Finally, labour discipline must be based upon the strictest mutual control. Since all the comrades know that a decline in the productivity of labour will involve the ruin of the whole working class, that if we fail to improve in this respect we shall inevitably perish, they must all supervise with a proprietary eye the common task of utilising the life-giving energies of nature. For labour is a struggle; it is a struggle with nature. We have to win the victory over nature; we must transform nature’s crudities into clothing, fuel, and bread. And just as in the forefront of the struggle with the enemies of our class, with the capitalists, the landlords, and the military officers, we measure our successes, and keep a vigilant eye upon all who are afraid, all who are slack, all who are treacherous — so, here, we must control one another mutually. He betrays the workers’ cause who fails now to help in getting the workers’ cart out of the mire; such a one is a blackleg.
It is plain that the work of creating a new labour discipline will be arduous, for it will involve the re-education of the masses. A slave psychology and slavish habits are still deeply ingrained. It is just as it was in the case of the army. When the tsar drove, the soldier moved on; but when it was a case of defending his own cause, the soldier scratched his head and did nothing. Still, we were able to deal with this question of the army because the members of the workers’ vanguard were well aware of what was at stake, and they did all that was necessary. Now we have to achieve similar results in the case of production. The re-education of the workers will be facilitated by the fact that the toiling masses themselves realise (and have been taught by daily experience) that their fate is in their own hands. They had a very good lesson when for a time, in various regions, the Soviet Power was overthrown by the counter-revolution. For instance, in the Urals, in Siberia, etc.