[97] Gorbunov, Lenin i Proletkul't , p. 195.
[98] Biulleten' tretego s"ezda Politprosvetov RSFSR (Moscow, 1922), no. 1, pp. 4–5. See also Lunacharskii's contribution to the proletarian culture debate, "Eshche o voprose proletarskoi kul'ture," Izvestiia TsIK , November 3, 1922, reprinted in Sobranie sochinenii v vos'mi tomakh , by A. V. Lunacharskii, ed. I. I. Anisimov (Moscow, 1967), vol. 7, pp. 288–93.
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By December it was running a deficit. In January 1924 there were only eleven Proletkult organizations left in the entire Soviet Union.[99] The ideological aftershocks of these debates were just as severe. They put all advocates of working-class creativity on the defensive in the early years of the New Economic Policy. But for the Proletkult their effects were even more disruptive. Proletarian creation and artistic expression were now separated from the Proletkult as a social and cultural movement.
The short, simple answer to the question of why the Proletkult declined is obvious: financial hardships were the primary cause. From late 1920 onward the organization experienced one cutback after another, and each one had serious effects on the range and quality of Proletkult activities. But this abbreviated answer only conceals another question. Why did state, party, and local institutions end their financial support? To answer this question, we must unravel a complex tangle of practical and ideological explanations.
At a very basic level the Proletkult's demise seems almost predetermined. Members of the Communist Party's central leadership, and Lenin in particular, distrusted any institution that demanded independence, from trade unions and party factions to opposing political parties. They could hardly be expected to tolerate an organization that not only aspired to autonomy but also claimed a large proletarian following. In addition, Lenin had a special grievance against the organization he associated with Bogdanov. Once he took note of the size and scope of Proletkult activities in the fall of 1920, the organization was fated for radical change.
The end of the Civil War and the introduction of the New Economic Policy only hastened the Proletkult's collapse. The
[99] November and December 1922 meetings of the Proletkult presidium, TsGALI f. 1230, op. 1, d. 9, ll. 3–4; "Sostav Proletkul'tov i rukovodiashchikh organov," TsGALI f. 1230, op. 1, d. 121, l. 51.
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New Economic Policy marked the beginning of fiscal austerity measures for all state organs as the country struggled to recover from the long years of war. In the process most educational and cultural institutions suffered severe cutbacks. But it is also fair to say that the Proletkult was singled out as a special victim. Given the changing needs of the Soviet state and its shrinking assets, the government was hardly willing to finance an organization with dubious cultural accomplishments and a suspect political reputation.
The New Economic Policy also marked a change in the ideological climate of the Soviet Union. It initiated an era in which the radical language of class war was increasingly out of place. The party encouraged alliances between workers and peasants and between workers and the experts needed to rebuild an ailing economy. Of course the Proletkult had included experts and peasants in its activities from the outset; it was never an exclusively proletarian organization. Still, central leaders had always loudly condemned the participation of other social groups. Their class-exclusive pronouncements were part of a general chorus during the Civil War, but now they appeared querulous and even dangerous.
Proletkult leaders continued to portray themselves as stalwart defenders of proletarian culture, but they no longer had a large movement behind them to help them realize their goals. A few thousand participants, no matter what their quality, could hardly evoke the same messianic, enthusiastic appeal as the rambling, chaotic organization of the Civil War years. It did not seem utopian to think that such small numbers could change the ethical and cultural basis of an entire society. Instead it seemed quixotic. The institution that had placed proletarian culture on the revolutionary agenda in 1917 was pushed to the sidelines and was no longer able to claim a formative role in Soviet cultural life.
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