Communism without revolution

[SecondLife]

Hi,
I think communism (I think here socialism,ruled by only Communist Party) withou revolution is also possible, with legal elections. Of course communist or socialist parties can be coexisted also with right-side parties, but later this becomes anyway bad idea. If state flip-flops between nationalization and privatization, then soon this state simple make collapse. But possible is to put communist-party into power with elections and later eliminate other parties. But this don't means dictatorship, because different interest groups can remain inside the same one party.

[Sam_b]

This is reformism, and has no place in my opinion in leftists thought. For the working class to try and play by the rules of the bourgeoisie by using its electoral system and its method of government it would be doomed to fail. The point is that these institutions are so corrupt, so weighted in the favour of the ruling class, so bureaucratic that there is no way to save them and give them useful purpose: they must be overthrown.

[Stranger Than Paradise]

Definitely agree with what Sam B is saying. We cannot bring this about whilst we are still adhering to bourgeois justice. This will always fail.

[Sam_b]

That isn't to say, however, that we can't in our present state stand for elections, as they provide a useful platform for agitation and propoganda. But will real change come through such a parliament? No.

[SecondLife]

This is reformism, and has no place in my opinion in leftists thought. For the working class to try and play by the rules of the bourgeoisie by using its electoral system and its method of government it would be doomed to fail. The point is that these institutions are so corrupt, so weighted in the favour of the ruling class, so bureaucratic that there is no way to save them and give them useful purpose: they must be overthrown.

But in history (especially in Latin-America, also in India etc) exactly in this way left-wing becomes to power. Or are you see some other chance? Revolution? :) Not every day isn't revolution day and this don't happen just as. Protests? Demonstrations? Are they ever helped something? If there exist some other chance then why you or someone wasn't used it already?

[Sam_b]

But in history (especially in Latin-America, also in India etc) exactly in this way left-wing becomes to power

You mean like the CPI(ML) in India that is in bed with big business? The fact is that none of these examples actually mean anything: they still support capitalism. It is impossible to have an anticapitalist state within a sea of capitalism because then these states are forced to go along with capitalism's game to survive. But then why are you putting so much emphasis on states anyway: surely this position is inconsistent with communism and the idea of a classless and stateless society?

For someone who has said they've been a member of the CP for ten years I reccommend you read up on some basic leftist theory.

[Stranger Than Paradise]

That isn't to say, however, that we can't in our present state stand for elections, as they provide a useful platform for agitation and propoganda. But will real change come through such a parliament? No.

But by participating in these governments we are participating in an illegitimate power structure which we wish to see the end of, seems strange.

[Sam_b]

I didn't say anything about forming governments, thats an assumption on your part. The role of the provisional government in Russia was, as you put it, an 'illegitimate power structure', yet the Bolsheviks participated in it and even defended it at the time of the Kornilov revolt.

[SecondLife]

You mean like the CPI(ML) in India that is in bed with big business?


No I mean Indian National Congress and Indira Gandhi. But more interseting was in Chile, Argentina and Brazil, also the same way: left-wing was elected by people and then left-wing eliminater right-wing. Altough this ends badly - military fasists become soon into power. But if military-fasists wasn't gain power then it would be perfect strategy.

[Stranger Than Paradise]

I didn't say anything about forming governments, thats an assumption on your part. The role of the provisional government in Russia was, as you put it, an 'illegitimate power structure', yet the Bolsheviks participated in it and even defended it at the time of the Kornilov revolt.

I never said you wanted to form a government. I said that by participating in the bourgeois government we are adhering to a power structure which we feel is illegitimate. I hardly think the Bolsheviks are a great example of true Communism in action.

[InTheMatterOfBoots]

Hi,
I think communism (I think here socialism,ruled by only Communist Party) withou revolution is also possible, with legal elections. Of course communist or socialist parties can be coexisted also with right-side parties, but later this becomes anyway bad idea. If state flip-flops between nationalization and privatization, then soon this state simple make collapse. But possible is to put communist-party into power with elections and later eliminate other parties. But this don't means dictatorship, because different interest groups can remain inside the same one party.

It depends whether you believe communism to mean the rule of a Communist Party (as many Leninists do) or the self-management of the working class and the regulation of the economy through free communes. You can achieve the former without making any fundamental changes to the economy (as Nepal showed), for the latter the bourgeoisie will attempt to defend their material power (by force if necessary) and will need a revolution. If your only aim is to place the control of the economy in the hands of state bureaucrats (as is what happens with nationalization) then this can in some circumstances be achieved through legal elections. But this is not communism.

