The Soviet Communist Origins of "Human Resources" and D.I.E Enforcement

HR, or "People Ops", or as it used to be called, "personnel", is easily the most hated of all company departments. If you ask anyone where it came from, you'll get two different answers and a wildly incomplete timeline. One of those is the more palatable: of it developing from personnel departments in the industrialised US.

The simple truth of what we have now, is this bloated hive of commissars, - actively fermenting political radicalism inside the heart of capitalism - , has its roots in the Red Army's OrgBuro. Like all communist theory, it was imported into the humanities lounge as something "novel". Like teaching, It's staffed entirely from the social sciences by people who are mostly unemployable elsewhere; and anyone else from any other department can do the job. These political commissars were called Partorgs.

It may have started in the Carnegie age, but after the Sixties it was developed by the same far-left campus sociology lunatics who gave us "gender theory". Yet again, reason #127636 most universities need to be shut down and fumigated.

Where Does This Odious Phrase Come From?

FarLeftipedia claims it goes back to 1893 and is associated with Frederick Winslow Taylor and "scientific management":

Pioneering economist John R. Commons mentioned "human resource" in his 1893 book "The Distribution of Wealth" but did not elaborate.

But the OED’s earliest published example is from a 1915 issue of the Times of London:

“Side by side with the committees that have been set up to deal with the production of material there should be an organization to take stock of the human resources still at the disposal of the nation.”

The first use of the term “Human Resources” comes from a 1958 report for the Yale Labor and Management Center titled “The Human Resources Function” by sociology professor Edward Wight Bakke: https://oac.cdlib.org/ark:/28722/bk00040130r/

Perhaps most revealing, however, is it was used by the same individual who described his fellow ideologues as "engineers of the human soul", comrade Joseph Stalin.

In 1935, he famously declared, as part of the Second Five Year Plan and Stakhanovite Movement:

Human resources (Cadres [Personnel]) solve everything.

Ref: https://www.google.com/books/edition/Против_фашистского_мр/evMfBwAAQBAJ?hl=en

The USSR adopted a young miner, Alexei Stakhanov, as its model of productivity and efficiency. The Communist Party aimed to encourage and reward workers with the economic status of "Stakhanovite", or a Promethean "superhero" comrade. Not just a New Soviet Man, but a New Soviet Worker.

As with anything concerning the social sciences, extreme skepticism is required when it concerns historicity. These people simply delete or cover up information which might be embarrassing, and revise history so it is favourable to their nutty theories and ideology. It's reasonable to consider any historical account which comes from any social science department as complete bullshit until proven otherwise.

What Was The OrgBuro?

When the Bolsheviks took power in 1917, they were entirely led by the vanguard of Lenin and his friends. They were organised as the Central Committee and the Central Body.

The word "Soviet" simply means "council".

Before Lenin died in 1924, the Party's implementation of government expanded to fill many more entities which served distinct needs. In March 1919, the 8th party congress reinstated the Politburo ("Political Bureau"), which was to be elected by the Central Committee immediately after each party congress, which in turn elected the Central Committee.

The Organizational Bureau (Orgburo) was authorized to make key decisions about organizational work. It supervised the work of local party committees and was empowered to select and place Communist cadres. The functions of the Orgburo and the Politburo were often intertwined, but the Politburo reserved the right to make final decisions.

While the Politburo was mostly preoccupied with strategic planning and general monitoring, the Orgburo helped elaborate tactics by proper distribution of party forces.

The Orgburo was elected in the same manner as the Politburo and the Secretariat by the plenums of the Central Committee and one of the Central Committee secretaries supervised the work of the Orgburo.

The first Orgburo of three members (Vladimirsky, Krestinskij and Sverdlov) was elected on 16 Jan 1919, at the Central Committee meeting. The 8th party congress (8 Mar 1919 - 23 Mar 1919) amended the party charter and set up provisions for election of the Politburo, the Orgburo and the Secretariat. The Central Committee plenum elected the new Orgburo of five members and of one candidate member on 25 Mar 1919.

Buro, is of course, analogous to "bureau" in English, from where we derive the notion of "bureaucracy".

Put simply, the OrgBuro was the USSR's "HR" department and its "People Ops".

