Ninth Party Conference, Resolution on the Regular Tasks of Party Construction. September 25, 1920
Original Source: Kommunisticheskaia partiia sovetskogo soiuza v rezoliutsiiakh i resheniiakh s”ezdov, konferentsii i plenumov TsK (Moscow, 1954), Part 1, pp. 506-12.
The unprecedented difficult position of the Soviet Republic during the first years of its existence, the utter destruction and the extreme military danger have made inevitable the emergence of ‘shock’ (and therefore in reality of privileged) departments and groups of workers. This was inevitable since it was impossible to save the devastated country without concentrating forces and means in those departments and in those groups of workers without whom the united imperialists of the whole world would certainly have suppressed us and wouldn’t even have permitted our Soviet Republic to start the task of economic construction. These circumstances, together with the legacy of capitalist and private ownership habits and attitudes which are difficult to throw off, make the necessity apparent over and over again to direct the attention of the whole party to the struggle for the bringing into being of greater equality, first of all, within the party, secondly, within the proletariat, and then also within the whole toiling masses, finally, thirdly, among the various departments and various groups of workers, especially ‘specialists’ and those workers who hold responsibilities with respect to the masses. The party in differentiating party members only according to the degree of the development of their consciousness, devotion, steadfastness, political maturity, their revolutionary experience, their readiness for self-sacrifice, in doing this, the party is struggling with every kind of attempt to differentiate among party members on some other basis; the upper and the lower strata, intelligentsia and the workers, nationality, etc.
Confirming the CC letter of the 4 September 1920 conference regards the carrying out of the following measures as necessary:
3. It is absolutely necessary to alter the nature of the Revision Commissions: endow them with the rights to inspect the functioning of organizations, check the implementation of CC circulars, decrees of conferences, the rapidity of the conduct of business in party committees, the efficient working of the administrative apparatus, etc. Revision commissions are obliged to report all instances of neglect not only to the organs which elected them, but also directly to the CC of the party. Accordingly it is necessary to elect to the Revision Commissions sufficiently responsible and active comrades.
4. It is necessary to pay particularly serious attention to the organization of party re-registration. Experience of these re-registrations has revealed more than once a too formalistic approach to the matter. If a doubtful communist, pursuing careerist goals, has produced two or three recommendations, he is enrolled as a member without further ado, while workers who for some reason did not get around to it, or who did not wish, or were not able to produce the necessary recommendation, remain outside party organizations. It is necessary to organize re-registration in such a way as to reduce to a minimum all formalities for workers and the proletarian elements in the peasantry and to raise to a maximum barriers against the entry into the party of non-proletarian elements. The use by some organizations of examinations during re-registration should be considered inappropriate.
5. Pay special attention to the organization of effective mass propaganda, which systematically raises the level of the main mass of party members. Take all measures to regulate the running of party schools. Create, in good time, special shock schools, as for example, provisioning schools and others, and provide them with the relevant literature … Call regular meetings of heads of agitation and propaganda sections of gubkoms and when possible representatives of the party press
6. The organization of ‘weeks’ and ‘days’ should be strictly regulated through the relevant central organs, permitting them on an all-Russian scale only in exceptional cases according to the CC decree.
7. In order to avert the fragmentation of party work, which has come about in some places as a result of the existence of specialist organizations (political sections, etc.) and in order that the gubkoms should effectually take over all party work in a given territory, instruct the CC to work out a plan for the above-mentioned unification of party work in time for the next conference or congress …
9. In the inner life of the party it is necessary to, foster a more widely based criticism both of local as well as central institutions of the party. Instruct the CC to indicate by a circular ways of broadening intra-party criticism at general meetings. Establish literary organs which are capable of offering a more systematic and wider criticism of the mistakes of the party and intra-party criticism in general (discussion leaflets etc.); for this purpose a special discussion leaflet should be established at the center attached to ‘Izvestiia of the CU. It is desirable to establish the same type of discussion leaflets attached to ‘Izvestiias’ published by gubkoms …
12 … It is necessary to enliven the activity of the plenums and congresses of Soviets, by carefully preparing them, by holding at them all-embracing discussions of the most important economic and political questions. It is especially necessary to prepare for uyezd and guberniia congresses of Soviets, by drawing the attention of all the local population to them (wide pre-congress agitation, oral and written) …
13. At the center and at the local level it is necessary to transfer systematically responsible workers from job to job, so as to afford them the opportunity of studying work widely in the soviet and party apparat and to facilitate their task of struggling with routine …
14. As regards central workers conference finds it necessary to carry out the following measures:
(a) Oblige every People’s Commissar and every member of a collegium to visit at the local level at least twice a year.
(b) Alter the staff of a collegium more often by bringing in promising workers. In doing this it is necessary to take care that current work should not suffer and that accumulated experience is not lost …
16. It is necessary to oblige all responsible communists without exception to carry out regularly party work first and foremost among the lower strata of the proletariat, the peasantry and the Red Army; for this purpose all responsible workers, irrespective of the posts they hold, should be attached to factory, works, Red Army or rural cells. They are duty bound to attend all general meetings and to deliver reports at them of their activities … It is necessary to make participation in subbotniks absolutely obligatory for all party members, as we envisaged in the decree on subbotniks …
19. It is considered necessary to set up a Control Commission, side by side with the CC, which must consist of comrades who have had the longest party training and are the most experienced and must be impartial and capable of carrying out strict party control. The Control Commission, elected by the party congress, must have the right to accept all types of complaints and investigate them, in coordination with the CC and if necessary calling joint general meetings with it or transferring the questions to a party congress. Temporarily until the party congress, confirm as members of the Control Commission comrades Dzerzhinskii, Muranov, Preobrazhenskii and one representative from the Moscow, Petrograd, Ivanovo-Voznesensk and Nizhnii Novgorod organizations, who must be elected at guberniia conferences (until these conferences have been called, gubkoms together with active workers are to elect representatives) …
20. Bureaucratism, which prevails in many of our central boards and centers, is often painfully damaging the most legitimate interests of the popular masses and is serving as one of the most important sources of dissatisfaction with the party, on to which responsibility for the central boards and centers is being shifted.
The Central Committee of the party must adopt the most serious measures to combat this. Local organizations must aid the CC in this struggle, first and foremost, by reporting the relevant facts …
Source: Martin McCauley, ed., Russian Revolution and the Soviet State, 1917-1921: documents (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1975), pp. 204-207.