[Sam_b]

No I mean Indian National Congress and Indira Gandhi. But more interseting was in Chile, Argentina and Brazil, also the same way: left-wing was elected by people and then left-wing eliminater right-wing. Altough this ends badly - military fasists become soon into power. But if military-fasists wasn't gain power then it would be perfect strategy.

Congress weren't, and aren't, a socialist party.

[SecondLife]

Congress weren't, and aren't, a socialist party.
But Indira Gandhi was socialist and she come to power through elections.
But what difference this means at all? Elections, not-elections. This is only bulshit how exactly to give result. The most important mission is nationalization nad saving this from reversion. Even "Year Zero" is better than private ownership. :D

[Sam_b]

But Indira Gandhi was socialist and she come to power through elections

Bollocks. In what way? I didn't see her calling for democratic worker's control, did you? And when Congress did retain power through that time, what policies were socialist about it?

[SecondLife]

Bollocks. In what way? I didn't see her calling for democratic worker's control, did you? And when Congress did retain power through that time, what policies were socialist about it?

She eliminates political competitors after election. Without this step nationalization isn't possible at all. Nobody want's to give private ownership without fight. What means "democratic workers"? Democracy is pecksniffian fiction. In reality workers vote only political structures those have more money to make better campaign. This also means capital accumulation, yes, this accumulation alse reflect in elections.
Workers aren't as enlightened as you. Simple, if you havent power to make revolution, then you have choice to just buy socialism. Exactly as capitalism was done. Finally there isn't differences.

[Sam_b]

I know this is Learning, but i'll be frank. That analysis is garbage, which shows no understanding of socialism or Democratic Worker's Control in the slightest. Without workers having the means of production there is no socialism. Nationalisation of industry means nothing unless it is workers that have the control of the means of production.

Please, go and read some articles about basic communist thought before making such absurd assumptions about what socialism is. Have you even read the Communist Manifesto? I would have hoped that someone who is a member of the Communist Party would have at least a basic understanding of this.

[SecondLife]

Please, go and read some articles about basic communist thought before making such absurd assumptions about what socialism is.

Regardless that you don't like this, socialism was any system where industry was nationalised, also USSR with Stalin direction, also China with Mao direction. If you dont like this, this dont mean that it wasn't socialism. Yes, it wasn't communism.

p.s. you don't need to tell me what is socialism or communism. I am enough old and lived in USSR years, learned communism in university. You only in UK with theory and with no practice.

[Invincible Summer]

p.s. you don't need to tell me what is socialism or communism. I am enough old and lived in USSR years, learned communism in university. You only in UK with theory and with no practice.


You do know that the USSR wasn't communist... right?

[Sam_b]

You only in UK with theory and with no practice.

I currently reside in Prague and am involved with several anticapitalist organisations over here. You, thankfully, know nothing about me so don't comment on what you don't know. As the above poster says, the system in the USSR was not communist: it was a bureaucratic top-down state capitalist system, You cannot have communism in a sea of capitalism.

Any more evidence that Indhira Gandhi and the INC was socialist? All you have is a very shaky, nay authoritarian and not socialist, assertion that she destroyed political opposition. What about the INC and Mohandas Gandhi getting into bed with British imperialism at the time of the party's formation?

[Blackscare]

I didn't say anything about forming governments, thats an assumption on your part. The role of the provisional government in Russia was, as you put it, an 'illegitimate power structure', yet the Bolsheviks participated in it and even defended it at the time of the Kornilov revolt.


Just wanted to say that I think it's more of a basic issue than simply forming a government. It's pretty apparent that a really radical left party wouldn't actually make it far in traditional electoral politics without becoming something other than well... radically left. But by participating at all, even without the hope of actually forming a government, you endorse or legitimize the electoral process, rather than undermine it.

Unless you want to do what a kid at my school did on class election day; stand up and announce that the elections are a pointless sham (but that people should vote for you anyway, just to disrupt things). That's a position some might legitimately hold. I'd doubt the efficacy of that myself.


