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But before presenting my own viewpoint on the topie suggested for discussion by the editors of »Praxis«, I would like to stress two things: firstly, my intention to discuss the crisis of contemporary socialism does not include the concept of crisis that has been preached for about half of the century by the prophets of evil, who have been anticipat-ing a break of socialism, and who have based their predictions for the most part on their own aspirations. When I talk about the crisis of socialism, I mean exclusively the crisis in the sense that has been understood and approached by the true fighters for socialism (both theoreticians and practicians), who have been deeply concerned with it, questioning its sources, and who have been willing to help in order to surmount present obstacles, for they have been aware of the fact that a »properly designed futurę belongs to socialism, marxism«.^{1 2 3} Se-condly, I would like to define precisely the meaning of the term crisis in this context. Not long ago, the term crisis, just like the term criti-que, had an »inappropriate« connotation for those who referred to it to criticize society and exposed them to suspicion and even to a ruthless labeling.

Those who strived for a radical social criticism or discussed about the crisis were accused and suspected by press of being nihilists deny-ing anything that was socialist in our society. It was necessary for the bureaucratic oposition toward self-management to reach such dimen-sions as those under which the new conditions of our society could no longer be labelcd - euphemistically - »stagnation«, »crisis of the growth«, etc., and these indietments had eventually faded away in the light of life’s realities.

I use the term crisis therefore in the sense in which it has been recently used by E. Bloch: »Crisis is an old term for a burden, for re-jecting that burden«.*

Talking about the crisis of contemporary and Yugoslav socialism as well I bear in mind the burden, the need for rejecting that burden, which has been haunting, like a nightmare, present day socialism, suffocating its internal strength and fettering its growth.⁴

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1

*    E. Bloch: Introductory Speech addrcsscd to the Summcr School of Koriula,

2

Praxis, 1-2, 1969, p. 4.

3

E. Bloch - Interview givcn to NIN, No. 1031, Octobcr, 11, 1970.

4

*    In contemporary socialism, its theory, different viewpoint have been develop-cd regarding the naturę of obstacles that socialism has had to copc with in the coursc of our century. If we ovcrlook the bureaucratic optimism which is dcaf and blind to the events of socialism, and which ascribes all the difficulties cithcr to somc »objective« causcs or to the activity of somc capitalistic intclligence services, and if we ovcrlook the »disappointment« with socialism on the part of those who have equatcd socialism with stalinism by mistake, we shall notice that diffcrcnccs in viewpoints regarding the character of the crisis of socialism today are apparent rather than real. Those diffcrcnccs may be rcstrictcd to a single question: Is the present crisis of socialism just a mcrc crisis of its theory or does it saturate the whole movcment?

Thus, for instance, Andre Gorz thinks there is no crisis of the Workcrs Move-ment but only a crisis of its theory. R. Garaudy holds that the overall Movement