GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

THEORY OF COMMUNISM 721
throws up a new and different type of man, the domin-
ating, executive type, who has been found in the past to
use the powers with which successful force has endowed him
for ends very different from those which originally led his
followers to embark upon a policy of force. These ends
are normally found to be incompatible with liberty, and
liberty, both during the period of revolution and during
the period which succeeds it, is accordingly eclipsed.
Communists are, as we have seen, ready to admit that
the suppression of liberty would follow the success of their
efforts. They claim, however, that such suppression will
be temporary only. A successful revolution will, they
believe, t>e followed by a period of dictatorship, the
dictatorship of the proletariat, which will firmly establish
the new regime, finally liquidate counter-revolutionary
elements, and defend the revolution from the attacks of
external enemies. During this period the liberty (now
enjoyed by the bourgeois classes, but not by the workers)
to criticize the government must, it is conceded, be with-
drawn, since such liberty would be used by bourgeois
elements to undermine and discredit the revolution. This
from one class in the interests of
withholding of liberty
another, from the vestigial bourgeois in the interests of
the triumphant working class, is, no doubt, regrettable.
But, it is contended, it is no more unjust
than the denial
by bourgeois governments, under the Capitalist regime,
of economic liberty to the depressed workers. In fact, it is
less unjust, since, while the few now deny liberty to the
many, the many will then be withholding liberty from the
ever-diminishing few. When the danger of counter-revolution
is over, and the building-up of a classless community
is complete, the State will, as we have seen, "wither away ",
and the restrictions which have been placed upon liberty
during the dictatorship of the proletariat will disappear.
THAT DICTATORSHIPS TEND BY THEIR NATURE
TO GROW MORE NOT LESS EXTREME. Without doubt-
ing the good faith of those who employ this argument,