Also, to the OP: Where have the "socialist" reformers gotten Western Europe in the time they've been active? Where has there been actual progress towards communist ideals? You know, worker's control, expropriation of means of production, that whole deal? Where has reformism ever done anything other than draw a smiley face over a fundamentally exploitative system?

[Comrade Anarchist]

Some times when revolution can not happen i agree with emma goldman that we should fight for all we can get. But at the end of the Pure Communism can not be reached without revolution because of the capitalists control of the worlds governments

[teenagebricks]

If capitalists didn't control the government it would a be a different story. Hypothetically, I think that even the purest socialist system is possible without an uprising, if a socialist government is democratically elected, they could oversee the fundamental changes and eventually dissolve. Of course, it's just a matter of opinion, nobody can really know until someone actually goes ahead and does it.

[SecondLife]

The world isn't long time the same as before. Marxism, Leninism, anarchism etc, all previous theories don't work anymore. The world is more brutal. Question isn't anymore about how to make normal society (like communism), now this isn't possible at all, but instead how to stop capital accumulation, how to fight with cancerous to stay alive at all.
USSR wasn't communist or perfect society, but it was anyway socialism and its influence was worldwide. When it collapses, this influence was also worldwide. This collapse destroys not only half of the world, but also ideology itself. But this is not the end, because human exertions never ends.

[Blackscare]

The world isn't long time the same as before. Marxism, Leninism, anarchism etc, all previous theories don't work anymore. The world is more brutal.


I don't think it's correct to say the world is more brutal now.

The horrors of the industrial revolution, two world wars, imperialist anti-communist wars in Vietnam and elsewhere, brutal suppression of communists in Germany and many other countries (that dwarf the occasional case of brutality at a demo), the Father Gapon affair, Haymarket, etc have all been roadblocks to revolution before, and didn't stop a lot of struggles from being carried out. The past was much more brutal than present circumstances.

In fact I think it's fair to say that if anything we lack the courage of our comrades from centuries past.

[Cynical Observer]

i disagree with the notion that there must be a revolution, but i don't think reformism will get us anywhere.

I think if small self-sufficient communes run by anarchist principles are set up they will attract more and more support eventually garnering enough popular support to directly challenge capitalism as obsolete.

[Oktyabr]

Communism without revolution is impossible. There is no way to liberate the proletariat from the chains of the bourgeois without violence, or at least mass protesting.

Politics are a very contagious game: if you play by the rules of your enemy, you risk falling to the very same faults of his that you despise. Sorry if that last statement wasn't very clear.

[InTheMatterOfBoots]

I think if small self-sufficient communes run by anarchist principles are set up they will attract more and more support eventually garnering enough popular support to directly challenge capitalism as obsolete.

Yes but this is ignoring the fact that:

a) If these bodies start to represent a political threat they will be met with political oppostion in the form of criminalisation by the state and demonisation by the corporate media (thereby eroding any chance of futher popular support).

b) If they represent a revolutionary threat (i.e. have the capability of challenging existing property relations) they will be met with violent repression.

c) If they are not directly challenged they will be assaulted through co-option into the existing system of capitalist management and become another mechanism for subduing and "managing" class struggle.

You can't ignore the fact that whatever we set up it will be under conditions of class war and that the bourgeois class is better organised, more agressive and has greater material resources than us. It has historically done everything in its power to destroy any challenge to its position. I see no reason why this will change in the future.

[Cynical Observer]

Yes but this is ignoring the fact that:

a) If these bodies start to represent a political threat they will be met with political oppostion in the form of criminalisation by the state and demonisation by the corporate media (thereby eroding any chance of futher popular support).

b) If they represent a revolutionary threat (i.e. have the capability of challenging existing property relations) they will be met with violent repression.

c) If they are not directly challenged they will be assaulted through co-option into the existing system of capitalist management and become another mechanism for subduing and "managing" class struggle.

