Troubled Transition
Social Democracy in East Central Europe

Michael Dauderstädt, André Gerrits, György G. Markus

Herausgegeben von der Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung,

der Wiardi Beckman Stichting und der Al-fred Mozer Stichting

166 Seiten in Englisch

Probekapitel 1.3

From revolutionary enthusiasm to forced unification

The history of East European social democracy following the Second World War is generally known, at least in terms of the "outcome". Social democracy ceased to exist as an organised political force after the communists had assumed power rendering it practically non-existent in the region for four whole decades, which in turn hindered its ability to emerge from the ashes of communism in 1989-91. The dominant interpretation stresses that social democracy was destroyed through the machinations and terror of the communist parties, supported by the occupying force in the form of the Red army. Despite its dominant status such an interpretation remains incomplete. It largely ignores the initial enthusiasm with which most social-democratic parties decided to join the communist-dominated "national governments", and it underscores the subversive and demoralising effects of dissension within the socialist movement itself.

In conjunction with the actual "Sovietisation" of East Central Europe, the relationship between communism and social democracy went through different stages: from voluntary co-operation, increasing pressure and outright terror to elimination (through forced unification). In some respects, the immediate post-war years resembled the situation following the First World War. Once again social-democratic parties took advantage of widely felt expectations of radical change, a broadly shared belief that the days of the ancien régime, which had brought the disappointing experience of the inter-war decades and the incredible suffering of the war, were over. Many social democrats were inclined to accept strong Soviet influence in their countries (which should not be confused with full "Sovietisation") and were quite prepared to enter the coalition blocs which were set up, often on the initiative of the local communist parties, in most countries during the final stages of the war (the Polish Committee of National Liberation, the National Democratic Bloc in Romania, the Fatherland Front in Bulgaria and the National Front in Czechoslovakia). Similarly social democrats voluntarily participated, together with communists and other anti-fascist elements, in post-war coalition governments. In certain cases social-democratic parties were co-responsible for the ostracism of bourgeois political forces, such as the Agrarian Party in Czechoslovakia, which was left out of the country's ruling front, and the Smallholders Party in Hungary, which had won an absolute majority in the only free elections in November 1945 before it was disbanded.

Electorally social-democratic results were mixed in the free elections that were held in the first post-war years. The communists had definitely gained from the radical atmosphere, from their wartime conduct and from the presence of their powerful ally, the Soviet army. In the elections of May 1946, the social-democratic party of Czechoslovakia remained far behind the communists, with 14 and 38 percent respectively. Never before had a communist party received such a large percentage of votes in free and fair elections. In Berlin 48.7 Percent of all voters supported the Social-democratic Party of Germany in the municipal elections of August 1946. Berlin was the only part of Soviet-occupied Germany where the SPD was allowed to compete with the unified SED (Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands, United Socialist Party of Germany). Surprisingly only 19.8 percent voted for the combined list of the SED. Otto Grotewohl, chairman of the Central Committee of the SPD in Berlin, was himself an enthusiastic supporter of merging with the communist party - initially even more so than the leadership of the Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands. The official results of the second post-war elections in Hungary, held under heavy communist pressure, showed a clear majority, more than sixty percent, for the left-wing coalition of social democrats (14.9 percent), communists (22.3 percent) and two peasant parties. It was a dramatic turnaround from the outcome of the first, and free elections of November 1945, when the Smallholders Party won 57 percent, the Hungarian Social-democratic Party gained 17,4 percent and the communists 17 percent.

