The reason for the collapse of the USSR. Engineer's opinion
Collectivism is good
I had a difficult relationship with the Komsomol. Moreover, I wasn’t close to a dissident, I always believed, and now I think that collectivism and subbotniks are good, they just strained the organization and the cliches and hymns pouring from the stands towards Khrushchev, whom the bulk of the Urals did not respect. It got to the point that in a technical school, at a group meeting, the future wife of a friend asked: maybe I'm against the Soviet regime?
I became a Komsomol member at the institute when they said that there was nothing for a non-Komsomol member to do at the physics and technology department. In the Komsomol district committee, the secretary who handed the ticket talked normally with me, agreeing that there were a lot of stupid things, including persecution of rock, Vysotsky. For example, a curator from organs went to the hostel and threatened with punishments for Vysotsky’s song “Fearing counterintelligence, avoiding secular life ...”
And already as a young engineer I was conditionally certified for doubts about the necessity of the Komsomol for people over 20 years old; thank goodness my boss let things go on the brakes.
In general, there was enough formalism and careerism in the Komsomol. And now for the fun part.
My leftist views on the need for a just society both remained and have remained, except that they have become more justified, but many leaders of the Komsomol and the CPSU, as it were softer to say about the chameleons from the Polypov clan, from the series "Shadows disappear at noon" ... And it’s very interesting argue with these baptized former ideological Komsomol communists. Purely supper in the pan.
About party workers
Growing up, seen enough of party workers. The party organizers of the workshops often had really decent communists, which was explained by direct communication with people and being in office usually for no more than a few years. As a rule, experienced and authoritative leaders from chiefs / senior masters of the plots were elected to the party organizers. Naturally, they wanted to go back to production, so the natural and optimal rotation was obtained.
From the science of management: the time spent in one position should not exceed 7 years, otherwise increasing professional deformation changes a person not for the better. The well-known "blurring of the eyes," when absurdity becomes habitual, is one of the worst manifestations of deformation. But the level of secretary of the party organization of an enterprise and higher is another. Often people went there, loving power and themselves in power, also often shoved there according to the principle: on you, God, that I am not worth it. Is a good engineer going to permanent party workers?
According to the order in the district committee of the CPSU, the masters of the production site “shoved” them, they did not like him for arrogance. He returned to the enterprise with an increase and with the acquired habit of pushing people foreheads. Sometimes good engineers / executives also left. A large factory manager, who, due to his integrity, did not suit the director, went to the city committee of the CPSU. And he returned to the enterprise just a good person - he will not do disgust, but the team will not lead him and is no longer a fighter.
The level of the district committee and higher was distinguished by cultivated declines in responsibility and criticism: the higher, the greater the decline. For example, urban successes were marked by the encouragement of the first secretary of the city committee and the chairman of the city executive committee, and omissions were hung up on the city executive committee, because the city committee did not have subordinate housing and communal services, construction departments, the police and other things. And according to criticism, they didn’t know at the factory who, what, and how in the district committee or city committee. If there was a representative of the city committee at party meetings, he usually sat silently and wrote down something. Most communists of the enterprise knew only the name of only the first secretary of the city committee - and that’s it! Who to ask, whom and for what to criticize? At production, two major failures or two major failure to fulfill promises - the head was dismissed, and the party organizer was reprimanded. On the scale of the plant, the directors were removed, but the first secretary of the party committee could have nothing to do with it, if he had previously overlaid with papers.
Communist and his immunity
Do you know that even a simple party card holder possessed some immunity as a communist - instead of tightening his responsibility? A good mechanic friend advised me to join the CPSU. The party card helped him to disown his criminal record - the party meeting of a large unit did not agree to be expelled from the ranks, and the district committee was forced to agree with this decision and he was only a witness in a serious injury court, it was impossible to judge the communist.
How it would be true to leave only ideology behind the party! But the elite of the party wrote the rules of the game and determined for themselves the maximum of rights and the minimum of responsibility, naturally crushing criticism towards them as much as possible. Indeed, Khrushchev did the worst for the country when he pushed the ban to the authorities to even look at the top of the CPSU. And the top began to feel like bars.
Control and criticism are the foundations of good governance. A system without negative feedback, which includes criticism and self-criticism, is either peddling (the largest example is Hitler Germany), or it stops. Similarly, with a system managed by non-specialists (without appropriate education, without experience working with small and large collectives, without satisfaction with the vast majority of the above collectives). In the Soviet Union, the science of management was quite developed, but moved to hell. It required periodic monitoring and immediate action, and the larger the deviation, the more stringent measures. She demanded the creation of a system of criticism as negative feedback. She demanded the selection of leading personnel for specific criteria. But on it the overwhelming part of the top of the CPSU had to be removed.
In general, the collapse of a great country was inevitable.
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