State Capitalist Theories [Archive]

vyborg

26th April 2010, 13:24

I read the article “Russia, Lenin and State Capitalism”. In it, we can find, concentrated, the classical menshevik mistakes about soviet economy.

The SPGB criticizes Lenin and the Bolsheviks on a number of topics. Unfortunately, it is evident that they never studied Lenin and bolshevism enough, as many times we can find the very same critic they raise in bolshevik works. For instance, the idea that “it was not possible to construct socialism in one country alone” and a backward country, is ABC for bolshevik. They never pretend differently (Stalin did, but this is another story).

The myth of a jacobin Lenin is die-hard. It is true that in a polemic against reformist Lenin wrote in “What has to be done?” that workers cannot reach a socialist consciousness. But he wrote the opposite in a number of books. Unfortunately neither of them has been read by the SPGB.

The idea that the soviets “were a specific product of backward political conditions” is a nonsense. Since 1917, the soviet were the product of any revolution in history, from Germany to Italy, from Portugal to Iran because soviets are the elementary cells of the new workers state.

As for the idea of a state capitalist Russia. Bureaucrats in Russia were appointed politically and could be removed in a matter of minutes. The single officer didn’t control the means of productions (the same market of means of productions didn’t exist). As the SPGB must acknowledge this reality, they use a trick: the bureaucracy is a capitalist class even if the single capitalist doesn’t exist. Of course this is not Marxism neither a rational explanation. Capitalism can exist only with private property. The capitalist is the owner and without ownership you do not have capitalism. This is ABC for Marxist. SPGB quotes often Marx but never on the subject.

If we study history we see that there are societies were a group of functionaries control economy and society. They are rich, they are powerful, but they do not own anything. This happened for centuries during the Asiatic mode of production. This is what happened in Russia. That’s why, for instance, under Stalin the historians were prohibited to write about the Asiatic mode of production (they could only speak of feudalism).

It is very superficial to underline that bureaucrats were rich and exploited workers. The point is the way they did it. The production relationship didn’t passed for the accumulation of private capital and for the markets. The exploitation was a political one. If you can deprive a capitalist of his/her role simply dismissing him/her (as in the USSR you could do with bureaucrats) he/she is not a capitalist but an officer of the plan.

Inequality of wealth is not equivalent to capitalism. It existed before, as I mentioned. It can exist in capitalism besides capitalist relationship (for instance with manager of state owned companies etc).
What a state capitalist theoretician must show is how and if the laws of capitalism applied to the USSR and this was not the case.

Finally I agree with their critic to the comical idea of Cliff that in 1928 Russia switched from a workers to a capitalist state. As Ted Grant explained in the 40s, if any, Russia in the 30s was a lot more distant from capitalism that at the time of Lenin even if politically was a lot more degenerated.

Dave B

26th April 2010, 18:23

Well as to the idea of Lenin’s stated in ‘What Is To Be Done’ in 1902 that the working class cannot reach socialist consciousness without the assistance of the bourgeois intelligentsia or the Bolshevik Vanguard. It was an idea he repeated after they had seized power, thus;

V. I. Lenin

THESES ON THE FUNDAMENTAL TASKS OF THE SECOND CONGRESS OF THE COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL

Published in July, 1920

On the other hand, the idea, common among the old parties and the old leaders of the Second International, that the majority of the exploited toilers can achieve complete clarity of socialist consciousness and firm socialist convictions and character under capitalist slavery, under the yoke of the bourgeoisie (which assumes an inIinite variety of forms that become more subtle and at the same time more brutal and ruthless the higher the cultural level in a given capitalist country) is also idealisation of capitalism and of bourgeois democracy, as well as deception of the workers.

In fact, it is only after the vanguard of the proletariat, supported by the whole or the majority of this, the only revolutionary class, overthrows the exploiters, suppresses them, emancipates the exploited from their state of slavery and-immediately improves their conditions of life at the expense of the expropriated capitalists -- it is only after this, and only in the actual process of an acute class struggle, that the masses of the toilers and exploited can be educated, trained and organised around the proletariat under whose influence and guidance, they can get rid of the selfishness, disunity, vices and weaknesses engendered by private property; only then will they be converted into a free union of free workers.

http://www.marx2mao.net/Lenin/TSCI20.html (http://www.marx2mao.net/Lenin/TSCI20.html)

These ‘corrupted and degraded’ workers of course could not be allowed to participate in government either;

V. I. Lenin

THE TRADE UNIONS, THE PRESENT SITUATION AND TROTSKY'S MISTAKES

But the dictatorship of the proletariat cannot be exercised through an organisation embracing the whole of that class, because in all capitalist countries (and not only over here, in one of the most backward) the proletariat is still so divided, so degraded, and so corrupted in parts (by imperialism in some countries) that an organisation taking in the whole proletariat cannot directly exercise proletarian dictatorship. It can be exercised only by a vanguard

http://www.marx2mao.net/Lenin/TUTM20.html (http://www.marx2mao.net/Lenin/TUTM20.html)

Nor could these ‘corrupted and degraded’ workers be allowed to join the regularly purged Bolshevik party which operated as a one party dictatorship and whose membership never constituted as much as one percent of the population.

As to bolshevik Russia being state capitalism, well in fact it was Lenin and Trotsky who said that first not the SPGB.

In fact who denied that Bolshevik Russia was state capitalist before 1925?

Ted Grant, Mandel and Tony Cliff along with the rest of the Trotskyist intelligentsia knew that Bolshevik Russia was state capitalist, they just lied about it because the workers wouldn’t be able to understand the truth. And created the greatest intellectual hoax and fraud of the 20th century.

And the suckers fell for it.

So much for educating the workers.

Our Trotskyist intellectuals probably got hold of Lenin’s state capitalist road to socialism in "On Left Wing Childishness and Petty Bourgeois Tendencies," from a key article from Trotsky himself

Leon Trotsky The Third International After Lenin

I. The Program of the International Revolution or a Program of Socialism in One Country?

(Part 2)

At the beginning of the same year, i.e., 1918, Lenin, in his article entitled "On Left Wing Childishness and Petty Bourgeois Tendencies," directed against Bukharin, wrote the following:

" If, let us say, state capitalism could be established in our country within six months, that would be a tremendous achievement and the surest guarantee that within a year socialism will be definitely established and will have become invincible."

How could Lenin have set so short a period for the "definite establishment of socialism"? What material-productive and social content did he put into these words?

http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1928/3rd/ti02.htm (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1928/3rd/ti02.htm)

The whole of the degenerate workers state bullshit revolves around a few paragraphs by Trotsky in the 1930’s. With no analysis or even reference to what Lenin himself had to say on the subject.

Stalin to his credit I suppose did attempt an analysis and critique of the state capitalist argument in;

http://www.marx2mao.com/Stalin/FC25.html#p4s7 (http://www.marx2mao.com/Stalin/FC25.html#p4s7)

.

vyborg

26th April 2010, 19:54

Ted Grant and the other trotskist knew that Ussr was not a capitalist state as Trotsky knew already in the 30s.

There are a lot of very good works by Trotsky since the 20s (but also by Rakovsky and other leader of the Left Opposition) that explain why Russia was a deformed workers' state

A.R.Amistad

26th April 2010, 20:02

Dave B

26th April 2010, 20:10

So where is the Trot analysis of Lenin’s leftwing childishness?

And for that matter;

V. I. Lenin Eleventh Congress Of The R.C.P.(B.)

March 27-April 2, 1922

I think that generally our press and our Party make the mistake of dropping into intellectualism, into liberalism; we philosophise about how state capitalism is to be interpreted, and look into old books. But in those old books you will not find what we are discussing; they deal with the state capitalism that exists under capitalism. Not a single book has been written about state capitalism under communism. It did not occur even to Marx to write a word on this subject; and he died without leaving a single precise statement or definite instruction on it. That is why we must overcome the difficulty entirely by ourselves.

That is why very many people are misled by the term state capitalism. To avoid this we must remember the fundamental thing that state capitalism in the form we have here is not dealt with in any theory, or in any books, for the simple reason that all the usual concepts connected with this term are associated with bourgeois rule in capitalist society. Our society is one which has left the rails of capitalism, but has not yot got on to new rails. The state in this society is not ruled by the bourgeoisie, but by the proletariat. We refuse to understand that when we say "state" we mean ourselves, the proletariat, the vanguard of the working class. State capitalism is capitalism which we shall be able to restrain, and the limits of which we shall be able to fix. This state capitalism is connected with the state, and the state is the workers, the advanced section of the workers, the vanguard. We are the state.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1922/mar/27.htm (http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1922/mar/27.htm)

vyborg

26th April 2010, 20:26

So, heres a practical question. My Dad works as a scientist for the State. He is paid a salary and sells his labor, but is it still State Capitalism within capitalism that he sells his labor to the state? Honest question.

state capitalism means anything and nothing, that's why is so usefull to every people who is too lazy to assess the real situation in Ussr. the law of development of state capitalism are the opposite of capitalism, capitalists doesnt exist, still it is capitalism...this is not science.

if you have a scientist working for the state you cannot decide if the state is capitalist, proletarian or degenerated proletarian without analyzing the general social relationship and the political situation

Dave B

26th April 2010, 23:01

What is 'the law of development of state capitalism'?

..

vyborg

27th April 2010, 08:03

What is 'the law of development of state capitalism'?

..

Nobody knows...that's the trick..so anyone can state whatever he wants and that's fine...

autonomous bomb thrower

13th May 2010, 23:35

The chinese maoist used a strategy of state capitalism for nationalizing enterprises composed of a small and medium capital. This strategy was composed of two stages of state capitalism: Joint-state private operation of individual enterprises then a transformation into Joint-state private operation in whole industries. In the joint-state private operation cadres were sent to manage the enterprise according to state plan but the capitalist still recieved and distributed profit. In the stage of joint-state operation of the whole industry the state then paid the capitalist a fixed interest according to assests prior to joint-state operation. The only sign of ownership was shown according to this fixed interest which eventually the state stopped paying causing any form of capitalist ownership to dissentegrate into complete nationalization.

14th May 2010, 07:16

Devrim

14th May 2010, 07:37

Die Neue Zeit

15th May 2010, 05:50

Some state-capitalist lines are free of opportunism. A lot of others, however, are hollow and then opportunistic by effectively siding with Western imperialism.

There are certain critical lines that do not like to use the term "state capitalism," but on the other hand have more substance that almost all state-capitalist lines by preferring terms like "lower phase of communism" and "communist mode of production" rather than fuzzier words like "socialism":

http://www.revleft.com/vb/giving-up-some-t129907/index.html

The ISO/British SWP follow Tony Cliff's view of military competition creating state capitalism.

This "theory" is one of the hollowest, most opportunistic ones. The Cliffites sided with the mujahedeen in the 1980s against Soviet "imperialism."

CLR James/Raya Dunskayava have yet another theory.

This one is closer to the views held by ZeroNowhere above, Paul Cockshott, myself, Rakunin, and a few others.

Maoists, Anti-revisionists, Hoxhaists

It all boils down to that "dreadful" year 1956. :glare:

I generally hold to the analysis of state capitalism similar to that of Paresh Chattopadhyay in 'The Marxian Concept of Capital and the Soviet Experience'. Given that a 'workers' state' takes place under capitalism anyhow, that's not much of a difference, theoretically. Given that Marx referred to "the state as capitalist producer" (Notes on Wagner), and mentioned, "state capital, in so far as governments employ productive wage labour in mines, railways, etc, and function as industrial capitalists," in Capital Vol. 2, pg. 177 of the Fernbach translation, the state producing commodities hardly seems to absolve you of capitalism.

If you define 'state capitalism' as meaning 'capitalism with a state', then sure, but that's not how it is generally used.

The problem with the term "state capitalism" is that, like "socialism," it is broad. The most extreme bourgeois end of "state capitalism" is dirigisme (which doesn't and shouldn't exclude the possibility of extensive nationalization).

And who owns the state in those countries? Hint: it's not the workers.

While it is true that coordinators were in charge (or if not them then worse, more parasitic bureaucrats), there's nothing "capitalistic" about the combination of public ownership and monetary planned economy (except for the money part), which was advocated as early as German Social Democracy.

Crudely speaking, there were no labour markets (unemployment being the foundation of these) and no capital markets (private property being the foundation of these), the two kinds of markets that made bourgeois-fied commodity production distinct from previous modes of commodity production (which had only consumer markets and in most cases slave markets). There were also severe limitations on consumer goods and services markets (black markets notwithstanding).

[Rakunin might disagree with this.]

The concept of "state capitalism" can scarcely pass the test of serious economic analysis. Once the state becomes the exclusive owner of all means of production, the functioning of a capitalist economy is rendered impossible by destruction of the mechanism which keeps the life-blood of such a system circulating.
-Hilferding (http://marxists.org/archive/hilferding/1940/statecapitalism.htm)

Ever heard of the various proponents of Market Socialism?

Die Rote Fahne

15th May 2010, 06:56

Has the means of production and political power ever been given to the proletariat?

NEVER.

What does that mean? It means socialism has never existed.

Then what were these nations, and peoples, who were claiming to be socialist? They were state capitalist. What this meant is that the economy was run in a capitalistic manner, by the state -- which acted as a giant corporation, whilst the political power was given to a small elite (the vanguard party). This was the fate of the USSR, Red China, etc.

Weezer

15th May 2010, 08:34

Leon Trotsky said the term state capitalism "originally arose to designate the phenomena which arise when a bourgeois state takes direct charge of the means of transport or of industrial enterprises."

This would imply, in order for state capitalism to exist, the bourgeoisie would take the state and take over the means of production. The success of the Bolshevik Revolution disproves this. The workers and peasants took over the state at first.

State capitalism, at least applied to the USSR, is false. The state was not bourgeois at first, and became degenerated with the reign of Stalinism, hence the theory of the Degenerated Worker's State.

Plain and simple.

Blake's Baby

15th May 2010, 13:23

The workers and peasants did take over the state. Then, from 1918, the Bolsheviks took it off them, became a new elite presiding over the Russian state, integrated themselves into the state machinery to become a new ruling class, and defended the interests of Russian 'national', or state, capitalism and indeed imperialism.

They did this for relatively benign reasons - they believed that 'hanging on' to the gains of the revolution would allow time for the revolution to develop in the west - but the result was that they became a counter-revolutionary force that in the abscence of world revolution merely became a vicious state capitalist bureaucracy that turned the Soviet Union into a prison camp.

Lenina Rosenweg

16th May 2010, 03:20

This one is closer to the views held by ZeroNowhere above, Paul Cockshott, myself, Rakunin, and a few others.
Rakunin might disagree with this.]

Ever heard of the various proponents of Market Socialism?

Is there an abstract of this theory? The only thing I've read by CLR James is "The Black Jacobins" (excellent book).

Also-what do people think of Hillel Tiktin? As I understand, he tried to modify and extends Trotsky's theory of the USSR without using a state capitalist analysis.

robbo203

16th May 2010, 09:51

The concept of "state capitalism" can scarcely pass the test of serious economic analysis. Once the state becomes the exclusive owner of all means of production, the functioning of a capitalist economy is rendered impossible by destruction of the mechanism which keeps the life-blood of such a system circulating.
-Hilferding (http://marxists.org/archive/hilferding/1940/statecapitalism.htm)

The modern state, no matter what its form, is essentially a capitalist machine, the state of the capitalists, the ideal personification of the total national capital. The more it proceeds to the taking over of the productive forces, the more does it actually become the national capitalist, the more citizens does it exploit. The workers remain wage workers - proletarians. The capitalist relationship is not done away with. It is rather brought to a head.

F Engels Socialism Utopian and Scientific

Blake's Baby

16th May 2010, 13:08

Uppercut

16th May 2010, 14:48

Somewhere Engels talks too about the formation of joint-stock companies that replace the traditional top-hat and cigar capitalist owner; this he also links to the idea of the 'collective capitalist'. Just as we swouldn't see the joint-stock company as 'socialist', even though it's a form of collective ownership, so we shouldn't see ownership by the state as socialist.

Just because a government nationalizes something does not mean it is necessarily a socialist enterprise. Workers can still control their workplace through their unions or committees, and elect their managers. The state is merely the tool that ties this together.

ChrisK

16th May 2010, 18:33

Just because a government nationalizes something does not mean it is necessarily a socialist enterprise. Workers can still control their workplace through their unions or committees, and elect their managers. The state is merely the tool that ties this together.

That's what Blake's Baby was saying

Blake's Baby

16th May 2010, 20:17

Maybe Uppercut was agreeing with me?

I'll admit, it doesn't seem very likely.

Is that Bill waving at me from your avatar?

ChrisK

16th May 2010, 20:49

Maybe Uppercut was agreeing with me?

I'll admit, it doesn't seem very likely.

Is that Bill waving at me from your avatar?

It is indeed. He says hello.

soyonstout

16th May 2010, 22:11

The communist left sees 'state capitalism' to be a general tendency within capitalist societies, not something that applies only to the USSR and its satellites.

Devrim

I recently wrote a discussion introduction for the idea of State Capitalism as a universal tendency among all national economies since the first world war (somewhat reversed in the victor countries of that war until 1929, when it was fully resuscitated and strengthened). The term actually appears very specifically in Trotsky's Manifesto to the First Congress of the CI:

The catastrophe of the imperialist war has completely swept away all the conquests of trade union and parliamentary struggles. For this war itself was just as much a product of the internal tendencies of capitalism as were those economic agreements and parliamentary compromises which the war buried in blood and muck.
Finance capital, which plunged mankind into the abyss of war, itself underwent a catastrophic change in the course of this war. The dependency of paper money upon the material foundation of production has been completely disrupted. Progressively losing its significance as the means and regulator of capitalist commodity circulation, paper money became transformed into an instrument of requisition, of seizure and military-economic violence in general.

The debasement of paper money reflects the general mortal crisis of capitalist commodity circulation. During the decades preceding the war, free competition, as the regulator of production and distribution, had already been thrust aside in the main fields of economic life by the system of trusts and monopolies; during the course of the war the regulating-directing role was torn from the hands of these economic groups and transferred directly into the hands of military state power. The distribution of raw materials, the utilization of Baku or Rumanian oil, Donbas coal, Ukrainian wheat, the fate of German locomotives, freight cars and automobiles, the rationing of relief for starving Europe – all these fundamental questions of the world’s economic life are not being regulated by free competition, nor by associations of national and international trusts and consortiums, but by the direct application of military force, for the sake of its continued preservation. If the complete subjection of the state power to the power of finance capital had led mankind into the imperialist slaughter, then through this slaughter finance capital has succeeded in completely militarizing not only the state but also itself; and it is no longer capable of fulfilling its basic economic functions otherwise than by means of blood and iron.

The state-ization of economic life, against which capitalist liberalism used to protest so much, has become an accomplished fact. There is no turning back from this fact – it is impossible to return not only to free competition but even to the domination of trusts, syndicates and other economic octopuses. Today the one and only issue is: Who shall henceforth be the bearer of state-ized production – the imperialist state or the state of the victorious proletariat?

Even more illustrative of this developing theory about State Capitalism is Bukharin's work in Towards a Theory of the Imperialist State, Imperialism and World Economy, and ABC of Communism (especially chapter IV, the section called "State Capitalism and the classes")*

In some ways the exclusive application of the term "State Capitalism" to the so-called "socialist countries" has obscured the understanding of the statification of capital worldwide, and led to all kinds of absurdities, such as calling for the nationalization of this or that industry (as if nationalization has anything to do with the working class).

The USSR was of course a slightly different story in terms of how State Capitalism came about (from a counter-revolution born within a government brought to power by a workers' revolution), but that doesn't change its capitalist nature, and its nature as a counter-revolutionary capitalist state. In fact, it just shows that State Capitalism, in addition to having been inaugurated by finance capital, military cliques, or reformist parties, can also come about from a defeated world revolution in the one country where the workers overthrew the bourgeois state (only to have it grow back with the Party as the new national bourgeoisie).

*all available in English (and probably many other languages) on marxists.org

Paul Cockshott

16th May 2010, 22:23

The modern state, no matter what its form, is essentially a capitalist machine, the state of the capitalists, the ideal personification of the total national capital. The more it proceeds to the taking over of the productive forces, the more does it actually become the national capitalist, the more citizens does it exploit. The workers remain wage workers - proletarians. The capitalist relationship is not done away with. It is rather brought to a head.

F Engels Socialism Utopian and Scientific

The significant issue is whether there exists an in-kind planning system which prevents money being a universal equivalent.
Money persisted as a means of payment for labour, but it was not a general equivalent in the USSR in the 1950s for example. Without it being a general equivalent the preconditions for the economic category constant capital do not exist.

Blake's Baby

16th May 2010, 22:50

robbo203

16th May 2010, 23:40

The significant issue is whether there exists an in-kind planning system which prevents money being a universal equivalent.
Money persisted as a means of payment for labour, but it was not a general equivalent in the USSR in the 1950s for example. Without it being a general equivalent the preconditions for the economic category constant capital do not exist.

You grossly exaggerate the influence of in-kind planning in the Soviet Union. In fact, plans rather than guiding production tended to follow changing economic realities and be constantly modified in the light of the latter. There was never a plan handed down by GOSPLAN that was ever strictly fulfilled. Some plans were not even made available into well into the implementation period.

As for money not being a universal equivalent, at the end of the day, state enterprises had to keep profit and loss accounts expressed obviously in monetary terms. Though the state nominally owned the means of production, the legal posession and operation of these was in the hands of the state enterrprises and trusts that existed as legal entitites in their own right with responsibility for production. Crucially, their relationship with each other took the form of legally binding contracts for raw materials and productive machinery which were paid for by credits (money) in the central banks. State agencies like GOSSNAP (State Commission for Materials and Equipment Supply) operated essentially to facilitate horizontal links between these state enterprises.

In its essentials, the Soviet Union was a capitalist economy albeit of a particular kind. However it is not quite correct to characterise the
relationship between the state and the economic system as a whole as being analogous to the relationship between capitalists and the particular enterprises they own as in the West - the notion of "Soviet Union inc". This is becuase of the role of the state enterprises outlined above which makes the situation a lot more complicated than the simpliustic idea of everyone working for one big firm called the state.

While the system did have a rather more slack in it and greater scope for overriding the imperative of profit compared with western capitalism, ultuimately it had to fall in line with the law of value. Losses incurred by state enterrpises might revert to the state itself but there was a limit to how much these losses incurred by some enterprises could be sustained or compensated for by the profits creamed off by the state from other enterprises. Much of the subsequent reforms were really about devising better indicators of economic performancee and as such confimed the fundamental, if not immediately apparent, importance of the law of value in the Soviet economy and of course the need to accumulate capital out of surplus value

Uppercut

16th May 2010, 23:56

Maybe Uppercut was agreeing with me?

I'll admit, it doesn't seem very likely.

Is that Bill waving at me from your avatar?

Sorry, guys. I guess I fail at reading -_-:(

bie

17th May 2010, 01:03

... a vicious state capitalist bureaucracy that turned the Soviet Union into a prison camp.

In 1937 in USSR there were 1,196,369 prisoners in Total (including penal colonies and prisons). In 2000 there were 1.1 mln prisoners in Total in the capitalist Russia. In 2008 there were 2,424,279 prisoners in USA. Clearly anticommunist propaganda did its job.

(sources: American Historical Review, Prisoners in 2008. (NCJ 228417). December 2009 report from the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, http://www.newsru.com/world/29feb2008/prisoners.html)

Die Neue Zeit

17th May 2010, 02:18

Blake's Baby

17th May 2010, 09:20

In 1937 in USSR there were 1,196,369 prisoners in Total (including penal colonies and prisons). In 2000 there were 1.1 mln prisoners in Total in the capitalist Russia. In 2008 there were 2,424,279 prisoners in USA. Clearly anticommunist propaganda did its job.

(sources: American Historical Review, Prisoners in 2008. (NCJ 228417). December 2009 report from the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, http://www.newsru.com/world/29feb2008/prisoners.html)

Which means... I hate the USSR so I must love the USA?

Wrong of course, I could hate both of them.

Did you know that the Tanzanians under Julius Nyrere had more political prisoners than South Africa in the 1980s? That must mean you're an apartheid-loving racist.

Doesn't really work as a debating tactic does it?