In the Balkans, social-democratic parties had few opportunities to improve their already very poor record. In Albania virtually all real, or perceived, political opponents were eliminated through purges and trials before the end of 1946. As in Yugoslavia, social democracy never had a chance to really challenge the political monopoly of the communist party. In Bulgaria, the opposition Socialist party, led by its centrist leader Kosta Lulchev together with the Agrarians as led by Nikola Petkov, won 28 percent of the ballots cast in the elections for a Grand National Assembly (October 1946). Ninety-nine opposition politicians, of whom nine were social democrats (led by Lulchev), were chosen as representatives. It was a honourable result, considering the manipulative circumstances under which the Bulgarians had to vote, but it had very little political relevance. Lulchev was one of those social democrats who refused to yield to the pressure of the communist authorities, which would subsequently cost him his life. He refused to enter the communist-dominated government which was formed after the November 1945 elections, and opposed the option of unification with the communist party. With a parliamentary platform he consistently challenged the communist rulers. Such dissent eventually resulted in his arrest, conviction and imprisonment in November 1948. He would not leave his cell alive. In Romania three social democrats entered the government after the August 1944 coup against Marshal Ion Antonescu, Romania's wartime leader, and his entourage. Mounting Soviet pressure and the gradual "communisation" of the National Democratic Front forced the social democrats to form a single combined list of candidates with the Romanian Communist Party (though the party split over the issue). When the Front won the fraudulent November 1946 elections, the social-democratic party was practically kaltgestellt.

Social democratic forces posed a formidable obstacle in the process of Sovietisation, more so in fact than most other political forces. They were often too big and too ideologically close to the communist movement to be simply outlawed and destroyed, a fate reserved for most bourgeois and peasant parties. The communist option was elimination through forced unification. 1948 saw the end of social democracy in East Central Europe. The Social-democratic Party of Romania merged with the Romanian Communist Party in February. Their Czechoslovak comrades followed in April; the Hungarian social democrats in June, the Bulgarian socialists in August, and the Polish party was finally liquidated in December of that year.

Adversaries, within the social-democratic parties, of co-operation and fusion who had not chosen exile were persecuted, arrested and tried. (see: Hodos 1997, and Révész 1971) It proved to be only a matter of time before many of the social democrats who had favoured the merger, and who had been generously paid with prominent positions within the unified parties, would meet the same fate. Most of these cases were dealt with behind closed doors. Generally, the "confessions" extracted were not given much publicity. Apparently, "repentant" social democrats did not make a good propaganda issue. The scale of terror varied country by country. Practically all of the right-wing and centrist leaders of the Czechoslovak Social-democratic Party had fled the country after February 1948 (and formed an exile party in London). The number of activists arrested remained relatively small: several hundreds. In Hungary, however, more than 4.000 social democrats from all different orientations, fell prey to the vengeance of the communist leaders. Those who survived their imprisonment were mostly released during the reformist government of Imre Nagy (1953-54).

The most crucial factor in the elimination of social democracy in post-war East Central Europe was, of course, the incomparably stronger position of the Soviet-backed communist parties. Social democrats were limited to reacting to the increasing power and abuse of power by the communists. Responses ranged from fundamental and consistent opposition to communism on political grounds, to enthusiastic co-operation, either publicly or covertly. The final decision to accept the communist terms of unification, a decision all party leaderships were forced to take, should not necessarily be seen as an act of surrender, let alone betrayal. Resignation to the ever more unfavourable "correlation of forces" (a standard communist phrase) was understandable, as the hope to keep alive at least some "independent" traces of the social-democratic world outlook proved futile. In the end, the story is a very simple one: social democrats were far too weak and possessed inadequate means of power to resist the communists' pressure and the methods they used.