You can't ignore the fact that whatever we set up it will be under conditions of class war and that the bourgeois class is better organised, more agressive and has greater material resources than us. It has historically done everything in its power to destroy any challenge to its position. I see no reason why this will change in the future.

if the first wave of these communes is demonized and put down by force all the better! it will help us spread the idea that the government is a tool for oppression and is inhibiting our freedoms, if the communes are able to function even for a short time and then are completely non-violent when they are overrun we will garner a huge amount of support as we will be the martyrs! I fully realize that we don't have the resources to survive very long against capitalism but most governments are highly reactionary, they will destroy us before we fail ourselves and the 2nd time around we will have more support and more resources. the only real danger is co-option which can be averted by sticking to our principles, and through discipline, any other attack by the government on us will only add fuel to the fire

[teenagebricks]

I think too many people want a revolution for the sake of having a revolution, a lot of comrades come out with things like "the revolution must be fronted by the proletariat", or "armed struggle is the only way to achieve real change for the workers", as if they are trying to fulfill some ancient prophecy. It just seems like a lot of people advocate revolution for purely symbolic reasons, I'm probably missing something, but whatever happened to doing what's best to fit the current situation? The times they are a changin', we should change with them.

[Cynical Observer]

I think too many people want a revolution for the sake of having a revolution, a lot of comrades come out with things like "the revolution must be fronted by the proletariat", or "armed struggle is the only way to achieve real change for the workers", as if they are trying to fulfill some ancient prophecy. It just seems like a lot of people advocate revolution for purely symbolic reasons, I'm probably missing something, but whatever happened to doing what's best to fit the current situation? The times they are a changin', we should change with them.

that's all well and good if u want ur great grandchildren to experience communism, but if u want to see it within our lifetime we need to begin undermining the current system. We don't want a revolution just for revolution's sake we want a revolution in order to create a better world, we don't want to "change with the times" or "fit the current situation" we want the times and the situation to change according to our needs, and we are going to change them through revolution

[teenagebricks]

Indeed, I fully support revolution, and I'm sure you do too, but I think too many people support it for the wrong reasons is all. It seems that many leftists shun non revolutionary methods even when revolution isn't convenient, Venezuela, for example.

[Cynical Observer]

Indeed, I fully support revolution, and I'm sure you do too, but I think too many people support it for the wrong reasons is all. It seems that many leftists shun non revolutionary methods even when revolution isn't convenient, Venezuela, for example.

I agree that they are misguided but they will be useful later when we need to present a strong front, so let them persist in their radicalism for now. and actually i believe Venezuela is a prime place for revolution, a completely non-violent one of course seeing how the government is slightly beneficial there, but the state has already laid the ground-work for communism in Venezuela all that's left to complete the marxian cycle is complete nationalization and then abolition of the, then unnecessary, state. Venezuela is coming close to a peaceful transition to anarchism i believe.

although i think i may have misunderstood ur post

[JimmyJazz]

I think communism (I think here socialism,ruled by only Communist Party) withou revolution is also possible, with legal elections. Of course communist or socialist parties can be coexisted also with right-side parties, but later this becomes anyway bad idea. If state flip-flops between nationalization and privatization, then soon this state simple make collapse. But possible is to put communist-party into power with elections and later eliminate other parties. But this don't means dictatorship, because different interest groups can remain inside the same one party.

I would say that you don't quite appreciate how inherently revolutionary socialism is, even just as an economic system.

It entails expropriating the property of a bunch of capitalists. They aren't going to stand for that just because the people voted for it. If you let them (i.e., if you don't stop them), they'll willingly abandon democracy for fascism, or an anti-working class police state (think Pinochet's Chile,).

You can try to vote it in, but when you do, either you'll carry it through as a revolution or you'll lose to the bourgeois counterrevolution (using the army to crush the workers, probably).

I agree that in an ideal world you'd get some kind of an electoral majority in the bourgeois elections before carrying through the revolution, in order to prove once and for all to everyone that the socialist changes you are making are legitimate and popular. But after that, you will need to carry through the revolution or lose to the counterrevolution.

Here's what Engels had to say about it:


And lastly, the possessing class rules directly through the medium of universal suffrage. As long as the oppressed class, in our case, therefore, the proletariat, is not yet ripe to emancipate itself, it will in its majority regard the existing order of society as the only one possible and, politically, will form the tail of the capitalist class, its extreme Left wing. To the extent, however, that this class matures for its self-emancipation, it constitutes itself as its own party and elects its own representatives, and not those of the capitalists. Thus, universal suffrage is the gauge of the maturity of the working class. It cannot and never will be anything more, in the present-day state; but that is sufficient. On the day the thermometer of universal suffrage registers boiling point among the workers, both they and the capitalists will know what to do.However, history shows that even Engels was a bit naive on this.