Paul Cockshott

17th May 2010, 10:12

Universal equivalent -- money is a universal equivalent when all things are measured in money and money is acceptable as a command for all things
Economic category of constant capital -- See the appropriate chapter of Capital Vol I

Paul Cockshott

17th May 2010, 10:15

But labour power was still exploited to produce a surplus that was still divided between re-investment, overheads and consumption, after wages were taken out. Just because no-one was accounting it doesn't mean that it wasn't capitalism. Invested social capital was still expanding itself through exploitation of a working class - just in a really chaotic, badly organised and ultimately doomed form.

Yes there was surplus labour, but if a socialist economy did not have surplus labour how could it develop?
The mere existence of a social surplus product is only enough to distinguish all subsequent societies from primitive communism, not enough to differentiate between them.

Paul Cockshott

17th May 2010, 10:29

In fact, plans rather than guiding production tended to follow changing economic realities and be constantly modified in the light of the latter. There was never a plan handed down by GOSPLAN that was ever strictly fulfilled. Some plans were not even made available into well into the implementation period.
This is a red herring. The better the cybernetic functioning of a planning system the more able it is to respond to, and modify itself in the light of new circumstances arising. The ability of GOSPLAN to respond in this way is to its credit.

As for money not being a universal equivalent, at the end of the day, state enterprises had to keep profit and loss accounts expressed obviously in monetary terms. Though the state nominally owned the means of production, the legal posession and operation of these was in the hands of the state enterrprises and trusts that existed as legal entitites in their own right with responsibility for production. Crucially, their relationship with each other took the form of legally binding contracts for raw materials and productive machinery which were paid for by credits (money) in the central banks. State agencies like GOSSNAP (State Commission for Materials and Equipment Supply) operated essentially to facilitate horizontal links between these state enterprises.
You are right that accounting was done in money terms, and that over time, in particular after Kosygin's reforms in the mid 60s the nominal discretion of managers over funds became greater. But what this meant was that you had nascent capitalist relations of production existing within the basic structure of a socialist planned economy. The existence of these funds and the wish of managers for discretion over them was probably a contributory factor, in the sense of class interests, towards pressure for the progressive re-establishment of more capitalist relations of production that culminated under Yeltsin.

However, right down to the late Gorbachov period, having command over money was not enough. Money did not command real resources unless these were allocated in the plan, and many of the 'swap' arrangements and favour trading between enterprises arose from the inability of money to be a decisive factor.

There are real and very serious social problems for the management of any socialist economy that were brought out in the debates of the late 50s and early 60s. The various 'state capitalist' critics of the USSR do not themselves have any coherent answers to these problems, in large part because their a priori rejection of the USSR as not being socialist prevents them engaging in a serious intellectual way with the issues that were being thrown up.

I have been reading this literature since the early 1970s and have yet to see a single serious work on how to run a socialist economy written by proponents of the state capitalist perspective.

What, to take an example, is your take on the role of Kantorovich's Objectively Determined Valuations in socialist economic calculation?

More generally, what serious polemical work has the state capitalist school undertaken against the economists of the Austrian school who claim to demonstrate the impossibility of socialist economic calculation.

Paul Cockshott

17th May 2010, 10:39

I have been reading this literature since the early 1970s and have yet to see a single serious work on how to run a socialist economy written by proponents of the state capitalist perspective.

Incidentally, probably the best book from the state capitalist perspective was Bordiga's Struttura economica e sociale della Russia d'oggi , but even that has nothing positive to say about socialist economic calculation.

bie

17th May 2010, 11:30

Which means... I hate the USSR so I must love the USA?
Which means that calling USSR a "prison state" has no factual basis and is the product of an anticommunist imperialist propaganda and you express support for this propaganda. "Prison state" is the term restricted to describe the state with an exceptional amount of population in the penal sytem. As seen from the above figures (I hoped in vain that you may take the conclusion by yourself) number of prisoners in USSR per population in the worst period was not only "not significantly higher" but - comparable of even lower than in the other places.

Wrong of course, I could hate both of them.
You may hate whatever you like but if you base your conclusions on hatred, you would better join irrationalists club. Marxism is the science, hatred or love is not a key to its methodology.

In its essentials, the Soviet Union was a capitalist economy albeit of a particular kind
Another myth. By the definition - capitalist economy is driven by the expropriation of labor through the means of labor market by the class of owners of the means of production, labor is a commodity, production is profit-driven and the economic laws are spontaneous/ chaotic. USSR had none of the above. There was no labor market, no profit driven economy or the anarchy of production. The economic model of socialist USSR, however contained some remains of the capitalist relations of production based on the law of value. There were 2 reasons for this:

1) the consumer goods unlike means of production were treated as commodities (it was a theoretical error)
2) various types of social property (eg. cooperational, national) forced the trade between them by treating them as commodities

Since 1956 and Kosygin and later Libermann reforms, the capitalist relations within the socialist country were strengthened, and caused eventually the regression to the capitalist economy in 1991 - that is based on profit driven, on the private ownership of means of production, exploitation of labor via labor market and the anarchy of the production. In the period of 1928-1991 the socialist relations prevailed. USSR was a socialist coutry.

Paul Cockshott

17th May 2010, 12:46

The economic model of socialist USSR, however contained some remains of the capitalist relations of production based on the law of value. There were 2 reasons for this:

1) the consumer goods unlike means of production were treated as commodities (it was a theoretical error)
2) various types of social property (eg. cooperational, national) forced the trade between them by treating them as commodities

In what respect was it a theoretical error to treat consumer goods as commodities?

Note that some consumer goods were not treated as commodities -- heating in housing blocks for instance.

But leaving that aside, do you think that there was any alternative to allowing individuals to choose what particular mix of consumer goods they wanted by buying them. Insofar as there was a problem here it was that selling prices were too low relative to the purchasing power in the hands of the public. Supposing that that was fixed, and that prices were brought into conformance to labour values, there was no principled objection to having some form of purchase of consumer goods.

RED DAVE

17th May 2010, 13:02

In the period of 1928-1991 the socialist relations prevailed. USSR was a socialist coutry.Then what you're saying is that:

(1) During this period the workers controlled, by workers democracy, the rate of extraction and use of surplus value. Just where were the organs of workers democracy?

(2) And then, virtually overnight, without any mass protests, the workers lost this control?

How did we miss all that in the New York Times?

RED DAVE

bie

17th May 2010, 13:29

(1) During this period the workers controlled, by workers democracy, the rate of extraction and use of surplus value. Just where were the organs of workers democracy?
It was estimated that in the various commissions in Soviets, there were 25 mln Soviet citizens employed (1971). The duties of the commissions include local budgets, industry, education, culture, healthcare etc. - all the issues that were the competences of the Soviets.

Social control was exerted by the Supreme Soviet of National Economy, introduced on the basis of a decree from 19.11.1917, other commissions and institutions, like State Control Commission. In the direct people's control committee's in 1971 there were over 5 mln people employed.

(2) And then, virtually overnight, without any mass protests, the workers lost this control?
No. This process was long. The opportunists within the CP gained strength in late 80, forcing the direction towards counterrevoutionary transformation.

Of course there were mass protests - eg. here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkPfUnwyFsI (or here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dB7l3zXc5go.) The whole process was much more complex however.

How did we miss all that in the New York Times?I don't know. Ask yourself. Are you so well informed by this paper by the way?

Die Neue Zeit

17th May 2010, 13:47

Incidentally, probably the best book from the state capitalist perspective was Bordiga's Struttura economica e sociale della Russia d'oggi , but even that has nothing positive to say about socialist economic calculation.

Wasn't his Dialogue with Stalin the more "famous" one though? It was, after all, a direct critique of Economic Problems of Socialism in the USSR. I think there he made brief "positive" remarks about planning based on labour credits, but definitely not on the same level as Fundamentals of Communist Production and Distribution.

bie

17th May 2010, 13:58

In what respect was it a theoretical error to treat consumer goods as commodities?
Consumer goods may appear as commodities, but have this character only in the external trade. Even if the means of consumption are not distributed freely, they are not stricte commodities - they are not subjected to the theory of value. The fact, that the consumer goods were considered to be commodities by the most of the economists in 50s, resulted in the non-compatibility between centrally planned economy (based on the socialist principles) and the economy based on the law of value. It eventually worked as the brake on the development of the productive forces and blocked the development of the central planning.

In other words, in order to overcome the contradiction between the productive forces and the obsolete relations of production, there is a need to integrate the whole economy under the socialist principles directed by the central plan. In order to do so, those 2 limitations (1) consumer goods distribution as commodities (2) different forms of social ownership need to be abolished. The above statements are based on the Resolution of Socialism, KKE 18th Congress Thesis, from: http://inter.kke.gr/News/2009news/18congres-resolution-2nd, section: Assessments on the economy during the course of socialist construction in the USSR

Blake's Baby

17th May 2010, 18:29

... This process was long. The opportunists within the CP gained strength in late 80, forcing the direction towards counterrevoutionary transformation...

So, what you are saying is, Lenin, Trotsky and 25,000 Bolsheviks, at the head of pretty much the entire working class and a good many peasants, only just managed to topple capitalism in Russia when it had been battered by three years of war, the population was revolting, the economy was in pieces and Lenin himself said that it was the 'weak link in the capitalist chain'; whereas, in the 1980s, a new set of class relations were imposed on 'socialist' Russia, without a revolution, by a class of capitalists that didn't exist, without a fight? It doesn't say much for your 'socialist paradise'.

I know you didn't say 'socialist paradise' but I didn't say 'prison state' either. I said that Stalin turned the USSR into a prison camp. Not because x-million were in the penal system, but because the whole of the USSR was a prison.

Paul Cockshott; yes there will be the exploitation of surplus labour under socialism, because ther will always be some (young, old, sick) who cannot work and there will be some 'investment' for future expanded production or to protect against future shortage - I didn't think you'd assume I meant otherwise; but I wasn't very clear. You were arguing that it wasn't capitalism, I was arguing it was. It is obvious to me that class relations continued in the USSR; there was still a working class. How could there not be? So, how can there be a working class, working, having its surplus labour exploited, if not by another class? Ergo, there is a ruling class. That ruling class is the capitalist class. Not the capitalist class of the 1850s, but the capitalist class of the 1880s that Engels and Wilhelm Liebknecht refer to - the collective capitalist owner-administrator class, personified in the form of the CPSU. Engels is quite happy to call these people capitalists, and I agree with Engels on this, not Stalin.

bie

17th May 2010, 18:34

I said that Stalin turned the USSR into a prison camp. Not because x-million were in the penal system, but because the whole of the USSR was a prison.
Can I know what is your source of information of that subject?

robbo203

17th May 2010, 19:45

.

Another myth. By the definition - capitalist economy is driven by the expropriation of labor through the means of labor market by the class of owners of the means of production, labor is a commodity, production is profit-driven and the economic laws are spontaneous/ chaotic. USSR had none of the above. There was no labor market, no profit driven economy or the anarchy of production.
.

Where do you get this idea from? Of course there was a labour market in the SDoviet Union. A regulated one admittedly but a market all the same. Labour power was as commodity that was bought and sold at a price which was the wages which Russian workers received. If you argue that there was no laboutr market you might as well argue there were no wages which is absurd. Ditto profits. In fact state enterprises were obliged to keep profit and loss accounts and there was certainly pressure exerted on managers fron on high to ensure profitability without which the the funding of the state apparatus itself would have been problematic.

I am not saying there were no differences between the state capitalism or the SU and the private or mixed capitalism of the West but in their essentials they were the same

bie

17th May 2010, 20:22

Where do you get this idea from?
Sure :) Among others: Constantin A. Krylov, Soviet Economy - How it really works?, Toronto, 1979 - an anticommunist position.

Of course there was a labour market in the SDoviet Union
No, there was not :) Wages were not established by the law of the supply/demand (therefore the price of labour were not lowered by the increased supply) but its value was set-up on the level of the central planning (in the example of the Soviet union - GOSPLAN.

"The planned nature of the system requires the planned wages too. This is because the national economic allocation for wages, that is, the amount of money paid to the worker is a piece of vital initial information in planning the production of a whole series of industrial sectors as well as planning domestic trade and the country's cash circulation. The allocation for wages on a national scale subdivided by ministries and departments is fixed by GOSPLAN and it is based on the principle that the rise in abour productivity will be greater than the rise in wages. (p.148)
As we see above quite clearly that wages were not created by the market - therefore there was no labor market in USSR. Relations concerning labour were established within the sphere of the socialist relations of the production. Is was the essential difference between socialist and capitalist countries.

Dave B

17th May 2010, 21:59

Dave B

17th May 2010, 22:11

Bukharins use of the phrase ‘they were mobilized and militarized’ in 1920 was probably related to what was being said and done elsewhere;

The Labour Armies, On Mobilising the Industrial Proletariat, on Labour Service, on Militarising the Economy, and on the Utilisation of Army Units for Economic Needs Theses of the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party

http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1920/military/ch06.htm (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1920/military/ch06.htm)

And from something Bukharin said earlier.

" State capitalist structure of society, besides worsening the economic conditions of the working class, makes the workers formally bonded to the imperialist state. In point of fact, employees of state enterprises even before the war were deprived of a number of most elementary rights, like the right to organise, to strike, etc. A railway or post office strike was considered almost an act of treason.

The war has placed those categories of the proletariat under a still more oppressive bondage. With state capitalism making nearly every line of production important for the state, with nearly all branches of production directly serving the interests of war, prohibitive legislation is extended to the entire field of economic activities. The workers are deprived of the freedom to move, the right to strike, the right to belong to the so-called "subversive" parties, the right to choose an enterprise, etc. They are transformed into bondsmen attached, not to the land, but to the plant. They become white slaves of the predatory imperialist state, which has absorbed into its body all productive life."

http://www.marxists.org/archive/bukharin/works/1917/imperial/13.htm (http://www.marxists.org/archive/bukharin/works/1917/imperial/13.htm)

robbo203

17th May 2010, 23:29

Sure :) Among others: Constantin A. Krylov, Soviet Economy - How it really works?, Toronto, 1979 - an anticommunist position.

No, there was not :) Wages were not established by the law of the supply/demand (therefore the price of labour were not lowered by the increased supply) but its value was set-up on the level of the central planning (in the example of the Soviet union - GOSPLAN.

As we see above quite clearly that wages were not created by the market - therefore there was no labor market in USSR. Relations concerning labour were established within the sphere of the socialist relations of the production. Is was the essential difference between socialist and capitalist countries.

I think you are confusing two things - the process of determining wage levels and the very fact that you have wage labour signifiying the sale of labour power at a price and hence the existence of a labour market. Even in overtly capitalist countries ghovernments intervene in the labour market in all sorts of ways - from minimum wage laws to feezing pay increases, not to mention taxation policies. In state capitalist counties like the Soviet Union, the labour market was unquestionably more heavily regulated but as I said a regulated market is still a market. Nevertheless it is a myth to suppose that wage levels were not influenced by supply and demand. State enterprises did retain a not inconsiderable degree of flexibility particularly in the area of adjusting wage levels (so called central planning notwithstanding)and there was often fierce competition between enterprises over supplies of labour especially skiiled labour with vacancies frequently being advertised at factory gates. The attempt to reduce labour mobility - for a while during the Stalin years it was illegal to change jobs with official permission - proved futile in the end and caused rising resentments

bie

18th May 2010, 13:35

It is possible of course that state capitalism when taken to the extreme can degenerate towards industrial serfdom and slavery proper. When wage workers are no longer ‘free’ to sell their labour power on the market according to the laws of supply and demand and are forced to work for a wage set by the ruling state capitalist class.

There is no such thing as "ruing state capitalist class". Bucharin in the same text admits it explicitly. State administration is just a tool in the hand of one class or the other. It doesn't have an intrinsic class character.

We must never forget the class character of the State. The State must not be conceived as constituting a 'third power' standing above the classes; from head to foot it is a class organization. Under the dictatorship of the workers it is a working-class organization. Under the dominion of the bourgeoisie it is just as definitely an economic organization as is a trust or a syndicate.

The Bucharin's analysis of State capitalism is actually a hypothetical situation describing the possible direction of the development of the imperialist stage of capitalism. Here Bucharin describes explicitly what is meant by the "State capitalist trust":

The anarchy of production and of competition within each specific country ceases more or less completely because the individual entrepreneurs unite to form a State capitalist trust. All the fiercer grows the struggle between the various State capitalist trusts. This is what always happens when capital is centralized. When the small fry are ruined, then of course the number of competitors diminishes, for only the big fish are left. Among these latter, the struggle is now conducted upon a larger scale; instead of a fight between individual manufacturers, there ensues a fight between the trusts. Of course the number of the trusts is less than the number of the individual manufacturers. The struggle, therefore, has become fiercer and more destructive. When the capitalists in any particular country have defeated their lesser opponents and have organized themselves into a State capitalist trust, the number of competitors is still further reduced. For the competitors are now these titanic capitalist powers. Such competition involves expenditure and waste upon an unprecedented scale. The fight between the State capitalist trusts expresses itself during 'peace' time in the rivalry of armaments. Ultimately it leads to a devastating war.
http://www.marxists.org/archive/bukharin/works/1920/abc/04.htm

And here it is visible how he explains its class nature:

How could the bourgeoisie do this? The matter was quite simple. To that end it was necessary that' the bourgeoisie should place private production, privately owned trusts and syndicates, at the disposal of the capitalist robber State. This is what they did for the duration of the war. Industry was ' mobilized' and 'militarized', that is to say it was placed under the orders of the State and of the military authorities. 'But how?' some of our readers will ask. ' In that way the bourgeoisie would surely forfeit its income? That would be nationalization! When everything has been handed over to the State, where will the bourgeoisie come in, and how will the capitalists reconcile themselves to such a condition 'of affairs?' It is an actual fact that the bourgeoisie agreed to the arrangement. But there is nothing very remarkable in that, for the privately owned syndicates and trusts were not handed over to the workers' State, but to the imperialist State, the State which belonged to the bourgeoisie. Was there anything to alarm the bourgeoisie in such a prospect? The capitalists simply transferred their possessions from one pocket to another; the possessions remained as large as ever.As visible above, the Bucharin's analysis of State capitalism refers to the explicity to the stage of the development of the imperialism, as the system ruled and dominated by the industrial bourgeosie. This model has no applications to the anaysis of the socialist societies.

bie

18th May 2010, 13:54

I think you are confusing two things - the process of determining wage levels and the very fact that you have wage labour signifiying the sale of labour power at a price and hence the existence of a labour market
No. The bare fact that under socialism workers got payment for their work according to the principle of: to each according to his labour, while each one works according to his abilities - doen't imply the existence of the labour market. What is labour market?

The most important feature of the labour market - and the all markets - is the fact that it is is based on the trade of commodities according to the supply/demand scheme, where, as pointed by you correctly - it can be modified by the regulatory institutions. In case of capitalist societies - what is crucial for its existence is the basic fact the labour is a commodity, that is subjected to the trade between the worker and the capitalist. The fact of the dependence of the worker on capitalist gives rise the the exploitation and capitalist's profit in terms of the surplus value. This is how the labour markets work. Increased supply of labour existng as the commodity (eg. unemployment) gives rise to the lowering wages and working conditions.

In socialist economies, however, the labour is not an commodity. It is not a subject of the trade between the employer and the employee based on the commodity markets rules. Labour allocation is controlled socially via social institutions, the same - wages. In case of socialist states wages were established on the basis of social planning - therefore they belong by the definition to the socialist relations of production. This is the basic, but crucial distinction between the capitalism and socialism.

The second one is that - even if in capitalist and socialist economy you may find a surplus value, in socialist economy that value is not expropriated by the class of private owners of the capital, but - on the contrary - it returns to workers through the socialist funds in form of social services etc.

I hope this may help to understand the distinction between capitalist and socialist economy.

Paul Cockshott

18th May 2010, 13:58

Wasn't his Dialogue with Stalin the more "famous" one though? It was, after all, a direct critique of Economic Problems of Socialism in the USSR. I think there he made brief "positive" remarks about planning based on labour credits, but definitely not on the same level as Fundamentals of Communist Production and Distribution.

The book I cited was an extension of the analysis in Dialogue with Stalin and much longer.

Paul Cockshott

18th May 2010, 14:50

RED DAVE

18th May 2010, 14:59

The second one is that - even if in capitalist and socialist economy you may find a surplus value, in socialist economy that value is not expropriated by the class of private owners of the capital, but - on the contrary - it returns to workers through the socialist funds in form of social services etc. You have yet to demonstrate that this was, in fact, the case. Where were the organs for the control of working conditions, wages, hours, etc., in the workplace?

All you have shown is that there were bureaucratic systems for the control of labor and surplus value. If there had been workers institutions for the control of labor and surplus value from the bottom up, soviets in other words, these would have been the basis for workers massive resistance to privatization, which never took place.

The working class in old Russia, tiny though it was, fought nearly to the point of its own physical liquidation during the Civil War to prevent the return of Tsarism. Are you trying to say that the working class in the USSR permitted counter-revolution and privatization of socialism without a significant fight?

However, if the USSR were state capitalist, and, in fact, the workers did not control the conditions of labor, wages, hours and surplus value, then it makes perfect sense that there would be little or no resistance.

RED DAVE

bie

18th May 2010, 15:13

You have yet to demonstrate that this was, in fact, the case. Where were the organs for the control of working conditions, wages, hours, etc., in the workplace?
Eg. in socialist Poland there were workers councils in every workplace (formalized by the law from 19.11.1956), as well as trade union cells. Their duties were to look after the working conditions. Its representatives were also a member of the management board. Concerning wages and hours - this is not in the competence of the production unit, but a central plan. Imagine what would happen if every workplace choose its own wages and own working time. Country would be paralysed by chaos. Workers exerted the control over its wages and working time by participation in the Workers Party and - by expressing its discontent by the means of trade unions (eg. by economical strikes). Interestingly, the all wages demands were accepted by the government (with one exception in 1970). This policy eventually caused the economic crisis due to the fact that wages were rising faster to the labour productivity!

All you have shown is that there were bureaucratic systems for the control of labor and surplus value.Well, you may call it "bureaucratic" or whatever, but there is no possibility to avoid employing number of people in the organization and coordination of production within the socialist society.

If there had been workers institutions for the control of labor and surplus value from the bottom up, soviets in other words, these would have been the basis for workers massive resistance to privatization, which never took place. No. The lack of decisive response from the working class was due to the fact of:
1) ruling CP lost its proletarian character and was influenced by petit-bourgeoisie ideology
2) the ideological offensive caused the false consciousness among proletariat
3) the organizations that were capable of leading the workers against privatization were paralyzed or destroyed

Are you trying to say that the working class in the USSR permitted counter-revolution and privatization of socialism without a significant fight?
There was a SIGNIFICANT FIGHT. For all the period of 1917-1991. There was a strong workers opposition within CP after 1956. I think I have posted already the examples of the worker's resistance against privatization. By just in case - here is the video material. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dB7l3zXc5go

Your logic fails completely just because I may invert your question - if "bureaucracy" had such power and privileges, why didn't they defend its state, "Are you trying to say that the "bureaucracy" in the USSR permitted to lose its privileges and to without a significant fight? See - it is meaningless.

Blake's Baby

18th May 2010, 15:43

The bureaucrats in the USSR were substantially the same people in power after the end of the USSR - Putin, Yeltsin and their cronies.

In many of the other Eastern European countries the same people ran the governments before and after 1989.

But even if they had not, we're talking about class relations here. The working class was still the working class; the ruling class was still the ruling class. That changed not one iota. All that changed was the legal fiction of the ownership of the means of production (from 'the state' to 'private companies').

We had state ownership in the west too comrade. It amounted to nothing. Just another way to organise capitalism.

bie

18th May 2010, 15:54

There is no such thing as "rulling class" comrade. Rulling class may be a bourgeoisie or it may be a working class or it may be something it between. I refer to the quoted above Bucharin's text. You had state ownership on the West, ok.

We had full employment, free and good healthcare, good working conditions, free and good education, sex equality, national sovereignity, social safety and social justice, great relations between people... We had once a socialism. Not everything that was told on the West about the socialist societies has to be true, comrade.

I remember that in my primary school in the 1980 there was a dentist surgeon, who looked after all the kids. His services were completely free of charge. And it used to be like that in every other primary school. Life was better under socialism - especially in terms of relations between people. Believe it or not - there was no "homo homini lupus". People were friendly towards each other. Another thing is housing. It was simply accesible. My auntie got a 3 bedroom apartment just for a good university degree. Doesn't seem like capitalism, isn't it?