These developments could not however conceal the fact that the social-democratic parties were bitterly divided on the issue of co-operation with the communists, and that this dissension, rather ironically, made it much easier for the communist parties to weaken and to ultimately destroy their opponents. Advocates of closer co-operation (or unification) with the communists ranged from sincere radicals, captivated by the revolutionary spirit of the age, to communists in disguise and communist agents. Although they encouraged and manipulated these differences the communist authorities had certainly not created them. Dissension was, of course, a permanent feature of the social-democratic movement, a factor that was only ever going to be accentuated by the specific post-war conditions of devastation, despair and revolutionary impatience. Take for example Poland. By the time the Soviet army had reached the pre-war Polish borders, there were three socialist organisations active in the country. Two of them claimed the name PPS (Polska Partia Socjalistyczna, Polish Socialist Party): a left-wing fraction, which, after initial hesitation, argued for far-reaching co-operation with the newly established communist party, and the "traditional", much larger PPS (during the war: WRN-PPS, Wolnosc, Równosc, Niepodleglosc, Freedom, Equality, Independence), which supported the London Government-in-Exile. The traditional PPS consistently refused to join forces with the communists who were organised as the PPR (Polska Partia Robotnicza, Polish Workers Party) and rejected the obstinate efforts of the communists to forge a united list for the January 1947 elections, despite the fact that it was prevented from participating independently. A year later the communist party would simply ignore the senior status of the traditional PPS and unified with the recently established left-wing "PPS" (Lublin faction) to form the Polish United Workers Party (PZPR, Polska Zjednoczona Partia Robotnicza).

Unlike the majority of Polish socialists, the Czechoslovak social democrats eagerly accepted the national front concept of co-operation with the communists. They subscribed to the Košice declaration (April 1945), which was a legal precondition for political activity, and joined a left-wing government. Like the PPS, however, the Czechoslovak Social-democratic Party remained divided on the nature of its contacts with the communist party. Co-operation, as such, was not at stake; the main question was whether immediate unification would be in the interests of the party. A left-wing (radical) group, led by the country's former ambassador to Russia, Zdenek Fierlinger, advocated unification; the more conservative part of the leadership, behind Vaclav Majer, sought a rapprochement with the non-communist parties. At the 21st party congress (November 1947) the radicals suffered a surprising, though temporary, defeat. The Czech and Slovak social democrats were officially reunified (which made the social-democratic party the only effective national party) and the merger question with the communists was removed from the agenda. In February 1948, however, the issue of unification returned. Torn between heavy communist pressure to form a two-party coalition government and an opposition which urged the social democrats to withdraw their representatives from the government, the leadership split and the party collapsed. Three left-wing social democrats entered a new, heavily communist-dominated, administration. Within a month the party centre decided, against its own statutes, to shortly merge with the dominant communist movement.

It should now be evident therefore that social democracy played an important role in the first formative years of independence; it had joined forces with the anciens régimes in the years following the Great War and had co-operated with the new, revolutionary elites after the Second World War. Ultimately though, it proved unable to influence the powers that would subsequently destroy it. At the end of 1948, when the Cold War had started in earnest, East European social democracy had ceased to exist as one of the political families with the longest history in the region, it had been declared a thing of the past. All that remained of East European social democracy were memories and an ever smaller, older, and ever more marginal group of exiled politicians, whose rather pitiful history will be told below. In some respects, though, social democracy also continued to be present in East Central Europe - not as a political organisation of course but as a vaguely defined set of political ideas that found expression in revisionism, communist reformism and anti-communist dissidence. It is this very thin trace of continuity of social-democratic thought, from the suppression of social-democratic parties when communism was established, at the end of the 1940s, to the return of social democracy after the collapse of communist rule, that we will focus on later. At the same time, though, it is important to state one major caveat, namely: although communist reformism or revisionism may have been inspired by social democratic thought it is not the same thing as social democracy and hence should not be identified, wholeheartedly, with social democracy. The most fundamental, of a plethora, of differences is that surrounding the concept of political democracy, which is far more central to social-democratic thought than it has ever been to the ideas and concepts of revisionists and reformists.

Probekapitel 2.2

Different transitions - different fates of social democracy

Forty years of communist party dictatorship, particularly in Central Europe, weakened the wealth of ideas and concepts that have historically and ideologically shaped social democracy: the tendency to seek holistic solutions for social problems; the assumption that these solutions are in the direct interest of the workers; the formulation and organisation of these interests through a political party; and a trust in the (democratic) state as the direct economic agent for these solutions were all marginalised as the ruling political forces predominantly supported more liberal principles, maintaining that the complete restructuring of the existing "socialism" was necessary. Consequently, they sought to achieve freedom at the expense of security, without paying too much attention to the question of what constituted an optimal mixture of social security and the individual freedom to choose risks and opportunities. Therefore, the chosen path was predominantly liberal, although the destination was probably social-democratic - that is, a democratic welfare state with a market economy. For a full and deeper understanding of the process of regime change and the different faces of social democracy, it is useful to differentiate between four groups of countries with different transition motives and processes:

