REPORT ON THE FOOD TAX AT THE MEETING OF SECRETARIES AND RESPONSIBLE REPRESENTATIVES OF RCP(b) CELL COMMITTEES IN MOSCOW AND MOSCOW GOVERNORATE

APRIL 9, 1921
Comrades, when it comes to the question of the food tax and the transformation of food policy—as well as the economic policies of Soviet power—very diverse opinions are being voiced, giving rise to numerous misunderstandings. With the agreement of Comrade Kamenev, let me divide our discussion in such a way that he will be responsible for presenting, in all their minute details, the laws that have just been enacted. This approach is all the more appropriate, since Comrade Kamenev served as chairman of the commission initially appointed by the Central Committee of our Party—and later confirmed by the Sovnarkom—which, through a series of meetings with representatives of the relevant authorities, drafted all the laws issued in recent times. The most recent of these laws was promulgated yesterday, and today we could already read about it in the newspapers.66 There is no doubt that each of these laws gives rise to a host of practical questions, and considerable effort will be required if Party members and Soviet officials at the local level are to become sufficiently familiar with these laws and to develop sound practices for their implementation in the field.
I would like to draw your attention to the broader, or more fundamental, significance of all the measures under discussion. How can we explain why Soviet power—and the dictatorship of the proletariat—are now embarking on this path of, to varying degrees, recognizing the existence of free trade?

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To what extent can free trade and individual farming be permitted alongside socialist economic planning? To what extent can this revival of capitalism be tolerated—especially when even the slightest, however limited, allowance for free trade may seem to inevitably lead to such a resurgence? What accounts for this shift? What is its true meaning, character, and significance? And how should members of the Communist Party understand this change? How ought we to explain it, and how should we view the limits of its application in real life? These, roughly speaking, are the questions I intend to address.
The first question is: what has prompted this change, which many regard as excessively abrupt and insufficiently justified?
The primary and most crucial reason for this shift is the extraordinarily acute crisis facing the peasant economy—a crisis so severe that by spring 1921 the situation had grown far more dire than anyone could have anticipated. On the other hand, the consequences of this predicament were felt not only in the restoration of our transportation system but also in the recovery of our industry. I would like to point out that when people speak of replacing the grain requisitioning system with the food tax—or when they debate the significance of this replacement—they make the greatest number of mistakes precisely because they fail to ask themselves: what, in essence, does this transition consist of? What does it move from, and what does it lead to? The peasant economy, after all the devastation wrought by war, had been further devastated by an exceptionally severe crop failure—and the resulting famine, for the poor harvest affected both fodder crops and livestock, leading to widespread mortality among farm animals. The productive forces of the peasant economy were weakened, and in many places, outright ruin seemed to be the inevitable fate of rural households. Such was the picture of the peasant economy by the spring of 1921. And here arises the question: how, exactly, is this acutely intensified crisis of the peasant economy related to the shift in grain requisitioning that Soviet power has undertaken? I maintain that in order to to grasp the significance of this measure, we must first ask ourselves: from what do we seek to move, and toward what do we aim to arrive?
If, in a country where the peasantry constitutes the majority of the population, a workers’ revolution takes place and factories, plants, and railways pass into the hands of the working class, then what, fundamentally, should be the nature of the economic relations between the working class and the peasantry? Clearly, the workers—producing, in the factories and plants now owned by them, all the goods necessary for the country, and thus for the peasantry as the majority of the population—will transport these goods via their own railways and river vessels, delivering them to the peasants while receiving from them all surplus agricultural products. This is perfectly obvious and hardly requires further explanation. Yet when people discuss the food tax, this fact is constantly overlooked. It is essential to bear this in mind, for in order to understand the significance of the food tax—which is merely a transitional measure—we must clearly grasp what it is that we ultimately seek to achieve. From what I have outlined, it becomes clear that what we desire—and indeed must—achieve is this: peasant products should no longer flow to the workers’ state as surplus under the grain requisitioning system, nor as mere tax—but rather should be exchanged for all the essential goods delivered to the peasantry, transported by means of the nation’s various modes of transport. On this basis, the economy of a country that has embarked upon the path of socialism can be built. If the peasant economy is to continue to develop, it is imperative to secure the further transition—and the inevitable next step in this process is that the least profitable, most backward, small-scale, isolated peasant holdings gradually merge and organize themselves into large, communal agricultural enterprises. This has always been the vision held by socialists. It is precisely this vision that guides our Communist Party as well. Let me reiterate: the greatest source of error and misunderstanding lies in the fact that the food tax is evaluated without taking into account the distinctive features of those transitions…