Now we have 2 mln unemployed, 2 mln emigration, 12% extreme poverty and 60% of poverty. None of it existed under socialism.

bie

18th May 2010, 18:15

It is of course a mistake to identify socialism with the lower phase of communism as Lenin in a typically Kautskyite way did.
Can I know why is it mistake to identify the socialism with immature stage of communism?

FSL

18th May 2010, 19:50

The bureaucrats in the USSR were substantially the same people in power after the end of the USSR - Putin, Yeltsin and their cronies.

The people in power in Russia aren't Yeltsin or Putin but capitalists much like the people in power in the US aren't Obama and Biden but capitalists as well.

If your class analysis is so weak that you're not even able to identify modern eastern europe as capitalist, it's no wonder you're mistaken on what the USSR was.

Since a lot of communist parties reformed to social democratic ones it's only obvious people will keep some seats. Their importance remains next to none. Governments are mostly just given the laws they are to enact.

Devrim

18th May 2010, 21:17

bie

18th May 2010, 22:20

...but if you look back to 1960s, early 1970s in the west, for example in the UK, there was virtual full employment, free and good healthcare, and free and good education, certainly in comparison to today.

It wasn't socialism though.
True. I have never said that they were socialist. But what is important - Soviet Union played a decisive role here as well - ie. in the creation of so-called Welfare State. The gains of the working class in the USSR and people's democracies exerted a strong pressure on the Western capitalist classes in order to retreat before the "native" labour movement. This pressure made them to increase the quality of life of the workers in capitalist states. Today it is not essential anymore - therefore bourgeoisie is in the offensive, and dismantles the Walfare State. Shortly we will see the different shape of Europe (under Treaty of Lisbon). Even social-democrats admit, that the decisive factor in creation of the Walfare State was the pressure from the socialist bloc.

Die Neue Zeit

19th May 2010, 03:51

The book I cited was an extension of the analysis in Dialogue with Stalin and much longer.

Paul, what about this brief state-capitalist remark in Fundamentals?

http://libcom.org/library/fundamental-principles-communist-production-gik-chapters

At the same time as social life itself, through its definite expression, social practice, has, in the form of the Workers' Councils, the Soviet system, impelled Marx's concept of the Association of Free and Equal Producers into the forefront of history, that same social life, with its objective criticism of theory and practice, has simultaneously given the actual power in society to state capitalism.

The fact that there is no unemployment means that the normal conditions of a labour market do not exist.

I think I said that in my very first response to this thread when I said "crudely speaking."

BTW, would there still be a labour market in Minsky's "zero unemployment" scenario? There would still be people looking for jobs while in the ELR program.

On the other hand the soviet system of paying money wages rather than labour vouchers on an hour for hour basis - which was what Marx had advocated, was clearly socialist rather than communist, and reflected the lasting influence of Kautsky on soviet economic policy.

To move to a communist system would not have been just a matter of abundance as Khruschev thought, it also would have involved getting rid of the socialist principle of paying money wages, and replacing it with the communist principle of allocation using labour accounts.

It would also have involved a shift from the idea of funding the state via the turnover tax to funding the state via an income tax which was voted on by the population as a whole. Such a radical change from socialism to communism naturally comes up against the opposition of the dominant party officials and managers under socialism since it would entail so much of a loss of their power.

It is of course a mistake to identify socialism with the lower phase of communism as Lenin in a typically Kautskyite way did.

Are you distancing yourself more from your own usage of the word "socialism" in your TNS book, despite the politically inhibiting environment of that time?

IIRC, I don't recall (pre-renegade) Kautsky explicitly equating "socialist" with the lower phase of the communist mode of production. In The Social Revolution, Kautsky's mentions of the word "communist" are as follows:

A particularly important field for us is that of education. Popular schools have always occupied the attention of proletarian parties and they even played a great role in the old communistic sects of the Middle Ages.

[...]

In a communistic society labor will be systematically regulated and the labor power be assigned to the individual branches of production according to a definite plan. In the production for exchange this regulation is obtained through the law of value. The value of each product is determined not by the labor time actually applied to it but by the socially necessary time for its production. With the modification that this law receives in capitalist production by profits rye are not concerned because this would only unnecessarily complicate the analysis without bringing any new knowledge to the question. The socially necessary labor time in each branch of labor is determined on the one side by the height of its technique in any society and the customary exertion of labor, etc., in short through the average productive power of the individual laborers; on the other side, however, by the number of products demanded by the social necessity of a particular branch of labor, and finally by the total number of labor powers at the disposal of society. Free competition sees to it to-day that the price of products, that is to say the amount of money that one can exchange for them, is continually tending towards the value determined. by the socially necessary labor time.

[...]

In the present stage of production there are only two possible forms of material production so far as production in quantities is concerned, aside from a few remnants which are mainly curiosities: on the one side communistic with social property in the means of production, and the systematic direction of production from a central point, or the capitalistic.

[...]

Communism in material production, anarchism in the intellectual. This is the type of the socialist productive system which will arise from the dominion of the proletariat or, in other words, out of the social revolution by the logic of economic facts whatever may be the wishes, ideas and theories of the proletariat.

Tradition says Kautsky made the implicit equation, but there's enough room for out-of-context interpretation with this work of his.

robbo203

19th May 2010, 07:55

No. The bare fact that under socialism workers got payment for their work according to the principle of: to each according to his labour, while each one works according to his abilities - doen't imply the existence of the labour market. What is labour market?

The most important feature of the labour market - and the all markets - is the fact that it is is based on the trade of commodities according to the supply/demand scheme, where, as pointed by you correctly - it can be modified by the regulatory institutions. In case of capitalist societies - what is crucial for its existence is the basic fact the labour is a commodity, that is subjected to the trade between the worker and the capitalist. The fact of the dependence of the worker on capitalist gives rise the the exploitation and capitalist's profit in terms of the surplus value. This is how the labour markets work. Increased supply of labour existng as the commodity (eg. unemployment) gives rise to the lowering wages and working conditions.

In socialist economies, however, the labour is not an commodity. It is not a subject of the trade between the employer and the employee based on the commodity markets rules. Labour allocation is controlled socially via social institutions, the same - wages. In case of socialist states wages were established on the basis of social planning - therefore they belong by the definition to the socialist relations of production. This is the basic, but crucial distinction between the capitalism and socialism.

The second one is that - even if in capitalist and socialist economy you may find a surplus value, in socialist economy that value is not expropriated by the class of private owners of the capital, but - on the contrary - it returns to workers through the socialist funds in form of social services etc.

I hope this may help to understand the distinction between capitalist and socialist economy.

Well, Im sorry , but I disagree with this analysis fundamentally.

For a start, I dont accept your definition of socialism which seems to me a leninist-inspired one of a transition between capitalism and communism. In traditional marxism , socialism and communism are not different stages but simply different terms denoting the same thing. The only distinction Marx made was between a lower and higher phase of communism and what you are describing here certainly does not correspond to the lower phase ashas been pointed out.

Secondly, you once again miss the point about a labour market. You claim that in your "socialist" economy labour was not a commodity. It certainly was! You had employers and employees. The relationship between them was a commodified one, a quid pro quo market transaction. You admit this yourself. You say workers were "paid according to their labour" . However you still contend that "labour is not an commodity. It is not a subject of the trade between the employer and the employee based on the commodity markets rules.". How is it possible for workers to be "paid according to the labour "and for their labour not to be a commodity. The very fact that it is paid for means by definition that it is a commodity!

The fact that the price of this commodity is not established via the normal market interplay of supply and demand is neither here nor there. As I said before, even in overtly capitalist countries, there are regulatiory factors that come into play such as minimum wage laws. In state capitalist countries, this regulatory approach is taken somewhat further. However a regulated market is still a market and a fixed price is still a price. There is still the fundamental buying and selling relationship at the bottom of it all.

Thirdly, despite your extravagant claim that "In case of socialist states wages were established on the basis of social planning - therefore they belong by the definition to the socialist relations of production", there was in fact a considerable amount of competitive bidding and advertising for labour at the level of state enterprises . Despite the fact national wage rates might be established centrally, enterprises could and did exercise a considerable degree of discretion in the hiring of wage labour and in offering employment benefits. Competitioon between enterrpises was particularly fierce in relation to skilled labour and various ruses might be used to attract and hold onto such labour. You need to distinguish between the abstract theoretical model of your so called socialist economy and the empirical reality of what actually went on

Fourthly, on the question of surplus value you say:

you may find a surplus value, in socialist economy that value is not expropriated by the class of private owners of the capital, but - on the contrary - it returns to workers through the socialist funds in form of social services etc.

Well to begin with the theory of state capitalism does not require there to be a class of private owners of capital, for there to be capitalism. This is a legalistic de jure approach to capitalism whereas a historical materialist approach looks instead at the de facto relations of production. It argues that there was a capitalist class in the Soviet union that collectively owned the means of production as a class by virtue of their complete control of the state - the nomenklatura. Ownership and control are in fact inseparable. Ultimate control IS ownership.

It is utterly naive to suppose that "surplus value was returned to workers in the from of social services etc". For a start, if that was the case capital accumulation could not have taken place and there is a good deal of empirical evidence to show that wage rates lagged significantly behind the growth in capital. It also needs to be pointed out that the ruling class itself apprprriated some of this surplus value for its own consumption purposes. According to Roy Medvedev (Khrushchev: The Years in Power ,Columbia University Press. 1976, 540), taking into account not only their inflated (and often multiple) "salaries" but also the many privileges and perks enjoyed by the Soviet elite (who even had access to their own retail outlets stocking western goods and various other facilities from which the general public was physically excluded) the income ratio between low and high earners was approcimately 1:100

Paul Cockshott

19th May 2010, 08:58

Paul Cockshott

19th May 2010, 09:12

Robbo:
For a start, I dont accept your definition of socialism which seems to me a leninist-inspired one of a transition between capitalism and communism. In traditional marxism , socialism and communism are not different stages but simply different terms denoting the same thing. The only distinction Marx made was between a lower and higher phase of communism and what you are describing here certainly does not correspond to the lower phase ashas been pointed out.

You are right about 'traditional marxism', but that is the school that derives from German Social Democracy. Marx does not identify the first phase of communism with socialism. Indeed he set communism to be a doctrine distinct from all varieties of socialism.

In part one can say that words changed their meaning over time, the socialist movement of the 1900 was not the socialist movement of 1848, but nor was the socialist movement of 1900 truely communist. The USSR could be socialist in terms of the aims of classical social democracy, and yet not communist in the sense of Marx's critique of the programme of social democracy.

Paul Cockshott

19th May 2010, 09:33

A recent article by Dieterich may be of interest here. I post the Google Translate version which I have not yet had time to correct from the original Spanish

1.
La economía del Socialismo del Siglo XX, llamado en la Alemania socialista (RDA) también „el socialismo realmente existente“, no fue planeada democráticamente , sino por elites--al igual que en el capitalismo.

The economy of the twentieth century socialism, called in socialist Germany (GDR) also "really existing socialism" was not planned democratically but by elites - as in capitalism.

En „el socialismo realmente existente“, la planificación la hacían unos cinco mil tecnócratas y políticos del Partido Único y en el capitalismo la hacen unos cinco mil megacapitalistas, burócratas y políticos.

In the "actually existing socialism" were planning the five thousand technocrats and politicians of Single Party and capitalism make five thousand megacapitalistas, bureaucrats and politicians.

La esencia es la misma: las mayorías están excluidas.
The essence is the same: the majority are excluded.
2.
2.
La regulación y dirección de la economía del „socialismo realmente existente“ se realizaba via una combinación de precios administrativos y precios de mercado , no mediante el valor de trabajo y el intercambio de equivalencias.

The regulation and management of the economy "really existing socialism" was done via a combination of administrative prices and market prices, not by the value of work and the exchange of equivalents.

Los precios administrativos fueron determinados por el Estado a raíz de consideraciones sociales, políticas y militares y, en forma secundaria, económicas.

Administrative prices were determined by the State as a result of social, political and military and, secondarily, economic.

Los precios de mercado se tomaron del mercado mundial y se adecuaron a los parámetros nacionales.

Market prices were taken from the world market and were adapted to national benchmarks.

3.
3.
La no-determinación del valor de los productos y servicios por su valor de trabajo ( time inputs ) y su respectivo intercambio por el principio de equivalencia , significaba en la economía monetarizada del „socialismo realmente existente“ que no se podía abolir el sistema de trabajo asalariado.

The non-determination of the value of the goods and services by labour value (time inputs) and their exchange by the principle of equivalence, in the money economy meant the "actually existing socialism" could not abolish the system of wage labour.

Significaba también que los trabajadores no tenían el derechoal pleno valor creado por su trabajo, sino solo a la parte salarial y algunos servicios sociales que las elites les asignaban.

It also meant that workers had no right to the full value created by their work, but only to the wage and some social services were assigned to the elite.

Pero, si no se acaba con el trabajo asalariado, como insistían Marx y Engels, no se puede acabar con el capitalismo; como tampoco se puede acabar con él mediante la estatización de los medios de producción, sino sólo mediante su socialización ( Vergesellschaftung ).

But, if you dont get rid of wage labour , as Marx and Engels insisted, you can not destroy capitalism, and you can not kill it by nationalizing the means of production, but only through socialization (Vergesellschaftung).

Hoy sabemos que esasocialización tiene que ser trimodal: planificación y ejecución democrática, valorización por el tiempo de trabajo e intercambio de equivalencias.

Today we know that socialisation has to be trimodal : democratic planning and execution, recovery time for work and exchange of equivalents.

4.
4.
El tipo y el volumen de los „ fondos socialmente necesarios “ (Marx/Engels) como salud, educación, defensa etc., no fueron decididos por las mayorías, sino por las elites.

The nature and volume of "socially necessary funds" (Marx / Engels) as health, education, defense etc. Were not decided by the majority, but by the elites.

El Socialismo del Siglo XX, al igual que el capitalismo, no permiten que las mayorías deciden por plebiscito, por ejemplo, lastasas de impuestos, ni tampoco, si prefieren impuestos directos o indirectos.

Twentieth-century socialism, like capitalism, do not let the majority decide by plebiscite, for example, tax level, nor, if they prefer direct or indirect taxes.

Para las mentes stalinistas al igual que para las capitalistas es inconcebible, que las masas conducen democráticamente a la economía, pese a que son ellas las que generan el plusproducto social.

For the Stalinists minds as to the capitalists is inconceivable that the masses lead democratically to the economy, even though they are the ones that generate the social surplus product.

5.
5.
La propiedad y el poder fáctico sobre el plusproducto social es ejercido en „el socialismo realmente existente“ por el Estado, no por los productores inmediatos.

Property and real power over the social surplus product is exercised in "really existing socialism" by the State, not by the immediate producers.

Pero, el Estado es siempre una estructura de violencia que responde a la distribución del poder de la sociedad.

But the state is always a structure of violence in response to the distribution of power in society.

Cuando las elites se enajenan de las mayorías, éstas dejan de ver al Estado como su Estado.

When elites are alienated from the majority, they fail to see the state as a state.

En consecuencia, la fábrica, la tierra y los servicios de la economía estatal se convierten en una fuerza externa alienada e impositiva.

Consequently, the factory, land and services of the state economy become alienated, an external imposed force.

Sin identificación entre trabajadores y propiedad productivano se defiende el sistema cuando entra en crisis.

No identification between workers and property productivano defends the system when in crisis.

Por eso, los trabajadores del „socialismo realmente existente“ actuaron ante la caída del sistema comolos campesinos hindúes ante las conquistas externas: con indiferencia atentista o inclusive, como protagonistas de su destrucción (Polonia).

Therefore, workers' actually existing socialism "acted before the system crash suchas Indian farmers to the external conquerors: with indifference or even aware, as protagonists of their destruction (Poland).

6.
6.
Científicamente no tiene sentido llamar al modo de producción del Socialismo del Siglo XX „ capitalismo de Estado “ .

Scientifically it makes no sense to call the mode of production of twentieth-century socialism "state capitalism."

Porque sin una clase de propietarios particulares del capital que actúa por ganancia y opera el mecanismo cibernetico del sistema (mercado), el concepto pierde su capacidad analítica.

Because without a kind of private owners of capital that acts for profit and operates the cybernetic mechanism of the system (market), the concept loses its analytical capacity.

Tampoco conviene llamar a ese modo de producción socialista ,por que carece de los tres principios distintivos de la economía política socialista .

Nor should call the socialist mode of production, because it lacks the distinctive three principles of socialist political economy.

7.
7.
La combinación de los tres principios constitutivos de la Economía Política del Socialismo del Siglo XXI, la planificación y ejecución democrática (autogestión coordinada), el valor del trabajo como unidad de valorización de productos y servicios y, la equivalencia como principio de todos los intercambios, es la esencia política-económica del modo de producción del Socialismo del Siglo XXI

The combination of the three constituents of the Political Economy of the XXI century socialism, planning and implementation of democracy (self-coordinated), labour value as a unit of recovery products and services and, as a principle of equivalence of all exchanges, is the essence of political and economic mode of production of the XXI Century Socialism

(A. Peters), y, por lo tanto, de su modelo de transición .

(A. Peters), and therefore its model of transition.

Para obtener el efectosinergético a nivel nacional y regional, las tres políticas tienen que llevarse a cabo coordinadamente y en cabal consideración de las fuerzas antagónicas a nivel nacional, regional y mundial.

Efectosinergético to get the national and regional level, the three policies have to be carried out in coordination and in full consideration of the opposing forces at national, regional and global levels.

8.
8.
Este modelo trimodal de transición hace la explotación laboral imposible y cambia cualitativamente la importancia de la propiedad sobre los medios de producción.

This trimodal model of the transition makes labor exploitation impossible and qualitatively changes the importance of ownership of the means of production.

La forma de propiedad se vuelve secundaria, porque la planificación democrática de los rubros y volumenes de producción y la determinación de los precios y salarios por el valor del trabajo, junto con su intercambio en forma equivalente, quitan a eventuales propietarios formales---Estado, cooperativas, individuales--- la capacidad de abusar de la propiedad.

The form of ownership becomes secondary, because the democratic planning of the areas and volumes of production and the determination of prices and wages by the value of work, together with an equivalent exchange, deny any formal owners --- State , cooperatives, individuals --- the ability to abuse the property.

La determinación plebiscitaria de los impuestos, a su vez, impide el abuso confiscatorio del Estado.

The determination plebiscite of taxes, in turn, prevents abuse of State confiscatory.

9.
9.
El sistema burgués utiliza dos mecanismos principales para apropiarse del valor creado por los trabajadores:

The bourgeois system uses two main mechanisms to appropriate the value created by workers:

los dueños de los medios de producción se apropian del valor en forma de ganancia, interés y renta de la tierra; -> the owners of the means of production appropriate the value as profit, interest and rent of land,
el Estado, el „capitalista colectivo virtual“ ( ideell, Marx/Engels), se apropia del valor en forma de impuestos -> . the State, the "virtual collective capitalist" (ideell, Marx / Engels), appropriate the value in taxes.

Ambos mecanismos quedan bloqueados en el modelo de transición.
Both mechanisms are blocked in the transition model.

La „ expropiación de los expropiadores “ (Marx/Engels) ya no se realiza primordialmente sobre la estatización de la propiedad privada, sino sobre el derecho y el poder socio-político de apropiación del valor cabal generado por los trabajadores, por parte de los trabajadores.

The "expropriation of the appropriators" (Marx / Engels) no longer takes place primarily on the nationalization of private property, but on the right and power to socio-political appropriation of the full value created by workers, by workers .

10.
10.
Las características principales del modo de producción del „socialismo realmente existente“ son: una economía centralmente planificada por una elite; dirigida mediante precios administrativos y de mercado; con metas de obtener un plusproducto, más no una ganancia ( Profit ) y, por lo tanto, no-crematística; basada en el sistema asalariado ymonetarizado.

The main features of the production mode of "really existing socialism" are: a centrally planned economy by an elite, led by administrative and market prices, with goals of obtaining a surplus product, but not a profit (Profit) and therefore , non-financial considerations, based on the system of money wages.

Se trataba de un modo de producción sui generis que se estancó en la transición de la crematística capitalista hacia el socialismo.

It was a sui generis mode of production which stagnated in the transition from crematistic capitalism to socialism.

Al no evolucionar, colapsó y regresó a su punto de origen.

By not evolving, it collapsed and returned to its point of origin.

Ese experimento de evolución planificada requiere de un concepto científico adecuado, urgentemente.

That experiment planned evolution requires a proper scientific concept, urgently.

11.
11.
La economía del „socialismo realmente existente“ no se alejó lo suficiente de la autoritaria crematística capitalista como para convertirse en un modo de producción socialista en el sentido del Socialismo temprano, de Marx/Engels, Bakunin, RosaLuxemburg y Lenin .

The economics of 'actually existing socialism "was not far enough away from the authoritarian capitalist financial considerations to become a socialist mode of production within the meaning of early Socialism, Marx / Engels, Bakunin, and Lenin RosaLuxemburg.

Pero, ni burguéses, ni stalinistas pueden parar las leyes de la evolución.
But neither bourgeois nor Stalinists can stop the laws of evolution.

Decía una canción cubana: „Carlos Marx está enojado, cheque de Engels no ha llegado.“ Bueno, al fin y al cabo siempre llegó, de tal manera que el prócer pudo realizar su gran obra de transformación.

He said a Cuban song, "Karl Marx is angry, Engels check has not arrived." Well, after all was always, so that the hero was able to make his great work of transformation.

Hoy, las condiciones objetivas para la nueva civilización son incomparablemente mejores que durante los últimos dos siglos.

Today, the objective conditions for the new civilization are incomparably better than in the past two centuries.

Por eso, Karl Marx en su tumba del Highgate Cemetery en Londres ha de estar de fiesta: El cheque de la historia está llegando al Socialismo.

So Karl Marx's grave in Highgate Cemetery in London must be celebrating: the cheque of history is coming to Socialism.

RED DAVE

19th May 2010, 13:18

Eg. in socialist Poland there were workers councils in every workplace (formalized by the law from 19.11.1956), as well as trade union cells. Their duties were to look after the working conditions.It seems to me there is a big difference between "look after" and controlling.

Its representatives were also a member of the management board.So there was management other than workers management. You have made my point: this is not workers control. In German, workers representatives sit on teh boards of directors of corporations. This is not socialism.

Concerning wages and hours - this is not in the competence of the production unit, but a central plan.Translation: the state bureaucracy runs the show, just as I said it does.

Imagine what would happen if every workplace choose its own wages and own working time.It would be the beginning of socialism from below.

Country would be paralysed by chaos.Fascinating that you think that workers control implies chaos.

Workers exerted the control over its wages and working time by participation in the Workers Party and - by expressing its discontent by the means of trade unions (eg. by economical strikes).So what you are saying is the the Party controlled the economy and workers had the right to strike.

Interestingly, the all wages demands were accepted by the government (with one exception in 1970). This policy eventually caused the economic crisis due to the fact that wages were rising faster to the labour productivity!Yeah, those nasty workers. They made unreasonable demands on the government. Fascinating how you instinctively demonstrate the difference between the workers, making wage demands, and the government, which accepted them. If this were socialism, the workers would [i]be the government.

Well, you may call it "bureaucratic"I sure as shit do.

or whatever, but there is no possibility to avoid employing number of people in the organization and coordination of production within the socialist society.Again, you are positing a state apparatus separate from the working class. You are making my point: this was state capitalism.

No. The lack of decisive response from the working class was due to the fact of:
1) ruling CP lost its proletarian character and was influenced by petit-bourgeoisie ideologyIf the party had been proletarian all along, this could not have happened, or at least it could not have happened without a huge fight within the party, such as happened in Russia 1921-28.

2) the ideological offensive caused the false consciousness among proletariatAgain, where was the great Workers Party in this ideological offensive? I mean, they couldn't even defeat the Catholic Church, with its miserable ideology.

3) the organizations that were capable of leading the workers against privatization were paralyzed or destroyedBy who and from where? It seems to me that the answer is that these were organizations of the bureaucracy in the first place, not of a workers government.

There was a SIGNIFICANT FIGHT. For all the period of 1917-1991. There was a strong workers opposition within CP after 1956. I think I have posted already the examples of the worker's resistance against privatization. By just in case - here is the video material. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dB7l3zXc5goA SIGNIFICANT FIGHT was what we saw with Solidarity. That was a SIGNIFICANT FIGHT. If Poland or Russia or China was a workers state under attack, we would have seen mass strikes, armed uprisings, factory occupations, etc.