Table 2.1: Different transitions in East Central Europe

	Old nation-states	New nation-states
Fast reforming countries	Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary	Czech Republic, Slovakia, Latvia, Estonia, Slovenia, Croatia,
Slow reforming countries	Romania, Bulgaria, Albania	Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Moldava, Serbia, Bosnia, Macedonia, Georgia, Armenia, Lithuania

A country is defined as "Fast reforming" if it gets more than 27 points as a sum of nine transition indicators each ranging from one to four points, i.e. an average score of three points on that scale (taken from table 2.1. titled "Progress in transition" of the EBRD's Transition Report 1996, p.11) "Slow reforming" is defined by less than 27 points "Old nation" is defined as an already established independent state between 1950 and 1990 "New nation" is defined as an independent nation established after 1990

In the fast reforming old nation-states (Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary) opposition movements and ruling communists played different roles in the transition process. The opposition movements were the main agents of change in the first two countries, while the communist party opened the process in Poland and was its motor in Hungary. The subsequent rise of the opposition came as quite a surprise for many, in particular, the Polish communists. These movements were most-often a rather mixed bag of different ideological and cultural groupings united by the common goal of overcoming communist rule. In the first (or "founding") elections in Central Europe, held in 1989/90, the reform/opposition movements achieved considerable success enabling them to form governments in Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary. The historical social democrats, though, remained very weak (i.e. under five percent and thus often without any seats in Parliament). Although the successor parties were defeated they continued to maintain a presence. Defeat often accelerated internal reforms strengthening their social-democratic wings or factions as they emerged and developed as post-communist parties. As for the victorious opposition movements, the accomplishment of the primary common goal (i.e. the destruction of the communist system) and the actual business of government brought about increasing tensions and rapid splits that revealed the hitherto submerged diversity of right and left political currents (Vermeersch 1991).

More importantly, for our purposes, some of the members of the reform elite did not see themselves as free-marketeers, but rather as social democrats who were forced by circumstances to carry out radical reforms of the old system in order to construct some form of capitalism. Without the presence of capitalist structures it made little sense, at this stage, to advocate social-democratic policies aimed at the public control of private capital. Too begin with private capital had first to be created and accumulated. Under these conditions the difficult balance between the freedom of the individual from state power and the protection of the weaker members of the society by the state, was markedly in favour of the former (over time, however, this began to change as the state started to look like an instrument of the (newly) rich rather than a protector of the poor). János Kis, a famous Hungarian political philosopher and former chairman of the liberal Alliance of Free Democrats (SZDSZ) put it this way: "If I am not mistaken, the difference between liberals and social-democrats lies in the amount that the state docks: for the former not more than one third of the state (national) income, for the latter 40 percent. For us who just emancipated from the omnipotent state, this question comes too early. Do not expect us to adopt your criteria." (Vermeersch 1991, p.6)

Against the background of a centrally planned and overwhelmingly nationalised economy, even social democrats had to be in favour of liberalisation and privatisation. They might have wanted to protect those affected by the dramatic increase in the price of basic goods (e.g. food, energy) or to pursue a more equitable distribution of wealth in the course of privatisation. Steinwede (1997), after analysing the political programs of various parties in the early nineties, highlighted a common tendency for post-communist (successor) and social-democratic parties to stress egalitarian and redistributive policies in comparison to liberal and conservative parties. Although he goes on to make it clear that such findings do not preclude such tendencies from existing within the parties of the centre-right nor masks strong differences between the social-democratic and the successor parties (Steinwede 1997). Other currents in the anti-communist spectrum, such as nationalist and religious groups, also showed some scepticism towards an unmitigated free-market capitalism.

