Communism – Legitimacy – Nationalism

Front matter

GESCHICHTE - ERINNERUNG - POLITIK 20

Marcin Zaremba

Communism — Legitimacy — Nationalism

Introduction

Issues surrounding the nation, fatherland, patriotism, nationalism, independence, national interest, and national betrayal are the foundations for the understanding of the last 200 years of Polish history. Neither can one avoid them in reflections upon the history of People's Poland. Nationalism served as one of the most important formulas for the legitimation of the communist system of power. Because of this, there occurred redefinitions of, among other things, such concepts as patriotism, the nation, and the state.

The goal I have set for myself in this study is a) the description of the nationalist legitimation of communist power in Poland between 1944 and 1980, b) and a description of the role played in the validation of the system by the communist concept of the nation and the nationalist slogans that derived from it. The patriotic red and white nationalist costume so readily donned by the authorities was supposed to convince society about the national character of their governments and break through the barrier of externality between the authorities and society.

My research question is as follows: What historical threads, national myths, symbols, and contents of national culture were selected from the past and adjusted to the purposes of those in power and what elements were negated in an effort to make them disappear from the national tradition? I am especially interested in national symbols, national phraseology, the celebration of national holidays, anniversaries of historical events, the choice and manner of presenting national heroes, and the relationship of those in power to national culture and monuments.

Above all, the approach taken in this study was decided by two factors. The first of them came from the impoverished state of research upon nationalism and the problem of the nation in postwar Poland. Our evidential knowledge is not only incomplete but, despite the research into traditions dating to the interwar period, we still have not worked out the tools that would allow us to understand the phenomenon of nationalism. I do not think a judicious analysis of contemporary Poland is possible without a discussion of issues connected to the nation and nationalism in Poland's recent past. I also do not think it is possible to understand the functioning of the Polish People's Republic (PRL) without looking at issues of the “internality” and “externality” of the elites as understood by the social groups of those times. It is also important to remember the words of Amitai Etzioni, “When elites are external (or when some are internal and some external), societal guidance is less effective and the societal units are less active than when all the elites are internal?!

The second factor connected to my approach is the attempt to discover a sociological model that will allow for a description and understanding of the essence, to use a formula of Tadeusz Lepkowski, of “planned” communist nationalism.’ The building of an ideologically-motivated vision of the Polish nation that was supposed to result in legitimation—meaning, the creation of a situation where the patriotism of the rulers would be acknowledged by the ruled as their own—seems especially interesting for a sociologist and historian.

Not everything that came into being in the symbolic discourse between the authorities and society from 1944 to 1980 flowed from pretensions of legitimation. Therefore, I would like to stress that I am solely interested in what national slogans were used with the aim of legitimating the power of the state.

The national question over the whole period of actually-existing socialism cannot be described only in categories of nationalist legitimation of the authorities or their de-legitimation. Here we are dealing with a whole complex of national questions that demand further separate research and analysis. This book is not a work about nationalism during the period of People’s Poland in general, but about a specific use of it. This is the reason why I devote very little space to, for example, politics toward national minorities unless they served as an object of pride for the authorities and constituted an argument for legitimation.

The primary material used in this work is composed of public appearances of party leaders, their declarations of a programmatic and ideological character. Some other especially important source-types were intra-party notes, scripts for celebrations of anniversaries and national holidays as well as transcripts and protocols of meetings of various party bodies and authorities.

These documents frequently talk directly about intentions that directed the preparation of some propaganda campaign. Since I had such materials at my disposal I took less recourse to the press. As the plentitude of press information is practically limitless I treated my forays into them as something like probes. I took them up systematically to the best of my ability. I, therefore, believe that this method did not compromise my conclusions.

The selection of, and intensity of, nationalist legitimating arguments was connected to the actual conditions of the ruling system and with the social-economic

1 Amitai Etzioni, The Active Society (New York: Free Press, 1968), 114. 2 Tadeusz Łepkowski, Uparte trwanie polskości (Warsaw: Aneks, 1989), 49-50.

situation of the country. This is why this work has a chronological structure, which permits one to follow the changes in officially sanctioned nationalism.