In reality, waiting around to get a majority in the regular elections is rarely possible in a revolutionary moment, which can pass very quickly and leave you in the dust if you do not decisively act on it. Also, history shows that capitalist governments and privately-owned media will never, ever accept socialist changes in any country (unfortunately, they are more grounded in the importance of international class solidarity than the working class seems to be!), and there's really nothing you can do that they won't either ignore it or twist it to try and discredit you in any way possible.

For instance, say you're in a moment of revolutionary upsurge, and you can't sit around and wait for the next four-year election cycle, so you seize the state apparatus and hold emergency/irregular elections. That would work, right? And if you had a big turnout and won a huge majority, everyone would accept your regime as totally legitimate?

Well, that is exactly what the Bolsheviks did, in November 1917.

Harvard historian Richard Pipes:


The Bolsheviks honored their pledge to hold elections for the [Constituent] Assembly; these took place in Petrograd on November 12-14, and in the rest of the country in the second half of the month. Eligible, according to the criteria established by the defunct Provisional Government, were all male and female citizens twenty years of age and over; for men in uniform, the voting age was lowered to eighteen. The turnout was impressive: in Petrograd and Moscow some 70 percent of those eligible went to the polls, and in some rural areas the figure reached 100 percent. According to the most reliable estimate, 44.4 million persons cast ballots. On December 1, Lenin declared: "If one views the Constituent Assembly apart from the conditions of the class struggle which verges on civil war, then, as of now, we know of no institution which more perfectly expresses the will of the people.

The results of the voting cannot be precisely determined because of the large number of parties involved and because in many localities they formed electoral blocs; in Petrograd alone, nineteen parties competed. The largest number of votes--17.9 million, or 40.4 percent--went to the Socialists-Revolutionaries. Next came the Bolsheviks--with 10.6 million, or 24.0 percent. The Mensheviks ans Left SRs were all but wiped out. The Constitutional-Democrats, as the most important nonsocialist party running, garnered the bulk of the nonsocialist vote (2.1 million, or 4.7 percent).

The biggest nonsocialist party got less than 5% of the vote. Crazy, eh? I don't know of many elections in history that were won by such a landslide.

Richard Pipes is literally a raving anti-communist, by the way, so the fact that even he admits all this is significant.

But the capitalist governments and media will never teach this history. How many people here learned in school that socialism was fairly elected--and by an overwhelming majority--in Russia? I know I didn't. The masses will never learn this stuff from the capitalist-owned and pro-capitalist sources that dominate society.

That's why Engels was a bit naive about how it works out in practice.

Oh, and btw: did you notice that Russian women were allowed to take part in the vote? This is 1917--two years before American "democracy" extended the vote to women. :p

[SecondLife]

I would say that you don't quite appreciate how inherently revolutionary socialism is, even just as an economic system.

It entails expropriating the property of a bunch of capitalists. They aren't going to stand for that just because the people voted for it. If you let them (i.e., if you don't stop them), they'll willingly abandon democracy for fascism, or an anti-working class police state (think Pinochet's Chile,).

You can try to vote it in, but when you do, either you'll carry it through as a revolution or you'll lose to the bourgeois counterrevolution (using the army to crush the workers, probably).


But exaxtly this I was meant. The first step must not be revolution, but just elections. Even better if you dont propagate communism at all in this step. You must gather votes and support. You must endure as long as you can. In no case start nationalization, just raise taxes to paralyse private companies. You must be very vigilant to descry the right moment before fasists (really they are just simple capitalists) starts to eliminate you (like happens in Chile,Argentina or Brazil where it was too late) physically or legally (no difference)
In right moment you must eliminate fasists,other political parties,elections and start nationalisation. But this is not revolution, because this step is only destruction private ownership. Normal society organisation becomes second step. In revolution instead both steps are together, but revolution is nowadays too utopian.

[mikelepore]

This is reformism, and has no place in my opinion in leftists thought. For the working class to try and play by the rules of the bourgeoisie by using its electoral system and its method of government it would be doomed to fail. The point is that these institutions are so corrupt, so weighted in the favour of the ruling class, so bureaucratic that there is no way to save them and give them useful purpose: they must be overthrown.

I don't know of any evidence to justify describing the "electoral system" in that way.

All evidence point to the conclusion that the only thing malfunctioning in the area of holding elections is that the left, after almost 200 years of trying, still hasn't been able to persuade most of the the working class to abandon their pro-capitalist views. The elections themselves operate just fine. The election results accurately reflect what most members of the working class, when asked, say that they want. Most workers say that they want capitalism, and, having said that, they get it.