Most economists had expected a small decline in output, then rapid and strong growth (the so-called "J-curve") during the transition. The dramatic and prolonged recession (in many cases deeper than the Great Depression of 1929-32) that actually took place in East Central Europe after 1989 defied such expectations. The steep decline in output was partially caused by the collapse of trade amongst the former CMEA (Council for Mutual Economic Assistance) countries due to the switch to world market prices and hard currency accounting. The electorate began to feel increasingly frustrated with the results: increasing unemployment, declining income, and growing insecurity (e.g. criminality).

In 1993-1994 the electoral pendulum swung in the direction of the successor forces in Poland (Democratic Left Alliance - SLD) and Hungary (Hungarian Socialist Party - MSZP). This came about as a consequence of, not only, the liberal reforms but also the nationalist and conservative, often pro-church policies, pursued by the first governments, as well as the fragmented nature of the political right. In response voters turned to the seemingly well organised and professionalism of the successor parties. They succeeded in projecting a pragmatic image which posed no threat to the core of the reforms, namely democracy, European orientation, while promising to mitigate the worst excesses. The forces which saw themselves as the legitimate and internationally recognised social democrats (i.e. the historic and non-successor social democrats) remained extremely weak and incapable of attracting support.

Four years later the SLD (1997) and the MSZP (1998) lost power. Both groups failed, when in government, to substantially reverse the relative impoverishment of large parts of the population, in particular elements of their voters. In continuing the reforms towards a market economy and EU accession their political adversaries played the populist card and had at the same time, especially in Poland, largely overcome their fragmentation. The populist approach appealed to the losers of the transition, often using the traditional language of social democracy, and to some of those who had voted for the successors in 1993 and 1994.

In the slow reforming, old nations, of Romania, Bulgaria and Albania with weaker opposition movements and the experiences of more paternalistic communist regimes the marginally reformed communist parties won the first, albeit not completely free and fair elections in 1990 and 1991. The changes signalled the rise of reformist factions within the old nomenclatura and state apparatus rather than the overthrow of the old regime and radical reforms. The rhetoric, and formal agenda of these, in comparison to the old guard, reform-oriented communists, borrowed from social-democratic ideas and programs. They used such rhetoric to justify the limited nature of their reforms. This was presented as protecting the weak strata of the population while it actually maintained the power and privileges of the new ruling groups. Thus for Central European politicians like János Kis, who preferred a mixed economy, the means to the end was a set of radical reforms that dismantled the command economy and reduced the state sector. Further east politicians like, for instance, Ion Iliescu justified their reluctance to adopt radical reforms by stressing the state content in a mixed economy. The outcome of these delayed, and reluctant, reforms was a decline in output and employment similar to the fast reforming countries but without the creation of the conditions for future growth. In addition Iiternal reform of the former communist parties was slow, too.

Similar to the pattern of the fast reforming countries, the next elections (in Albania and Bulgaria already in 1992, in Romania in 1996) brought about a victory of the opposition. In this case, the opposition was either liberal-conservative or a broad alliance ranging from conservatives and liberals to social democrats and greens. Their principal task had to be the acceleration of reforms. Thus, a social-democratic agenda of slowing down "shock therapy" was not yet relevant. Nonetheless, successor parties returned to power in both Albania (1997) and in Bulgaria (1994-97) only to be removed in the latter for exactly the same reasons as in 1992.