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of measures that are indispensable if we are to reach the point we can and must reach.
So what, then, is the food tax? The food tax represents a measure that carries within it elements of both the past and the future. A tax, by definition, is something the state extracts from the population without providing any corresponding compensation. If this tax is set at roughly half the level of last year’s requisitioning scheme, then the workers’ state—whose task it is to sustain the Red Army, the entire industrial sector, the non‑agricultural population as a whole, to foster production, to develop trade relations with foreign countries, and to secure the machinery and equipment we so desperately need—cannot rely solely on taxation. On the one hand, the state seeks to lean on taxation, setting the tax rate at roughly half the previous requisitioning level; on the other hand, it also aims to rely on the exchange of industrial products, on whatever surpluses may emerge from peasant production. Thus, the tax contains a residue of the old requisitioning system, while at the same time incorporating elements of a new order—one that alone appears truly sound: the exchange of products from large socialist factories against the produce of peasant households, conducted through the food agencies of the state power, which belongs to the working class, and through the cooperative organizations of workers and peasants.
Why, one might ask, are we compelled to resort to a measure that retains only a partial legacy of the past, placing only a fragment of our efforts on the right track—while we remain far from certain that we will succeed in fully setting even that fragment onto the proper course, or that the portion we do manage to steer onto the right path will prove significant enough? Why must we adopt such a half‑hearted measure? Why, in our food and economic policies, must we count on such makeshift solutions? What, precisely, gives rise to this measure? Of course, everyone knows that it does not stem from any particular preference on the part of the Soviet authorities for one policy over another. Rather, it arises from dire necessity, from an utterly hopeless predicament. You know that, in the years following the victory of the workers’ revolution in Russia, after the imperialist war, we were forced to endure a civil war—and today we can say without exaggeration that among all the nations drawn into the imperialist conflict, even among those that suffered most from the war because it raged on their own soil, there is still no single country that has borne as heavy a burden as Russia. For after four long years of imperialist warfare, we were left to contend with three more years of civil war—a conflict that, in terms of devastation, destruction, and the collapse of production conditions, was far more ruinous than the external war itself, since this war was waged at the very heart of the state. This desperate ruin stands as the primary cause of why, in the early days of the war—especially when the civil war cut off vital grain‑producing regions like Siberia, the Caucasus, and all of Ukraine, while also severing supplies of coal and oil and severely limiting the availability of other fuels—we, besieged within a fortress, had no choice but to implement requisitioning: to seize every surplus the peasants possessed, sometimes taking not merely surplus goods but even essentials required by the peasant household—so long as we could preserve an army capable of fighting and prevent industry from completely collapsing. During the civil war, this task proved extraordinarily difficult; indeed, viewed through the lens of other political factions, it was universally regarded as an impossible challenge. Take the Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries—the party of the petty bourgeoisie and the party of the kulaks. It was these very parties that, during the most critical moments of the civil war, loudly proclaimed that the Bolsheviks had embarked on a reckless venture, that it was simply impossible to hold out in the civil war when all the great powers had rallied to support the White Guards. In truth, the task was exceedingly arduous, demanding the utmost exertion of all available resources—and it was accomplished successfully only because the sacrifices borne by the working class and the peasantry during this period were, one might say, nothing short of superhuman. Never before had the working class experienced such severe malnutrition, such acute famine, as in the first few years of its dictatorship.