The pronounced rise in interest in the problems of legitimation undoubtedly dates back to the start of the 1970's. In the discussion of the time the point of reference was constituted by, above all, Max Weber's concept of legitimation—and, especially, around Jiirgen Habermas among contemporary thinkers. The main object of those discussions, other than the topic of the legitimation crisis of the Western democracies ofthe time, was the issue of political systems patterned after the Soviet model. Likewise in Poland, especially during the 1980's, there appeared many articles and studies taking up this very problem, especially in the perspective of Polish experiences.* Today we are going through a renaissance of interest in questions of legitimation of the communist system. This is the result of a widelyexpressed conviction that without an answer to the question of the legitimation of the communist regime it is impossible to fully evaluate the recently passed period.

The following observation from Jacek Tarkowski still seems relevant even though we know much more about the communist period than we did only a couple of years ago: most of the articles devoted to the legitimation of the communist system have the character of general theoretical considerations not based upon systematic empirical research.*

The present work is an attempt to combine theory with historical empirical knowledge. As a result, it is divided into two parts. The first part consists ofthree chapters and is devoted to theoretical considerations of the topics of legitimation, nationalism, and the evolution of approaches to national questions from the side of the Marxists, including the Polish Communist Party. The third chapter, which seemingly strays from the rest, treats other, extra-nationalist, sources of legitimation and stabilization of the system of power. The second part, divided into six chapters, is concerned with the nationalistic legitimation of power in People's Poland. It describes the period from the roots of the PRL until 1980. The selection ofthis breakoff point comes from my conviction that it was precisely then that the mechanism of the PRL communist system broke down. In the succeeding years, despite appearances, nothing was the same as before. However, since some endstage phenomena say a lot about the baseline period under consideration, in the epilogue I will suggest taking a look at certain aspects from the period between 1980 and 1989.

3 Legitymacja. Klasyczne teorie i polskie doświadczenia, eds. Andrzej Rychard and Antonij Sułek (Warsaw: PTS UW, 1988).

4 Jacek Tarkowski, Socjologia świata polityki. Władza i społeczeństwo w systemie autorytarnym (Warsaw: ISP PAN, 1994), 43.

In conclusion, I would like to stress that the object of my interest is exclusively the means of attaining legitimacy, rather than the considerations to what degree if at all, the Polish society legitimized the authorities, the system, or its political elites. All the observations about this last topic have merely the character of more or less grounded hypotheses.

Part I Legitimation: The Theoretical Context

In the contemporary world, the nationalist legitimation of political authority is one of the main ways of validating authority. Emphasizing the national character of governments, demonstrative celebration of national and state holidays by the political elites, projecting oneself as one of the defenders of national values, creating a sense of threat of foreign goods flooding the country, are only some of the many different phenomena that constitute the substantial element of today’s political culture.” The cause of this state of things should be sought, on the one hand, through relying upon the sociology of politics in its discussions of the shaping of modern nation-states and of the crisis of the previous sources of legitimating state authority. On the other hand, explanations must be sought from the perspective of sociology, social anthropology, and finally psychology—in the universal and fundamental need of humans to interpret the social world through the categories of internality and externality.

The legitimating function of nationalism, frequently mentioned in studies dedicated to nationalism, up to this day, has not been thoroughly described by scholars. On the theoretical level, the problem of the relation between legitimation and nationalism has not been probed to this day at all. It is significant that in studies chiefly devoted to questions of legitimacy, but also nationalism, the concept of “nationalist legitimation” appears infrequently. This imposes a certain logic upon my deliberations. In order to undertake an attempt at defining “nationalist legitimation; one must zoom-in upon the understanding of the two units that make up the concept: “legitimation” and “nationalism.” The history of research, for example, on nationalism, is characterized by many controversies and polemics. The number of concepts, and not infrequently contradictory definitions, is dif-

5 Benedict Anderson writes, “nation-ness is the most universally legitimate value in the political life of our time” in Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (New York: Verso, 1991), 3.

ficult to grasp. It is more or less the same thing when it comes to legitimacy. Out of necessity the comments devoted to clearing up the concepts of “legitimation” and “nationalism” must be limited.

