A. I. SOBOLEV. The Communist International and the Topical Problems of the Communist Movement

Defining the historical place of the Comintern, the article stresses that for a quarter of a century this international revolutionary organization stood at the head of the class battles fought by the world proletariat, being invariably in the centre of all progressive developments in the period following the October Revolution. Founded on the initiative of V. I. Lenin who actively shared in its organization and activities, the Comintern came forward as the successor and creative continuer of the glorious traditions of the Communist movement which were established under the leadership of Marx and Engels and which found their direct embodiment in the activity of the Communist League and the First International. The Comintern also inherited all the finest traits of the Second International, taking over everything that was valuable and progressive in its activity.

The article makes a point of stressing that in the conditions obtaining today following the dissolution of the Comintern, new forms of unity of the Communist movement are coming into being. Among the most important principles underlying the interrelations between the Communist parties-principles evolved in the days of the Comintern and further developed in the contemporary period-are proletarian internationalism, complete equality and independence of each individual Communist Party, and fraternal mutual assistance.

L. N. NEZHINSKY. The Sources of Soviet-Hungarian Friendship (the 50th anniversary of the proletarian revolution in Hungary)

The author highlights the historical significance of the proletarian revolution which triumphed in Hungary on March 21, 1919, and which culminated in the establishment of the Hungarian Soviet Republic. Particular attention is devoted by the author to a close analysis of objective facts testifying to the active mutual support binding the working people of Hungary and Soviet Russia throughout the existence of the Hungarian Soviet Republic.

The article dwells on diplomatic contacts between the two republics and on the political and military assistance the working people of Soviet Russia and Soviet Hungary rendered auch other. The author comes to the conclusion that, notwithstanding the difficult military position of Soviet Russia and the Hungarian Soviet Republik as well as the short duration of proletarian dictatorship in Hungary, the relations of close friendship and mutual assistance which existed between Soviet Russia and the Hungarian Soviet Republick from March 21 to August 1,1919, left an indelible imprint in history. Their major significance is vividly reflected in the emergence and development of the new type of international, relations now binding the fraternal contries comprising the socialist world system.

R. Y. AKOPOV. How Agrarian Overpopulation Was Eliminated in the U.S.S.R.

Tsarist Russia was a country where agrarian overpopulation predominated. Its industry was unable to absorb the redundant manpower which could not find employment in the countryside. Agrarian overpopulation continued to prevail in the early period following the victory of the Great October Socialist Revolution. The author shows that only the socialist could cope with the problem of eliminating the overpopulation in the countryside and wiping out unemployment in the towns.

From its very inception the Soviet state, acting in close cooperation with the Communist Party, systematically and consistently implemented farreaching measures

aimed at rendering agrarian overpopulation less acute and somewhat reducing its proportions. The article cites a number of concrete facts showing how the socialist transformation effected in the country's economy, undeviating implementation of the Leninist plan of socialist industrialization and all-round collectivization of agriculture contributed to the solution of this important problem.

J. KAHK. Do We Need a New Historical Science?

Profoundly pessimistic views have of late been expressed by a number of representatives of bourgeois historical science concerning the present-day state of their particular scientific subjects; a veritable campaign has been launched for the creation of a "new" or "quantitative" history. While ^testifying to the collapse of non- Marxist conceptions of history and to the general, state of crisis that has gripped the capitalist system, these sentiments at the same time reflect the dialectical process of development of human knowledge and creative quests. The appearance of Marxism put an end to all attempts at metaphysically counterposing social and natural sciences. Stressing the inadmissibility of mechanically carrying over natural laws to human society, the classics of Marxism-Leninism at the same time successfully applied diverse mathematical and statistical methods in their investigation of social processes. The application of mathematical methods to historical research is practised by the Annales historical school in France; in the recent period it has become characteristic of American historical science to draw extensively on electronic computing devices and to practise fruitful cooperation between historians and sociologists. In the Soviet Union too a measure of experience has been accumulated in the employment of mathematical methods and up-to-date computing techniques in historical research, and efforts are being made to enrich the methodical arsenal of historical science with research methods applied in such contiguous subjects as sociology and social psychology. The striving manifested by bourgeois historical science to discard descriptiveness and to apply precise analytical methods, coupled with spontaneous acceptance of certain fundamental propositions of Marxism, can be interpreted as an obvious advance towards a new quality. In Marxist historical science, which has long renounced objectivist descriptiveness and has always sought to disclose the basic laws and regularities by employing a variety of methods of mathematical and statistical analysis, we can speak merely of the need for systematic perfection of research methods dictated by the general progressive trend of scientific development.