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The class had never experienced such a situation. And it was only natural that, in order to address this challenge, there were no viable alternatives other than requisitioning—meaning the seizure of all surplus produce and a portion of the grain necessary for the peasant’s subsistence. “You may go hungry too, but together we will defend our cause and drive out Denikin and Wrangel”—no other solution could even be imagined.
The issue was not that we possessed an economic system or a formal economic policy plan, nor that we had the luxury of choosing between one system or another. None of that existed. To restore industry when neither food nor fuel was even minimally secured was simply out of the question. Our sole objective was to preserve what remained of industrial capacity—to keep the workers from scattering entirely, to maintain an army—and there was no way to achieve this except through requisitioning without compensation, since paper money, of course, could never serve as remuneration. We had no other option. I have already explained to you what we left behind and what we are moving toward. As for how to effect this transition, it is precisely here that a measure like taxation becomes indispensable. Had we been able to accelerate the restoration of our industry, perhaps—if the harvest had been better—we might have been able to shift sooner to exchanging industrial products for agricultural goods.
Many of you probably remember that at the Ninth Party Congress we raised the question of transitioning to the economic front. At the time, all attention was focused on this issue. We had hoped that we had finally put an end to war: after all, we had extended to bourgeois Poland an unprecedentedly favorable peace offer. As you know, however, the peace talks collapsed; the Polish War ensued, followed by its continuation under Wrangel and others. The period between the Ninth and Tenth Congresses was almost entirely consumed by war; as you know, it was only quite recently that we signed a final peace treaty with the Poles, and just a few days ago we concluded a peace agreement with the Turks—a pact that alone has spared us endless wars in the Caucasus. It was only now that we entered into a trade agreement with England of global significance; only now was England compelled to establish commercial relations with us—while America, for example, still refuses to do so. This gives you some sense of the tremendous difficulties we faced in emerging from that war. If we had been able to realize the objectives set forth at the Ninth Party Congress at that very moment, we certainly would have been able to deliver far more goods.
Today I met Comrade Korolev from Ivanovo-Voznesensk, from our most industrialized, proletarian, red province. He presented figures and facts. In the first year, no more than six factories were operating—and not a single one ran continuously for even a month. Industry had come to a complete standstill. Yet in the past year alone, twenty-two factories were brought back online, operating without interruption for several months at a stretch, some even for half a year. The target plan had been set at 150 million arshins; according to the latest available figures, they produced 117 million—but they received only half the fuel that had been allocated. Such were the setbacks—not only on the scale of Ivanovo-Voznesensk, but across the entire country. These failures were largely due to the collapse of the peasant economy, the mass die-off of livestock, and the inability to transport sufficient firewood to railway stations and river ports. Because of these challenges, the people of Ivanovo-Voznesensk received less wood, less peat, and less oil. It is nothing short of a miracle that they managed to secure only half the fuel they needed, yet still fulfilled their program, producing 117 million arshins out of a planned 150 million. They increased labor productivity and facilitated the movement of workers to better factories, which in turn led to a remarkably high rate of output. Here is a close and precise example that illustrates the predicament we found ourselves in. The entire textile program adopted at the Ninth Party Congress had been set at just over 600 million arshins—but we have not even completed a third of that target, despite the fact that Ivanovo-Voznesensk proved to be the most productive region; even it delivered only 117 million arshins. Imagine a Russia numbering in the millions—and yet those 117 million arshins…

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manufactories. This was utter destitution. The recovery of industry had stalled to such an extent that by spring 1921, its revival seemed utterly unthinkable. We needed a massive army—and we had grown it to a multi-million-strong force; but demobilizing it quickly in winter, given the devastation of transportation networks, proved extraordinarily difficult. We accomplished all of this only at the cost of unimaginable strain.
Such was the situation that had arisen. And what alternative was there, if not to reduce requisitioning to its absolute minimum—taking 240 million poods of grain instead of 423? That was the bare minimum we needed to collect under average harvest conditions, barely enough to sustain us. But to stop there would be insufficient; we had to give the peasant economy a chance to recover. Now, measures were required. Of course, the best possible measure would have been to restore large-scale industry. Undoubtedly, this would have been the most beneficial—and the only economically sound—solution: to boost factory production and supply the peasant with more of the goods he needed—not only textiles, which were essential for the worker and his family, but also machines and tools, however simple, that the peasant relied upon to the very last degree. Yet what happened to the textile industry also befell the metalworking sector. Such was our predicament. After the Ninth Party Congress, we failed to restore industry—because the year of war had taken its toll, because fuel supplies were scarce, and because the peasant economy had been weakened to its absolute limits by inadequate transportation. What measures could be taken to provide maximum support to the peasant economy? There were no other options besides reducing requisitioning and converting it into a tax—set at 240 million under average harvest conditions, perhaps even lower in times of poor yields—so that the peasant would know he was obligated to pay a specific sum, fixed at the lowest possible amount, and could then devote all his labor with the greatest zeal to production, ensuring that all other goods could provide him with what he truly needed, enabling the peasant…

