Soviets or Parliamentarism: The Competing Ideas

This article discusses two models of representation that were once competing: Soviets and parliamentarism. The following basic differences between the construction of Soviets and parliamentarism are indicated: Soviets lack the separation of powers, adhere to the principle of "socialist legality", have the imperative mandate of the deputy and a one-party system. It is concluded that, with the initial idea of building a truly national representation through a system of actually working and sovereign representative institutions, the concept of Soviets, in practical implementation, demonstrated the supremacy of government bodies and disregard for the law. Many significant issues of public life were not regulated by Soviet laws, they were often replaced by administrative acts; the laws were not respected in practice. In the conditions of the refusal from a multi-party system and from the right to political opposition in the Soviet state, great attention was paid to ensuring the connection of the population with the mechanism of the state; however, the effectiveness of this interaction is questionable. The imperative nature of the deputy's mandate, appealing in the modernity, is analyzed, but it is not recommended to use it due to the contradiction between the mandate given to the deputy and the competence of the parliament. Deputies cannot execute instructions of a socioeconomic nature that are not in their powers and are not in the competence of the parliament itself Accordingly, it is legally impossible to recall a deputy for non-execution of such instructions. Therefore, it is legitimate to take instructions of socioeconomic content only in the conditions of a planned economy and of the lack of separation of powers, which proved to be inefficient by the Soviet state as an example. Modern examples of the appropriation by the legislative bodies of executive and administrative powers are considered in the article as contradicting the law. In general, the article proposes not to deviate from the path chosen for the establishment of parliamentarism and not to support the idea of using the Soviet representative system. At the same time, there is a positive importance of the competition of the concepts of Soviets and parliamentarism, which is expressed in the democratization of the institutions of bourgeois parliamentarism and the activation of social policy in many countries.