Your logic fails completely just because I may invert your question - if "bureaucracy" had such power and privileges, why didn't they defend its state, "Are you trying to say that the "bureaucracy" in the USSR permitted to lose its privileges and to without a significant fight? See - it is meaningless.The bureaucracy retained its privileges. It's still there. It is the working class, not the bureaucracy that got devastated when private capitalism was restored.

RED DAVE

bie

19th May 2010, 13:27

I disagree with this analysis fundamentally.For a start, I dont accept your definition of socialism which seems to me a leninist-inspired one of a transition between capitalism and communism. In traditional marxism , socialism and communism are not different stages but simply different terms denoting the same thing. The only distinction Marx made was between a lower and higher phase of communism and what you are describing here certainly does not correspond to the lower phase ashas been pointed out.

You may disagree with me, but you will probably have to agree with Engels theory of the transformation towards communism:

It is impossible, of course, to carry out all these measures at once. But one will always bring others in its wake. Once the first radical attack on private property has been launched, the proletariat will find itself forced to go ever further, to concentrate increasingly in the hands of the state all capital, all agriculture, all transport, all trade. All the foregoing measures are directed to this end; and they will become practicable and feasible, capable of producing their centralizing effects to precisely the degree that the proletariat, through its labor, multiplies the country’s productive forces.

Finally, when all capital, all production, all exchange have been brought together in the hands of the nation, private property will disappear of its own accord, money will become superfluous, and production will so expand and man so change that society will be able to slough off whatever of its old economic habits may remain.

F. Engels, Principles of Communism, http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/11/princom.htm

What is important here is:
1) transformation to communism is a gradual process (cannot be carried on at once)
2) it depends on the class strength of the proletariat
3) its essence is to concentrate private property in hands of the nation by the mediation of state institutions

This allows us to make a distinction between various stages of this process. The socialist stage is the stage of immature communist relations. It is not a separate socio-economic formation but a transitional one. It refers to the society on its way to build communism. Every future revolutionary nation before achieving communism, that is a long and hard work, will have to go through the socialist stages similar to those of XX century socialism.

bie

19th May 2010, 14:24

Secondly, you once again miss the point about a labour market. You claim that in your "socialist" economy labour was not a commodity. It certainly was! You had employers and employees.

The relationship between them was a commodified one, a quid pro quo market transaction. You admit this yourself. You say workers were "paid according to their labour" . However you still contend that "labour is not an commodity. It is not a subject of the trade between the employer and the employee based on the commodity markets rules.". How is it possible for workers to be "paid according to the labour "and for their labour not to be a commodity. The very fact that it is paid for means by definition that it is a commodity!

The fact that the price of this commodity is not established via the normal market interplay of supply and demand is neither here nor there. As I said before, even in overtly capitalist countries, there are regulatiory factors that come into play such as minimum wage laws. In state capitalist countries, this regulatory approach is taken somewhat further. However a regulated market is still a market and a fixed price is still a price. There is still the fundamental buying and selling relationship at the bottom of it all.

Identification of the regulated market and the socialist system of allocation of goods (in this case - labour) is a serious mistake. In the centre of the marixist analysis of the capitalist system is the human labour as the subject of trade:

By the competition between buyers and sellers, by the relation of the demand to the supply, of the call to the offer. The competition by which the price of a commodity is determined is threefold.

The same commodity is offered for sale by various sellers. Whoever sells commodities of the same quality most cheaply, is sure to drive the other sellers from the field and to secure the greatest market for himself. The sellers therefore fight among themselves for the sales, for the market. Each one of them wishes to sell, and to sell as much as possible, and if possible to sell alone, to the exclusion of all other sellers. Each one sells cheaper than the other. Thus there takes place a competition among the sellers which forces down the price of the commodities offered by them.

But there is also a competition among the buyers; this upon its side causes the price of the proffered commodities to rise. (....)
K. Marx, Wage Labour and Capital, http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/wage-labour/ch03.htm

The basic features of the commodity markets were expressed above: it is the competition between buyers and sellers that establishes the price of the commodity, price of commodity is based on the price of its production (reproduction), also "if the price of a commodity falls below its cost of production, then capital will be withdrawn from the production of this commodity." etc. None of that existed in the socialist system of allocation of labour.

So the commodity market needs more to exist than the bare fact that workers get wages for their work. You ask: "How is it possible for workers to be "paid according to the labour "and for their labour not to be a commodity". The answer is quite simple. The existence of the money commodity relations along with socialist type relations implied the need of the payment in the monetary form. In other words, until the consumer products were sold as commodities, workers got payment that allowed them to purchase goods that appears as commodities (their nature were, however, more complex).

But the labour itself was not a commodity. It was considered in the economic plan in 2 ways:

1) as the resource, that needed to be allocated according to the principle of the economic rationality - in the similar way other resources were allocated to various branches of the industry, eg. fuels, raw materials, transport etc. As the production as a whole was directed according to the principle of the satisfaction of social needs, the allocation of resources was not dependent on the profitability but on its importance towards the realization of the economic plan,
2) as the social need, that has to be satisfied by the economic structure o the society. Therefore centrally planned economy was designed in such a way that allowed full employment. Is was a very important point of the socialist economy, as right to work was considered to be a basic human right (unlike in capitalism).

It is clearly visible that such a design is entirely different than rules of labour commodity markets of the capitalist societies, that are based on the exploitation of human labour, creation of unemployment, economic outsourcing and profit-driven enterprises. You asked how it is possible for the worker to get a wage according to his work with no labour market present. It is possible in such a way that all parameters of labour (availability, location, amount of payment, working time etc.) are being determined on the level of social management of the economy (as the rational allocation of labour resources), but the socialist relations are not mature enough to abandon the consumer goods character as commodities. Therefore the monetary (or other) equivalent of labour is still necessary to control the distribution of the consumer goods, which appear as commodities in the early states of the development of socialism-communism.

bie

19th May 2010, 14:44

Thirdly, despite your extravagant claim that "In case of socialist states wages were established on the basis of social planning - therefore they belong by the definition to the socialist relations of production", there was in fact a considerable amount of competitive bidding and advertising for labour at the level of state enterprises . Despite the fact national wage rates might be established centrally, enterprises could and did exercise a considerable degree of discretion in the hiring of wage labour and in offering employment benefits. Competitioon between enterrpises was particularly fierce in relation to skilled labour and various ruses might be used to attract and hold onto such labour. You need to distinguish between the abstract theoretical model of your so called socialist economy and the empirical reality of what actually went on
This was actually the result of the wrong economic policies introduced in after 1956. The increasing degree of formal independence of the productive units (so called "softening" of the central plan) gave rise to the expansion of the money-commodity relations and capitalist-like economic phenomena (eg. competition between productive units, indication of "profitability" etc.). This decentralization had a destructive effect on the socialist economy - causing difficulties in coordination of planning (central plan was weakened), that resulted in stagnation, slowdown of economic growth (in 1970s) and eventual economic crisis. It were also the first steps towards restoration of capitalism.

But this sort of failed economic policies (towards so called "market socialism") are not an essential part of the socialist economy but rather the expression of the opportunistic political lines. They are actually responsible for the crisis in 1970 and 1980. Therefore all the empirical observations on the socialism of the 2nd half of XX century have to consider them as the source of deviations. It is crucial to get a historical perspective and political understanding of the policy changes.

edit: On the other hand, however you may also argue that some degree of competitiveness between the production units (eg. "socialist competitiveness") may be also beneficial to some extent in order to increase labour productivity, increase rationality of resource management, increase the quality of products etc. If wisely used, it can be a powerful tool too.

bie

19th May 2010, 15:46

So there was management other than workers management. You have made my point: this is not workers control. In German, workers representatives sit on teh boards of directors of corporations. This is not socialism.
I think you confuse the distinction between manual and intellectual labour with the distinction between workers and bourgeoisie. There was no other control than workers. The management boards consisted of people assigned by the Workers Party. They were all workers of the productive unit.

It would be the beginning of socialism from below.
Well, it is quite silly. You are not talking about socialism but on some form of corporate collective capitalism. How would you prevent your "self-managed productive units" from competing with each other, from hiring the wage for profit and eventually - how would you coordinate the gobal production? This is incredibly utopian point of view. Socialism is about the social control over country resources, not just the self-management of the productive units.

Yeah, those nasty workers. They made unreasonable demands on the government. Fascinating how you instinctively demonstrate the difference between the workers, making wage demands, and the government, which accepted them. If this were socialism, the workers would be the government.
This is ridiculous. So you recon there should be no government? Or workers should carry on governmental offices after hours?

Again, you are positing a state apparatus separate from the working class. You are making my point: this was state capitalism.
As above. Do you think there should be no state apparatus then? It is a sort of ultraliberalism - not a socialist approach. You fail to understand the basis thing, as Bucharin stated in his ABC of Communism, I will remind:

We must never forget the class character of the State. The State must not be conceived as constituting a 'third power' standing above the classes; from head to foot it is a class organization. Under the dictatorship of the workers it is a working-class organization. Under the dominion of the bourgeoisie it is just as definitely an economic organization as is a trust or a syndicate

Therefore "State" cannot be the same as "class". State may act in the interest of this class or the other. It depends on the balance of forces. In case of socialist societies - balance of forces within CP.

If the party had been proletarian all along, this could not have happened, or at least it could not have happened without a huge fight within the party, such as happened in Russia 1921-28.
In 1928 the petit-bourgeoisie elements were defeated (they get less than 1% of the party votes), but they come back after 1956. If you had even the slightest idea about what we are talking about (sorry, but I take an impression that you simply don't know many things), you would know that the struggle within CP was the major driving force of its development (eventually towards Buchanist stance of social-democracy). Everyone from the former CPs will tell you that the internal fractional struggle between "reformists", "conservatives" etc. was of the huge importance.

Again, where was the great Workers Party in this ideological offensive? I mean, they couldn't even defeat the Catholic Church, with its miserable ideology.
Well, they did what they could. I wouldn't say that Catholic Church ideology is "miserable". In Poland it was much stronger than scientific marxism-leninism, especially among the working class. The reason is that most of the Polish working class were backward peasants one generation before. And in the rural areas before the socialist revolution priest was the only authority. It is the superstructure of the society that is conservative by nature, it cannot be changed immediately.

Strange contradiction - on the one hand you support the workers regardless of the fact if they act in their own interest or the interest of the different class (so called false consciousness) and on the other you deny their own ideology that was catholicism.

By who and from where? It seems to me that the answer is that these were organizations of the bureaucracy in the first place, not of a workers government.
By the "reformistic" and "procapitalist" fractions within CP supported by so-called "democratic opposition" that were the collection of liberals, social-democrats, nationalist inteligentsia, professionals under the infuence of the petit-bourgeoisie ideology, catholic clergy etc. The pro-socialist organizations (eg. Grabski, Yegorov) were sucessfully isolated and destroyed. Does it answer your question?

A SIGNIFICANT FIGHT was what we saw with Solidarity. That was a SIGNIFICANT FIGHT. If Poland or Russia or China was a workers state under attack, we would have seen mass strikes, armed uprisings, factory occupations, etc.
"Solidarity" was created by the "reformist" fraction within CP (W.Kania) in the 70s as the tool against Gierek's regime. (he admits it himself in his memories). The whole history is however much more complex (many forces were involved in this process), but eventually resulted in suicidal action of the parts of the working class leaded by liberals and clergy towards their own disaster. This is the mechanism of the conuterrevolution that made advantage of national sentiments etc in order to impose a false consciousness on the part of the industrial working class. And it was cheered by opportunists within CP, financed by CIA etc.

The bureaucracy retained its privileges. It's still there. It is the working class, not the bureaucracy that got devastated when private capitalism was restored.
Really? I see that you have not even basic idea about things that we are talking about here. Instead you are presenting a mechanistic, dogmatic, ultra-simplified and rather schematic approach.

In the counterrevolution most of the people connected to the socialist regime were put out of work, state factories were closed down, institutions were dissolved etc. Many of the servants of the socialist state were prosecuted in so called "lustration" processes. They were not allowed to run for a public function anymore. Majority of WP formed a social-democratic party that eventually turned into an ordinary liberal pro-bourgeoisie organization.

There were only nationalistic and liberal anticommunists that took power in 1991 like eg. Fransyniuk, Michnik etc. that gained on the counterrevolution and use the opportunity of holding power to enrich themselves and to became a petit-bourgeoise or even millionaire bourgeoisie. If you don't have in your CV that you were an anticommunist activist in the 80w, prosecuted under "terrible totalitarian regime" you are simply no-one (as a popular singer Kazik Staszewski sings in the mid 90s)

Paul Cockshott

19th May 2010, 16:55

Quote:
Originally Posted by bie http://www.revleft.com/vb/../revleft/buttons/viewpost.gif (http://www.revleft.com/vb/../showthread.php?p=1750743#post1750743)
or whatever, but there is no possibility to avoid employing number of people in the organization and coordination of production within the socialist society.
Again, you are positing a state apparatus separate from the working class. You are making my point: this was state capitalism.

Do you deny that coordination and planning is a disctinct labour process, one of many that is required in a society with a developed division of labour?

Paul Cockshott

19th May 2010, 16:57

Quote:
Originally Posted by bie http://www.revleft.com/vb/../revleft/buttons/viewpost.gif (http://www.revleft.com/vb/../showthread.php?p=1750743#post1750743)
There was a SIGNIFICANT FIGHT. For all the period of 1917-1991. There was a strong workers opposition within CP after 1956. I think I have posted already the examples of the worker's resistance against privatization. By just in case - here is the video material. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dB7l3zXc5go (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dB7l3zXc5go)
A SIGNIFICANT FIGHT was what we saw with Solidarity. That was a SIGNIFICANT FIGHT. If Poland or Russia or China was a workers state under attack, we would have seen mass strikes, armed uprisings, factory occupations, etc.

But politically Solidarity was a significant fight for capitalism -- look at their economic programme.

Lyev

19th May 2010, 17:57

bie

19th May 2010, 18:31

"who owned the means of production?"

It is actually quite easy to answer, just have a look into a Soviet Constitution from 1936:

THE ORGANIZATION OF SOVIET SOCIETY

ARTICLE 1. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics is a socialist state of workers and peasants.

ARTICLE 2. The Soviets of Working People's Deputies, which grew and attained strength as a result of the overthrow of the landlords and capitalists and the achievement of the dictatorship of the proletariat, constitute the political foundation of the U.S.S.R.

ARTICLE 3. In the U.S.S.R. all power belongs to the working people of town and country as represented by the Soviets of Working People's Deputies.

ARTICLE 4. The socialist system of economy and the socialist ownership of the means and instruments of production firmly established as a result of the abolition of the capitalist system of economy, the abrogation of private ownership of the means and instruments of production and the abolition of the exploitation of man by man, constitute' the economic foundation of the U.S.S.R.

ARTICLE 5. Socialist property in the U.S.S.R. exists either in the form of state property (the possession of the whole people), or in the form of cooperative and collective-farm property (property of a collective farm or property of a cooperative association).

ARTICLE 6. The land, its natural deposits, waters, forests, mills, factories, mines, rail, water and air transport, banks, post, telegraph and telephones, large state-organized agricultural enterprises (state farms, machine and tractor stations and the like) as well as municipal enterprises and the bulk of the dwelling houses in the cities and industrial localities, are state property, that is, belong to the whole people.

ARTICLE 7. Public enterprises in collective farms and cooperative organizations, with their livestock and implements, the products of the collective farms and cooperative organizations, as well as their common buildings, constitute the common socialist property of the collective farms and cooperative organizations. In addition to its basic income from the public collective-farm enterprise, every household in a collective farm has for its personal use a small plot of land attached to the dwelling and, as its personal property, a subsidiary establishment on the plot, a dwelling house, livestock, poultry and minor agricultural implements in accordance with the statutes of the agricultural artel.

ARTICLE 8. The land occupied by collective farms is secured to them for their use free of charge and for an unlimited time, that is, in perpetuity.

ARTICLE 9. Alongside the socialist system of economy, which is the predominant form of economy in the U.S.S.R., the law permits the small private economy of individual peasants and handicraftsman based on their personal labor and precluding the exploitation of the labor of others.

ARTICLE 10. The right of citizens to personal ownership of their incomes from work and of their savings, of their dwelling houses and subsidiary household economy, their household furniture and utensils and articles of personal use and convenience, as well as the right of inheritance of personal property of citizens, is protected by law.

ARTICLE 11. The economic life of the U.S.S.R. is determined and directed by the state national economic plan with the aim of increasing the public wealth, of steadily improving the material conditions of the working people and raising their cultural level, of consolidating the independence of the U.S.S.R. and strengthening its defensive capacity.

ARTICLE 12. In the U.S.S.R. work is a duty and a matter of honor for every able-bodied citizen, in accordance with the principle: "He who does not work, neither shall he eat."
The principle applied in the U.S.S.R. is that of socialism: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his work."

http://www.departments.bucknell.edu/russian/const/36cons01.html

The social ownership of the means of production as well as land, waters, forests etc. is explicitly stated in the most important legal document.

robbo203

19th May 2010, 19:42

You may disagree with me, but you will probably have to agree with Engels theory of the transformation towards communism:

F. Engels, Principles of Communism, http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/11/princom.htm

What is important here is:
1) transformation to communism is a gradual process (cannot be carried on at once)
2) it depends on the class strength of the proletariat
3) its essence is to concentrate private property in hands of the nation by the mediation of state institutions

This allows us to make a distinction between various stages of this process. The socialist stage is the stage of immature communist relations. It is not a separate socio-economic formation but a transitional one. It refers to the society on its way to build communism. Every future revolutionary nation before achieving communism, that is a long and hard work, will have to go through the socialist stages similar to those of XX century socialism.

As it happens I disagree with Engels' approach to the revolutionary transformation - although, unlike you, Engels never called this stage when capital is concentrated in the hands of the state, "socialism". In fact, he was quite clear that in this stage the state acts as the "national capitalist". You need to be aware that your notion of the socialist stage comes from the Leninist stable, it has nothing to do with traditional marxism.

I think this whole idea of reaching socialism/communism via state capitalism or nationalisation is , if not ill-founded, utterly obsolete. State capitalism is a dead end, going nowhere. In my view it does not expedite the changeover to socialism as Engels argued. He saw it as facilitating the socialisation or production and raising the level of the productive forces. This would have happened anyway with or without nationalisation. More importantly, advocating state capitalism as a transition to socialism actually serves to bind the workers more firmly to capital and gloss over the conflicting interests between the workers and exploitative state capital.

At least on that point Engels was right in saying that the more the the state takes over the means of production the more workers does it exploit. Pity he didnt follow this through with this insight and reject state capitalism outright as a transitory stage to socialism

robbo203

19th May 2010, 22:52

Identification of the regulated market and the socialist system of allocation of goods (in this case - labour) is a serious mistake. In the centre of the marixist analysis of the capitalist system is the human labour as the subject of trade:
.

Yes and that is precisely the mistake that you are making. You are confusing what was essentially a regulated market system such as existed in the Soviet Union with socialism. In the Soviet Union not only were consumer goods commodified but so too were capital goods. They were bought and sold between enterprises using credit (money) from the banks

K. Marx, Wage Labour and Capital, http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/wage-labour/ch03.htm

The basic features of the commodity markets were expressed above: it is the competition between buyers and sellers that establishes the price of the commodity, price of commodity is based on the price of its production (reproduction), also "if the price of a commodity falls below its cost of production, then capital will be withdrawn from the production of this commodity." etc. None of that existed in the socialist system of allocation of labour. .

I think this is a very rigid and simplistic line of argument. Marx was describing a market system as an ideal type - in its pure form for explanatory purposes in a pamphlet. In western style capitalism the state can and does sometimes intervene when the price of a commodity falls below its cost of production by injecting capital into the failing enterprise. Its called subsidisation. Now you are not surely suggesting , are you?, that capitalism no longer exists because the state subsidises some firms. It was the same in the state capitalist soviet union. All profits and losses technically reverted to the state. State enterprises that made a loss could continue in business essentially becuase the state could afford to subsidise such loss making enterprises out of the profits creamed off from other enterprises. But state funds were not a bottomless pit. Considerable downward pressure was brought to bear on failing enterprises including the imposition of penalties on state managers to get them to turn around their performance and become become profitable

So the commodity market needs more to exist than the bare fact that workers get wages for their work. You ask: "How is it possible for workers to be "paid according to the labour "and for their labour not to be a commodity". The answer is quite simple. The existence of the money commodity relations along with socialist type relations implied the need of the payment in the monetary form. In other words, until the consumer products were sold as commodities, workers got payment that allowed them to purchase goods that appears as commodities (their nature were, however, more complex).
.

This is an absurd argument. Think about it. If you get paid for doing a certain amount of labour what else can that mean than that your labour power is being sold to the employer of this labour power in exchange for a wage? There is thus a market transaction happening here in other words. You seem to have a very bizarre definition of markets and commodities in my view. A market exchange is simply a quid pro quo transaction between a buyer and seller involving an exchange of property titles. X gives Y an apple in exchange for an orange. N gives his labour power over to M over the course of a working week in exchange for a weekly wage. The point is that X does get that orange unless she offers an apple to Y and N does not get his weekly wage unless he offers his labour power to M.

According to you theory, if I understand you correctly, wages in the Soviet Union were nothing more than a means of payment that "allowed them to purchase goods that appear as commodities". Sorry but if they have to purchase these goods thewn they ARE commodities. That is elementary. But - hey! - whats the big difference between that and what happens in the west? In the west workers too have to get wages as allow them, to buy commodities. As in the West so in the Soviet Union, the workers are dispossed of the means of production and this , as you will know if youve studied your Marx, is what gave rise to a system of generalised wage labour

But the labour itself was not a commodity. It was considered in the economic plan in 2 ways:

1) as the resource, that needed to be allocated according to the principle of the economic rationality - in the similar way other resources were allocated to various branches of the industry, eg. fuels, raw materials, transport etc. As the production as a whole was directed according to the principle of the satisfaction of social needs, the allocation of resources was not dependent on the profitability but on its importance towards the realization of the economic plan,
2) as the social need, that has to be satisfied by the economic structure o the society. Therefore centrally planned economy was designed in such a way that allowed full employment. Is was a very important point of the socialist economy, as right to work was considered to be a basic human right (unlike in capitalism)..

You are way off beam here. Your comments above bear no relation to the historical reality of state capitalism. It seems like you have just been caught up in the mantra of Soviet state capitalist ideology without critically applying its precepts to the real world.

Its just nonsense to say that allocation of resources in the Soviet Union was not dependent on the profitability but on its importance towards the realization of the economic plan. If that were the case why were state enterprises required to make a profit? Loss making enterprises could exist (as they do in the West through subsidies) but their very existence presupposed the existence of profit making enterprises elsewhere which provided the means by which loss making enterrpirses could be sustained

In point of fact it was the imposition of plan targets on enterprises which ironically meant that each had to look to their own interests in order to meet these targets so that in effect their relationship with other enterprises was much the same as between businesses in the west i.e ruthlessly competitive. You also grossly exaggerate the influence of the "plan". Logistically speaking, society wide planning is complete pipe dream. Its just not possible and the Soviet authorities had perforce to devolve a huge amount of decisionmaking downards - notably to the managers of state enterprises. Instead of guiding developments, the "plan" was invariably modified to fit in with the changing reality as I explained earlier.

There is also plenty of evidence to suggest that the social needs you talk very much took a back seat compared with the need for capital accumulation - particularly in the Stalin years

On the question of unemployment you will perhaps need to acquiaint yourself with the literature on hidden or disguised unemployment in the Soviet Union. In the west, they have a pretty name for it. Its called job creation schemes. In the Soviet Union, they took this one or or two steps further. As one wag put it. "They pretend to pay us and we pretend to work". Sums it up quite nicely

Paul Cockshott

19th May 2010, 23:27

...but if you look back to 1960s, early 1970s in the west, for example in the UK, there was virtual full employment, free and good healthcare, and free and good education, certainly in comparison to today.

It wasn't socialism though.

Devrim

Why do you say that?
You could argue that the economy was at least partially socialist. These things that you list were the work of a labour movement guided by the goal of socialism.

Paul Cockshott

19th May 2010, 23:38

BTW, would there still be a labour market in Minsky's "zero unemployment" scenario? There would still be people looking for jobs while in the ELR program.