Legitimation

The starting point for this study is the observation of a basic fact needed for further deliberations: in general, those who rule strive toward achieving legitimation. The above thesis should sound more categorical ifwe were to limit it exclusively to communist governments, because these governments, for ideological reasons that we will invoke later, had especially pronounced legitimating pretentions. In history there were political systems—frequently created by way of invasion—where the rulers did not feel the need to gain legitimation. Precisely because they did not have legitimation their governments did not last very long, even though they required immense resources from the army and police in order to ensure, through the use of power, the stability and continuation of the system. Legitimation is not the result of an acceptance based upon fear of force. Violence was and still is, the most popular means for making the seizure and subsequent maintenance of power possible. It constitutes the necessary condition for maintaining social order, therefore also the legitimation of the state, but it is not a self-sufficient condition. Without terror or the constant threat of its use, it would be impossible to establish and then maintain the communist system in the Soviet Union and the remaining countries of the Eastern Bloc. However, it usually became apparent that violence lacking legitimation is not enough. Those who led their governments thanks to violence, after a certain period, strove to both legitimate the violence and their hold on power. The history of People’s Poland gives many examples of the authorities becoming aware of the meaning of legitimation. Those who came to power in 1944 thanks to Soviet tanks became aware of it. Władysław Gomułka noticed this in October 1956 when he said at the meeting of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Polish United Worker’s Party (KC PZPR): “It is possible to rule the nation with bayonets when you have lost its trust, but whoever positions himself toward such an eventuality, positions himself toward losing everything.” This principle is also attested to by the actions undertaken on institutional and propaganda levels by Wojciech Jaruzelski’s team, still under Martial Law, with the aim of rebuilding social trust, which was highly strained by the crisis of the 1980's.

6 "Wystąpienie Władysława Gomułki w dniu 12 X 1956 na posiedzeniu Biura Politycznego KC PZPR, in Gomułka i inni. Dokumenty z archiwum KC 1948-1982, eds. Jakub Andrzejewski and Andrzej Paczkowski (Warsaw: Wydawnictwo Krąg, 1986), 95.

Legitimation is also not the result of acceptance based upon material interests. It is possible to pay someone in order to gain their obedience. However, this does not mean that they will remain obedient to the same degree when the resources for such a transaction run out. Seymour Martin Lipset introduced the distinction between legitimation and effectiveness into scholarly circulation. He called the following effectiveness: actual achievements, the degree to which a system fulfills basic functions of governing in the opinion of the greater part of the populace.’ This distinction is important from an analytical and heuristic standpoint, however, in reality, both concepts are clearly mutually intertwined.’ One of the fundamental demands made by citizens of contemporary states is the satisfaction of their material needs. The Economic crisis is almost totally identified these days with a crisis of state authority. It is much easier to overcome such a crisis by maintaining social order when those who stand at the head of the state have social legitimation. During the 1970’s Edward Gierek’s team in Poland was convinced of this, when it treated its apparent economic effectiveness as practically the sole argument that bore witness to their right to rule and of the legitimacy of the system. Therefore, the natural consequence of a deep economic crisis was an almost immediate outburst of social discontent, which the authorities, deprived of wider legitimating foundations, were unable to manage.

However much one can say that most of the researchers of this issue (though not all) agree upon the great degree of relevance attached to legitimation in the relationship between the rulers and the ruled,’ it is equally difficult to square such an agreement with any one definition." While keeping in mind the need for

7 Seymour Martin Lipset, Political Man: The Social Bases of Politics (New York: Doubleday, 1960), 77.

8 For more on the relation between effectiveness and legitimation see: Wojciech Sokół, Legitymizacja systemow politycznych (Lublin: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Marii Curie- Skłodowskiej, 1997), 34-36.

9 There will be more on this topic in the third chapter. It is enough to say here that for some researchers of the concept of legitimation it is inadequate to analyze the mass subordination in countries of Eastern Europe during the period of real socialism. They point to the coercion, pragmatic calculation, apathy, and habit as sources of stability in the social order.

10 There is a great deal of literature on the topic of legitimation. Out of the latest round of works that discuss the question of legitimation one could single out the following: Wojciech Sokół, Legitymizacja systemów..., op. cit. Tadeusz Biernat, Legitymizacja władzy politycznej. Elementy teorii (Toruń: Wydawnictwo Adam Marszałek, 1999); David Beetham, The Legitimation of Power (Hong-Kong: Humanities Press International, 1991).

further deliberation, let us, for now, accept that we are dealing with the legitimation of political authority when it is positively appraised in moral categories as being just, appropriate, and deserving of recognition." In other words, when the authorities are recognized as internal thanks to the system of values represented by them. On the other hand, legitimation is the process of gaining or granting legitimation.” De-legitimation is the name given to the reverse process, that is, the erosion of legitimation. However, a deficit of legitimation is not identical with the lack of legitimation.

