The communist party and its structures played a special role in post-war Poland. The party and its apparatus were the highest authority supervising all activities in the state. One of the most important subjects for the party officials were state-owned enterprises and the economic administration. However scholars examining the management ...
(Show more)The communist party and its structures played a special role in post-war Poland. The party and its apparatus were the highest authority supervising all activities in the state. One of the most important subjects for the party officials were state-owned enterprises and the economic administration. However scholars examining the management system in the command economy (not only in Poland) focused mainly on the relations between levels of the economic administration or on the importance of the higher levels of the party-state bureaucracy (e.g. Gregory 2004, Harrison 2011). The importance of the local party apparatus in the supervision of the economy was examined very rarely (e.g. Hough 1969, Lane 1978). Authors in the proposed paper try to fulfill this gap. The objective is to examine methods of a conduct of the local party apparatus and to define and describe major strategies adopted by the local party officials in the supervision of the enterprises. The second objective is to analyze the evolution of the behavior of the local party apparatchiks in their relation with the supervised enterprises during the period of 1950-1980.
Using the categories of the new institutional economics (especially a principal-agent theory), the authors analyze the relations between local party elites and the enterprises, especially the relations with the managers of plants. In the result they point out that members of the local party elite diverged their strategies: one group focused on their career in the party-state structures, the second one tried to minimize costs of their duties in the supervising the local economy. Both groups in their performance used different methods to reach their targets: building networks, supporting the local enterprises on the higher party-state levels, hiding information about the real economic situation from higher authorities, using the nomenklatura system to control the supervised plants etc.
Furthermore, the authors observe the changes in the behavior of the party apparatchiks during entire period: however the main strategies were similar during the thirty years, the evolution of political and social constraints was influencing the strategies of the local political elites. In the time of political crises – for example in 1956-1957 – the activity of the party apparatus declined. On the contrary, in the time of introducing new programs by the central authority the local party officials became more active.
In conclusions authors pointed out that, as a consequence of informal actions and activity of the local party apparatus and changes of political and social constraints, the character of the local party elites’ supervision over enterprises changed in time but the general strategies of the party officials were stable during the entire period.
Gregory P.R. 2004, The Political Economy Of Stalinism. Evidence from the Soviet Secret Archives, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Harrison M. 2011, Forging Success: Soviet Managers and False Accounting, 1943-1962, Journal Of Comparative Economics, vol. XXXIX, 1, 43-64.
Hough J. 1969, The Soviet Prefects: Local Party Organs in Industrial Decision-making, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass.
Lane D. 1978, Politics and Society In the USSR, New York University Press, New York.
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