There would be a labour market but one much more favorable to labour, and one which in long run would not guarantee the extraction of surplus value. This was pointed out by Kalecki in 1943.

Are you distancing yourself more from your own usage of the word "socialism" in your TNS book, despite the politically inhibiting environment of that time?

The short answer is yes.

We conceded this in the preface to the Czech edition of the book. The English original of the Czech edition is here http://ricardo.ecn.wfu.edu/~cottrell/socialism_book/preface-us.pdf

The relevant passage is

Our book was titled Towards a New Socialism, but it was essentially an elaboration of what Marx
called the first stage of communism. That the title referred to socialism rather than communism
was an accommodation to the political climate of the times. The English edition came out at a
nadir for socialism. In the decade since then the advance of neo-liberalism has slowed down. An
international anti-capitalist movement has come into being, although not yet an new international
socialist movement. It is inevitable that there will be a growing readership for a coherent alternative
to capitalism. But it was difficult enough in the early ’90s to find a publisher willing to print a
book advocating socialism. We judged that a title explicitly advocating communism would have
made it impossible to place or would have reduced the readership. Socialism was a sheepskin for
our communist wolf. But this now leaves us with an obligation to explain what we understand by
socialism and communism.
To repeat, what we advocated in the book was the first stage of communism. We called it
socialism for political expediency. We reject the orthodox Soviet view of socialism as a prolonged
period during which the productive forces are built up in preparation for an eventual communism.
Our objection is not to the idea that the Soviet system was socialist, nor to the attempt to rapidly
develop the productive forces, but rather to the conception of communism that is involved in this.
The CPSU and western Trotskyist parties shared a common problematic when it came to thinking of
communism. Communism is seen as a stage following socialism, a stage predicated upon material
plenty with the free distribution of consumer goods. The sequence of development here is seen
as capitalism -> socialism -> communism. This is not the same as the formulation put forward
by Marx, which was capitalism -> dictatorship of the proletariat -> first stage of communism ->
second stage of communism. In State and Revolution Lenin equated the first stage of communism
with socialism (Lenin, 1964), and treated both as synonymous with the public ownership of the
means of production. This formulation was then adopted by all the traditions that base themselves
on Leninism. In our opinion this is unfortunate since it represents an oversimplification of what
Marx was saying.
Socialism, defined as public ownership of the means of production, is not equivalent to Marx’s
first phase of communism, because the latter presupposed the elimination of money and a movement
to calculation in labour time. Socialism as defined by Lenin can be quite compatible with the
continued existence of money. The USSR after collectivization was socialist in Lenin’s sense but
money persisted, as did wages and the commodity form. This continuation of money was not seen
as a short-term phenomenon lasting maybe 5 or 10 years, but as something that was to persist for
decades, and did indeed persist for half a century. The effect of Lenin’s formulation was to make
the specific features of Marx’s first phase of communism invisible. The notion of calculation and
payment in terms of labour time vanished, and with it any programmatic concept of achieving the
first phase of communism as a distinct task.
It should be clear that payment in money terms allowed for significant disparities in hourly
pay. People’s incomes could all be ideologically presented as ‘payment according to labour’, albeit
differentiated by the quality of the labour. While these economies did not have forms of property
income such as interest, rent or dividends, the notion that widely differing money wages were all
‘payments according to labour’ was just as much an ideological fiction as the idea in bourgeois
economics that wages, prices and profits are all equivalent as payments to ‘factors of production’.
What remained of communism in the Leninist view was Marx’s second phase: ‘from each
according to their ability, to each according to their need’. The path to this goal was seen as leading
through the provision of free or subsidized consumer goods, moving eventually to a situation where
all distribution would be free and unlimited.
We strongly disagree with this conception. We think that it rests on a misunderstanding of
distribution according to need and had pernicious consequences.
1. When combined with monetary payment for labour, it installed a system of economic calculation
that systematically held back the productivity of labour.
2. It made communism an ever receding mirage, since however much the productivity of labour
did rise, it was never sufficient to allow the free distribution of all goods.
Distribution according to need is not the same thing as unlimited free distribution. In the British
National Health Service, medical treatment is free at the time of need.6 But this free distribution
only works because there is some relatively objective assessment of need by doctors, combined with
waiting lists for treatments (plus an element of privatization). This is quite different from saying
that free distribution of clothes, for example, would be a case of ‘to each according to their need’.
If consumer goods in general were distributed free this would lead either to profligate waste, or
alternatively to military-style uniformity of consumption if waste were curtailed.
Marx does not talk about free distribution, he talks about ‘to each according to their need’. This
is more compatible with the model followed by social-democratic welfare states of making supplementary
payments to those with disabilities, to students, to large families etc. Payment according
to need presupposes some procedure for socially assessing need. In this, welfare-state capitalism
prefigures communism, but it does so in a monetary economy with wide income differentials. The
gap between the first and second phases of communism is now much less than in Marx’s day, when
no welfare state existed. The principle of distribution according to need has already been accepted
for some sectors of the economy in Canada and most European capitalist countries, and much of
this would be carried over into communism. Those with special needs would either receive gratis
specific goods and services for which they had a need, or would be credited with additional labour
time to acquire what they needed from the social stores.

Die Neue Zeit

20th May 2010, 01:39

Damn, I forgot that first part of the preface when I skipped to the transition commentary in that preface.

This was pointed out by Kalecki in 1943.

I don't know how much of Kalecki's work has been translated and especially published online. :(

...but if you look back to 1960s, early 1970s in the west, for example in the UK, there was virtual full employment, free and good healthcare, and free and good education, certainly in comparison to today.

It wasn't socialism though.

Devrim

"Full employment" is a slithery term. There certainly was no zero unemployment.

Paul Cockshott

20th May 2010, 10:52

I don't know how much of Kalecki's work has been translated and especially published online. :(

That was published in the 1960s or 70s in a collection of his articles by, I think, CUP.

bie

20th May 2010, 14:45

I think this whole idea of reaching socialism/communism via state capitalism or nationalisation is , if not ill-founded, utterly obsolete. State capitalism is a dead end, going nowhere. In my view it does not expedite the changeover to socialism as Engels argued. He saw it as facilitating the socialisation or production and raising the level of the productive forces. This would have happened anyway with or without nationalisation. More importantly, advocating state capitalism as a transition to socialism actually serves to bind the workers more firmly to capital and gloss over the conflicting interests between the workers and exploitative state capital.

At least on that point Engels was right in saying that the more the the state takes over the means of production the more workers does it exploit. Pity he didnt follow this through with this insight and reject state capitalism outright as a transitory stage to socialism

First of all you fail to understand that the nature of the state depends on the class that is politically in control of it. "State" is nothing but an empty set of rules/institutions etc. that are necessary for the society to reproduce its socio-political formation. Therefore the state controlled by the bourgeoisie is the another mean of exploitation of the workers. The state controlled by the workers is the essential feature of transformation towards socialism/communism. The change in power (ie. change of the class controlling the state) is called a social revolution.

You are writing here "I think this whole idea of reaching socialism/communism via state capitalism or nationalization is , if not ill-founded, utterly obsolete.". By this sort of statements you clearly show that you "vision" of socialism is clearly a utopian one. By rejecting the concept of socialized means of production by nationalization you
simply regress to the utopian socialism. Moreover, you as unable to present any alternative way of socializing production (and ilustrating it with practical examples) you join the club of people that rejects the possibility of creating an alternative to capitalist slavery. Therefore you became the defendant of current capitalist relations. Instead of
presenting a socialist alternative you concentrate on attacking existing socialist societies from ultra-leftist positions, falsely claiming that this societies "do not work".

Of course it is what bourgeoisie want workers to believe. "There is no alternative". If real socialism is not an alternative to capitalism, so what is? An utopian theoretical concept that never and nowhere were realized by no-one? Convincing workers that real socialism does not work is not only harmful but also false. Real socialism DID eventually worked. It allowed millions of people in many countries worldwide a significant social progress, it achieved great successes on the field of economy, education, healthcare, social justice. It actually PROVED that IT IS an ALTERNATIVE and that it works.

Of course it didn't get the good reception from the bourgeoisie, that went scared that their privileges may end in their country. Therefore bourgeoisie tried (to some extend with success) to discredit and present socialism in the worst possible and false way. It found also reception among "leftists" and caused confusion among them (as we see in progress of this discussion). The real and working socialist ideas were replaced by utopian concepts. But - your concepts of utopian socialism (stateless etc) are pretty harmless to the ruling capitalist class - and your attacks on real alternatives - harmful to the whole workers movement. It is pretty sad.

black magick hustla

20th May 2010, 15:30

bie

20th May 2010, 16:01

In the Soviet Union not only were consumer goods commodified but so too were capital goods. They were bought and sold between enterprises using credit (money) from the banks
In the historical perspective you can see that the elements of the market economy were introduced gradually to from 1956 and forth. Although capital goods became in some cases subject to the trade between productive units, its scope was quite low (less than 1% on total transfer of means of production). The majority of the funds for investments came from the state's budget and enterprise own production fund. Other important information is that capital goods couldn't be purchased outside the planning channels. The same with consumer goods. Their prices were established by the state. Show me a capitalist economy in which all the prices are established on the central level.

Now you are not surely suggesting , are you?, that capitalism no longer exists because the state subsidized some firms. It was the same in the state capitalist soviet union.
No. You don't understand the difference between state subsidized market and central planning. In the state subsidized market prices are set by the supply/demand scheme with the state correcting them in some cases. In central planning - it is opposite. Prices are set up by the central plan and eventually corrected by the other factors. I will give you the example: in capitalism, the sudden large increase in the number of any commodity (including labour) will cause the decrease of its price (regardless if it is subsidized or not). As in capitalism labour is not subsidized by the state (and rather the opposite is true), the increase of supply of labour or decrease of its demand will cause lowering wages. Therefore it is possible to control and keep low level of wages by controlling its supply/demand (therefore unemployment is present). In socialism even high supply of labour would not effect the level of wages of workers! The wages and prices were all set at the level of the central plan. Think about this. This is the clear distinction.

This is an absurd argument. Think about it. If you get paid for doing a certain amount of labour what else can that mean than that your labour power is being sold to the employer of this labour power in exchange for a wage? There is thus a market transaction happening here in other words.
Again wrong. Of course you get paid for doing a certain amount of work (therefore it is a sort of transaction) but the conditions of this transactions are not determined by the blind market forces that give rise to exploitation but - by the rational economic plan. You couldn't trade with labour in USSR. Therefore there was no labour market.

You seem to have a very bizarre definition of markets and commodities in my view. A market exchange is simply a quid pro quo transaction between a buyer and seller involving an exchange of property titles. X gives Y an apple in exchange for an orange. N gives his labour power over to M over the course of a working week in exchange for a weekly wage. The point is that X does get that orange unless she offers an apple to Y and N does not get his weekly wage unless he offers his labour power to M.
The above scheme can be applied both to capitalist and socialist society (in its early stages). In case of socialist market, that is essentially different from capitalist market,
all the conditions concerning price, quality, amount etc. are effect not a blind forces (sometimes corrected by the state) but - rational economic planning. Of course it would be nice in communism to go to the shop and take whatever you like, but it its initial stages and due to the limitation of resources certain elements of market economy have to be maintained for some period. What is important here is that gradually they should be removed and replaced by the communist relations ("ones according to his needs")

If that were the case why were state enterprises required to make a profit?
The state enterprises were not required to make profit. It is common mistakes people do about the economy of socialism. Only since Kosygin/Libermann reforms profit became one of planned targets of the enterprise (even not the most important one). It wasn't a force in command but only an indication of the efficiency of the productive unit. Measure of profit as the additional factor was introduced in order to increase efficiency of the individual factory and improve the management level. But gross output not a profit was a measure of the success of the productive unit. Of course this "profit" differs significantly from the the capitalist profit (eg. cannot be increased by restricting production, profit did not determine the distribution of investments etc.)

I think that the main differences between the capitalist and socialist economy presented above allows clear understanding that the term "state capitalist" simply do not give the accurate picture of the socialist economy and is rather the element of the subversive game played against the socialism and workers movement in general.

bie

20th May 2010, 16:29

this is wrong. the state is not an "empty set". it is made in the image of those who control it. after the french revolution, the state was completely overturned into a new one, with new institutions, with new mechanics of control. the state ARE the bosses. without the state the bosses are nothing. there has been numerous times throughout the history of capitalism that the state acted against large private capital when it deemed it as necessary to preserve the social glue. one of them being the new deal in the US. or the anti-trust laws. to think the state is this "tool" that anybody can use is preposterous. the state is built by the assumptions of class society - therefore there cannot be such thing as a workers state. the state will someday have to be destroyed.
If you consider the state as the tool of oppression of one class over the other (eg. bourgeoisie dictatorship, dictatorship of proletariat) it should definitely be destroyed someday. But it you look at the state as the set of social institutions allowing the coordination of the social production originating from the complexity of the modern division of labour - this "state" is crucial for the functioning of the society. I see nothing wrong in this type of a state.

RED DAVE

20th May 2010, 16:41

But it you look at the state as the set of social institutions allowing the coordination of the social production originating from the complexity of the modern division of labour - this "state" is crucial for the functioning of the society. I see nothing wrong in this type of a state.Problem is, Comrade, your definition would also fit a capitalist state. Each state is, as Marx called it, "the executive committee of the ruling class." The issue is not the state but which class controls the state.

The fact that the state of the USSR was carried over into the current society there demonstrates that it was not a workers state.

RED DAVE

bie

20th May 2010, 16:51

The issue is not the state but which class controls the state.
Agree.

The fact that the state of the USSR was carried over into the current society there demonstrates that it was not a workers state.
In the historical perspective you may say that the revolutionary and counterrevolutionary elements fought over the state for the whole period of existence of USSR. There was times when workers got biggest gains, also - ones where they got biggest loses. The final lost was the worsts and resulted in the current society. But there is a germ of truth. The CP were not an stricte workers party in the late 80. It was influenced by highly by petit-bourgeoisie and bourgeoisie ideology- therefore its evolution towards nationalist, liberal and socialdemocratic programs. And the CP controlled the state.

Dave B

20th May 2010, 18:58

The workers were no more in control of the state in 1921 than they were later;

V. I. Lenin The Second All-Russia Congress of Miners

January 23, 1921

Does every worker know how to run the state? People working in the practical sphere know that this is not true, that millions of our organised workers are going through what we always said the trade unions were, namely, a school of communism and administration. When they have attended this school for a number of years they will have learned to administer, but the going is slow.

We have not even abolished illiteracy. We know that workers in touch with peasants are liable to fall for non-proletarian slogans. How many of the workers have been engaged in government? A few thousand throughout Russia and no more. If we say that it is not the Party but the trade unions that put up the candidates and administrate, it may sound very democratic and might help us to catch a few votes(?), but not for long. It will be fatal for the dictatorship of the proletariat (Bolshevik party).

And it is quite improper for the proletariat to rush into the arms of syndicalism and talk about mandatory nominations to "all-Russia producers’ congresses". This is dangerous and jeopardizes the Party’s guiding role.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1921/jan/23.htm (http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1921/jan/23.htm)

It was the dictatorship of one party and a very small party at that being composed of significantly less than 1% of the population.
As a ruling capitalist class for dividing up the surplus value and special privileges; as a proportion of the population, the envy of the capitalist world.

V. I. Lenin, SPEECH AT THE FIRST ALL-RUSSIA CONGRESS OF WORKERS IN EDUCATION AND SOCIALIST CULTURE JULY 31, 1919

When we are reproached with having established a dictatorship of one party and, as you have heard, a united socialist front is proposed, we say, "Yes, it is a dictatorship of one party! This is what we stand for and we shall not shift from that position because it is the party that has won, in the course of decades, the position of vanguard of the entire factory and industrial proletariat.

http://www.marx2mao.net/Lenin/SWSC19.html (http://www.marx2mao.net/Lenin/SWSC19.html)

By the way Bie what is your gripe, are you an ex member of the dispossessed state capitalist ruling class yourself?

RED DAVE

20th May 2010, 19:11

In the historical perspective you may say that the revolutionary and counterrevolutionary elements fought over the state for the whole period of existence of USSR.Then why did Stalin announce during the 1930s that Russia had achieved the resolution of all class conflict. Why he [GASP] lying?

There was times when workers got biggest gains, also - ones where they got biggest loses.What you are saying then is that Russia was never a workers state.

The final lost was the worsts and resulted in the current society.How could the workers have lost control of "their" society 60 years after the revolution? Where did the counter-revolutionary class come from?

But there is a germ of truth. The CP were not an stricte workers party in the late 80.What makes you think it was a workers party in the late 1920s?

It was influenced by highly by petit-bourgeoisie and bourgeoisie ideology- therefore its evolution towards nationalist, liberal and socialdemocratic programs. And the CP controlled the state.How could it be that a workers party, leading the proletariat on to a glorious socialist future, succumbed to the enticements of capitalism?

RED DAVE

bie

20th May 2010, 21:17

The workers were no more in control of the state in 1921 than they were later:
Really? I think your understanding of workers power as the the manual labours running governmental offices after hours is quite faulty and actually quite funny. It is not important what fraction of the whole population was the CP (by the way ap. 200 mln people were peasants) but in the interest of which class the CP acted. Lenin admitted the socialist character of the USRR number of times, even explicitly:

This sounds very strange, and perhaps even absurd, for already at that time our Republic was a socialist republic and we were every day hastily—perhaps too hastily—adopting various new economic measures which could not be described as anything but socialist measures.(...)

(Five Years Of The Russian Revolution And The Prospects Of The World Revolution
Report To The Fourth Congress Of The Communist Internatioinal, November 13, 1922)

http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1922/nov/04b.htm

By the way Bie what is your gripe, are you an ex member of the dispossessed state capitalist ruling class yourself?
Unfortunately I need to disappoint you. There was no "state capitalist ruling class". It is purely product of your imagination or/and anticommunist subversive actions. My grandfather was the chief accountant in a large state company. As of the "experts" on socialist societies and economies you probably know (or not)- it was the second most important function after the director. For the whole life he did not earn enough to get himself a car.

May I ask you a question now - what is your gripe "Dave B"? Are you a petit-bourgeoisie intellectual?

Paul Cockshott

20th May 2010, 21:19

Then why did Stalin announce during the 1930s that Russia had achieved the resolution of all class conflict. Why he [GASP] lying?

He was clearly mistaken and relied too heavily on the traditional marxist conception that with the abolition of private property in the means of production classes would disappear. Mao was more realistic in recognising that class and class struggle were inherent to socialism. I suspect that you are working in the same basic problematic as Stalin except that you turn the logic round. He was saying - since we have socialism we must have no classes. You are saying since there were classes there was no socialism. Both you and Stalin share the same false and dogmatic premise that classes are incompatible with socialism.

What you are saying then is that Russia was never a workers state.

RED DAVE

Can I ask you what you think the basis of classes in the USSR were.

How do you think classes can be abolished?

How do you think that the political system of socialist society should be structured to maximise the probability that the working class is the dominant class in the state?

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

Dave B

20th May 2010, 23:46

May I ask you a question now - what is your gripe "Dave B"? Are you a petit-bourgeoisie intellectual

Are then, well you walked neatly into that one, as I just can’t resist a opportunity of talking about myself.

I am a chemist and therefore a fairly skilled and well paid worker, but I do work in a non-supervisory and productive role in a food factory.

I suppose at one point there was two other guys working with me and I was the ‘boss’ but I like to think that we had a flat team.

My father was a maintenance electrician who worked in a large factory making tin cans, my mother was a machine operator in a factory making spark plugs, most of her life.

I know it is a bit of a cliché about their father being an active trade unionists and a shop steward etc but mine actually was.

I went to a ‘comprehensive’ school, which in the UK was for the working class, the middle class go to grammar schools and the ruling class to ‘Public’ schools.

I have had the ancestry trace your family type bug and to my partial disappointment came clean on my working class heritage.

Traced it back to a bastard child born to an illiterate unemployed silk weaver in Croft Lancashire on poor relief in 1842, whilst Marx was reading Hegel.

My paternal grandfather was a labourer, lived in two up two down terraced house in Anfield, near the famous football ground, and was machined gunned non fatally at Gallipoli after joining the East Lancashire fusiliers

.

Die Neue Zeit

21st May 2010, 04:00

He was clearly mistaken and relied too heavily on the traditional marxist conception that with the abolition of private property in the means of production classes would disappear. Mao was more realistic in recognising that class and class struggle were inherent to socialism. I suspect that you are working in the same basic problematic as Stalin except that you turn the logic round. He was saying - since we have socialism we must have no classes. You are saying since there were classes there was no socialism. Both you and Stalin share the same false and dogmatic premise that classes are incompatible with socialism.

Stalin said there were classes, though. However, he was very confused about whether to go with Aggravation of Dem Klassenkampf or "Non-Antagonistic Classes." [My position is the former, with only the latter for hired unproductive labourers like butlers and private arms manufacturing workers.]

Paul Cockshott

21st May 2010, 09:28

RED DAVE

21st May 2010, 12:10

Then why did Stalin announce during the 1930s that Russia had achieved the resolution of all class conflict. Why he [GASP] lying?
He was clearly mistaken and relied too heavily on the traditional marxist conception that with the abolition of private property in the means of production classes would disappear.Yeah, right. Stalin's problem was that he was too much of an orthodox Marxist and not that he was a murderous, pathological liar.

Mao was more realistic in recognising that class and class struggle were inherent to socialism. I suspect that you are working in the same basic problematic as Stalin except that you turn the logic round. He was saying - since we have socialism we must have no classes. You are saying since there were classes there was no socialism. Both you and Stalin share the same false and dogmatic premise that classes are incompatible with socialism.No, I'm saying that since the working class did not control society, that it wasn't socialism.

What you are saying then is that Russia was never a workers state.
Can I ask you what you think the basis of classes in the USSR were.The basis of classes in the USSR was the same as the basis of classes in the USA: one class, the bureaucracy, controlled the economy and the extraction and distribution of surplus value; one class, the working class, did the work and was exploited. This is why there was no mass uprising to defend "socialism" in the USSR: the workers exchanged one set of exploiters for another.

How do you think classes can be abolished?Basically, when the working class has control of the economy of the world, it will proceed to eliminate class distinctions in the distribution of wealth, worldwide. When this is accomplished, the stage of communism will have been achieved and classes will have been abolished.

How do you think that the political system of socialist society should be structured to maximise the probability that the working class is the dominant class in the state?By basing the state on workers control of production from the working place upwards, with the working class always in firm control of production.

RED DAVE

bie

21st May 2010, 12:19

Stalin said there were classes, though. However, he was very confused about whether to go with Aggravation of Dem Klassenkampf or "Non-Antagonistic Classes." [My position is the former, with only the latter for hired unproductive labourers like butlers and private arms manufacturing workers.]

He clearly recognized the danger of reactionary opportunism within the political leadership and the necessity of the internal struggle against anti-leninist ideology (both "right" and "ultraleft"). The future degeneration of CP in late USSR period proved that he was actually right.

Report to the Seventeenth Party Congress on the Work of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.)[/I], January 26, 1934"]

1. Questions of Ideological and Political Leadership

Does this mean, however, that the fight is ended, and that the offensive of socialism is to be discontinued as superfluous?

No, it does not.

Does it mean that all is well in our Party, that there will be no more deviations in the Party, and that, therefore, we may now rest on our laurels?

No, it does not.

We have smashed the enemies of the Party, the opportunists of all shades, the nationalist deviators of all kinds. But remnants of their ideology still live in the minds of individual members of the Party, and not infrequently they find expression. The Party must not be regarded as something isolated from the people who surround it. It lives and works in its environment. It is not surprising that at times unhealthy moods penetrate into the Party from outside. And the ground for such moods undoubtedly exists in our country, if only for the reason that there still exist in town and country certain intermediary strata of the population who constitute a medium which breeds such moods.

The Seventeenth Conference of our Party 10 declared that one of the fundamental political tasks in fulfilling the Second Five-Year Plan is "to overcome the survivals of capitalism in economic life and in the minds of people." That is an absolutely correct idea. But can we say that we have already overcome all the survivals of capitalism in economic life? No, we cannot say that. Still less can we say that we have overcome the survivals of capitalism in the minds of people. We cannot say that, not only because in development the minds of people lag behind their economic position, but also because the capitalist encirclement still exists, which endeavours to revive and sustain the survivals of capitalism in the economic life and in the minds of the people of the U.S.S.R., and against which we Bolsheviks must always keep our powder dry.