What Were PartOrgs, Politruks, and Apparatchiks?

The problem with revolutions is they devour their children - ask the French. The Red Army had a problem in 1917 with factions and internal conflict.

During the ongoing civil war in the years after the revolution, Komissars were deployed to all Red Army units to keep comrades in line with the communists. They had the same rank as unit commanders, and had authority to overrule them.

Their job was to enforce compliance with communist orthodoxy.

Two years later, in 1919, Politruks, or political leaders, were assigned into larger military units.

Members of the Apparat - desk bureaucrats with any political responsibility - were known as Apparatchiks ("agent of the apparatus").  They worked for senior people, Nomenklatura, and all of them for Partmaximum, or a "maximum wage".

In 1933, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union started deploying "party organizers" (each being a PartOrg or Partkom ("party committee" secretary) into important infrastructure organisations: chemical plants, construction zones, collectivised farms, and other areas involving the means and mode of national production.

During the purges a few years later, Commissars were enforced again in the military as "Secondary Commanders".

These are known in China's PLA Red Army as zhengwei (commissars), jiaodaoyuan (directors), and zhidaoyuan (instructors).

Polish intellectual Ryszard Legutko describes how it worked:

At the peak of communist domination, when culture was in the grip of the doctrine called socialist realism, it was officially proclaimed that nothing in the human world would not have an ideological dimension. … Anything that existed, not only materially, but also as thought or a seemingly harmless folly of imagination, could be non-mistakenly identified as correct or incorrrect, bourgeois or proletarian, revolutionary of counterrevolutionary, socialist or antisocialist, materialistic or idealistic, progressive or regressive. This practically put an end to any form of intellectual argumentation. No one argued, but either accused someone of ideological treason or defended himself against such a charge.

"The Demon In Democracy: Totalitarian Temptations in Free Societies"

Because comrade, you may be factually correct, but what you are saying is not ideologically correct, and require re-education.

We all now have come to realise the phrase "social justice" means "communism", but this time from the sociology department for "soft" use in the culture.

"What I want to say today and what I want my countrymen to hear is that as an intellectual I have never wanted anything other than social justice for my country,"

Khieu Samphan, Khmer Rouge communist leader, convicted of committing crimes against humanity in 2014, to Phnom Penh court in 2016

Naturally, all that mass murder, starvation, and top-down authoritarian horror is a little embarrassing. Better to smooth it all over as an all-Western idea about humanitarian labour relations within corporations, and a Utopian endeavours from the campus to realise a "kinder" version of capitalism.

The Wretched Trifecta With "Human Potential" and "Wellness" During The 90s

Two events are key to the history of HR: at Cornell University in 1945, the first academic studies of it appeared as the School of Industrial and Labor Relations. Three years later in 1948, the American Society for Personnel Administration (ASPA) formed in Alexandria, VA, which became known as the Society for Human Resource Management in 1990.

It's old name was simple: personnel.

Its latter name became: labour relations.

In the fifties, when HR was developing into its modern form, the Beat generation and Sixties hippies who became the professors, were students. Dr Halbert L. Dunn, chief of the National Office of Vital Statistics was discussing “high-level wellness” and wrote a same-titled 1961 book.

Around the same time, of course, was the so-called "human potential" movement associated with the Sixties counterculture. In 1955, Glenn Doman and Carl Delacato founded the nutty Institutes for The Achievement of Human Potential (IAHP) in Pennsylvania, which was followed in 1962 by Michael Murphy and Dick Price creating the Esalen Institute in Calfornia.

By the Seventies, quack Dr John Travis had opened an "alternative medicine" clinic named the "Wellness Resource Center" in Mill Valley, California. It's always California, isn't it?

In the UK, 1975 saw the creation of the Stalin-esque Health and Safety Commission (HSC), aka the Robens Committee report, leading to the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, which was renamed to the Health & Safety Executive. At least twenty further laws were created from it.

By 1982, the Journal of Occupational Health started featuring articles that looked at how workplace "wellness" programs could reduce absenteeism and other costs related to illness, as well as a few articles that discussed how fitness centers could potentially attract top talent.

Very useful for lowering those employer insurance premiums.

