Questions from a junior Marxist

[Montes]

Seeing as this is my first post on here, I'll give a little background to shed some light on who I am. I'm seventeen years old and I was born in the USA to Argentine parents (who are both socialists). Ever since politics started to interest me, I was typically on the far-left so I decided to learn about communism and try to see it in a fair light without the influence of 20th century Cold War propaganda. I've got a couple of questions regarding Marxism and communism on the whole so I was wondering if maybe this forum could help answer them:


1) What place does communism have in the 21st century onward? From what I can tell, most communist countries are reverting back to capitalism and I expect that the communist country the I admire most, Cuba, won't last after Fidel and Raul pass away.

2) Living in the post-Industrial USA, are the people in the service industry which now composes a large (if not the largest) part of the economy considered proletariat? As I have understood, the proletariat are those who create wealth and seem to be more like industrial workers than those flipping burgers at McDonalds. However on the other side, Marx said that a characteristic of the proletariat is that they sell their labor as a commodity (which would make sense for people in the service industry).

3) Is the possibility of violent revolution out of the question? Seeing as we live in a time where satellites can feed live video of your location to the imperialist empires of the world, I find it hard to believe that Che-styled guerilla warfare has any chance in the face of modern technology.

Those are the only questions I can think of at the moment, and if I think of others I'll be sure to post them.

Thanks.

[Bright Banana Beard]

1)There is people's war in Nepal, India, Philippines, Chile, Peru, etc. As you know, we emphasize global revolution as the socialist revolution can only be realized once the capitalist is weakened thanks to dictatorship of the proletarian. If anything, I suggest we should agitate to forward the revolution and rather not be look down that it is dying.

2)Yes, majority are proletarians since they do not own the means of production, their work life will dramatically change.

3)It is out of question when it lacks mass support from the proletarians. Focoism (which is Che-style guerilla warfare) only works on Cuba, but it had been to proven to be a ineffective. Violent revolution is still possible and it has to be done by the proletarians.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Welcome comrade!

1) What place does communism have in the 21st century onward? From what I can tell, most communist countries are reverting back to capitalism and I expect that the communist country the I admire most, Cuba, won't last after Fidel and Raul pass away.I think that style of Stalinist/Maoist countries is over. My hope and what I organize for is that radical movements will return to a bottom-up working-class based radicalism.

There may be a trend back towards state-capitalism with the example of Venezuela and the world-wide economic crisis, but I think we need to organize popular movements of unionists, the oppressed, and so on that can take power into their own hands - as opposed to top-down strategies for change such as a military take-over (like Che or whatever) or getting elected to office and making reforms.


2) Living in the post-Industrial USA, are the people in the service industry which now composes a large (if not the largest) part of the economy considered proletariat? As I have understood, the proletariat are those who create wealth and seem to be more like industrial workers than those flipping burgers at McDonalds. However on the other side, Marx said that a characteristic of the proletariat is that they sell their labor as a commodity (which would make sense for people in the service industry).Great question. They are still workers, but their position in society means they have less inherent power than industrial workers. Not that they can't be radical or be really powerful - it's just that service workers tend to work in smaller groups and unfortunately shutting down retail shops does not have as big of an impact as a longshore or trucking strike.

Never the less, imagine if Wal-Mart workers unionized and struck - this would actually be a huge thing because it could bring industrial workers - teamsters who deliver goods to Wal-Mart and so on - into the mix. It would also be huge ideologically - I think it would be the equivalent of the unionization and auto-strikes in the 1930s.


3) Is the possibility of violent revolution out of the question? Seeing as we live in a time where satellites can feed live video of your location to the imperialist empires of the world, I find it hard to believe that Che-styled guerilla warfare has any chance in the face of modern technology.
I don't think a guerilla warfare is out of the question or that it won't happen or couldn't win - I think it's a poor way to win worker's power unless it is sort of an auxillary to a worker's movement.

We can get some guns and maybe take over the hills but capitalism will survive and the working class in urban areas is still pretty much in the same situation it was before the hills were liberated. A sitdown strike in a major industry, on the other hand, is something that can hobble capitalism as well as put power directly into the hands of workers.