The economy will not only improve thanks to industry—though that would be the most appropriate, the most rational course of action—but we simply do not have the resources to achieve that. The tax has been set at its lowest possible rate, and its implementation at the local level alone will already begin to restore small-scale industry, for we cannot reestablish large-scale industry within the timeframe we had hoped for. This has already been demonstrated by the Ivanovo-Voznesensk program, which delivered the best results among all our planned initiatives. We must wait another year before fuel reserves are sufficient to sustain production across all factories. Ideally, we could accomplish this within a single year; at the very least, it may take two years. But can we truly provide for the peasantry? If the harvest had been good, such an outcome would have been feasible.
At the Party Congress, when the question of the tax in kind was being debated, a pamphlet authored by Comrade Popov, head of our Central Statistical Administration, on Russia’s grain production was distributed. This pamphlet will soon be published in an expanded edition, and everyone should familiarize themselves with it. It offers a comprehensive overview of grain production, based on the data from the census we conducted—which yielded precise figures for the entire population and provided a reasonably accurate estimate of household sizes. According to the pamphlet, with a yield of forty poods per desyatina, a peasant household could have produced 500 million poods of surplus grain within the current territory of Soviet Russia. In that scenario, we would have fully met the urban population’s needs—350 million poods—and still retained a surplus for foreign trade and for improving rural livelihoods. However, the crop failure was so severe that, on average, we harvested no more than twenty-eight poods per desyatina. A deficit ensued. If we follow statistical estimates and assume that eighteen poods per person are required, then we must take three poods from each individual and condemn every peasant to a degree of malnutrition—enough to ensure a semi-starved existence for the army and for industrial workers. Given this situation, we had no choice but to reduce—

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the requisition system and convert it into a tax. We must devote every ounce of effort and care to improving small peasant farms. While we were unable to supply them with manufactured goods, machinery, and other products from large factories, we nonetheless needed to address this challenge without delay—and we had to rely on small-scale industry to do so. The first year of implementing this new measure should already begin to yield results.
So why is the peasant household receiving the greatest attention? Because it is from the countryside that we can obtain the food and fuel we so desperately need. If the working class wishes to manage the economy properly—as the ruling class, as the class exercising its dictatorship—it must recognize that the weakest link lies precisely in the crisis facing the peasant economy. This must be rectified so that we can once again turn our attention to restoring large-scale industry and ensure that, in the Ivanovo-Voznesensk region alone, not twenty-two factories are operating, but all seventy. When that happens, large-scale factory-based manufacturing will meet the needs of the entire population—and instead of collecting taxes in kind, the peasants will be able to exchange their surplus produce for industrial goods supplied by the working class. This is the transition we are undergoing: we must distinguish between need and hunger, accepting that the price of widespread undernourishment is the salvation of those without whom we cannot maintain even a single factory, a single railway, or an army capable of resisting the White Guards.
The Mensheviks relentlessly criticized our requisition system, claiming that Soviet power had brought nothing to the people except requisitions, hardship, and ruin—and that after the restoration of partial peace, after the end of the Civil War, it would prove impossible to revive our industry anytime soon. Yet even in the wealthiest nations, it often takes years to rebuild industry. Even a country as prosperous as France must spend considerable time and effort on reconstruction.

France’s industry, after all, did not suffer as severely as we did—its destruction affected only a small portion of the nation. It is remarkable that, in the first year of incomplete peace, we managed, for example, to put twenty-two out of seventy factories back into operation in Ivanovo-Voznesensk, producing 117 million out of a total output of 150 million. While requisitioning was unavoidable at the time, we now needed to shift our food policy—from requisitioning to taxation. This will undoubtedly improve the peasant’s situation; it will certainly enable him to plan with greater precision, certainty, and confidence, knowing that any surplus grain he may have can be exchanged—at least in part—for locally produced handicrafts. This is why such an economic policy is essential for Soviet power.
In closing, I would like to address the question of how this policy can be reconciled with the principles of communism—and how it comes to pass that the communist Soviet state actually fosters the development of free trade. Is this truly in line with the tenets of communism? To answer this question, we must carefully examine the changes that have taken place in the peasant economy. At first, the situation was such that we witnessed the broad-based resistance of the peasantry against the landed gentry. Both the poor and the kulaks opposed the landlords—though, of course, with differing motives: the kulaks sought to seize land from the landlord and develop their own farms upon it. It was then that the divergent interests and aspirations of the kulaks and the poor became apparent. In Ukraine, these conflicting interests are now far more evident than they are here. The poor, in fact, had very little opportunity to benefit directly from the transfer of land from the landlords—lacking both the materials and the tools necessary to make use of it. And so we see the poor organizing themselves to prevent the kulaks from seizing the lands they had taken. The Soviet state has been providing support to the newly formed committees of the poor among us, as well as to the “komnezamozhams” in Ukraine.67 So what has been the result?

