In Tsarist Russia, 80 percent of the population was unable to read or write. In the first decree of the Commissar of Education, after October 1917, it was stated, as has been already pointed out, that “every democratic power must, in the domain of education, in a country where illiteracy and ignorance reign supreme, make its first aim the struggle against this darkness. It must acquire in the shortest time universal literacy”. The people, under the Soviets, began to learn to read and write, to read the newspapers and to write in them. For, as we have also already seen, the newspaper has been introduced into every organization in the U.S.S.R.
The making of the Press really available to the people was not something which could be done without procuring the necessary supplies of paper and ink, and the printing presses with which newspapers are printed. But in 1917, when the Soviets seized State power, these things were practically all in the hands of the well-to-do—of those who were rich enough to own newspapers, the employers of labour. Therefore it is not surprising to find, in the first Soviet Constitution of 1918, the following clause: “To ensure for the workers effective liberty of opinion, the Russian Socialist Federal Soviet Republic puts an end to the dependence of the Press upon capital; transfers to the working class and to the peasants all technical and material resources necessary for the publication of newspapers, pamphlets, books, and other printed matter: and guarantees their unobstructed circulation throughout the country.”
The Soviet Government realized that freedom of the Press could only exist together with the ownership of the printing presses and the other means for publishing newspapers. Therefore, so long as the printing presses and stocks of paper were in the hands of the well-to-do, there was only freedom of the Press for the well-to-do. Effective freedom of the Press for the working people could only be guaranteed by giving the ownership of the newspapers to these same working people. Hence the abolition of the private Press in the early days of the Revolution; its place being taken by the Press of the people themselves, from their wall-newspapers in the factories to the newspapers of the Soviet State itself.
The policy of putting an end to illiteracy, together with the transferring of the printing presses to the organizations of the working people, caused a tremendous development of the Press. The percentage of adult citizens who can read and write in the Soviet Union to-day is about 90. The daily circulation of newspapers has increased from 2·7 million in 1913 to 36·4 million in 1934, and the planned circulation for 1937 is 66 million. The only limit to the circulation of a Soviet newspaper to-day is the amount of paper available, so that we see how such a cultural question as the availability of literature has its economic foundation. Any evening in Moscow to-day, queues are visible about five o’clock, waiting for the evening paper. After an hour or, so all copies may be sold out. But this is not due to a shortage of papers compared with old Russia, for the circulation has greatly increased. It is due to the fact that the demand is now so great that limited resources of paper prevent enough being printed.
It would be a mistake to consider the large printed papers, whose daily circulation has been stated, to be fully representative of the Press in the Soviet Union. For, in addition to national and local papers, there are the factory papers and news-sheets, and the wall-newspapers which are everywhere. In considering the Press we must remember all these, from the wall-newspaper in the factory to the greatest national newspapers, Izvestia, organ of the Government; Pravda, the newspaper of the Party; and Trud, the paper of the trade unions.
For some months, while working in Moscow, I was the editor of a wall-newspaper. Compared with the editorship of any kind of newspaper or magazine in Britain, work on a Soviet publication is particularly onerous, for the editor, whether of the wall-newspaper in a workshop or of one of the national papers, has certain obligations which do not exist for the newspaper editor under capitalism.
We all read, from time to time, the correspondence columns of our newspapers. We know how readers express their views on every subject under the sun. We also know that, as far as the editor is concerned, his only job is to see that the most interesting letters are printed, and, when heated controversies show signs of becoming out of hand, to terminate them abruptly with the short note in italics: “This correspondence is now closed”.
The editorial committee of a Soviet newspaper, whether of a factory wall-newspaper or of the Government’s newspaper Izvestia, does not deal with its correspondence in this light-handed way. For on every Soviet newspaper, from the very smallest to the very largest, there are members of the editorial staff whose entire work is to deal with the complaints of readers, to investigate these complaints, and to see what can be done to remedy their grievances, if any real grievances exist.