Here it makes sense to return to the question posed at the start: Why do rulers strive to achieve legitimation? What advantages do those in power gain from being legitimated? Above all, the achievement ofa state of legitimation can be significant for the rulers because of their internal situation. It assures the maintenance of internal cohesion to the ruling elite itself, giving it a sense of the meaningfulness of the actions undertaken by it. Legitimation is also significant to the rulers in their relations with society. When those in power are legitimated the laws imposed by them are followed without any major resistance. In critical moments such rulers, thanks to the social support, will have a much greater ability to resolve crisis situations, without the necessity of applying compulsion. Legitimation is a necessary element for mobilizing society. Among other factors, this is the reason why the achievement of legitimation was so important for the rulers of monocentric systems patterned upon the Soviet model, which have been alternatively described as being based upon a mobilizing ethos.” Finally, legitimation is signifi-

11 When formulating this definition I depended upon definitions of authors such as: Jürgen Habermas, Communication and the Evolution of Society (Boston: Beacon Press, 1979), 178-179; Thomas Rigby, “A Conceptual Approach to Authority: Power and Policy in the Soviet Union” in: Archie Brown, Thomas Rigby, Peter Reddaway, eds., Authority, Power and Policy in the USSR (London: Macmillan, 1982), 9; Robert Lane, Conservative Man and State, in: Legitimation of Regimes, ed. Bogdan Dentich (New York: Sage, 1979), 55. Similar definitions of legitimation are given by some Polish authors: Aleksandra Jasińska-Kania, Osobowość, orientacje moralne i postawy polityczne (Warsaw: Instytut Socjologii, 1988), 245; Andrzej Rychard, “Komu potrzebna jest legitymizacja, in: Klasyczne teoriei..., op. cit., 301; Wocjech Lamentowicz, Kulturowe aspekty legitymizacji monocentrycznych struktur politycznych,” op. cit., 70.

12 Peter Ludz, “Legitimacy in a Divided Nation: The Case of the German Democratic Republic, in: Bogdan Denitch, ed., Legitimation of Regimes..., op. cit., 162.

13 Marcin Zaremba, “Komunizm jak system mobilizacyjny: casus polski,’ in: Komunizm. Ideologia, system, ludzie, ed. Tomasz Szarota (Warsaw: NERITON, IH PAN, 2001), 110-126.

cant for society itself for its internal cohesion.'* In summary, it would be difficult to disagree with Jacek Tarkowski who wrote that, for the majority of political systems, legitimation became one of the fundamental problems they must solve, and sometimes a matter of life and death.’

The following question also must be considered: who must acknowledge the rulers as internal in normative categories, so that one can say that they are legitimized? In order to gain legitimation, every system of the exercise of governmental power must be accepted by both the subservient and the dominant groups. The significance of both of these groups might vary. Many scholars believe that, at the conclusion of this process, the deciding significance is on the side of the faith of the political elites in their right to govern and the importance of the titles which they invoke. Without a doubt, the chances of gaining the legitimation of a political system shrink to zero when the rulers themselves question its legitimacy.

The crucial importance, for political stability, of the ruling elites’ feeling of self-legitimation is noted especially in communist systems. The particular role ascribed to self-legitimation is a result of the systems peculiarities: the centralization of its structures of power and its monopolistic position, also from feelings of insecurity and consciousness of the insufficiency of the legitimation of the ruling elites. How important this factor was can be attested to by the fact that during the middle of the 1960’s there were around fifty thousand instructors in Poland whose task it was to strengthen members of the ruling party in precisely their belief in their own right to rule. * Without negating the significance of the key role that fell to the political elites in the process of legitimation, it is difficult to agree with its absolutizing and the assertion, expressed by some scholars, that the auto-legitimating crises of the party establishment were the essential and the most important cause of successive political eruptions in the countries of Eastern Europe.” Such a stance, which trivializes the significance of other social groups, interprets crises in this region of Europe all too one-sidedly.

