Point of View

During the Chinese cultural revolution ``healthy forces'' paraded enemies of the people through the streets, so that the people could see their shame and the authorities' decisiveness in fighting them and others like them. Wall papers were popular, they depicted the enemies as rats or an especially repulsive insect or reptile. For the time being, Serbian television is only bringing the names of the grocers, butchers and other scoundrels who are violating the government's ``measures of economic and social policy,'' i.e., increasing prices, since they do not wish to work without a profit. Just in case you are not watching the screen at that particular moment, the speaker will read out the names of those who are being prosecuted for various transgressions. Often an official shows up, giving advice and making threats.

The state is proud of its measures and of the way it is making them respected. Directors of companies which are of the greatest interest to the citizens--those supposed to supply them with food--speak of the disaster in the baking industry, the price of milk which fails to cover production expenses, of peasants whose sons don't wish to produce sugar beet because it brings no profits, etc. The citizens can only make a note of the fact that it makes no difference what prices the state determines, since there are no goods, except with those who demand Deutsche Marks, and that hyperinflation is impervious to all these measures, as it was towards the previous ones.

The measures, do, however, represent a proper requiem for the market and a definite setting up of the rule that to earn money is an unpatriotic act, but to make losses is an ultra-patriotic one. They also give the state the chance of showing that it is not only all-seeing and all-powerful, but also all-just. It does not nail to the wall of shame only less important directors and tradesmen, but also important people like the directors of the dailies ``Politika'' and ``Vecernje Novosti,'' who were forced to bring down prices. Those in authority must set an example and behave patriotically, and not ``bring into question the social and moral basis of the program.'' Serbian Information Minister Milivoje Pavlovic took the opportunity of reminding the media that without the ``support of the press, the necessary readiness of citizens, the economy, supervisory organs, chambers of the economy and trade unions on the essential dimensions of the three governments' measures would be missing.'' In this way Pavlovic reintroduced the media's (officially) abandoned role of social-political workers. A groggy people do not need to know that in the final run, the losses incurred by the above mentioned media, will be made up to them from the primary issue, since the state is absolutely aware of the fact that the ``support of the press'' for measures such as these, must be paid for.

It seems that with their immoral denouncing of bakers and milkmen via television, the authorities wish to tell the people several things. First of all--the state, as always in matters such as these--acts in the best interests of the workers, pensioners and others. The boat is being rocked by proven foreign enemies, traitors and the opposition, and of late by yet undiscovered troublemakers in our own ranks--producers and tradesmen (their party affiliation was not disclosed). The long arm of the authorities has probably concluded that the list of enemies has become rather worn out from constant use, so that a new one would be very welcome. At the same time, while the authorities in Serbia are recommending themselves to the people as the leading light at the Geneva peace negotiations, there is no need to go on and on about the mujahedin and the Ustasha as the enemies with whom peace must be made, or the inter-planetary traitors under whose auspices Serbia is negotiating. That is why all grocers fit the bill as the enemy.

In between the lines, the authorities tell the people that they are small and unprotected and that anybody can rob them. But, this is where the state steps in, and takes the people under its protection, preventing milkmen and butchers from letting the people go hungry. The state is prepared to announce their names on the screen of shame. The state has promised its people a monthly survival parcel, so that the people won't notice the new measures, such as the taxation of the lowest wages (if they can be called such), nor the dismissal of technological surplus (what technology?), i.e. of the increasingly numerous population on paid leave. The authorities count on the fact that the people are proud of their shackles and their authorities, and will not stop to think that it is not the butchers who are preventing them from buying meat, but the state. The people will also not stop to wonder why there is such a influx of criminals among businessmen when Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic promised six months ago, and reiterated several times very decidedly, that a total and uncompromising battle against crime would be fought.

For the time being, the decisiveness and capabilities of the state organs are being employed in discovering the perpetrators of the people's misfortunes, embodied in the producers of ready-to wear-clothing, etc. But, if historical criteria are something to go by, the people will soon be seeing enemies behind every stand and cashiers', helping create a climate of denouncement and mistrust characteristic of war, misery and lawlessness. The lowest impulses, hatred, revenge, and envy have always been the best allies of an authority which stays in power by producing affluence for itself and its hangers on, leaving the bones for the rest. Those who call on us to denounce our enemies, in order that they might be properly punished, are above all suspicion. All the more so, as they are prepared to offer some small privilege, such as a coupon for extra flour, or something like that to those who manage to come up with a real enemy. But, the authorities are being cautious, just in case, and are not letting the people waste their time searching for enemies in the wrong places, but are showing them where they can be found, among what nationalities, social layers and professions, including the order in which they should be looked for. At one particular moment the peasants looked a bit suspicious, but they have now receded into the background. The time has come for directors, bosses and managers.

A state in which bakers are proclaimed enemies will not have any bread. Or perhaps, there will be bread, but then the state will be different.