To the wall-newspaper, for example, a worker may write to say that, after being off work owing to illness, he did not receive the full amount due to him. Another may write to say that a certain foreman appeared at work with the signs of drink on him, and such a writer may include a cartoon of the foreman concerned! Another may say that the safety devices on certain machines are inadequate; and another may write that, in spite of continual complaints, the administration continues to delay in the supplying of materials, and as a result the workers are being held up at their job.
The editorial staff of the wall-newspaper, receiving these topical comments on the life of the factory, is under an obligation, not merely to publish them, but to investigate the complaints; and to publish the letters with a statement of what has been done to redress the grievances expressed. In the case of the inadequate insurance money, the social insurance delegate must be asked to investigate. If he considers that there has been no injustice, he will be asked to write a short reply. If there has been an injustice, then the editorial board will announce that the matter has been set right. In the case of the foreman, if the facts are as stated, the article and cartoon will most certainly appear, with still more caustic remarks by the editorial staff, and possibly an appeal to the administration to take disciplinary measures. In the case of safety devices, this is a matter for the labour protection delegate of the trade union, who will be asked to make a statement on the matter. And, finally, where the administration holds up the supplies of materials it is the job of the editorial board itself to move heaven and earth to make the administration take the necessary steps to supply materials on time, and thus to avoid the delays.
The work of the editorial board of a wall-newspaper, then, is not simply the publication of a newspaper. It is also the investigation of complaints and the removal of grievances; so that the Press becomes an effective weapon of the people in the fight for better conditions in every respect. The national Press of the U.S.S.R. in no way differs from the local Press in this matter.
It will be remembered by many readers how, during the years of the first Five Year Plan, the most harrowing stories appeared in our Press in Britain about the failure of one large Soviet factory after another to achieve the planned output. And, to the confusion of the British reader who was sympathetic to the Soviet Union, Soviet sources would usually be quoted as the basis for these stories. We would read how at Stalingrad, for example, two tractors would come off the conveyor on one day, thirty the next, then a hundred, and then down to two again as some process in the production went wrong and held up the whole job. And editorial comments in the British Press would ruthlessly point out that “these Russians” would never learn to run machinery, and the whole Five Year Plan was therefore a giant fiasco.
But in spite of this adverse comment, and in spite of, or perhaps because of, the fact that it was the Soviet Press which gave full publicity to the difficulties of Stalingrad and other vast new enterprises, they have pulled through. And when we look more closely at the kind of facts which received such loud publicity at that time we find that all these difficulties and disorders which accompanied the first Five Year Plan were not necessarily peculiar to Soviet conditions, but operate in one form or another in every new large industrial enterprise anywhere. The fundamental difference between such enterprises in the U.S.S.R. and similar ones in capitalist countries is that in the Soviet Union their every difficulty was publicized in the Press, whereas, in the conditions of capitalism, the same difficulties are completely hushed up!
Suppose that a new Ford plant, after it has started working, for a few weeks turns out only half the planned output. Suppose that this story leaks into the Press. Down go the shares of Ford Ltd.; the credit of the firm seriously suffers; panic results. Such a panic, in certain cases, is all that is necessary to ruin a new firm which is just starting to operate its first factory.
But in the Soviet Union every one of those same difficulties, hushed up under capitalism because they damage the reputation of a firm, are given the fullest publicity in the Press. For, by interesting the whole of the people in those things which are unsatisfactory as well as in those which are satisfactory, the Soviet Press stimulates citizens to improve matters, and as a result the whole community is benefited.