14 Andrzej Rychard, Komu potrzebna..., op. cit., 302.

15 Jacek Tarkowski, Socjologia swiata polityki..., op. cit., 35.

16 See: O zadaniach partii w dziedzinie dalszego doskonalenia wewngtrzpartyjnej pracy ideologiczno-szkoleniowej, Archiwum Akt Nowych (AAN), zespół Komitetu Centralnego Polskiej Zjednoczonej Partii Robotniczej (KC PZPR), sygnatura 237/VIII-739, karta 3

17 For example, this view was held by Joseph Rothschild: “truly critical delegitimation of a regime begins with the moral and psychological defection of elites, whose very defection, or loss of a sense of legitimacy in their own domination, communicates to the masses the onset of a general crisis” (Joseph Rothsichld, “Political Legitimacy

Beyond the ruling group, a particular significance in legitimating of the political system is attached to the intellectual elite. People's Poland can be a good example here, because its rules, for the whole of its existence, strove in many different ways to influence intellectuals and writers, so that they would legitimate the system through their moral authority. The refusal to cooperate most frequently ended with action on the part of the authorities aiming to deprive a given person of the possibility of any public articulation, especially expressions of a de-legitimizing character. The voice of the social group which, for doctrinal reasons, is regarded as important for the existing social order, can also be key to gaining legitimation. For the traditional order, this could be the nobility, for industrial societies it can be the middle class, for communist systems it is the working class. Signs of discontent coming from the side of the workers in People’s Poland were usually received anxiously by the rulers because they signalized their social de-legitimation. Several times such situations ended with the reshuffling of the ruling elites.

The next matter we ought to consider has now emerged: the existence of indicators of legitimation and de-legitimation. Of course, after the fact, we can say that the communist system in 1989 did not enjoy the widespread acceptance of Poles. Can we speak with the same certainty in relation to the period preceding it? Beetham acknowledged manifestations of acceptance of certain actions of the authorities by groups that are subordinate as an essential element of his definition of legitimation. The label of legitimated or legitimate authority was given by him to authority that “is obtained and exercised in accordance with fair rules and with evident consent”! A proof of such consent might be the engagement of subordinate groups in direct action in the reference frames laid out by the authorities, for example, through making an agreement with a superior, making an oath of obedience, or taking part in elections. Such actions, above all, would depend—for in Contemporary Europe,” in: Legitimation of Regimes..., ed. Bogdan Denitch, op. cit., 52). The events from Poznan in 1956 are a crisis in the history of the PRL that confirms Rothschild’s thesis. As is known, they were preceded by the disclosure of a “secret” party report by Nikita Khrushchev. The facts it revealed de-legitimated the Stalinist system of rule. The “flight of the elites can also similarly be attributed as a substantial cause of the system’s collapse in 1989. Also the social unrest of 1970 was preceded by—as attested by the journals of Mieczysław Rakowski—the growing dissatisfaction with the governments of Gomułka among the higher and middle echelons of the party apparatus. When it comes to the 'flight of the elites” of the intellectuals, then we can speak about the 1968 protests. 18 David Beetham, The Legitimation..., op. cit., 3.

those who would take them up—upon creating subjective identifications with the authorities without regard for the personal motives that lie at their foundations. David Beetham writes:

And if the public expression of consent contributes to the legitimacy of the powerful, then the withdrawal or refusal of consent will by the same token detract from it. Actions ranging from non-cooperation and passive resistance to open disobedience and militant opposition on the part of those qualified to give consent, will in different measure erode legitimacy, and the larger the numbers involved, the greater this erosion will be. At this level, the opposite or negative of legitimacy can be called de-legitimation.””

Therefore, legitimation is not a zero-sum game, that is, it is not the case that legitimacy either exists or does not, instead it has a gradated character and can either be strengthened or eroded. Finally, not every element of the political system must be legitimized to the same degree. Here we can recall David Easton's conceptualizations, who, while characterizing the objects of political support listed three elements of the system: the authorities, the regime, and the political community.” Each one of these elements can be legitimated or de-legitimated to various degrees. Tarkowski, in his analysis of the objects of legitimation, went even further and distinguished six groups of elements that make up a political system: the state, the regime, political institutions, leaders, key programs and decisions, and international relations.” The number of significant elements can differ depending on the situation under analysis and does not need to take on the form of a closed model. In other words, there is the possibility of a situation where the state, the regime, and political institutions are legitimated, while the remaining elements are not. With time such a situation can reverse itself.