Naturally, these survivals cannot but be a favourable ground for a revival of the ideology of the defeated anti-Leninist groups in the minds of individual members of our Party. Add to this the not very high theoretical level of the majority of our Party members, the inadequate ideological work of the Party bodies, and the fact that our Party functionaries are overburdened with purely practical work, which deprives them of the opportunity of augmenting their theoretical knowledge, and you will understand the origin of the confusion on a number of questions of Leninism that exists in the minds of individual Party members, a confusion which not infrequently penetrates into our press and helps to revive the survivals of the ideology of the defeated anti-Leninist groups.

That is why we cannot say that the fight is ended and that there is no longer any need for the policy of the socialist offensive.

It would be possible to take a number of questions of Leninism and demonstrate by means of them how tenaciously the survivals of the ideology of the defeated anti-Leninist groups continue to exist in the minds of certain Party members.

Take, for example, the question of building a classless socialist society. The Seventeenth Party Conference declared that we are advancing towards the formation of a classless socialist society. Naturally, a classless society cannot come of its own accord, as it were. It has to be achieved and built by the efforts of all the working people, by strengthening the organs of the dictatorship of the proletariat, by intensifying the class struggle, by abolishing classes, by eliminating the remnants of the capitalist classes, and in battles with enemies, both internal and external.

The point is clear, one would think.

And yet, who does not know that the enunciation of this clear and elementary thesis of Leninism has given rise to not a little confusion in the minds of a section of Party members and to unhealthy sentiments among them? The thesis that we are advancing towards a classless society—put forward as a slogan—was interpreted by them to mean a spontaneous process. And they began to reason in this way: If it is a classless society, then we can relax the class struggle, we can relax the dictatorship of the proletariat, and get rid of the state altogether, since it is fated to wither away soon in any case. And they fell into a state of foolish rapture, in the expectation that soon there would be no classes, and therefore no class struggle, and therefore no cares and worries, and therefore it is possible to lay down one's arms and go to bed—to sleep in expectation of the advent of a classless society. (General laughter.)

There can be no doubt that this confusion of mind and these sentiments are exactly like the well-known views of the Right deviators, who believed that the old must automatically grow into the new, and that one fine day we shall wake up and find ourselves in a socialist society.

As you see, remnants of the ideology of the defeated anti-Leninist groups are capable of revival, and are far from having lost their vitality

J. V. Stalin, Report to the Seventeenth Party Congress on the Work of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.), January 26, 1934
http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1934/01/26.htm

bie

21st May 2010, 12:41

The basis of classes in the USSR was the same as the basis of classes in the USA: one class, the bureaucracy, controlled the economy and the extraction and distribution of surplus value; one class, the working class, did the work and was exploited. This is why there was no mass uprising to defend "socialism" in the USSR: the workers exchanged one set of exploiters for another.
Absolutely wrong! The difference between capitalist USA and socialist USSR was that in case of USSR the class of exploiters (both in industry and agriculture) was abolished. The "bureaucracy" itself is not a social class, but the professional group! Why if in capitalism managers, accountants, clerks etc. do not constitute a social class, it suddenly like deux ex machina, turned to be a social class in socialism? Both in socialism and capitalism "bureaucracy" is not a social class. Therefore the extraction and distribution of surplus value in socialism was directed by the working class. The surplus value was not expropriated into private hands but it was spend on socialist accumulation (to facilitate growth), social and public services: free and accessible for everyone - education, sport, healthcare, housing, culture, public transport etc. And all the above worked fine and allowed unprecedented growth in all the sectors of society, economy and culture. You may compare with the current situation. In my country everything that is still good is the remains from socialist times.

Paul Cockshott

21st May 2010, 14:54

Yeah, right. Stalin's problem was that he was too much of an orthodox Marxist and not that he was a murderous, pathological liar.

No, I'm saying that since the working class did not control society, that it wasn't socialism.

Are you saying that socialism is compatible with the existence of classes if the working class dominates politics then?

The basis of classes in the USSR was the same as the basis of classes in the USA: one class, the bureaucracy, controlled the economy and the extraction and distribution of surplus value; one class, the working class, did the work and was exploited.

So there were only two classes?

What is your criterion for identifying an individual as a member of one class or another then?
Since they were all waged workers, who counted as a bureaucrat?

What about the distinction between the intelligensia and the manual working class, or between peasants and others -- were these not class distinctions.

Basically, when the working class has control of the economy of the world, it will proceed to eliminate class distinctions in the distribution of wealth, worldwide. When this is accomplished, the stage of communism will have been achieved and classes will have been abolished.

Yes, I am sure that that is perfectly orthodox Stalinism, but how will they be abolished.

By basing the state on workers control of production from the working place upwards, with the working class always in firm control of production.

So those who are not working in a factory are to be disenfranchised?

What of parents at home?
What of the retired and the sick?
What of the 40% or more of the population in advanced countries who are state employees?

How small a minority do you propose to retain full citizenship ?

Paul Cockshott

21st May 2010, 15:08

s. The surplus was not expropriated into private hands but it was spend on socialist accumulation (to facilitate growth), social and public services: free and accessible for everyone - education, sport, healthcare, housing, culture, public transport etc. And all the above worked fine and allowed unprecedented growth in all the sectors of society, economy and culture. You may compare with the current situation. In my country everything that is still good is the remains from socialist times.

Which country are you from?

I think the point above is important. In capitalist countries the portion of the surplus that is accumulated is often quite small. My figures for the UK in the late victorian heyday of capitalism put it as generally less than 10%. The majority of the surplus goes on luxuries and servants despite the claims the contrary by proponents of the system.

In contrast a considerable part of the surplus of countries with communist party governments went on re-investment. In China at the moment, which arguably has very strong state capitalist elements ( as opposed to socialist elements) to its economy, gross fixed capital formation runs at around 50% of gdp in the latest figures.

I dont have figures available to me for the USSR during different periods for fixed capital formation as a percent of GDP.

bie

22nd May 2010, 02:45

Which country are you from?
I was born in People's Republic of Poland. Everyone who lived in those times can see the fundamental difference between "communist Poland" and capitalist "democratic" one. There were two different worlds. I am far away from idealization of socialism (as every system it had its flaws) but what happened after 1989 cannot be called otherwise than the crime against the people.

robbo203

23rd May 2010, 19:15

First of all you fail to understand that the nature of the state depends on the class that is politically in control of it. "State" is nothing but an empty set of rules/institutions etc. that are necessary for the society to reproduce its socio-political formation. Therefore the state controlled by the bourgeoisie is the another mean of exploitation of the workers. The state controlled by the workers is the essential feature of transformation towards socialism/communism. The change in power (ie. change of the class controlling the state) is called a social revolution.

Well lets look at this argument, shall we? A state controlled by the bourgeoise exploits the workers, you say, but the state controled by the workers on the other hand is the "essential feature of transformation towards socialism/communism". Really? How do you figure that out then? The working class by definition is the exploited class in capitalism. So its very existence means it is being exploited. . If your theory is to be believed this means that the workers having captured the state are going to wield ultimate political power in society asnd yet form strange reason, will continue to allow themselves to remain the exploited class in society, will continue to allow the capitalist class to exploit them insofar as this so called working class state continues to exist. If that was not the case, then there would not be a working class, or indeed a capitalist class. You would have a classless society and therefore also a stateless society. But this is not what you advocate. In fact you pooh-pooh the whole idea of classless stateless socioety. You advocate a class-based society in which the state is run by the workers and hence you support the idea of holding on to a system which by definition will retain capitalist relations of production. by viurtue of retaining a working class.
In point of fact, a state run by the workers could not happen anyway. What always happens is that you get a small elite , a vanguard claiming to represent the workers, taking power and inevitably converting themselves into a new ruling class. You will only have exchanged one ruling class for another
The workers do need to capture state power, I agree, but the capturing of state must go hand in hand with the abolition of class relationships and the working class itself. If not, the state will simply come to reproducce and reinforce the very society it administers as you say which, in your case, will necessarily be a capitalist society by virture of the fact that you still have a working class

You are writing here "I think this whole idea of reaching socialism/communism via state capitalism or nationalization is , if not ill-founded, utterly obsolete.". By this sort of statements you clearly show that you "vision" of socialism is clearly a utopian one. By rejecting the concept of socialized means of production by nationalization you
simply regress to the utopian socialism. Moreover, you as unable to present any alternative way of socializing production (and ilustrating it with practical examples) you join the club of people that rejects the possibility of creating an alternative to capitalist slavery. Therefore you became the defendant of current capitalist relations. Instead of
presenting a socialist alternative you concentrate on attacking existing socialist societies from ultra-leftist positions, falsely claiming that this societies "do not work".

I dont think you have understood the point about "socialisation" at all , have you? The socialisation of production is a process that happens willy nilly irrespective of nationalisation. Marx and Engels wrote in the Commuist Manifesto of how capitalism brought together the fragmented and isolated means of production and fostered the socialisation of production. Engels suggested nationalisation would aid this process and enhance the productive powers of society, bringing the possibility of socialism/communism closer (although, unlike you, he never fell for the the myth that nationalisation was socialism). Whether or not he was correct in thinking this is now completely irrelevant. Production is a highly socialised process today and to call for nationalisation on the flimisy pretext that it is not yet sufficiently "socialised" is frankly ridiculous and reactionary. You are well over a century behinds the times. Trying catching up
As for you silly comment above, I have clearly put forward the revoutionary alternative to capitalism as a classless wageless stateless system of society. The fact that you dismiss this as "utopian" says a lot about where you are coming from. You join a long line of bourgeois hacks who similarly express this view.

Of course it is what bourgeoisie want workers to believe. "There is no alternative". If real socialism is not an alternative to capitalism, so what is? An utopian theoretical concept that never and nowhere were realized by no-one? Convincing workers that real socialism does not work is not only harmful but also false. Real socialism DID eventually worked. It allowed millions of people in many countries worldwide a significant social progress, it achieved great successes on the field of economy, education, healthcare, social justice. It actually PROVED that IT IS an ALTERNATIVE and that it works.
What you call "real socialism" was nothing of the sort. It was not an alternative to capitalism but a form of capitalism and one that proved not to be particularly viable in the long run. State capitalism in the sense of a so called command economy is probably more suited to a relatively backward undeveloped economy and it certainly did demonstrates some advantages over other varaints of capitalism in building up the basic infrastructure of society albeit at enrmous cost to the workers and the environment as in the case of Stalinist Russia. But this model of capitalist development proved increasing dysfunctional as the economy matured and diversifed. If it was so great as you claimed it would still be around wouldnt it? And the fact is that the people brought this model of state capitalism to an end in their "revolution from above" where the very people who according to Leninist theory were going to lead the workers into some glourooius communist future the nomenklatura. What a bunch of frauds they turned out to be!

Of course it didn't get the good reception from the bourgeoisie, that went scared that their privileges may end in their country. Therefore bourgeoisie tried (to some extend with success) to discredit and present socialism in the worst possible and false way. It found also reception among "leftists" and caused confusion among them (as we see in progress of this discussion). The real and working socialist ideas were replaced by utopian concepts. But - your concepts of utopian socialism (stateless etc) are pretty harmless to the ruling capitalist class - and your attacks on real alternatives - harmful to the whole workers movement. It is pretty sad.
I suspect the bourgeoise in the West muight learn a trick of tweo from the red bouregoisie of Soviet Union about how to defend their privileges. The Soviet Union despite your nonsensical wittering on about "socialist jusitice" was a highly unequal oppressive regime. The nomenklatura were past masters in the business of lining their pockets with the wealth stolen from the Russian workers.. This is to say nothing of the enormous range of perks they enjoyed as members of the state capitalist class like the daches, chauffeur-driven limos and posh private retail stores from which the ordinary workers were physically excluded
What is truly sad is that you can actually be bothered to defend this corrupt exploitative class-based system in the name of "socialism" if you please.

Comrade_Stalin

26th May 2010, 05:26

We had full employment, free and good healthcare, good working conditions, free and good education, sex equality, national sovereignity, social safety and social justice, great relations between people... We had once a socialism. Not everything that was told on the West about the socialist societies has to be true, comrade.

I remember that in my primary school in the 1980 there was a dentist surgeon, who looked after all the kids. His services were completely free of charge. And it used to be like that in every other primary school. Life was better under socialism - especially in terms of relations between people. Believe it or not - there was no "homo homini lupus". People were friendly towards each other. Another thing is housing. It was simply accesible. My auntie got a 3 bedroom apartment just for a good university degree. Doesn't seem like capitalism, isn't it?

Now we have 2 mln unemployed, 2 mln emigration, 12% extreme poverty and 60% of poverty. None of it existed under socialism.

Wow I don’t know which is sadder, to live under that type of live and to lose it all, or to come to this form, and talk to these people, that sound like conservatives. They always say, “well if you don’t like capitalism, then you will hate state capitalism”.

Lets look at wiki for a second, on how state capitalism is defines.

“Within Marxist (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxist) literature, state capitalism is usually defined in this sense: as a social system combining capitalism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism) — the wage (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage) system of producing and appropriating surplus value (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surplus_value) in a commodity economy — with ownership or control by a state apparatus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_state). By that definition, a state capitalist country is one where the government controls the economy and essentially acts like a single giant corporation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporation).[2] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_capitalism#cite_note-1) Fredrick Engels (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fredrick_Engels), in Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, states that the final stage of capitalism would consist of ownership over production and communication by the (bourgeoisie) state.[3] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_capitalism#cite_note-2) “

This all coming to from a man that once said:

The theory of Communism may be summed up in one sentence: Abolish all private property.
Karl Marx (http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/k/karlmarx157954.html)

So A) Karl Mars is state capitalist, as nationalizing anything and calling it socialism will lead to state capitalism, or B) he defined it wrong which lead to its miss use by revisionist, as any communist nation could be prove to be a state capitalist cnation.

The bureaucrats in the USSR were substantially the same people in power after the end of the USSR - Putin, Yeltsin and their cronies.

In many of the other Eastern European countries the same people ran the governments before and after 1989.

Do you know anything about Russian? Are you so lost that you think that Putin is part of any Russian communist party? Putin is part of the United Russian party, an anti-communist party, that has business half nationalized so that they can pay the losses for the privatized half.

Comrade_Stalin

26th May 2010, 05:39

QUOTE=robbo203;1754804]

I dont think you have understood the point about "socialisation" at all , have you? The socialisation of production is a process that happens willy nilly irrespective of nationalisation. Marx and Engels wrote in the Commuist Manifesto of how capitalism brought together the fragmented and isolated means of production and fostered the socialisation of production. Engels suggested nationalisation would aid this process and enhance the productive powers of society, bringing the possibility of socialism/communism closer (although, unlike you, he never fell for the the myth that nationalisation was socialism). Whether or not he was correct in thinking this is now completely irrelevant. Production is a highly socialised process today and to call for nationalisation on the flimisy pretext that it is not yet sufficiently "socialised" is frankly ridiculous and reactionary. You are well over a century behinds the times.
.[/QUOTE]

Let’s look at the Communist Manifesto for a second

The Communist Manifesto

1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes. Property tax paid annually prevents the outright ownership of property, because if property can be confiscated for taxes owed, it can never truly be owned. The application of our rents of land (property taxes)are used for public purposes as envisioned by Karl Marx.

2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax. The income tax was imposed upon the people briefly after the War Between The Southern States and The dictatorial Federal Government. In 1895, The US Supreme Court abolished it with the words, "The income tax is indeed a direct tax and therefore unconstitutional". The Court understood that, "No capitation, or other direct Tax shall be laid,..." Art. 1, Sec. 9, of the US Constitution, means exactly what it says. However, in 1913 there were enough socialist in Congress to again foist the income tax upon the people with the 16th Amendment to the Constitution. The income tax is not designed just to raise taxes, which could be accomplished very easily with a national sales tax. Instead, its goal is to punish achievement, invade privacy, and control the people through fear and intimidation from the most gestapo-like arm of our government, the I.R.S.

3. Abolition of all right of inheritance. Our inheritance tax puts all rights of inheritance in jeopardy. Property tax, income tax, and inheritance tax, should be abolished because they are all direct taxes and they all violate our God-given property rights. They could be replaced with indirect taxes like sales tax, tobacco tax, alcohol tax, or gasoline tax. Some advantages of indirect taxes are:

· They are indeed Constitutional.
· Our privacy would be protected.
· Everyone who spends money participates including the super-wealthy, foreign visitors, illegal aliens, drug dealers, and others now in the underground economy.
· It is a pay as you go system - no April 15th.
· The IRS and all associated collection cost would be eliminated.
· Lower production cost will allow business to compete internationally.
· Prices would come down more than enough to cover the sales tax increase.
· Business would expand creating new jobs.
· The money now in off-shore tax-havens would flood back into this country stimulating the economy.
· Manufacturing would come back home absent the over-taxation and over-regulation that drove them to foreign countries.

4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels. Our government does not normally confiscate property of emigrants, however, many laws and regulations have been passed in recent years which allow many government agencies such as the I.R.S., O.S.H.A., E.P.A., B.L.M., and drug enforcement agencies to confiscate property from citizens that are considered rebels. Much of this confiscation is achieved without due process of law.

5. Centralization of credit in the hands of the State, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly. The Federal Reserve System was created in 1913. It is not federally owned and nothing is in reserve. It is a private corporation with the power to increase or decrease the money supply by changing the interest rates and the reserve requirements of its member banks. It can create money out of thin air, lend it to the government and then collect the principal and interest from the taxpayers. That is why its owners always have and always will promote war and socialism to create inextinguishable government debt.

"Permit me to control the currency of a nation and I care not who makes its laws" Baron De Rothschild, brainchild of the Federal Reserve Bank.
"If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their money, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them, will deprive the people of their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered." Thomas Jefferson
6. Centralization of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State. Communication and transportation are controlled by a number of government agencies, e.g., The Federal Communication Commission (FCC), The Dept. of Transportation (DOT), The Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC), The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). Public Television is also a good example of state control of communication for the indoctrination of the concepts of socialism and humanism.

7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State, the bringing into cultivation of waste lands, and the improvements of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan. Dan Smoot's book, "The Business End of Government" revealed that, the federal government owned 1165 different businesses like AMTRAC. The Bureau of land Management, The Department of Agriculture, The Department of Commerce, The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), etc., all promote a common plan of more and more regulation and control from government with less and less freedom enjoyed by the people.

8. Equal liability of all to labor and the establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture. Heavy taxation, over-regulation, and other economic problems caused by our government's adoption of socialism has forced women to labor equally with men. Our industrial army is the Social Security System which requires membership at birth.

9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of the distinction between town and country by a more equitable distribution of population over the country. We are not living under this plank totally. However, we do have many large agriculture corporations who have combined all levels of production from the farm to the consumer. It appears that the goal of this plank is to reduce the number of family farms making it easier to gain control of all food and fiber production. This goal is fast becoming reality.

10. Free education for all children in public schools.... Communist and socialist have long recognized the value of indoctrination through a free educational system. And, it has produced a people with no understanding of the vast differences between the Free Enterprise System and socialism. During our Bicentennial celebrations (1986), a national poll of school children revealed that 46% of them believed that "From him with the most ability - to him with the most need" was part of our Constitution. Today all socialist, all liberals and most democracts believe the same thing.
Wow, so living in the USa is like living in a communist nation, Right?

Trying catching up
As for you silly comment above, I have clearly put forward the revoutionary alternative to capitalism as a classless wageless stateless system of society. The fact that you dismiss this as "utopian" says a lot about where you are coming from. You join a long line of bourgeois hacks who similarly express this view.

.

So you Ideal of "real socialism" is that everyone gives up “free” labor of their own “free” will. Sounds "utopian" to me.

What you call "real socialism" was nothing of the sort. It was not an alternative to capitalism but a form of capitalism and one that proved not to be particularly viable in the long run. State capitalism in the sense of a so called command economy is probably more suited to a relatively backward undeveloped economy and it certainly did demonstrates some advantages over other varaints of capitalism in building up the basic infrastructure of society albeit at enrmous cost to the workers and the environment as in the case of Stalinist Russia. But this model of capitalist development proved increasing dysfunctional as the economy matured and diversifed. If it was so great as you claimed it would still be around wouldnt it? And the fact is that the people brought this model of state capitalism to an end in their "revolution from above" where the very people who according to Leninist theory were going to lead the workers into some glourooius communist future the nomenklatura. What a bunch of frauds they turned out to be!

I suspect the bourgeoise in the West muight learn a trick of tweo from the red bouregoisie of Soviet Union about how to defend their privileges. The Soviet Union despite your nonsensical wittering on about "socialist jusitice" was a highly unequal oppressive regime. The nomenklatura were past masters in the business of lining their pockets with the wealth stolen from the Russian workers.. This is to say nothing of the enormous range of perks they enjoyed as members of the state capitalist class like the daches, chauffeur-driven limos and posh private retail stores from which the ordinary workers were physically excluded
What is truly sad is that you can actually be bothered to defend this corrupt exploitative class-based system in the name of "socialism" if you please.

Yes because it capitalism to have plan economy and to turn around and pay extra to your workers, if they make more then you planned. The entire surplus value comes from the army of the unemployed which helps to reduce your wages. You can only have surplus if you can sell the item for more than the combined wage (“rented time”) of all that labored to produce that item.

Blake's Baby

26th May 2010, 12:10

...

Do you know anything about Russian? Are you so lost that you think that Putin is part of any Russian communist party? Putin is part of the United Russian party, an anti-communist party, that has business half nationalized so that they can pay the losses for the privatized half.

Do you know anything about Russia? Putin was a KGB aparatchik before 1989. Then he worked as an adviser in the Petersberg Mayor's office. Did you not know that he was part of the ruling elite? Sheesh, some people are really badly informed.

robbo203

27th May 2010, 23:53

Let’s look at the Communist Manifesto for a second

Indeed, lets do. Or better still, lets look at the 1872 Preface which puts the matter of the state capitalist reforms advocated in the Manifesto in proper perspective

Thus

However much that state of things may have altered during the last twenty-five years, the general principles laid down in the Manifesto are, on the whole, as correct today as ever. Here and there, some detail might be improved. The practical application of the principles will depend, as the Manifesto itself states, everywhere and at all times, on the historical conditions for the time being existing, and, for that reason, no special stress is laid on the revolutionary measures proposed at the end of Section II (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch02.htm). That passage would, in many respects, be very differently worded today. In view of the gigantic strides of Modern Industry since 1848, and of the accompanying improved and extended organization of the working class, in view of the practical experience gained, first in the February Revolution, and then, still more, in the Paris Commune, where the proletariat for the first time held political power for two whole months, this programme has in some details been antiquated. One thing especially was proved by the Commune, viz., that “the working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes.” (See The Civil War in France: Address of the General Council of the International Working Men’ s Association (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1871/civil-war-france/index.htm), 1871, where this point is further developed.) Further, it is self-evident that the criticism of socialist literature is deficient in relation to the present time, because it comes down only to 1847; also that the remarks on the relation of the Communists to the various opposition parties (Section IV (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch04.htm)), although, in principle still correct, yet in practice are antiquated, because the political situation has been entirely changed, and the progress of history has swept from off the earth the greater portion of the political parties there enumerated.
But then, the Manifesto has become a historical document which we have no longer any right to alter. A subsequent edition may perhaps appear with an introduction bridging the gap from 1847 to the present day; but this reprint was too unexpected to leave us time for that.
Karl Marx & Frederick Engels
June 24, 1872, London

[/QUOTE]

So you Ideal of "real socialism" is that everyone gives up “free” labor of their own “free” will. Sounds "utopian" to me..

Its what is implied by "from each according to ability to each according to need". If you regard that as utopian then at least have the good grace not to pretend to be a socialist

robbo203

28th May 2010, 00:04

Do you know anything about Russia? Putin was a KGB aparatchik before 1989. Then he worked as an adviser in the Petersberg Mayor's office. Did you not know that he was part of the ruling elite? Sheesh, some people are really badly informed.

Interesting enough, according to one estimate, even today, two decades on from the collpse of soviet state capitalism 43% of the super rich oligarchs were previously high ranking members of the communist party nomenklatura ("Postcommunist Oligarchs in Russia: Quantitative Analysis Export", Serguey Braguinsky, The Journal of Law and Economics, Vol. 52, No. 2. (1 May 2009), pp. 307-349.) . In other parts of what once was the Eastern bloc the proportion is much higher - most notably in Romania.