[BobKKKindle$]

From what I can tell, most communist countries are reverting back to capitalismThese countries have never been communist in the sense that they're never operated under the communist mode of production - this is true not only because they were never classless and stateless societies that distributed goods according to need (the definition of what communism is) but also because the working classes of these countries have never exercised political power or controlled the means of production, and so they could never be described as socialist either. This is because the creation of communist regimes in these countries (i.e. governments controlled by an official communist party like the CPC in China) did not occur as a result of working-class revolution but other types of political changes, such as armed intervention (in the case of the states in eastern Europe after WW2) or the encirclement of the cities by peasant armies, or a prolonged guerrilla struggle, as in Cuba. Socialists who stand in the tradition of the International Socialist Tendency (IST) such as myself argue that the emancipation of the working class can only be the act of the working class itself, and on this basis we say that a workers state and the communist society we want to obtain can only come into being as a result of a revolution involving workers seizing control of their workplaces and creating bodies like Soviets to manage society in their own interests - you can't impose liberation from above. The societies which have referred to themselves as communist were actually state-capitalist regimes which replicated the inequalities and exploitation of capitalism, with the means of production being ruled and controlled by an elite class of bureaucrats. This explains why countries like China are currently undergoing a market transition and why it is often the high-members of the CPC and state bureaucracy who are becoming capitalists and enriching themselves even more.

Cuba is no different, as this article explains: Cuba, behind the myths, from the International Socialism Journal (http://isj.org.uk/index.php4?id=217)


2) Living in the post-Industrial USA, are the people in the service industry which now composes a large (if not the largest) part of the economy considered proletariat?As you said yourself they sell their labour power as a commodity, which means they have the same fundamental relationship to the means of production as workers in any other sector of the economy, including heavy industry. It's worth pointing out that a further aspect of the definition of the proletariat is that proletarians do not have the ability to hire and fire other workers, as this separates them from managers. The service sector is an important part of any modern economy (and not just the most advanced countries like the US - for the economy of Venezuela, for example, services account for 54% of GDP) and so it's important that socialists agitate amongst workers in this sector.


3) Is the possibility of violent revolution out of the question? Seeing as we live in a time where satellites can feed live video of your location to the imperialist empires of the world, I find it hard to believe that Che-styled guerrilla warfare has any chance in the face of modern technology.As I said on relation to 1), calling for Che-styled guerrilla warfare is not a strategy that revolutionaries should endorse because it neglects the role of the working class. A working-class revolution, carried out in workplaces and communities, is viable, because any revolutionary process involving the mass of the working population will quickly gain the means to use violence against the oppressors and defend its gains, and will also be likely to cause large numbers of soldiers (who are normally used by the bosses to maintain capitalism and carry out wars of imperialist aggression) to side with the revolution once they recognize that their interests lie with the working class and not the bosses.

[The Ungovernable Farce]

Your questions have been answered pretty thoroughly, but for what it's worth:

Ever since politics started to interest me, I was typically on the far-left so I decided to learn about communism and try to see it in a fair light without the influence of 20th century Cold War propaganda. I've got a couple of questions regarding Marxism and communism on the whole so I was wondering if maybe this forum could help answer them:


1) What place does communism have in the 21st century onward? From what I can tell, most communist countries are reverting back to capitalism and I expect that the communist country the I admire most, Cuba, won't last after Fidel and Raul pass away.

I'd say that the identification of communism with Cuba/Russia/China/wherever is a product of cold war propaganda. Now those models have failed, and lost their appeal in the workers' movement, the prospects for genuine communism can actually be said to have improved in some ways.

2) Living in the post-Industrial USA, are the people in the service industry which now composes a large (if not the largest) part of the economy considered proletariat? As I have understood, the proletariat are those who create wealth and seem to be more like industrial workers than those flipping burgers at McDonalds. However on the other side, Marx said that a characteristic of the proletariat is that they sell their labor as a commodity (which would make sense for people in the service industry).
There's a good quote by the pretentious French commie Gilles Dauve which answers this:
"If one identifies proletarian with factory worker (or even worse: with manual labourer), or with the poor, then one cannot see what is subversive in the proletarian condition. The proletariat is the negation of this society. It is not the collection of the poor, but of those who are desperate, those who have no reserves, who have nothing to lose but their chains; those who are nothing, have nothing, and cannot liberate themselves without destroying the whole social order."


3) Is the possibility of violent revolution out of the question? Seeing as we live in a time where satellites can feed live video of your location to the imperialist empires of the world, I find it hard to believe that Che-styled guerilla warfare has any chance in the face of modern technology.
As the trots above said, Che-style guerilla warfare is a really flawed tactic anyway. I still think violent revolution is possible - the most advanced technology in the world is useless without people to operate it, so if the workers who keep the surveillance systems going were to strike, for example, then they'd be totally taken out of operation. See Greece last December for an example of violent insurrection kicking off in a modern, pretty much First World, country.

[Montes]

Thanks for the great and enlightening answers. I have a few more I thought about a couple brought about by reading your responses.



