Personnel nomenclature in administration (party nomenclature)

PERSONNEL NOMENCLATURE IN ADMINISTRATION (party nomenclature) – a concept used primarily in the → Soviet model of public administration, characterized by the supervision of public administration by the communist party. Nom. at that time was a set of positions whose filling required the consent of the relevant communist party instances. Nom. did not concern only positions in public administration, but also in elective institutions (parliament, national councils), economic (management of state-owned companies) and social life (management of social organisations, universities, trade unions). In real socialism countries, the use of this concept has also become widespread in relation to the group of people performing functions based on nomenclature. In Western political science and sovietology, there appeared theories that recognized the nom. as the reigning class in socialism. The principle of nomenclature was implemented in different periods, applying a combination – in different proportions – two principles defined by Western sovietology as redness (ideology) and expertness (professionalism). Lower positions could be held by non-party candidates, but it was always necessary to gain approval of the local (company) party cell. It is estimated that in the USSR about 3 million jobs in 1982 were covered by the principle of nom., in the PPR in 1980 – 180 000, and in socialist Czechoslovakia in 1970 – 100 000 positions. The concept of party nomenclature is linked to pathological party membership. While in the period of People’s Poland it meant the merging of the party apparatus with the state apparatus by nominating to official positions members of the Polish United Workers’ Party, the Democratic Party and the United People’s Party, in the democratic system this phenomenon may occur in the form of staffing in public administration by persons designated and supported by the currently ruling political party. People employed as a result of political intervention are usually not guided by the interest of public service, they do not have to prove their knowledge, qualifications and skills, but only obedience to the party which gave them the job. (J. Boć). (→ civil service; political neutrality; managerial role of the party towards administration) [D. Długosz, J. Itrich-Drabarek]

Literature: L. Holmes, Politics in the Communist World, Oxford 1989 ■ R. Pichoja, Historia władzy w Związku Radzieckim 1945–1991 [History of power in the Soviet Union 1945-1991], transl. M. Głuszkowski, P. Zemszał, Warszawa 2011 ■ M. Voslensky, Nomenklatura. The Soviet Ruling Class, London 1984.