Opposition to a revolutionary use of the political process is a rationalization to avoid facing an uncomfortable truth. Religious people can't face the truth about not having an eternal soul, and so they argue that religious ideas "must be true." Similarly, many on the left can't face the truth that no one has ever found an effective way to persuade most members of the working class to recognize their oppression and exploitation for what it is, and to stop cheering and voting for capitalist parties, and this truth is so hard to bear that some on the left say that it's the method of holding elections that must be broken.

The truth is, the method of holding elections is a triumphant achievement of civilization, and it took thousands of years of struggle for humanity to win it. It's the strongest weapon that a proletarian revolution has -- a method in which all you have to do is convince the oppressed people to stop consenting to their oppression and then that oppression would immediately be discontinued. To deplore the use of elections is to say that the oppressed people shouldn't even consulted on the question; fearing that they might not be ready to give the right answer, don't even ask them.

Instead, find some way to get the working class to _want_ a new system of society. Do that, and then the election results will immediately reflect it.

Besides that, all notions of socialist revolution without going through the electoral process are impossible anyway. Without using the ballot to adopt socialism as a legal policy, the only other way to establish socialism would be for the working class to engage in a shootout with millions of police and soldiers who vastly outgun them, resulting in the worst holocaust in recorded history, the cities turned into rivers of blood and mountains of dead bodies. The working class as a whole will always realize that such a massacre would occur without use of the political process, and therefore, leftists who belittle the use of the electoral process are only causing more members of the working class to become conservatives, and further postponing the day of revolution.

[JimmyJazz]

Revleft.com

[SecondLife]

Instead, find some way to get the working class to _want_ a new system of society. Do that, and then the election results will immediately reflect it.

Working class now don't want new system, they dont want any society at all, they want only money. But they start to _want_ new system as soon as money ends. Then give them money and start nationalisation. :D
But even after that they still dont interested about society and still want only money. Because human is not jet social creature. Classical revolution is possible only in slavery society.


Besides that, all notions of socialist revolution without going through the electoral process are impossible anyway.

But why this "socialist revolution" is so important at all. Sounds like just capitalists propagate "revolution" to eliminate all others methods, because capitalists believe also that revolution isn't possible. :D
Is see that more important is simple to destroy private ownership. Even when counter-revolution wins, restart (or format"C") was done and capital accumulation (also power accumulation) isn't as big problem anymore, to start from beginning (why not at all from stone age) and in right (I mean left) direction.
p.s. but I can be also wrong of course, just my own viewpoint.

[Hondo]

"Communism without revolutiion" i want to believe that you mean communism through the electoral rout. We can archieve socialim through that rout - but its not a guaranteed path. Remember we need a total change (Revolution) of the State. To be alliened with liberation movements can be a serious threat to Socialism, because at times the Party gets too comfortable with Liberals (and Capitalists Tendancies with) and forget to persue the struggle to socialism. Like the case of RSA.

[ZeroNowhere]

Hi,
I think communism (I think here socialism,ruled by only Communist Party) withou revolution is also possible, with legal elections. Of course communist or socialist parties can be coexisted also with right-side parties, but later this becomes anyway bad idea. If state flip-flops between nationalization and privatization, then soon this state simple make collapse. But possible is to put communist-party into power with elections and later eliminate other parties. But this don't means dictatorship, because different interest groups can remain inside the same one party.
The irony here is that if you actually were a socialist, then you would necessarily be a revolutionary, no matter whether you wanted pure-and-simple politicianism or insurrection.

[Stranger Than Paradise]

Indeed, I fully support revolution, and I'm sure you do too, but I think too many people support it for the wrong reasons is all. It seems that many leftists shun non revolutionary methods even when revolution isn't convenient, Venezuela, for example.

But Venezuela is a capitalist country. So what has reformism done there?

[redSHARP]

though you do bring up a good point, that scenario of an elected communist nation is in a perfect world and practically impossible.

[SecondLife]

But Venezuela is a capitalist country. So what has reformism done there?

Very much has done, even more than possible. Its new era for all the world. Hugo Chavez does all this that is possible only by revolution, with legal election system. This is amazing, theoretically impossible, but its reality. Altough the oposition is very dangerous and the game goes on the border. Good Luck to Venezuela!