In the new nations of East Central Europe, particularly in the former Soviet Union and in the former Yugoslavia, nationalism i.e. national independence and freedom from Moscow's or Belgrade's rule was a crucial catalyst for transformation. In cutting across the priorities of social democracy and in defining the politics of the newly independent states, rather than the traditional left-right understanding of party politics, the goals of democracy and market economics, that had driven the Central European revolutions, remained secondary. In Slovakia the opposition movement "Public Against Violence" split and re-emerged to a large extent in Vladimir Meciar's Movement for a Democratic Slovakia (HZDS) which engineered the "velvet divorce" on the Slovak side. In some cases the local/regional communist parties, or their successors, have been at the forefront of the struggle for independence thus gaining new support among the voters. For instance, in Slovenia, a reformed (ex)communist, Milan Kucan, was elected as the first president of the independent Slovenia. The Czech Republic does not exactly comply with the above pattern as it released itself from a federal structure which it dominated. This is in contrast to Slovakia which could herald itself as a new nation liberated from such dominance. Today national issues play a minor role in the Czech Republic although national sensibilities are strong vis-ŕ-vis Germany and the Roma population and right-wing nationalists had political representation until June 1998.

Traditionally, social democracy defined itself as internationalist, arguing for the peaceful co-operation of nations, and has fought against the subordination of the social question to that of the national issue. In the West social democrats placed the issue of national independence behind those of minority rights, regional autonomy, federalism, and greater competence for territories and communities (for instance, in Spain). Although these principles have been sidelined by the prioritisation of national independence in East Central Europe, they could, potentially, play a considerable role in the solution of internal tensions within multi-ethnic states.

The Czech Republic does not exactly comply with the above patter as it released itself from a federal structure which it dominated. This is in contrast to Slovakia which could herald itself as a new nation liberated from such dominance. National issues thus play a minor role in the transformation although Czech national sensibilities are strong vis-ŕ-vis Germany and the Roma population and right-wing nationalists had political representation until June 1998.

Many of the fast reforming new nations focused on political and economic reform rather than nation-building though minority rights, language issues, relations to the former dominant power and boarder problems still played a major role in the politics of transformation. The sooner these problems were resolved the sooner the country could concentrate on economic reforms. The forces in charge of the separation from the old centres were a mixed bag: sometimes more liberal (the Baltic countries, Slovenia) sometimes more authoritarian (Slovakia, Croatia) but most generally conservative. Social-democratic values became more appealing when rapid reforms brought recession, increasing social inequality and insecurity or when authoritarian rule provoked a stronger wish for democracy.

Among the slow reforming new nation-states, Russia and Serbia (Yugoslavia) are old centres. They were (and still are) concerned about their loss of power and influence, and the protection of the Russian and Serbian Diaspora living in the newly independent states. Most of the armed conflicts in East Central Europe have resulted from, or were linked to, these problems. In comparison to Serbia, Russia is still a rather fast reforming country. Relations to her "near abroad" dominate her political agenda much less than war and foreign boycotts which determine Serbian politics and the economy. War and conflicts with neighbours and minorities have characterised the situation in Bosnia, Macedonia and the Caucasus republics while Belarus and Ukraine still suffer from weak democratic structures. Peace and democracy should be the major concerns of social democrats or, indeed, all citizens in this context. Unfortunately, large parts of the population are still voting for, or passively, tolerating nationalist and authoritarian forces and parties.

Social democrats are not alone in advocating peace and democracy (one should also include liberal and conservative forces) though both goals are very much compatible with social-democratic politics and ideology. The problem, however, is that all of these democratic forces are still relatively weak in most of these countries, with the exception of Macedonia and Lithuania, where largely reformed communists played a major role in the politics of transition and nation-building.

Generally, the newly independent countries with slower reforms have been preoccupied with nation building at the expense of economic reform and democratisation, albeit to a varying degree (Lithuania much less so than for example the CIS republics). In the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), in particular, the old regional power elites of the nomenclatura often remain in power. As in the slow reforming old nations, these elites articulated their interests through political formations which often have been called "the party of power". Their political rhetoric tended to replace outdated communist concepts with the language of social-democracy while continuously stressing the need for state intervention - which in fact, as previously mentioned, favours their own interests, of course. To some extent, even Milosevic and his party could be mistaken as social-democratic if one considers, in isolation, their social and economic policy agenda. Given the slow pace of reforms, the specific social-democratic agenda of taming capitalism by democratic means still remains a useful tool with which to approach the electorate, if its advocates are not considered to be part of the newly enriched.