M. G. SEDOV. Pyotr Lavrov and His Place in the Russian Revolutionary Movement

The article briefly describes the life and revolutionary activity of P. L. Lavrov, an outstanding representative of the Russian liberation movement, in the period following the abolition of serfdom, giving a general characteristic of historical literature devoted to this subject.

The author examines the content and component elements of Lavrov's political doctrine and revolutionary activity, analyzing in detail his "Historical Letters" and tracing the causes of their phenomenal success; highlights Lavrov's direct participation in the pitched battles fought by the Communards in Paris, his editorship of the journal Forward, his role in the revolutionary movement of the 1870's and relations with the Executive Committee of the Narodnaya Volya ("People's Will") organization, the significance of Lavrov's public pronouncements against decadent theories and views in the period of the darkest reaction.

The author emphasizes that many works produced by P. L. Lavrov significantly contributed to the cause of revolutionary education of the people. At the same time, it has to be admitted that dialectics was utterly alien to Lavrov's world outlook. At the height of the activity carried on by the Zemlya i Volya ("Land and Freedom") organization, he found himself trailing behind the movement. In the 1880's he failed to understand that the Narodnaya Volya organization was in a state of crisis, nor could he appreciate the historic significance of the Social-Democratic movement in the initial period of its development. But Lavrov's teaching on the role of the individual and the intelligentsia, his views on socialism and his theoretical principles of ethics are distinguished for their profoundly scientific character.

E. Y. FINEBERG. The Establishment of Russo-Japanese Diplomatic and Commercial Relations

According to an opinion current in bourgeois literature, Russia's traditional policy towards Japan has always been aggressive, and hostility prevailed for centuries in relation between the peoples of the two countries. This mendacious thesis figures in manv

pronouncements by official American spokesmen, as is evident from the statement made by the U. S. Ambassador to Japan E. Reischauer in the Senate subcommittee for national security on July 24, 1963. For about 150 years, the speaker alleged, the Japanese have regarded the Russians as their "natural enemies," adding that this feeling of hostility has grown stronger in the twenty-odd years since World War II.

The recently published archive documents an Russia's foreign policy highlight many interesting and hitherto unknown facts concerning the negotiations conducted in Japan by E. V. Putyatin in 1853 - 1858 (instructions of the Russian government to its representatives in Japan and reports by Russian ambassadors). In the opinion of E. Y. Fineberg, the author of this publication, the documents in question expose the falsification of the history of Russo-Japanese relations. Concepts of this nature are intended to comouflage the policy of expansion followed by the United States and other Western Powers in the Far East, notably in Japan.

Y. A. KIZILOV. The Main Prerequisites for the Eastern Slavs' Transition to Fendalism

The article shares the experience gained in the comparative study of the principal variants of class-formation in different natural-historical zones. The concluding stage of primitive society historically represented by the agricultural commune is amenable to "distortion" by the system of slavery and serfdom at the various stages of development. The earliest and crudest form of exploitation known to history-the universal form of appropriating surplus labour performed free of charge for the benefit of landowners - appears among the peoples of the East (commune of the "Asian" or "Eastern" type). At a more advanced stage "distortion" of the forms of primitive society spread to the peoples of Ancient Greece and Rome, where the free citizens of independent cities had already achieved private ownership of their land and the predominance of the slave-owning system in the country's economy.

The process of class-formation assumes an entirely different character among the Germanic and Slav peoples who attained a higher level in reaping the fruits of labour invested in crop cultivation but did not yet reach the stage of distributing land among the members of the commune. Here too the patriarchal slave-owning system played an importatn part in the emergence of privileged elements from the communes, but the scope of this process was rather limited. In ancient Rus the predominance of feudal and early feudal forms of appropriating the surplus product created by the immediate producers in agriculture and associated branches began to manifest itself in the early stages of feudalism on the landed estates and patrimonies owned by the top stratum.

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