This convalescent nonsense finally arrived thirty years ago during the nineties with the Clinton-era "diversity" programs, but it was catalysed by the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the need for companies to maintain compliance with its enforcement division,  the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).

By 1990, there was the Americans With Disabilities Act, and Older Workers Benefit Protection Act. With it came "Healthy People 2000" from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, recommending companies provide health benefits.

This unholy mix, of course, like everything in the social sciences, brought with it a whole lexicon of bullshit HR-speak jargon to make something vapid sound sophisticated:

• "Downsizing"
• "Alignment"
• "Reach out"
• "Layoff"
• "Onboarding"
• "Offboarding"
• "Restructuring"
• "Exit interview"
• "Workplace culture" (see "When I Hear the Word 'Culture' I Reach for My Gun" going back to "Schlageter" by Hanns Johst)

The pipeline of psychology to HR was well-established within the decade, with the use of idiotic psychometric tests to determine "unconscious bias" and personality "indicators". Pseudoscientfic nonsense like the Culture Index (https://www.cultureindex.com/) and DiSC (dominance, inducement, submission, and compliance) Assessment (https://www.discprofile.com/what-is-disc).

By 2019, HR had become the "vaccination compliance" (e.g. Lysenkoism) department against all previous ethical boundaries.

As everyone fled these horrific corporations, it led - inevitably - to what Forbes terms the "rise of the Chief Purpose Officer". For you know, your ESG social credit scores, or something.

One way to supercharge your purpose initiatives is to hire a chief purpose officer. Kwasi Mitchell, chief purpose officer of Deloitte, believes this will become an increasingly common job in the future. “More organizations will be naming chief purpose officers or some derivative thereupon. The last time I had my team check, perhaps six or seven months ago, only 10% of Fortune 500 companies had a chief purpose officer.”

https://www.forbes.com/sites/lindsaykohler/2022/02/14/the-rise-of-the-chief-purpose-officer/?sh=47060c0e73d2

Who wants to tell him?

Diversity Antiracism Commissars: You Will Comply And Keep Us On This Jobs Program

There are no shortage of examples documenting the tyranny of the bureaucrats whose jobs are conductible by anyone else, despite them themselves being unemployable elsewhere. Naturally, this stupidity arose on university campuses among staff who are easily bullied.

According to 2015 Bureau of Labor Statistics data, 73% of HR execs eight years ago were women. It had increased to 80% in 2021. It's a girls' club. A rather inconvenient fact and something which must NEVER be "dismantled" to end female supremacy and ensure gender equity. Ever.

These radicalised employables are flowing out into non-jobs being created in the HR departments, whose existence is predicated by regulatory bureaucracy of the kind found in the OrgBuro.

Thankfully, recessions do have some upsides. One of them being HR and D.I.E departments are the first and worst hit by redundancies. Because, of course, their roles are pointless, decadent, and political.

As noted by "Chief Diversity Officer" Julie Coffman at management consulting firm Bain:

At Lyft, which cut 13% of its workforce in early November, one employee on the diversity and inclusion team said most of her department had been cut, including her. Similarly, Twitter, now owned by Elon Musk, saw its DEI team evaporate almost overnight. Twitter's chief diversity officer Dalana Brand resigned within hours of Musk's acquisition, and employees reported that the company has since dissolved its employee resource groups.

https://www.shrm.org/executive/resources/articles/pages/tech-layoffs-hitting-hr-diversity-teams.aspx

Sadly this trend has no hit government employment, as it obviously never does when spending other people's tax money:

The NHS has hired “lived experience” tsars on salaries of up to £115,000, despite ministers vowing a war on waste in the health service. Midlands Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (MPFT) is recruiting a director for lived experience who must have experiences of a life-altering health condition and “significant power imbalances” in their use of health services.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/12/16/nhs-hires-army-lived-experience-tsars-115000-year/

HR and all "social" departments which recruit from the social sciences are a jobs program for the least capable graduates who want to socially climb to a fat salary despite being under qualified for any meaningful role in the market. And a useful cover for corporates who want to fend off criticism on Twitter.

But perhaps the most egregious - yet wonderfully honest - has to come, yet again, from the medical school world. Also dominated by women, also dropping all entry standards, also unionised into socialist OrgBuro shape, and also populated by authoritarians who get on better with cadavers than humans do.