It needs to be emphasised again and again that the red bourgeoisie - those pampered and privileged members of Soviet state capitalist class - were precisely the same lot that Lenin saw as the glorious vanguard of the working class who would lead the workers into the new era of communism. What happened instead was a "revolution from above" as Kotz calls it in which the Soviet fat cats jettisoned state capitalism in favour of corporate capitalism.

If ever a theory has been utterly rubbished by history its got to be this one!

Blake's Baby

28th May 2010, 00:20

Err, no, most of those that Lenin saw as a glorious vanguard were murdered by Stalin in the 1930s, if they hadn't died in the Civil War and the famines.

Also Russia is still state capitalist. State capitalism is the form capitalism takes in the epoch of imperialism. Britain is state capitalist, the USA is state capitalist, Germany is state capitalist. In the 1800s, Britain's state budget was 3-8% of GDP. Now it's 40% of GDP. The state is the biggest actor in the economy, as it is for practically every country in the world. That's state capitalism.

robbo203

28th May 2010, 01:01

Err, no, most of those that Lenin saw as a glorious vanguard were murdered by Stalin in the 1930s, if they hadn't died in the Civil War and the famines..

Stalin was part of that glorious vanguard but I am really referring to the institution itself rather than the particular individuals comprising it..

Also Russia is still state capitalist. State capitalism is the form capitalism takes in the epoch of imperialism. Britain is state capitalist, the USA is state capitalist, Germany is state capitalist. In the 1800s, Britain's state budget was 3-8% of GDP. Now it's 40% of GDP. The state is the biggest actor in the economy, as it is for practically every country in the world. That's state capitalism.

You can look at it that way and certainly I wouldnt disagree that the state is the biggest single actor (in the UK the NHS is I think still the biggest empoyer). However I would be reluctant to call the form of capitalism operating in the UK , USA , Germany et al as state capitalism. I would describe it more as a mixture of private and state capitalism - a mixed economy. Afterall 40% of the GDP is still less than half the GDP so "state capitalism" as a generalised description would not quite seem appropriate. You could however say there is a stronger component of state capitalism today than in the past

In the Soviet Union the balance was tilted rather more towards state capitalism and in this case I think as a generalised description the term is appropriate in a way that it is not in the West. Of course with the privatisation programme subsequent to the collapse of the Soviet Union, you had some movement towards the the kind of mixed economy model more typical of the West

Zanthorus

28th May 2010, 01:07

Stalin was part of that glorious vanguard but I am really referring to the institution itself rather than the particular individuals comprising it..

But vanguardism is all about the particular individuals comprising it who are the most advanced sections of the working class. The "vanguard" already exists as every communist worker out there. The idea of getting them all together into a political party was just what Lenin concluded was the best way forward. Of course if the party ceased to have any advanced proletarian elements it would cease to be a "vanguard" party.

Blake's Baby

29th May 2010, 16:47

... certainly I wouldnt disagree that the state is the biggest single actor (in the UK the NHS is I think still the biggest empoyer). However I would be reluctant to call the form of capitalism operating in the UK , USA , Germany et al as state capitalism. I would describe it more as a mixture of private and state capitalism - a mixed economy. Afterall 40% of the GDP is still less than half the GDP so "state capitalism" as a generalised description would not quite seem appropriate...

If you can name an organisation other than the state that has more than 40% of the economy of a country I'd agree with you.

Even 'private capitalism' isn't generally really private capitalism any more, it's institutional capitalism, as Engels started to realise in the 1880s. The 'private capitalist' as an individual owner is long dead. Corporations that are owned by other corporations or the state are the owners of capitalism now. The 'national capitalist' as Engels described it is the beginnings of state capitalism and the bureaucratic capitalisms both west and east are the outcome. The weight of the American state, for example, is absolutely massive and completely dwarfs anything else in the world economy.

robbo203

29th May 2010, 18:01

If you can name an organisation other than the state that has more than 40% of the economy of a country I'd agree with you.

Even 'private capitalism' isn't generally really private capitalism any more, it's institutional capitalism, as Engels started to realise in the 1880s. The 'private capitalist' as an individual owner is long dead. Corporations that are owned by other corporations or the state are the owners of capitalism now. The 'national capitalist' as Engels described it is the beginnings of state capitalism and the bureaucratic capitalisms both west and east are the outcome. The weight of the American state, for example, is absolutely massive and completely dwarfs anything else in the world economy.

Well no I agree there is no one organisation other than the state that has more than 40% of the economy of a country (except possibly in some small developing country) but are we not talking here about the different sectors of the economy rather than individual business? If the state sector is 40% that means it is smaller than the private sector even if the latter is composed over numerous businesses.

I do agree with your comments about the decline, if not the demise, of the individual private capitalist . The question is - what has replaced it? My argument is that state capitalism at least in its "hard" form as a socalled command economy is on the way out. In recent decades we have seen the phenomal gowth of neoliberal corporate capitalism particularly in the shape of giant mulltinational companies taking an increasing share of global trade and capital investment flows.

However there is a sense in which you might be correct about state capitalism albeit state capitalism in a "soft" form of state owned companies competing in the global market. Here we are no longer talking about a command economy but rather state owned companies behaving to all intents and purposes like any other company except that they happen to be nominally owned by the state (we saw the beginnings of this in the soviet union). There is some evidence that these have made some headway recently particularly in the important energy sector

"Between 2004 and the start of 2008, 117 state-owned and public companies from Brazil, Russia, India, and China (the so-called BRIC countries) appeared for the first time on the Forbes Global 2000 list of the world's largest companies, measured by sales, profits, assets, and market value"
The End of the Free Market: Who Wins the War Between States and Corporations? Ian Bremmer 2010

Comrade_Stalin

29th May 2010, 22:58

Do you know anything about Russia? Putin was a KGB aparatchik before 1989. Then he worked as an adviser in the Petersberg Mayor's office. Did you not know that he was part of the ruling elite? Sheesh, some people are really badly informed.

You just had to go and prove my point. Yes he was in the KBG, and yes he was a member of the Communist party of the Soviet Union. But the Communist party of the Soviet Union was the only party that you could join at the time, also the only jobs there were under the Soviet government were linked to it. You could just easily prove that he was part of the ruling elite if he worked at the library, as the library is government owned. In fact do you know what party he is a part of today. I already told you in fact, The United Russian party.

Here something to info a person who thinks that he is will inform. Here the United Russian party platform.

The party follows the policies outlined by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Putin). The official party platform defines the policies as centrist (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centrist), conservative (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative),[7] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Russia#cite_note-6) pragmatic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pragmatic) and opposed to radicalism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_radicalism).[8] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Russia#cite_note-edinros.ru-7) The party considers itself as conservative, as it regards itself to be one of the heirs to Russia's tradition of statehood, both tsarist and communist.[8] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Russia#cite_note-edinros.ru-7) Some analysts[who? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_words)] describe the party as populist (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Populism) and nationalist (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationalist). Foreign media and observers describe United Russia as a pure "presidential party" with the main goal of just securing the power of the Russian President in the Russian parliament. The vast majority of officeholders in Russia are members of the party, hence it is sometimes described as a "public official party" or "administration party." Because of this, it is also often labeled the 'party of power'[9] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Russia#cite_note-8), just like Our Home – Russia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Our_Home_%E2%80%93_Russia) in the 1990s. Within Russia, the party follows a centralist (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralism) course.
At the beginning of 2005, a few activists of the party presented projects of creating two 'wings' and a 'centre' inside the party, representing different political directions inside the party. This discussion ended quickly after opposing reactions from the presidential administration. Since 2006, when Vladislav Surkov (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladislav_Surkov) introduced the term Sovereign democracy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_democracy), many figureheads of the party have taken usage of the term.
The former President of the Soviet Union (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_Union) Mikhail Gorbachev (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikhail_Gorbachev) has characterised United Russia as a party of bureaucrats. He also described it as "the worst version of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union."[10] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Russia#cite_note-9)

Could you tell me the name of the current President of the Russian Federation, or what party he supports? Are they pro-communist?

Blake's Baby

29th May 2010, 23:05

Comrade_Stalin

29th May 2010, 23:07

Indeed, lets do. Or better still, lets look at the 1872 Preface which puts the matter of the state capitalist reforms advocated in the Manifesto in proper perspective

And did the revolution happen in any of the places that Marx said it would? Did it happened in any of the countries that meet his economic conditions?

Its what is implied by "from each according to ability to each according to need". If you regard that as utopian then at least have the good grace not to pretend to be a socialist

Taking my words out of context I see. No I never said that I was against "from each according to ability to each according to need". I said that I am against reducing the wage(compensation) to zero(free labor) and calling it socialism. If fact, I’m very much for compensating the workers for their skills and labor. That line you quoted was me calling you an utopist, as based on you last comments. Which you just supported with this last comment, which show that you believe that workers should give up their labor free of compensation and be happy about it.

Comrade_Stalin

29th May 2010, 23:27

I'm not sure of the relevance of the question to be honest, what I said was the Putin and Yeltsin were part of the ruling elite before 1991 and were part of the ruling elite after 1991. If you can demonstrate where I was in error, I will look again at it. If you can't, I take it that you accept that I'm right.
And what I’m trying to prove is that there are no red bourgeoisie. There many have been some people that acted communist, but that the same everywhere, and one of reasons why Lenin use to purge the party. Being part of the KGB does not make you a part of the ruling elite, otherwise being part CIA would make you a part of the ruling elite in the USA. Also if he was already part of the “red bourgeoisie” what would be his reason to destroy the same system that put him in power (and keeps him their)? Let’s look at Boris Yeltsin as well, to answer your question. If Yeltsin was part of the “red bourgeoisie”, then why would the communist party do a coup against him? Also then what would his reason for banning the communist party then? If the communist party was a “red bourgeoisie”, and Yeltsin is part of this elite group then what is the reason for them to fight each other?

Let me tell you how I see it. Putin and Yeltsin did in fact wish to be part of ruling elite, but there was never a “red bourgeoisie” (ruling elite). The Ideals of communism just don’t allow it, as they are against the bourgeoisie. So they “joined” The communist party to help banned it, and then to destroy the Soviet Union in order to create a place where they could have a ruling elite (bourgeoisie). Just look at the party platform for the United Russian party and you can see that they are a bourgeoisie party.

Blake's Baby

29th May 2010, 23:52

Of course United Russia are a bourgeoise party.

But I don't agree that Russia wasn't capitalist before 1989. I think Russia has always been capitalist, even under 'war communism', it was just a very inefficient sort of capitalism. But that's by the by, really, you can read all my pronouncements on state capitalism on a variety of threads.

On Yeltsin and Putin in particular: there was no real method in the Soviet Union for changing political direction. Leaders would be ousted (I'm thinking first of the constellations of Bolshevik grandees that Stalin allied with on his way up to out-manouevre Trotsky, and also of the machinations of Kruschev, Kosygyn and Mikoyin after Stalin's death) or people would sit tight waiting for them to die (Brezhnev, Andropov, Chernenko). There was no way that such a radically different policy as Gorbachev's liberalisation agenda could be brought in except by changing the whole institutional nature of the USSR. Different groupings that believed in a different set of policies for Russian national capital had battles in the streets - what else were they going to do, have an election? That would have meant only one party but fielding candidates with wildly different policies.

We're quite used to the idea of changing the governmental team in orfer to change policy in the West, we call the process 'elections', they're when the populace get to chose the team that misgoverns them for the next 4 years. When the team has already been chosen (by itself), they don't really work so well. Hence the events of 1989-92.

The CPSU and upper echelons of the Red Army were effectively the bourgeoisie of the USSR, and like any bourgeoisie, in the event of a failure of the existing political system to cope with a crisis and re-orientate itself, they tore themselves apart in a (mercifully brief) civil war, which the 'hardliners' (the Stalinists) lost in a very short time.

Paul Cockshott

30th May 2010, 00:07

And did the revolution happen in any of the places that Marx said it would? Did it happened in any of the countries that meet his economic conditions?

Taking my words out of context I see. No I never said that I was against "from each according to ability to each according to need". I said that I am against reducing the wage(compensation) to zero(free labor) and calling it socialism. If fact, I’m very much for compensating the workers for their skills and labor. That line you quoted was me calling you an utopist, as based on you last comments. Which you just supported with this last comment, which show that you believe that workers should give up their labor free of compensation and be happy about it.

I think you are right. There is no mention of general free distribution of goods under communism in Marx.. It is a totally utopian idea foisted onto him by the Trotskyists and also put about in the USSR under Khruschov.
Marx refered to distribution according to need not caprice, and even this was only a couple of lines in a letter (CGP).
Distribution according to need implies some objective social assessment of need so that for example, those with large families or those who are disabled get suplementary income or supplies. This is something quite different from the utopian fantasy that everything will be free under communism.

It is unclear when the myth that Marx advocated generally free distribution arose.

SocialismOrBarbarism

30th May 2010, 00:35

Distribution according to need implies some objective social assessment of need so that for example, those with large families or those who are disabled get suplementary income or supplies. This is something quite different from the utopian fantasy that everything will be free under communism.

Are you saying that Marx didn't think there would be income provided to people who were disabled and such during the lower phase of communism?

It is unclear when the myth that Marx advocated generally free distribution arose. Well when you word it that way it certainly is a myth, because Marx never simply "advocated" it as some sort of "utopian fantasy" as people like Louis Blanc abstract from the material conditions of society. He traced the development of the economic structure of society to show under what conditions this free distribution would come about, and his meaning is pretty clear:

Before this is divided among the individuals, there has to be deducted again, from it: First, the general costs of administration not belonging to production. This part will, from the outset, be very considerably restricted in comparison with present-day society, and it diminishes in proportion as the new society develops. Second, that which is intended for the common satisfaction of needs, such as schools, health services, etc. From the outset, this part grows considerably in comparison with present-day society, and it grows in proportion as the new society develops. Third, funds for those unable to work, etc., in short, for what is included under so-called official poor relief today.

robbo203

30th May 2010, 00:36

And did the revolution happen in any of the places that Marx said it would? Did it happened in any of the countries that meet his economic conditions?

What revolution did you have in mind? Engels, I believe, said in a letter to a Russian friend that he felt Russia was approaching its 1789 - a reference to the French bourgeois revolution. I think it was a prescient observation. The 1917 Revolutuion established state capitalism as the dominant form in Russia. Did any of the countiries at the time when Marx was around met the economic requirements for a socialist society - the terchnological capacity to produce sufficient wealth? Nope, but it is significant that Marx and Engels became increasingly optimistic on this front as time went by because of the gigantic strides made by modern industry. This was part of the reason why they felt compelled to heavily qualify in the 1872 preface (see my earlier post) their earlier advocacy in the Communist Manifesto of the various various state capitalist reformist measures

Taking my words out of context I see. No I never said that I was against "from each according to ability to each according to need". I said that I am against reducing the wage(compensation) to zero(free labor) and calling it socialism. If fact, I’m very much for compensating the workers for their skills and labor. That line you quoted was me calling you an utopist, as based on you last comments. Which you just supported with this last comment, which show that you believe that workers should give up their labor free of compensation and be happy about it.

Clearly you dont understand what is meant by "from each according to ability to each according to need" in that case. This alludes to a society in which there is no wage labour and where individuals have free and unrestricted access to the things they need. The question of "compensation" simply does not arise because there is no quid pro quo arrangement when you have free access. You simply take what you need without payment of any kind. No one was suggesting the daft idea that workers should still have to pay for things and yet "give up their labor free of compensation". The "free labour " bit goes hand in hand with the "free access" bit. This is what traditional marxian socialism was all about. Ypou have completely missed the point here with your talk of "compensation"

Die Neue Zeit

30th May 2010, 02:42

There would be a labour market but one much more favorable to labour, and one which in long run would not guarantee the extraction of surplus value. This was pointed out by Kalecki in 1943.

I forgot to ask this, but are you referring to surplus value as a whole (capital replacement and additional investment, retirees and the disabled, productive services not directly producing surplus value like some public-sector jobs - plus the usual overproduction and profit skimming) or just overproduction and especially profit skimming?

[If it's the whole, then there's obviously a problem beyond class struggle.]

robbo203

30th May 2010, 03:04

I think you are right. There is no mention of general free distribution of goods under communism in Marx.. It is a totally utopian idea foisted onto him by the Trotskyists and also put about in the USSR under Khruschov.
Marx refered to distribution according to need not caprice, and even this was only a couple of lines in a letter (CGP).
Distribution according to need implies some objective social assessment of need so that for example, those with large families or those who are disabled get suplementary income or supplies. This is something quite different from the utopian fantasy that everything will be free under communism.

It is unclear when the myth that Marx advocated generally free distribution arose.

I dont agree with your assessment.

Firstly. it is clearly not true that the idea that Marx subscribed to a model of "general free distribution of goods under communism" was fpoisted onto him "by the Trotskyists and also put about in the USSR under Khruschov". I think the idea is implicit if not explicit in his higher phase of communism (which I will come to in a moment) but in any event it is the case that long before the Trotskyists are alleged to have done what you claim, traditional Marxists of the impossibilist variety similarly interpreted Marx as advocating this. The SPGB is a notable case in point. "Free access"has been a cornerstone of their conception of socialism and in respect of which people like Marx, Morris and others have had a formative influence.

Secondly, it doesnt particularly matter what Marx may or may not have said - the argument (for free access and voluntary labour) stands on its own two legs, with or without Marx's approval. You clearly do not think it does and dismiss the idea as a "utopian fantasy" taking the same line of argument as Nove it would appear. This basically boils down the fact that if a good is not freely distibuted then it can only be acquired via some kind of of quid pro quo arrangement involving economic exchange or through some form of centralised rationing.

Marx clearly ruled out the former thus

Within the co-operative society based on common ownership of the means of production , the producers do not exchange their products ; just as little does the labour employed on the products appear here as the value of these products , as a material quality possessed by them.
(Critique of the Gotha Programme)

As for the latter Marx did envisage some form of ratioing in the form of labour vouchers applying in what he called the lower phase of communusm. But regarding this he observed

What we have to deal with here is a communist society , not as it has developed on its own foundations but , on the contrary , just as it emerges from capitalist society ; which is thus in every respect , economically , morally ,and intellectually , still stamped with the birth marks of the old society from whose womb it emerges.

In a higher phase of communist of communist society , after the enslaving subordination of the individual to the division of labour , and herewith also the antithesis between mental and physical labour , have vanished ; after labour has become not only a means of life but life’s prime want ; after the productive forces have also increased with the all-round development of the individual , and all the springs of co-operative wealth flow more abundantly - only then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois right be crossed in its entirety and society inscribe on its banners : From each according to his ability , to each according to his needs !

There isthus the definite implication here that the higher phase of communism will see the end of rationing (having become superfluous or unnecesary with the increases in the productive forces) , labour vouchers being confined only to the lower phase of communism. The question then might be posed - if goods and services are no longer rationed and are certainly not subject to economic exchange, in what other form can they be appropriated? The only logical possibility open to us is precisely the general free distribution model you have dismissed as utopian fantasy. Marx would not have agreeed with you on this but would have argued that it all depended on the prevailing material conditions which you are rluing out apriori as impossible to achieve, thus rendering free access commmunism "utopian". Your argument is deeply flawed. I would say the technological potential for a communist society has been around for decades

Thirdly I would contend that you have a rather impoverished conception of what free access would entail equating it with "caprice". The workers, it would seem, are not to be trusted to determine their own needs and freely take according to these self determined needs but are instead tarred with the original sin of innate greed and must be guided by the wiser counsel of the central planners in determining "objectively" what these needs are. I think this argument is nonsense, frankly, and runs perilously close to giving tacit support to the rank prejudices of bourgeois ideologists and their talk of human nature being a barrier to socialism/communism.

Again in the Critique Marx made this point

Any distribution whatever of the means of consumption is only a consequence of the distribution of the conditions of production themselves . If the material conditions of production are the co-operative property of workers themselves , then there likewise results a distribution of the means of consumption different from the present one.

You, it seems to me, advocate a somewhat paternalistiic mode of distribution that appears to be a little too cloely tied to the present material conditions of production and not those which would apply in a future communist/socialist society. Why for example do you argue that Distribution according to need implies some objective social assessment of need so that for example, those with large families or those who are disabled get suplementary income or supplies?

To begin with the term " income" makes me wonder whether you are still thinking in terms of the tradtional capitalist economic categories such as exchange value and money. If not, and if you mean by "income" merely labour vouchers then you have to explain why it is that Marx clearly thought these would become redundant as we moved into a the "higher phase" of communism.

But as well as that I question the whole point of making some "objective social assessement of need" if you have no means of ensuring that the demands of consumers will conform to what the planners have planned for them. If on the other hand you do envisage having the means to enforce conformity we are back to the question of ratioining. In this case it should be clearly said that you favour a system of centralised rationing over communist free access.

My approach would be quite different, Rather than "planning" what people purportedly "need", you work around what people themselves decide they need. Your objective assessment lies not in determing the needs themselves but the means to satisfy these needs. We talk about a socialism/communism being a society in which production FOR need replaces production for sale on the market. We should mean what we say

Comrade_Stalin

30th May 2010, 06:41

Comrade_Stalin

30th May 2010, 07:17

On Yeltsin and Putin in particular: there was no real method in the Soviet Union for changing political direction. Leaders would be ousted (I'm thinking first of the constellations of Bolshevik grandees that Stalin allied with on his way up to out-manouevre Trotsky, and also of the machinations of Kruschev, Kosygyn and Mikoyin after Stalin's death) or people would sit tight waiting for them to die (Brezhnev, Andropov, Chernenko). There was no way that such a radically different policy as Gorbachev's liberalisation agenda could be brought in except by changing the whole institutional nature of the USSR. Different groupings that believed in a different set of policies for Russian national capital had battles in the streets - what else were they going to do, have an election? That would have meant only one party but fielding candidates with wildly different policies.

We're quite used to the idea of changing the governmental team in orfer to change policy in the West, we call the process 'elections', they're when the populace get to chose the team that misgoverns them for the next 4 years. When the team has already been chosen (by itself), they don't really work so well. Hence the events of 1989-92.

First we don’t have 'elections' in the United States, we have vote buying, where the person who payes the most becomes the next leaders for 10 years. 'elections' require people to vote for you, and that not what we have here in the United States. If we had 'elections' here Al gore would have been president not Bush. When you elected the person who control the money, you can control the political direction of any county. Most of the real fighting between people in any group is always over the money. IF the workers pay your pay check, then you will work for any political direction(always pro-worker) the worker wise for.

Of course United Russia are a bourgeoisie party.

But I don't agree that Russia wasn't capitalist before 1989. I think Russia has always been capitalist, even under 'war communism', it was just a very inefficient sort of capitalism. But that's by the by, really, you can read all my pronouncements on state capitalism on a variety of threads.

The CPSU and upper echelons of the Red Army were effectively the bourgeoisie of the USSR, and like any bourgeoisie, in the event of a failure of the existing political system to cope with a crisis and re-orientate itself, they tore themselves apart in a (mercifully brief) civil war, which the 'hardliners' (the Stalinists) lost in a very short time.

When you talk of “red bourgeoisie” you make it sound like the ideal of having a party will lead to a “new elite”, instead of bourgeoisie playing the rule of reds, who run black ops against the party. Let’s face it Lenin’s purges, of the party, destroyed most of the fifth column of the bourgeoisie hiding in the party, and Stalin’s purges of the army destroyed most of the fifth column of the bourgeoisie hiding in the army. Both were called monsters for doing this, and were later attacked for it, from all sides. If the fall of the Soviet Union should teach us anything, it is to be on the lookout for fifth column of the bourgeoisie in every communist country and government.

The problem with the ideal of the “red bourgeoisie” is that anyone can be labeled one, no matter what they fought for. All one has to do is not fit into ones ideal form of communism.

Comrade_Stalin

30th May 2010, 07:44

What revolution did you have in mind? Engels, I believe, said in a letter to a Russian friend that he felt Russia was approaching its 1789 - a reference to the French bourgeois revolution. I think it was a prescient observation. The 1917 Revolutuion established state capitalism as the dominant form in Russia. Did any of the countiries at the time when Marx was around met the economic requirements for a socialist society - the technological capacity to produce sufficient wealth? Nope, but it is significant that Marx and Engels became increasingly optimistic on this front as time went by because of the gigantic strides made by modern industry. This was part of the reason why they felt compelled to heavily qualify in the 1872 preface (see my earlier post) their earlier advocacy in the Communist Manifesto of the various various state capitalist reformist measures

By you own statement; you have just proved that there has been no revolution in any of the country that Marx and Engels projected. We did not get a Revolution in Russia we got state capitalism.