I think it's a poor way to win worker's power unless it is sort of an auxillary to a worker's movement.

We can get some guns and maybe take over the hills but capitalism will survive and the working class in urban areas is still pretty much in the same situation it was before the hills were liberated. A sitdown strike in a major industry, on the other hand, is something that can hobble capitalism as well as put power directly into the hands of workers.


I think I'm more skeptical of a spontaneous mass uprising of the working class because I find it difficult to believe that enough people can be inspired to take direct action to something so serious, while the process of guerrilla warfare (or any other form of violent resistance that isn't directly tied to workers) can be used as a motivation or a catalyst for workers to revolt in an urban population.

Furthermore, if the common man is uneducated about Marxist policies, I don't see how they would revolt in favor of the working class as a whole as opposed to better conditions for themselves.



This is because the creation of communist regimes in these countries (i.e. governments controlled by an official communist party like the CPC in China) did not occur as a result of working-class revolution but other types of political changes, such as armed intervention (in the case of the states in eastern Europe after WW2) or the encirclement of the cities by peasant armies, or a prolonged guerrilla struggle, as in Cuba. Socialists who stand in the tradition of the International Socialist Tendency (IST) such as myself argue that the emancipation of the working class can only be the act of the working class itself, and on this basis we say that a workers state and the communist society we want to obtain can only come into being as a result of a revolution involving workers seizing control of their workplaces and creating bodies like Soviets to manage society in their own interest


Same issue as the one I posted above. I'm pessimistic that an uprising of the working class would convert each individual worker into a single unit that works in favor of the proletariat as a whole, as opposed to the individual.

[Montes]

I hope I don't get attacked for asking these questions (which I've seen happen several times on this board), but here goes:

Are you sure Communism or some other revolutionary leftist movement is the right choice and that it will genuinely improve man's condition in the world? I was watching some videos on a website (gapminder.org) that show that conditions around the world are truly improving. While it may be different than the classless society that Marxism may create, people have started to live increasingly better in a capitalist world. Obviously not everybody is living well, and I'm not trying to justify the imperialist wars that have devastated too many countries.

[Jonnydraft]

You've come to the wrong forum if you're looking for answers regarding Marxism.

[Montes]

You've come to the wrong forum if you're looking for answers regarding Marxism.

Ha I figured the learning forum on the "revolutionary left" forum was a good place to start.

[Montes]

Obvious troll is obvious

And I'm not quite sure what that means.

[Montes]

He is of the unique species called trollus idotus.


I hope I don't get attacked for asking these questions (which I've seen happen several times on this board)


My friend, you have made me some sort of a prophet, and for that, I thank you.

[Jonnydraft]

Obvious troll is obvious

Not a troll, simply stating fact. I have spent some time reading what this forum has to offer in regards to Marxist thought, and I am unimpressed. If you wish to dismiss this as my being a troll, so be it. The gentleman asked a question, I gave an answer.

[Q]

I hope I don't get attacked for asking these questions (which I've seen happen several times on this board), but here goes:

Are you sure Communism or some other revolutionary leftist movement is the right choice and that it will genuinely improve man's condition in the world? I was watching some videos on a website (gapminder.org) that show that conditions around the world are truly improving. While it may be different than the classless society that Marxism may create, people have started to live increasingly better in a capitalist world. Obviously not everybody is living well, and I'm not trying to justify the imperialist wars that have devastated too many countries.
What improving conditions are you talking about? The gap between rich and poor has never been greater, we live in a world of war, the biggest crisis of the last 80 years is currently raging for which working class people are expected to pay the price. Sure, our technological level has never been higher, however our social organisation is still as primitive as when Marx wrote about capitalism.


Not a troll, simply stating fact. I have spent some time reading what this forum has to offer in regards to Marxist thought, and I am unimpressed. If you wish to dismiss this as my being a troll, so be it. The gentleman asked a question, I gave an answer.
And the answer was a troll. Perhaps you can enlighten us, and this forum, what real Marxism is then, oh wise one?

[Montes]

What improving conditions are you talking about? The gap between rich and poor has never been greater, we live in a world of war, the biggest crisis of the last 80 years is currently raging for which working class people are expected to pay the price. Sure, our technological level has never been higher, however our social organisation is still as primitive as when Marx wrote about capitalism.

First off, thanks for a genuine response. About the improving conditions, I can't link it directly (not enough posts) but there's a website called gapminder where they us compile a bunch of data to make a bunch of graphs which clearly indicate that countries all over the world are having improved conditions. Furthermore, a video made by TED (or sponsored by TED) by the same people had a clip on the distribution of wealth with comparisons between the past and present, which I thought was very interesting.