That those who are responsible should be
discovered, tried, and _punished without mercy_. The petty
bourgeois environment, which we will have to combat persistently
now, shows particularly in the lack of comprehension of the
economic and political connection between famine and unemployment
and the _prevailing dissoluteness in organization and
discipline_--in the firm hold of the view of the small proprietor
that "nothing matters, if only I gain as much as possible."
A characteristic struggle occurred on this basis in connection
with the last decree on railway management, the decree which
granted dictatorial (or "unlimited") power to individual
directors. The conscious (and mostly, probably, unconscious)
representatives of petty bourgeois dissoluteness contended that
the granting of "unlimited" (_i.e._, dictatorial) power to
individuals was a defection from the principle of board
administration, from the democratic and other principles of the
Soviet rule. Some of the Socialist-Revolutionists of the left wing
carried on a plainly demagogic agitation against the decree on
dictatorship, appealing to the evil instincts and to the petty
bourgeois desire for personal gain.
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