REPORT ON THE FOOD TAX
As a result, the predominant element in the countryside became the middle peasants. We know this from statistical data, and anyone who lives in the village can confirm it through their own observations. The extremes—those leaning toward kulakdom or toward destitution—have diminished, while the majority of the population has moved closer to the middle peasant stratum. If we are to raise the productivity of our peasant economy, then we must first and foremost take the middle peasant into account. It was precisely on this basis that the Communist Party had to shape its policies.
Now that the countryside has become more middle-peasant in character, we must help the middle peasants improve their farms—and, moreover, we must hold them to the same standards we apply to the working class. At the Party’s most recent congress, the central issue was food propaganda: all forces were to be directed toward the economic front, with the goal of boosting labor productivity and increasing the output of agricultural products. Without fulfilling these tasks, no progress whatsoever is possible. If we say this about the workers, then we must say the same about the peasantry. The state will levy a certain tax on the peasant, but in return it will require that, after paying the tax, the peasant expand his farm—knowing full well that nothing more will be taken from him, and that he will retain all surplus production for the further development of his enterprise. Thus, the shift in policy toward the peasantry is explained by the fact that the situation of the peasantry itself has changed. The countryside has grown more middle-peasant in character, and if we are to raise productive forces, we must take this fact into account.
I should also recall that back in 1918, shortly after the signing of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, I found myself engaged in debate with a group of so‑called “Left Communists.”* Those who were members of the Party at the time still remember how some communists feared that the conclusion of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk would undermine every aspect of communist policy. In the course of my arguments with these comrades, I maintained that state capitalism in Russia was not something to be feared—

* See Collected Works, 5th ed., vol. 36, pp. 283–314. Ed.

in fact, it could even represent a step forward. This seemed quite strange: how could state capitalism, in a Soviet Socialist Republic, possibly be a step forward? In response, I argued: if you look closely at what we actually observe in Russia from the standpoint of real economic relations, what do you see? At the very least, we encounter five distinct systems—or modes of production, or economic orders—and, counting from the bottom up, they are as follows: first, patriarchal farming, where the peasant household works solely for its own subsistence, or operates in a nomadic or semi-nomadic manner—of which we have countless examples; second, small-scale commodity production, where farmers sell their produce on the market; third, capitalist production, marked by the emergence of capitalists and small private enterprises; fourth, state capitalism; and fifth, socialism. And if we take a closer look, we must acknowledge that even today, within Russia’s economic system—and indeed, within its overall economic structure—we continue to encounter all of these forms of economic relationship. We must never forget that we often witness socialist relations among workers at state-owned factories, where workers themselves gather fuel, raw materials, and finished goods, or where workers strive to distribute industrial products fairly among the peasantry, transporting those goods by various means of transport. This is socialism. Yet alongside it exists small-scale production, which frequently operates independently of the socialist sector. Why can it exist independently? Because large-scale industry has not yet been restored; because socialist factories may receive, at best, only one-tenth of what they ought to receive; and since they do not receive their full share, small-scale production remains autonomous from socialist enterprises. The country’s staggering devastation, coupled with shortages of fuel, raw materials, and transportation, mean that small-scale production persists apart from socialism. So I ask: under such conditions, what exactly is state capitalism? It is, in essence, the consolidation of small-scale production. Capital