Previously, graduates at the University of Minnesota had to swear bizarre public religious confessions of faith to in which they ditched Hippocrates to "honor Indigenous ways of healing that's been marginalized by Western medicine" and "uproot the legacy of structural violence within the healthcare": https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11348775/Top-doctor-slams-University-Minnesota-medical-school-abandoning-Hippocratic-oath.html

The full oath is amazing. Amazing in how utterly nutty and mental it is.

'Our institution is located on Dakota land. Today many indigenous people throughout the state of Minnesota, including the Dakota and the Ojibwe call the Twin Cities home.

'We also recognize this acknowledgment is not enough,' Englander continued, adding: 'We commit to uprooting the legacy and perpetuation of structural violence deeply embedded within the health care system.

'We recognize inequities built by past and present traumas rooted in white supremacy, colonialism, the gender binary, ableism and all forms of oppression.

'As we enter this profession with opportunity for growth, we commit to promoting a culture of antiracism, listening and amplifying voices for positive change.

'We pledge to honor all indigenous ways of healing that have been historically marginalized by western medicine.

'Knowing that health is intimately connected with our environment, we commit to healing our planet and communities.

'We vow to embrace our role as community members and strive to embody cultural humility.

[snip for sheer stupidity]

'With this devotion, we will champion our personal wellness and bring the best versions of ourselves to our profession.

'We will support one another as we grow as physicians and people,' they said, before concluding: 'We are honored to accept these white coats.

'In light of their legacy as a symbol of power, prestige and dominance, we strive to reclaim their identity as a symbol of responsibility, humility and loving kindness.'

Relevant:

Devotion, n

1
  a  : religious fervor : PIETY
  b : an act of prayer or private worship —usually used in plural
during his morning devotions
  c : a religious exercise or practice other than the regular corporate (see CORPORATE sense 2) worship of a congregation

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/devotion

But finally, back to our new generation of Kommissars.

Kaytlin Reedy-Rogier, who has a Master's degree in "Social Work" is a "co-lead, community engagement" in the "Understanding Systemic Racism Team" of Washington University in St. Louis. Its "Gateway Curriculum" mandates "Health Equity & Justice" lessons. They have published a 'Commitment to Anti-Racism Statement' and trained 21 new 'equity champions' who are a "vital part of our campus-wide initiative for culture change to understand and dismantle systemic racism".

Yes, this is a real university. In receipt of your tax money.

According to the Daily Hate Mail and Fox:

'We are very firm in race being a social construct, and that that has implications for how we practice medicine,' Reedy-Rogier said during the lecture.

'And so when we are asking you all to engage in this, we're really asking you to think about your own identities, and what that means to be anti-racist, which is an active stance in medicine that we know has a really bad racism issue.'

'I have a really hard time being neutral around issues of systemic oppression,' she said.

"And I will not think less of you, nor will I try to fight you or debate you. And in fact, if you try to fight me or debate me, I will shut that s--- down real fast," Reedy-Rogier, who holds a master’s in social work, added.

https://www.foxnews.com/us/washington-u-lecturer-warns-medical-students-not-debate-systemic-oppression-shut-down

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11551901/Washington-Uni-St-Louis-lecturer-says-race-implications-practice-medicine.html

You're also very wrong, what you are saying is utter nonsense, and it's all  indistinguishable from fiction.

Kaytlin's the new generation. She's an authoritarian tyrant; she's open about it, and she's proud of it. It's her religion, and you're going to comply, or fail.

She's not going to fight you or debate you; she's just going to abuse any authority she has been mistakenly given, and shut the shit down. Probably before making a TikTok dance video explaining neo-pronouns and why raping children isn't a big deal.

Comrade Stalin –real name Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili - would be proud.

“[the war] was fought for the abolition of racial exclusiveness, equality of nations and the integrity of their territories, liberation of enslaved nations and restoration of their sovereign rights, the right of every nation to arrange its affairs as it wishes, economic aid to nations that have suffered and assistance to them in attaining their material welfare, restoration of democratic liberties, and destruction of the Hitlerite regime.”

Joseph Stalin