Entangled Paths Toward Modernity: Contextualizing Socialism and Nationalism in the Balkans

17. How to make sense of broad socialism

17. How to Make Sense of Broad Socialism Tracing the different ideological layers and their eclectic amalgamation in the discourse of the adherents of Broad Socialism seems a much more fruitful exercise than simply verifying Sakŭzov’s revisionism. The intellectuals that came gradually to form this group derived their ideas from a variety of thinkers, from which they picked and molded whatever they deemed appropriate. Despite the conspicuous influence of Bernstein, they incorporated also Lassalle, David, the neo-Kantians, the German Agrarian Reformists, populist themes, etc. It is precisely this aspect of ideological independence of the “broad heresy” that constitutes its most fascinating aspect, at least in its initial fermentation period (1900–1903). The Broad “revolt” crystallized out of a process of ideological experimentation, as an intense soul-searching for more suitable answers to the problems of Bulgarian society. It arose out of the contradictions in the application of theory and dilemmas springing out of the confrontation with everyday political practice. In contrast to their Greek pendant, the “Sociologists” (see subsequent chapter), who entered the political arena already equipped with reformatory socialism as part of their academic baggage, the Broads arrived gradually at reformatory socialism through impasses on the level of political practice and after a quasi ten-year involvement with basis politics. The Broads contested the extremities of the “revolutionary” maximalist phraseology for several reasons. First, because it alienated several important segments of the population. The Agrarians showed a persistent aversion against being labeled as petty-bourgeois and would not discuss the issue of private property, while the handicrafts were still a professional element to be strongly reckoned with. And second, because it did not provide for any concrete temporal measures to address the concrete problems of social reality in Bulgaria. It was out of these dilemmas that Broad socialism was born, for it enabled intellectuals to work with the social material at hand and ease the contradictions arising from the discrepancy between the introduction of socialism as an ideology of modernity epitomizing the universality of capitalist development and the 274 IV. Caught up in the Contradictions of Modernity local conditions of “backwardness.” The contradictions they were up against were not negligent. Contrary to theoretical expectations, the peasant was not withering away; instead he chose to become vocal and political. If the Bulgarian Social Democrats intended to be strictly a class party, growing proportionately to the growth of the proletarian class (the orthodox scenario), they could as well content themselves with an intellectual salon. If, on the contrary, they decided to become a broad workers’ party, they would have to address seriously the social strata in question (artisans, peasants, etc.). If the Bulgarian Social Democrats were to take the issue of agrarian agitation seriously, they could not avoid realizing that they were entering into contradictions with official ideology. Equally, as Social Democrats, they could not sustain a discourse emphasizing the necessity for capitalistic growth, while criticizing capitalism and its effects at the same time.205 Last, but not least, social democracy was a theory looking into the future, predicting the collapse of capitalism and the victory of the proletariat. The Bulgarian Social Democrats, however, had to live in the present, a present that seemed not only very remote from the prospect of revolution, but from the development of industrial capitalism proper. Revisionism allowed for a compromise and a synthesis of all these complicated and contradictory roles. Instead of waiting for the verification of the inevitable scenario,­ revisionism206 allowed for a critique of the bourgeois order, while still reserving a prominent role for the working class. It also provided for intermediate and immediate solutions by emphasizing the significance of legalistic struggle, the value of constitutionalism, the importance of cooperation, the step-by-step amelioration of social and economic conditions: all elements that according to Socialists from “backward” countries required immediate application. More importantly, it allowed for the tackling of the most contradictory role mentioned above: the possibility of combining social critique with the imperative of economic growth. From a comparative perspective, if populism (as in the case of the Serbian Radicals in the 1870s) was a straightforward cancellation , or skipping over, of a whole period of modernization, and if social democracy was the verification of one and inescapable modernization process, then revisionism was something in-between. By questioning the inevitable process of capitalistic development, it provided space for 275 17. How to Make Sense of Broad Socialism...