The New Nomenklatura
BY Scott Horton - April 14, 2007 -
http://harpers.org/archive/2007/04/horton-nomenkloturaStudents of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four know the mechanisms of control for the totalitarian state. Parallel to the formal structures of the government are the structures of the party, and the dividing line between them is blurred. There is the outer party, membership in which insured a certain degree of privilege and authority but also subjects the member to discipline. The party is not a mass organization in the old bourgeois sense—for Orwell, the party makes up 19% of the population, whereas under the Soviet regime party membership fluctuated between 4 and 10%. It represents an elite of sorts, true-believers who provide the party’s eyes and ears out among the populace. On the other hand, with the perks of party membership comes the bridle of party discipline. A party member must mind his thoughts and must be careful not to stray from the path that the party leadership establishes. Infidelity may well be severely punished.
But a system must be developed to cull the party membership to select the true party elite, those who can be counted upon to demonstrate absolute fidelity to the party and to maintain its secrets. This is the “inner party.” It would never exceed roughly 1% of the population and its members will know that much of the party’s rhetoric is dishonest, generated to insure a supine populace and enhance its authority. But it will continue to articulate this rhetoric never the less. .......
The process of building party cadres and selecting the elite of the inner party was a fundamental challenge for the totalitarian or wannabe totalitarian state. It was developed to its greatest extent first in the fascist states of Europe in the late thirties, and then, in a far more sophisticated form, in the Stalinist era in Russia ..........