It is as a result of this policy that, in the Soviet Press, the most appalling stories of all kinds of public abuses are given publicity. I remember how, a few years ago, a certain anti-Soviet propagandist organization in this country issued a leaflet containing parallel quotations from the British publication Russia To-day and from the Soviet Trade Union newspaper Trud (Labour). In Russia To-day it was stated, for example, that 1,000 new nurseries had been opened for the working-class mothers. And, from Trud, there was quoted a horrifying story of how, in the town of, say, Minsk, at the “Hammer and Sickle” Factory, a new crèche had been opened where the floors were damp, and where, in the near neighbourhood, there was a pig-sty, the smell of which infected the whole establishment. By taking a whole series of such monstrosities, quoted in Trud as examples of disgraceful work on the part of one or another trade union organization, or on the part of the administration of one or another factory, the leaflet was able to offset each statement from Russia To-day about vast developments affecting the lives of 170 million people with a story of one fiasco, affecting the lives of some 1,000 people at the most, quoted in the Soviet Press in order to reduce such disorders to a minimum.
The Soviet citizen, writing to a newspaper in the Soviet Union, is aware of the fact that in expressing his opinion he is starting a sequence of actions which will, if his complaints are justified, lead to the removal of the grievance. In this way the Soviet citizen enjoys effective expression of opinion of a twofold nature. First, he can complain in the Press about things which, in other countries, it is impossible for the ordinary worker to criticize at all. Second, he knows that, when he has spoken, the authorities concerned will take action to see that the grievance is dealt with.
When I say that similar people, in other countries, cannot give public expression to the kind of very vital complaints which find their way in thousands into the Soviet Press, I have in mind the fact that, in Britain to-day, if I wish to express dissatisfaction about the service rendered by a firm or by an organization, or with the work of an individual, I have no right to call the attention of public opinion to the matter. For, in Britain, the airing of any grievance, however justifiable, against a person, or against an organization, if it is likely to damage their business or their reputation is libellous, and the person airing such a grievance may be sued for it. Not only do private firms hush up the kind of difficulties to which the Soviet Press gave publicity in the case of Stalingrad, but ordinary citizens, with grievances against all kinds of organizations and officials, are not permitted to direct public opinion to such grievances through the Press. The only form of action which is possible is litigation, and the cost of this is such that only major grievances of the well-to-do can be adequately settled in this way.
The Soviet Press, then, gives voice to two lands of criticism which are more or less non-existent in the Press of Britain: criticism of the working of all kinds of public institutions; and criticism of the working of responsible persons. Both these kinds of criticism, in a country of private enterprise, would be damaging to the firms concerned, also to the authority of employers over workers, and are therefore taboo.
In discussing the wall-newspaper in the factory, at an earlier stage, we raised the question of control and editorship. And we saw that the editor of the wall-newspaper was appointed by the trade union committee elected by, and responsible to, the workers. How are the national newspapers controlled?
There is no difference in principle between the control of the wall-newspaper in the factory, which is the organ of the participation in that factory, and the control of Izvestia, Pravda, or Trud, the three main newspapers of the U.S.S.R. For in the Soviet Union all the Press is in the hands of the organizations of the working people, from their factory trade union committee on the one hand, to their national Trade Union General Council, their Government, and the Central Committee of their Party on the other. In the factory, the editor of the wall-newspaper is appointed by and responsible to the trade union in that factory. On an All-Union scale, the editor of Trud, the central organ of the Soviet trade unions, is appointed by and responsible to the General Council of the Trade Unions. The Moscow evening paper is edited by a person appointed by and responsible to the Moscow Soviet. The All-Union Government newspaper, Izvestia, is edited by someone who is appointed by and responsible to the Government of the U.S.S.R. Pravda, the newspaper of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the U.S.S.R., is edited by someone appointed by and responsible to the Central Committee of the Party.
In addition to the myriads of publications of the trade unions, the local Soviets and the All-Union Government, together with the various State departments and the Party, there are a number of further publications—weekly and monthly magazines—which are issued by the State Publishing House, and children’s periodicals, issued by the Children’s Publishing House.
There is a vast variety of publications, published by different organizations. But all these organizations have one feature in common—they are organizations responsible to the people, and not private firms owned by well-to-do individuals and working for profit.
