struggle is very closely connected with the political situation, with the movement of the political ship to right or left. In recent years, a polarisation of political forces has been observed in the leading capitalist countries, expressed in a marked "shift to the right" and increasing activity on the part of conservative parties and movements, on the one hand, and in a strengthening and growth of left-wing and general democratic tendencies, on the other. In these processes there is a complex interaction between internal political and foreign political factors. What are the foundations of, and prospects for, the rightwing—conservative—shift? To what extent do elections and the parliamentary struggle reflect the deep-running socio-economic processes? What new opportunities are being revealed to the left-wing forces in the 1980s and 1990s? Under what internal conditions and in which countries is the formation of an effective anti-monopoly coalition, a real alternative to the modern policy of state-monopoly capitalism, really possible? All these questions need to be answered.

p The position and policy of governments, parties and politicians must be assessed from various angles. There are, however, criteria that, under contemporary conditions, are assuming absolute importance: are the activities of the given government, party or leader increasing the danger of war or reducing it? Who are they, these groups, parties, leaders—prophets of doom or responsible people, capable of assessing the prospects for human civilisation soberly? What are their priorities: general humane or personal interests?

p Since the revolutions of the 17th and 18th centuries, bourgeois democracy has been the Alpha and Omega of the political organisation of Western society. Fascism proved, however, that the bourgeoisie rejects it with ease when convenient. Under modern conditions, in the majority of developed countries, bourgeois democracy is still considered one of the bulwarks of capitalism. Recent years have, however, revealed signs of new deformations and subversion 23 of it. Rights and liberties are being consistently encroached upon, reactionary forms of political power are appearing more and more frequently, and repression is being stepped up. For manipulating public opinion in the interests of the ruling class, active use is being made of the achievements of the scientific and technological revolution. The bourgeois mass media are losing even their relative independence.

p The crisis of bourgeois civilisation is manifested in the sphere of morality, culture and art. The modern age is characterised in the West by the collapse of age-old values, while imperialism can offer nothing to replace them with. Individualism, shallowness, permissiveness, corruption, crime and terrorism are just a few of the well-known aspects of the Western way of life today.

p Capital has always subordinated to itself and disfigured the development of science, literature and art. But this process has never before assumed such a monstrous scale. The cult of force and violence, self-advertising and pornography, are penetrating the "mass culture" intended for millions of people, the idea being to deprive them of their social image and doom them to cultural inadequacy. Nikolai Rerikh once said that the civilised savage was the most repulsive sight. Let us add that it is also an extremely dangerous phenomenon.

p The "mass culture" and counter-culture have seized the key positions in the intellectual life of modern capitalist society; they have also, in diverse forms, been attacking socialism in recent decades. Their emergence and development are connected with the phenomenon of the "consumer society" and also with the development of the scientific and technological revolution, which has established the "mass culture" as a norm of modern life.

p The mass culture is not, however, simply a product of the consumer society; it is to a large extent also the creator, the demiurge of it. The latest powerful means of technology for mass communications and industrial production of culture have been whipping up consumer attitudes in people and establishing an inverted, dehumanised system of values, have been forming warped stereotypes of the average mass consciousness and corrupting the masses morally in the name of the salvation of capitalism. Mass culture is the offspring of and adjunct to the bourgeois, primarily American way of life. Its social sense lies in the consolidation of a negative hierarchy of values, and the smothering of active social principles. Capitalism’s terror in the face of the future has proved so great that the bourgeoisie is ready to commit the worst crime ever in the history of mankind—amputate people’s conscience, morals and overall humane attitudes.

p The last chapters of the book are concerned, more than the others, with the future, which depends decisively on the historical competition between the two systems, the course of the replacement of capitalism with the new socio-economic formation. Moreover, socialism, as the CPSU Programme states, "proves its superiority not by force of arms, but by force of example in every area of the life of society—by the dynamic development of the economy, 24 science and culture, by an improvement in the living standards of working people, and by a deepening of socialist democracy.”  [24•1 

p The central role in determining the fate of human civilisation, as already stressed, belongs to the questions of war and peace, life and death. Socialism’s chief mission is to avert the threat of nuclear destruction. There are also other problems of a global, general human order: protection and preservation of the environment throughout the world; provision of foodstuffs for the world’s growing population; development of the World Ocean and outer space; achievement of a satisfactory level of health care and education in all parts of the world; overcoming backwardness in the former colonies and semicolonies, and many others.

p The solution of these problems is being approached differently in countries with different social systems, but a pooling of the efforts of all states and co-operation between them is required. The Soviet Union and the other socialist countries have shown in practice their readiness to co-operate. The monopoly bourgeoisie and imperialist diplomacy pursue a different policy. Proceeding from their narrow self-seeking interests, they take advantage of complex global problems as a means for bringing pressure to bear on young states and sabotaging corresponding international agreements. A typical example is the refusal by the USA and a number of other Western countries to adhere to the UN convention on the law of the sea, signed by over a hundred states, the withdrawal of the USA and Britain from UNESCO, the use of the food problem for political blackmail, the USA’s refusal to sign the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, etc.

p The international situation in which the Soviet Union exists is complex and changeable. In order to find one’s bearings, a creative, open, unprejudiced approach is required to the multitude of diverse facts of reality. This is demanded by the world in which we are living on the eve of the third millennium—a world full of hopes, since never before have people been so well equipped for the further development of civilisation. But it is also a world, as Mikhail Gorbachev has stressed, "overburdened with dangers and contradictions, which prompts the thought that this is perhaps the most alarming period in history".  [24•2 

p This period of alarm, a period of unprecedented threat and danger was engendered by capitalism—both objectively, through its own contradictions, the very nature of society, in which everyone competes with everyone else, and subjectively—through the persistent reluctance of the dominant classes to give up their privileges, power and profits.

25

To get through this period and bring the world out of the deadend in which it has been cornered by imperialist militarism is a task of historic proportions. The socialist countries are firmly convinced that the arms race must be halted. The protracted feverish state of international relations, especially on the eve of possible new scientific and technological breakthroughs, is fraught with the danger of a sudden crisis fatal to all people on Earth. Real steps away from the nuclear chasm, and the efforts of the whole world community are required for a radical improvement in international relations. Steadily growing attention to the true problems of mankind is necessary: the guarantees of a dignified, socially just life for all. The progress of civilisation and its very survival are inseparable from it being relieved of the burden of the past, of the legacy of the private-property formation. These are the real dialectics of life. In an understanding of this lie the roots of the optimism with which we view the approaching 21st century and are working for a better, more just and secure tomorrow—in spite of all the convulsions of the old world.