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Capital consolidates small-scale production; capital grows out of small-scale production. There is no point in closing our eyes to this reality. Of course, freedom of trade implies the growth of capitalism—there is no escaping this fact, and anyone who tries to evade it or brush it aside is merely indulging in empty rhetoric. If there is small-scale farming, if there is freedom of exchange, then capitalism inevitably emerges. But is this kind of capitalism truly a threat to us—if we already control factories, plants, transportation networks, and foreign trade? Back then, I argued—and I will reiterate now, firmly convinced that this is irrefutable—that this form of capitalism poses no real danger to us. Concessions are precisely this kind of capitalism.
We have been striving to secure concessions, but unfortunately, we have yet to conclude a single one. Still, we are now closer to securing concessions than we were just a few months ago, when we last discussed them. What, from an economic perspective, is a concession? It is state capitalism. The Soviet state enters into an agreement with a capitalist. Under this agreement, the capitalist is granted certain resources: raw materials, mines, industrial sites, ore deposits—or, as in one of the most recent concession proposals, even a specialized factory (as in the proposed concession granted to a Swedish firm for ball bearings). The socialist state hands over to the capitalist the means of production that belong to it: factories, materials, mines; the capitalist operates as a contractor, as a lessee, using socialist means of production, and in return receives profits on his capital, while delivering a portion of the produced goods to the socialist state.
Why do we need this so urgently? Because we can immediately increase our output of agricultural products—a task we simply cannot accomplish on our own. And thus, state capitalism comes into being. Is it a threat to us? No, it is not, because we will determine the extent to which we grant concessions. Take, for example, a concession for oil. Such a concession will immediately provide us with millions of poods of kerosene—more than we ourselves can produce.

This is to our advantage, because the peasant will now supply us with surplus grain in exchange for kerosene rather than paper money, and we will immediately be able to effect a marked improvement in the overall situation of the country. That is why we have no fear of the kind of capitalism that will inevitably emerge from free trade: it will arise as a natural outcome of the expansion of circulation—of the exchange of industrial products, even if only those of small-scale industry, for agricultural commodities.
From today’s legislation, you will learn that workers in certain branches of industry are granted, in the form of a natural bonus, a specified share of the products manufactured in their factories, to be exchanged for bread. Thus, textile workers, on condition that state needs are met, will receive a portion of their own manufactured goods and may themselves exchange these for bread. This measure is intended to accelerate the improvement of both workers’ and peasants’ conditions. We would not be able to achieve this on a nationwide scale—but we must do it at all costs. That is why we do not close our eyes to the fact that, to a certain extent, freedom of trade implies the development of capitalism; rather, we affirm that this capitalism will remain under the control and oversight of the state. If the workers’ state has taken factories, plants, and railways into its own hands, we need not fear this form of capitalism. It will enable us to improve economic exchanges between agricultural products and neighboring artisanal producers—who, though they may not fully satisfy the peasant’s demand for industrial goods, will nevertheless make a significant contribution toward meeting that need; in any case, the peasant economy will see an improvement over its previous state—and we must strive to improve it without delay. Let small-scale industry develop to a certain degree; let state-run capitalism take root—this poses no threat to Soviet power. The Soviet authorities must face reality squarely, calling things by their proper names, yet they must also exercise strict oversight and carefully determine the appropriate limits.
Concessions pose no real danger—if we grant concessions to a few enterprises while retaining the majority under

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our control; this is not something to fear. Of course, it would be utterly absurd if the Soviet government were to hand over most of what it owns to concessionaires—such a policy would not constitute a concession at all, but rather a return to capitalism. Concessions are harmless so long as we retain control over all state-owned enterprises and carefully, rigorously assess which ones we may grant concessions to—and under what conditions—and to what extent. Capitalism that develops in this way remains subject to oversight and scrutiny, while state power remains firmly in the hands of the working class and the workers’ state. Whether it takes the form of concessions or whether it inevitably grows through cooperatives and through the freedom of trade—neither of these forms of capitalism frightens us; on the contrary, we must strive to develop and improve the lot of the peasantry, and we must exert every effort to ensure that these developments serve the interests of the working class. Whatever can be done to enhance peasant livelihoods and to stimulate local commerce—while at the same time planning for the national economy in such a way that large-scale socialist industry recovers more rapidly than before—will be accomplished sooner through concessions than without them; and with a revitalized, reinvigorated peasant economy, we will achieve results more quickly than when the peasantry was mired in the absolute scarcity that had long plagued it.
That, then, is what I wished to say regarding how, from a communist standpoint, we ought to evaluate this policy—why it was necessary, and why, when applied correctly, it will bring about immediate, and in any case more rapid, improvements than if it had not been implemented.
“Pravda,” Nos. 81, 82, and 83; April 15, 16, and 17, 1921.

Printed according to the text of the newspaper “Pravda.”