It is only when the nature of the control of the Soviet Press is understood that we see that there is an absolutely fundamental difference between the “freedom of the press” which is guaranteed in the Soviet Constitutions—and always has been—and the “freedom of the press” which exists in Britain at the present time. If we look at the circulation of newspapers in Britain to-day, we find that an overwhelming majority of the daily, weekly, and monthly newspapers and magazines are private property, run for profit, and owned by those who are sufficiently wealthy to own newspapers. The Daily Herald, incidentally, in which a majority of the shares is owned by a joint-stock company, must be included in this category. In contrast with this there stand out the Daily Worker, the publication of the Communist Party, and Reynolds's Newspaper, published by the Co-operative Movement, as the only national newspapers in the country which can even profess to represent working-class organizations. And yet 75 percent of the people of Britain are wage-earners. Then there are the various smaller weeklies and monthlies, among which the trade union and co-operative journals amount to a small proportion of the total. And, if we look at any bookstall in any railway station, or go into any newsagent’s, we again find that the overwhelming majority of the publications for sale are those, not of organizations of the working people, who are 75 percent of the population, but of the small minority, amounting to about 1 percent of the population of Britain, who in effect own the Press of the country.
It is absolutely true, of course, that in Britain, as compared with a Fascist country, working-class organizations have the right to publish their own newspapers and magazines, on condition that they have the necessary funds to do so. To this extent they are better off than they would be under Fascism. But a glance at the average bookstall, or at a list of the newspapers published in this country to-day, is sufficient to show that the freedom of the Press that actually does exist to-day operates in favour of the owners of property and against the organizations of the majority of the population, the wage-earners.
In Soviet Russia, “in the interests of effective freedom of expression for the working people,” the Press was transferred from private hands to the organizations of the workers, peasants, and soldiers. We have surveyed the results of this transfer of the ownership of the Press. And we have seen that the working citizen of the U.S.S.R. enjoys an effective freedom of expression, in two ways, which is not enjoyed by him in other countries. First, the material in the newspapers is what he writes, and not what a privileged few write for his consumption. Secondly, what he writes is effective in the sense that it leads to concrete action being taken against abuses, bad practices, inefficiency, and injustice. Compared with other countries, freedom of expression for the Soviet working citizen is a doubly effective weapon, a two-edged sword against all those who, through malice or laziness, negligence or simple inefficiency, obstruct the rapid raising of the general material and cultural level of the people. The Soviet Press can truly claim to be democratic.
Certain readers may, at this point, interject with the words: “Ah, but is this democratic, so long as there is no opposition Press in the U.S.S.R.?” The answer to this is another question: “What is opposition?” If, by opposition, you mean the public exposure of every land of injustice, abuse, and inefficiency, and of individuals who fail to fulfil their duties, then we see that such criticism exists in the Soviet Press to an extent unequalled anywhere else in the world. But if, on the other hand, you mean the right to express in Soviet newspapers anti-Soviet ideas, or in Soviet trade union newspapers anti-trade union views, then such opposition is not allowed by the editors of the Press of the U.S.S.R. But such “opposition” is not allowed in the official organs of any democratic body anywhere. No newspaper which is the organ of a particular social organization is going to be allowed by its owners to pursue a policy contrary to the interests of the organization that runs it; just as no privately owned paper can go contrary to the will of its proprietor. The Press lord will not allow his paper to oppose his policy, and the trade union journal in Britain will voice the views of the organization that publishes it, not oppose them. To ask that the Soviet Press should oppose the policy of the Soviets is to ask something that is never asked anywhere, of any newspaper, whether privately or democratically owned. It is the absurd request to oppose the policy of its owners instead of expressing that policy. The only serious question is: Who, in the U.S.S.R., are the owners? And the answer is: The people of the U.S.S.R. themselves, through their own organizations.