50 HUMAN I4FE IN RUSSIA
or, as the latest expression is, to funkzionalka and bureaucracy.
On this point the entire Russian press is at one, though only
in admitting details.1
The struggle carried out by the Government and the press
and its entire staff of correspondents for a renewal of the
economic apparatus and against the bureaucratic system, the
general mismanagement and the omnipotence of quite irre-
sponsible departments and functionaries, is nowadays of an
almost heroic character. Naturally the main struggle is in the
most important sphere—that of agriculture. The open criticism
of the agricultural institutions which began with Stalin's
remarks at the party congress, and the call for a complete
reorganization, grows louder and stronger from day to day.
A leading article in Izvestia quotes Stalin's words that
nine-tenths of the agricultural breakdowns were due to
1 The expressions, some of them newly coined, used by the Moscow
rulers and the press in their criticism of existing conditions, are very instruc-
tive for anyone acquainted with Russian. I quote some of the commonest.
Funkzionalka is used to describe the inefficiency of irresponsible and
uninterested officials of all departments, both at Moscow and in the pro-
vinces. Bohologia is the word coined to chastise the talking and phrase-
making instead of acting vigorously, so common among Soviet officials.
It is derived from boltatj (gossip). Kantselyastchina is a very common
expression used to signify bureaucratic officialdom. Otschkojtirateli^ or
people who supply others with coloured spectacles, are the officials who
throw dust in the eyes of their superiors and the public as regards their
own performances in the fulfilment of the economic plans. The word
lyshentsy covers what may rightly be called the most unfortunate category
—the disfranchised members of the former privileged classes. They belong,
in so far as they survive, to those elements of the population who were
recently deprived of their passports and who belong to the lowest group of the
various rationing categories. To these hypermodern expressions a few old
terms may be added which have been given an up-to-date meaning. Thus
nakhlebniki means people who have newly entered the collective farms
who constitute a burden in the distribution of the available bread (khleb).
The prikhlebateli (parasites) are a similar category. The new use of this
old Russian word in Soviet terminology throws light upon the real issue in
the struggle for bread. Pnkhlebateli are not, as formerly, idlers who are a
burden on others because of their idleness, but whole categories of hard-
working men, such as country doctors, veterinaries and country-dwellers
following the most varied professions, who do not form part of the labour
corps of the collective farms and are consequently regarded by Moscow as
a burden, or even as "superfluous mouths" to be eliminated as far as possible.