Establishing the range of legitimation is, therefore, not an easy task. In mature liberal-democratic systems, an indicator of the degree of legitimation might be the support expressed in the election process. However, the lack of an election process does not need to mean a lack of legitimation. A mobilizational mode of legitimation is also possible.” It presupposes that support is expressed through the long-lasting engagement of the citizens and their cooperation with the government toward the realization of specific goals. Such a manner of legitimizing is characteristic especially for power gained through revolutionary means and for

20 David Easton, “An Approach to the Analysis of Political Systems,” World Politics, Vol. 9, No.3, April 1957: 383-400.

21 Jacek Tarkowski, “Legitymizacja władzy. Zagadnienia teoretyczne i opinie oficjalne,” in Socjologia świata polityki, op. cit.

22 David Beetham, The Legitimation..., op. cit., 94-95.

the communist system. The mobilization resources of a system would, in this case, be an indicator of its legitimation. The problem is that political systems existed that were capable of organizing mass support, this did not, however, mean that they were really in possession of it. For those playing the game, beyond faith in the validity of the goals of mobilization, there could also be fear, the conformism of others, that is, motives that have nothing in common with the normative appraisals of legitimation. Finally, the legitimation of the mobilizing goals proposed by the authorities did not necessarily have to be identical with the legitimation of the authorities themselves. Take the following example: the actual support and successful mobilization of Polish society in answer to the communist call to rebuild Warsaw. It seems that the answer to the question about the degree of legitimation of a mobilizing system, for example, in People’s Poland, is difficult, or even impossible to give granted the current state of our knowledge about that period—and if it were to be attempted then it would have to take on the form of a hypothesis laden with many qualifications.

Max Weber distinguished only three types of a legitimate political rule: traditional, charismatic, and rational-legal.* There is no need to discuss them in detail in this study. Yet it makes sense to remember that Weber’s variations on legitimate ruling are ideal types, models, which never appear in historical reality in a pure form. All existing political systems are, in various proportions, a mix of the above types. Thus, the legitimation of a political system can have many different foundations and take on many different forms. This depends upon the cultural foundations and upon socially acknowledged norms and customs. Ways of legitimating also undergo continuous changes. The problem emerges when, as a result of a crisis, or, the birth of a new system of governance (overthrow, revolution, invasion) the rulers are deprived of their titles to exercising authority.

Besides the Weberian strategies, there are other strategies that serve to fill out lacks in legitimation. From the point of view of the later arguments of this book, it makes sense to look at legitimation based upon ideology. Establishing the semantic field of the concept of “ideology” constitutes a substantial problem. In order to avoid making an unfounded argument, it is enough to point to the typology of ideology’s definition drawn up by Terry Eagleton, which is made up of sixteen propositions.” The crucial selection, therefore, must be preceded by the choice of some research stance. Jerzy Szacki distinguishes two such basic approaches:

23 Max Weber, “The Three Types of Legitimate Rule,” tr. Hans Gerth, in A Sociological Reader on Complex Organizations, ed. Amitai Etzioni (New York: Holt, Rinehart, & Winston, 1969), 6-15.

24 Terry Eagleton, Ideology: An Introduction (London: Verso, 1991), 1-2.

a) evaluative, an approach that aims at verifying of the worldview proposed by a given ideology (and unmasking it) and b) descriptive, an approach that points to the particular social functions of some system of convictions, their internal structure, and the eventual particular manner of their expression and propagation.” The position labeled here as evaluative is represented by the research tradition associated with the names of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and with Karl Mannheim's total conception of ideology, which depended upon capturing it as a “socially rooted” system of views.” Both describe ideology by relating it to the phenomenon of false consciousness. Ideology, which represents a falsified picture of the world, is closely associated with utopia, and its rootedness in politics makes it an important source for legitimating the limited interests of dominant groups or social classes. It is no wonder that in this conception ideology has an extremely pejorative sense. Such a stance garners widespread critique directed primarily against the interpretation of ideology as false consciousness.”