“ The 1917 Revolution established state capitalism as the dominant form in Russia”

Also what is needed to have “technological capacity to produce sufficient wealth”?

Clearly you dont understand what is meant by "from each according to ability to each according to need" in that case. This alludes to a society in which there is no wage labour and where individuals have free and unrestricted access to the things they need. The question of "compensation" simply does not arise because there is no quid pro quo arrangement when you have free access. You simply take what you need without payment of any kind. No one was suggesting the daft idea that workers should still have to pay for things and yet "give up their labor free of compensation". The "free labour " bit goes hand in hand with the "free access" bit. This is what traditional marxian socialism was all about. Ypou have completely missed the point here with your talk of "compensation"

No me, bie and I think Paul_Cockshott understand what you were thinking of, you just confirmed it. You view communism as a world where everything is free, including labor. There is no money, because there is no need for it. What we have been trying to tell you is that this is utopian in thinking. Let’s define utopian for a minute. Utopian believe that you can create a perfect world. Now what is my motive to work under your communism? Well there is none, and there is no reason to have invention as there is on reward for me solving any problems. This would work perfectly in a utopia, as all problems are solved, and there would be no need for any invention to solve problem that are already solved. Also if I did not wish to work, then there would be no problem as there are so much resources in a utopia that my work would not be needed. Other reason is that this is not pro-union. Unions increasing wages make little sense when you are trying to move to a world without money.

Dave B

30th May 2010, 09:47

Marx and Engels did have a clear idea about what communism was as far back a 1844. Even if some people were ‘muddled’ about it then.

1844 Letter from Engels to Marx in Paris

The Teutons are all still very muddled about the practicability of communism; to dispose of this absurdity I intend to write a short pamphlet showing that communism has already been put into practice and describing in popular terms how this is at present being done in England and America. [12] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newreply.php?do=newreply&noquote=1&p=1760289#n12) The thing will take me three days or so, and should prove very enlightening for these fellows. I’ve already observed this when talking to people here.</SPAN>

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/letters/44_10_01.htm#n12 (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/letters/44_10_01.htm#n12)

Eg.

Frederick Engels Description of Recently Founded Communist Colonies Still in Existence;

Written: in mid-October 1844

Amongst these people no one is obliged to work against his will, and no one seeks work in vain. They have no poor-houses and infirmaries, having not a single person poor and destitute, nor any abandoned widows and orphans; all their needs are met and they need fear no want. In their ten towns there is not a single gendarme or police officer, no judge, lawyer or soldier, no prison or penitentiary; and yet there is proper order in all their affairs. The laws of the land are not for them and as far as they are concerned could just as well be abolished and nobody would notice any difference for they are the most peaceable citizens and have never yielded a single criminal for the prisons. They enjoy, as we said, the most absolute community of goods and have no trade and no money among themselves.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/10/15.htm (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/10/15.htm)

And from Lenin;

V. I. Lenin, From the Destruction of the Old Social System, To the Creation of the New

Communist labour in the narrower and stricter sense of the term is labour performed gratis for the benefit of society, labour performed not as a definite duty, not for the purpose of obtaining a right to certain products, not according to previously established and legally fixed quotas, but voluntary labour, irrespective of quotas;

it is labour performed without expectation of reward, without reward as a condition, labour performed because it has become a habit to work for the common good, and because of a conscious realisation (that has become a habit) of the necessity of working for the common good—labour as the requirement of a healthy organism.

It must be clear to everybody that we, i.e., our society, our social system, are still a very long way from the application of this form of labour on a broad, really mass scale.

But the very fact that this question has been raised, and raised both by the whole of the advanced proletariat (the Communist Party and the trade unions) and by the state authorities, is a step in this direction.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1920/apr/11.htm (http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1920/apr/11.htm)

Trotsky;

Leon Trotsky, The Revolution Betrayed, Chapter 3, Socialism and the State

The material premise of communism should be so high a development of the economic powers of man that productive labor, having ceased to be a burden, will not require any goad, and the distribution of life’s goods, existing in continual abundance, will not demand – as it does not now in any well-off family or "decent" boarding-house – any control except that of education, habit and social opinion. Speaking frankly, I think it would be pretty dull-witted to consider such a really modest perspective "utopian."

http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1936/revbet/ch03.htm (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1936/revbet/ch03.htm)

Kuatsky;

Karl Kautsky The Labour Revolution

III. The Economic Revolution X. MONEY

Besides this rigid allocation of an equal measure of the necessaries and enjoyments of life to each individual, another form of Socialism without money is conceivable, the Leninite interpretation of what Marx described as the second phase of communism: each to produce of his own accord as much as he can, the productivity of labour being so high and the quantity and variety of products so immense that everyone may be trusted to take what he needs. For this purpose money would not be needed.

We have not yet progressed so far as this. At present we are unable to divine whether we shall ever reach this state. But that Socialism with which we are alone concerned to-day, whose features we can discern with some precision from the indications that already exist, will unfortunately not have this enviable freedom and abundance at its disposal, and will therefore not be able to do without money.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1924/labour/ch03_j.htm#sb (http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1924/labour/ch03_j.htm)

Hyndman;

Henry Mayers Hyndman The Record of an Adventurous Life

Chapter XV Start of Social Democracy

"A much more serious objection to Kropotkin and other Anarchists is their wholly unscrupulous habit of reiterating statements that have been repeatedly proved to be incorrect, and even outrageous, by the men and women to whom they are attributed. Time after time I have told Kropotkin, time after time has he read it in print, that Social-Democrats work for the complete overthrow of the wages system. He has admitted this to be so. But a month or so afterwards the same old oft-refuted misrepresentation appears in the same old authoritative fashion, as if no refutation of the calumny, that we wish to maintain wage-slavery, had ever been made."

http://www.marxists.org/archive/hyndman/1911/adventure/chap15.html (http://www.marxists.org/archive/hyndman/1911/adventure/chap15.html)

Peter Kropotkin 1920
The Wage System

http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/kropotkin-peter/1920/wage.htm (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/kropotkin-peter/1920/wage.htm)

And even uncle Joe before he became a revisionist.

J. V. Stalin ANARCHISM or SOCIALISM? 1906

Future society will be socialist society. This means also that, with the abolition of exploitation commodity production and buying and selling will also be abolished and, therefore, there will be no room for buyers and sellers of labour power, for employers and employed -- there will be only free workers.
Future society will be socialist society. This means, lastly, that in that society the abolition of wage-labour will be accompanied by the complete abolition of the private ownership of the instruments and means of production; there will be neither poor proletarians nor rich capitalists -- there will be only workers who collectively own all the land and minerals, all the forests, all the factories and mills, all the railways, etc.

As you see, the main purpose of production in the future will be to satisfy the needs of society and not to produce goods for sale in order to increase the profits of the capitalists. Where there will be no room for commodity production, struggle for profits, etc.
It is also clear that future production will be socialistically organised, highly developed production, which will take into account the needs of society and will produce as much as society needs. Here there will be no room whether for scattered production, competition, crises, or unemployment.
Where there are no classes, where there are neither rich nor poor, there is no need for a state, there is no

page 337

need either for political power, which oppresses the poor and protects the rich. Consequently, in socialist society there will be no need for the existence of political power.

That is why Karl Marx said as far back as 1846:

"The working class in the course of its development Will substitute for the old bourgeois society an association which will exclude classes and their antagonism, and there will be no more political power properly so-called . . . " (see The Poverty of Philosophy).[89 (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newreply.php?do=newreply&noquote=1&p=1760289#en89)]
That is why Engels said in 1884:
"The state, then, has not existed from all eternity. There have been societies that did without it, that had no conception of the state and state power. At a certain stage of economic development, which was necessarily bound up with the cleavage of society into classes, the state became a necessity. . . . We are now rapidly approaching a stage in the development of production at which the existence of these classes not only will have ceased to be a necessity, but will become a positive hindrance to production. They will fall as inevitably as they arose at an earlier stage. Along with them the state will inevitably fall. The society that will organise production on the basis of a free and equal association of the producers will put the whole machinery of state where it will then belong: into the Museum of Antiquities, by the side of the spinning wheel and the bronze axe"

(see The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State).[

At the same time, it is self-evident that for the purpose of administering public affairs there will have to be in socialist society, in addition to local offices which
page 338
will collect all sorts of information, a central statistical bureau, which will collect information about the needs of the whole of society, and then distribute the various kinds of work among the working people accordingly. It will also be necessary to hold conferences, and particularly congresses, the decisions of which will certainly be binding upon the comrades in the minority until the next congress is held.

Lastly, it is obvious that free and comradely labour should result in an equally comradely, and complete, satisfaction of all needs in the future socialist society This means that if future society demands from each of its members as much labour as he can perform, it, in its turn, must provide each member with all the products he needs. From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs! -- such is the basis upon which the future collectivist system must be created. It goes without saying that in the first stage of socialism, when elements who have not yet grown accustomed to work are being drawn into the new way of life, when the productive forces also will not yet have been sufficiently developed and there will still be "dirty" and "clean" work to do, the application of the principle: "to each according to his needs," will undoubtelly be greatly hindered and, as a consequence, society will be obliged temporarily to take some other path, a middle path. But it is also clear that when future society runs into its groove, when the survivals of capitalism will have been eradicated, the only principle that will conform to socialist society will be the one pointed out above.
That is why Marx said in 1875:

page 339
"In a higher phase of communist (i.e., socialist) society, after the enslaving subordination of the individual to the division of labour, and therewith also the antithesis between mental and physical labour, has vanished; after labour has become not only a means of livelihood but life's prime want; after the productive forces have also increased with the all-round development of the individual . . . only then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois law be crossed in iis entirety and society inscribe on its banners: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs'" (see Critique of the Gotha Programme (http://www.revleft.com/M&E/CGP75.html)).[91 (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newreply.php?do=newreply&noquote=1&p=1760289#en91)].

Such, in general, is the picture of future socialist society according to the theory of Marx.
This is all very well. But is the achievement of socialism conceivable? Can we assume that man will rid himself of his "savage habits"?
Or again: if everybody receives according to his needs, can we assume that the level of the productive forces of socialist society will be adequate for this?
Socialist society presupposes an adequate development of productive forces and socialist consciousness among men, their socialist enlightenment. At the present time the development of productive forces is hindered by the existence of capitalist property, but if we bear in mind that this capitalist property will not exist in future society, it is self-evident that the productive forces will increase tenfold. Nor must it be forgotten that in future society the hundreds of thousands of present-day parasites, and also the unemployed, will set to work and augment the ranks of the working people; and this will greatly stimulate the development of the
page 340
productive forces. As regards men's "savage" sentiments and opinions, these are not as eternal as some people imagine; there was a time, under primitive communism, when man did not recognise private property; there came a time, the time of individualistic production, when private property dominated the hearts and minds of men; a new time is coming, the time of socialist production -- will it be surprising if the hearts and minds of men become imbued with socialist strivings? Does not being determine the "sentiments" and opinions of men?

http://www.marx2mao.com/Stalin/AS07.html#c3 (http://www.marx2mao.com/Stalin/AS07.html#c3)

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robbo203

30th May 2010, 10:18

By you own statement; you have just proved that there has been no revolution in any of the country that Marx and Engels projected. We did not get a Revolution in Russia we got state capitalism.

“ The 1917 Revolution established state capitalism as the dominant form in Russia”

I did no such thing. I said there was a revolution but it was essentially a capitalist revolution (hence the comparison to France 's 1789)which lead on to the establishment of a form of capitalism called state capitalism. The intention might have been different but the reality of what happened is what counts

Also what is needed to have “technological capacity to produce sufficient wealth”?

It means having the necessary developed industrial infrastructure to produce enough goods and services to sustain a communist society based on free access to these things. If you dont have that then as (I think)Engels said the "filthy old business" of competition over scarce resources will once again rear its ugly head.

No me, bie and I think Paul_Cockshott understand what you were thinking of, you just confirmed it. You view communism as a world where everything is free, including labor. There is no money, because there is no need for it.

Absolutely correct. This is what communism in its higher phase stands for

What we have been trying to tell you is that this is utopian in thinking. Let’s define utopian for a minute. Utopian believe that you can create a perfect world. Now what is my motive to work under your communism? Well there is none, and there is no reason to have invention as there is on reward for me solving any problems. This would work perfectly in a utopia, as all problems are solved, and there would be no need for any invention to solve problem that are already solved. Also if I did not wish to work, then there would be no problem as there are so much resources in a utopia that my work would not be needed. Other reason is that this is not pro-union. Unions increasing wages make little sense when you are trying to move to a world without money.

oh come on - this is a bit below par isnt it? There I was expecting some devastating new insight into why my utopian communist vision would not work and you trot out the most banal of objections which only people quite unfamiliar with the case for communism come out with. Communism is a perfect society. You cant have a perfect society. Ergo , you cant have communism. Jesus christ, you can do better than that surely? Nobody has ever claimed communism would be a perfect society - only anti-communists. We communists argue only that communism would be a better society not a perfect one.

And what's all this about "motivation to work"? Hells bells there is a whole literature of communist anthropology on the subject. Go back to Marx's Critique of the Gotha Programme where he talks of creative work being one of lifes prime wants. The whole thing about work is that it will be utterly transformed under free access communism. People wont work unless they are paid? Well Ive got news for you - studies have shown that, even today under capitalism, more hours are spent in unpaid labour than paid labour. The grey economy as it is called - the household sector, mutual aid projects, volunteering and charity works etc etc - is bigger in terms of labour hours expended than both the white economy (formal paid legal work) and the illegal black economy combined. What "compensation" does the guy who goes out in a lifeboat on a stormy sea to rescue people in distress get without being paid to do so, eh? He does it for no other reason than that he regards this as a matter of duty and honour that affords a sense of esteem and purpose. If you want to regard this as a form of "compensation" I will go along with that up to a point (since I doubt that most work in a communist will be anything but pleasant without a boss class on our backs) But there will be no material compensation - no quid pro quo arrangement, no wages, no rationed goods in a free access communist world which the workers would themselves have created in the full knowlege of what it entails . In short, they would fully recognise the sense of moral obligation to give according to their ability that goes with understanding that in a communist society everyone is dependent on everyone else.

Your last reason for rejecting communism "is that this is not pro-union. Unions increasing wages make little sense when you are trying to move to a world without money." This is a classic. I just love it. Well blow me over - a world without trade unions, eh? Isnt that positively terrible -people not having to organise into trade uniuons to defend themselves against against their employers when there are no employers to struggle against? Yep youve persuaded me. Ive now seen the error of my ways and will prompty banish any thought of a classless utopia from my head in future.

Dave B

30th May 2010, 14:36

[5. Development of the Productive Forces as a Material Premise of Communism]

And, on the other hand, this development of productive forces (which itself implies the actual empirical existence of men in their world-historical, instead of local, being) is an absolutely necessary practical premise because without it want is merely made general, and with destitution the struggle for necessities and all the old filthy business would necessarily be reproduced; and furthermore, because only with this universal development of productive forces..........

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch01a.htm

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Comrade_Stalin

30th May 2010, 21:02

I did no such thing. I said there was a revolution but it was essentially a capitalist revolution (hence the comparison to France 's 1789)which lead on to the establishment of a form of capitalism called state capitalism. The intention might have been different but the reality of what happened is what counts

.

I don’t think that capitalist should call anything they do a revolution. They keep most of the things the same, and only change who is in power. They keep god, landlords and the like to keep themselves in power.

It means having the necessary developed industrial infrastructure to produce enough goods and services to sustain a communist society based on free access to these things. If you dont have that then as (I think)Engels said the "filthy old business" of competition over scarce resources will once again rear its ugly head.

So what Lenin and Stalin should of done, is put the capitalist in power in the 1917 so that they could developed industrial infrastructure to produce enough goods and services to sustain a communist society?

oh come on - this is a bit below par isnt it? There I was expecting some devastating new insight into why my utopian communist vision would not work and you trot out the most banal of objections which only people quite unfamiliar with the case for communism come out with. Communism is a perfect society. You cant have a perfect society. Ergo , you cant have communism. Jesus christ, you can do better than that surely? Nobody has ever claimed communism would be a perfect society - only anti-communists. We communists argue only that communism would be a better society not a perfect one.

No, I think it is above par as I have not trolled you yet, even after restating the same information 3 times now. I can’t give you new “insight into why my utopian communist vision would not work” as the very idea of a utopia would make anything work. You seem to understand that you can’t have a perfect society but are unable to see that you view would only work in a utopia. If we all could live together without money and governments, then we would of been done it all long .

And what's all this about "motivation to work"? Hells bells there is a whole literature of communist anthropology on the subject. Go back to Marx's Critique of the Gotha Programme where he talks of creative work being one of lifes prime wants. The whole thing about work is that it will be utterly transformed under free access communism. People wont work unless they are paid? Well Ive got news for you - studies have shown that, even today under capitalism, more hours are spent in unpaid labour than paid labour. The grey economy as it is called - the household sector, mutual aid projects, volunteering and charity works etc etc - is bigger in terms of labour hours expended than both the white economy (formal paid legal work) and the illegal black economy combined. What "compensation" does the guy who goes out in a lifeboat on a stormy sea to rescue people in distress get without being paid to do so, eh? He does it for no other reason than that he regards this as a matter of duty and honour that affords a sense of esteem and purpose. If you want to regard this as a form of "compensation" I will go along with that up to a point (since I doubt that most work in a communist will be anything but pleasant without a boss class on our backs) But there will be no material compensation - no quid pro quo arrangement, no wages, no rationed goods in a free access communist world which the workers would themselves have created in the full knowlege of what it entails . In short, they would fully recognise the sense of moral obligation to give according to their ability that goes with understanding that in a communist society everyone is dependent on everyone else.

I start a post not too long ago about” Volunteerism, private charity, and …. Conservatism?”. Here is what some of the people answered in respect to my question.

The simple answer is that they can do it. But charity has never gone anywhere. It is band aid to a serious disease, not to mention that charity itself is profitable once you get to the right position within it. Note that this doesn't mean that all money donated go nowhere, but it is where the money go, and if the needed community can decide what to do with it. This is almost never the case - it goes dierctly to private medicine or private food.

Volunteering is another question I myself have; how do people live on volunteering? How do they pay for their homes, and food, let alone all the travels in question? Genuine volunteer work is, just as charity, a good thing. But like charity it is only a small stop to a much bigger problem. The food- and health crisis of many "third world" countries can only be solved if those countries themselves become ruled by the people and for the people.

Although, I doubt many charity organizations would want a betterment. Why else give to "Food For Africa" if Africa makes it's own food for it's own people?

The reason why capitalists love charity is the similar to why they love bailouts. Charity is an attempt to solve social problems by private action in a similar way as bailouts are a solution to the problems of private property owners by social action.

It's true that capitalists give to charity because they can afford to and because it makes them look good. But it is also true that working class and poor people often give a higher proportion of their incomes to charity (as well as doing practically all the volunteering). What this means is that problems created by the capitalist system in our society are solved (or more often tenuously bandaged) by what amounts to voluntary regressive taxation.

The Trot comedian Mark Steel did an excellent and amusing radio program on this topic called "Giving to Charity should be Illegal". I'd highly recommend the program if you have a spare half hour: http://www.marksteelinfo.com/audiovideo/audio/Charity.mp3 (http://www.marksteelinfo.com/audiovideo/audio/Charity.mp3)

I have nothing against charities and helping others if you can - but as someone else said, it doesn't do anything to actually help the situation. At best it can give a few people temporary relief.

Companies probably have to have some material reason for giving to charities - either PR, buying influence, or tax breaks - but this is because they are required by their stockholders to have a material reason for giving money or materials. Rich individuals can give to charities for any number of reasons from guilt to empathy to trying to build a legacy to narcissism or whatever. Liberals and conservatives point to philanthropy and charity as "solutions" to social problems or even to support the just-ness of the capitalist system.

But to paraphrase Malcolm X, don't stab me in the back and pull it out half-way and expect me to thank you.

Poverty and inequality aren't deformations of the system, they are what the system of profit is built on. So what if Carnegie or Bill gates give away 99% of their personal fortunes - the industries and companies they represent made many times more than just their personal fortunes through the exploitation of labor. The Waltons can give away money and it won't begin to make up for the poverty they created by forcing out their competitors and paying sub-living wages to their workers... which is how they were able to force out the competition in the first place.

And don't get me started about the "all-volunteer" military. If you knew any of my classmates who enlisted after high school, you'd realize that volunteerism wasn't their main interest. Having a job when they really had no prospects was their main interest - in fact the US military is one of the biggest employers in the whole country. Even things like the Peace-Corps or Teach-For-America aren't because people are idealistically itching to volunteer: all of them need work and don't have any exciting prospects and many are just trying to get away from small towns or having to go straight from high school or college into a brutal job market (even in the "good times").

Your last reason for rejecting communism "is that this is not pro-union. Unions increasing wages make little sense when you are trying to move to a world without money." This is a classic. I just love it. Well blow me over - a world without trade unions, eh? Isnt that positively terrible -people not having to organise into trade uniuons to defend themselves against against their employers when there are no employers to struggle against? Yep youve persuaded me. Ive now seen the error of my ways and will prompty banish any thought of a classless utopia from my head in future.

Taking my words out of contexts again, I will have to watch out for that in the future.

I’m saying that you view of communism is utopia, because it "is not pro-union. Unions increasing wages make little sense, under your view, as you would be producing a world without money, and there for wages.”

Comrade_Stalin

30th May 2010, 21:37

Marx and Engels did have a clear idea about what communism was as far back a 1844. Even if some people were ‘muddled’ about it then.

1844 Letter from Engels to Marx in Paris

Frederick Engels Description of Recently Founded Communist Colonies Still in Existence;

V. I. Lenin, From the Destruction of the Old Social System, To the Creation of the New

Leon Trotsky, The Revolution Betrayed, Chapter 3, Socialism and the State

Kuatsky;

Karl Kautsky The Labour Revolution

III. The Economic Revolution X. MONEY

Henry Mayers Hyndman The Record of an Adventurous Life

And even uncle Joe before he became a revisionist.

J. V. Stalin ANARCHISM or SOCIALISM? 1906

You tried to use gouts form everyone to look like you where not taking anyone’s side, but all you show is that you can revision communism form a sciences it a religion. Marx, Engels, and the rest are not gods, and can make mistakes, to say that they know everything is to prove that they are like gods which we know from religions around the world cannot be question. Just like we they can only see things with in the contexts of their times. At one time, scientists believed that the atoms that made everything up where make out of fire, water, earth, and wind. At one time scientists used the theory that the sun revolved around the earth. But we were able to question these theory and found out how wrong we were, from their we fixed our mistakes and sciences was improved by that act of questing. Hell it is found on it. What has been do here is nothing more than saying that now then, or in the future we should not able to question the teachings of these men, much like you cannot question the teachings of god. Did Uncle Joe change his view, yes after he was forced to question if his past view would ever work.

robbo203

30th May 2010, 22:26

I don’t think that capitalist should call anything they do a revolution. They keep most of the things the same, and only change who is in power. They keep god, landlords and the like to keep themselves in power.

Eh? What you on about? Are you denying there has been such a thing as a capitalist revolution? What was the 1789 French revolution for instance in your considered opinion?

So what Lenin and Stalin should of done, is put the capitalist in power in the 1917 so that they could developed industrial infrastructure to produce enough goods and services to sustain a communist society?

I am not interested in what they should have done but in what they did. The 1917 revolutuion led to the etsbalishment of state capitalism and, with that, the emergence of a new ruling state capitalist class that largely replaced the private capitalists

No, I think it is above par as I have not trolled you yet, even after restating the same information 3 times now. I can’t give you new “insight into why my utopian communist vision would not work” as the very idea of a utopia would make anything work. You seem to understand that you can’t have a perfect society but are unable to see that you view would only work in a utopia. If we all could live together without money and governments, then we would of been done it all long .

Oh well at least we all know now where you stand. Communism cant work because if it could, we would have been living together all along in a world "without money and governments". All you need to do now is recognise the thoroughly pro-capitalist nature of your political outlook :rolleyes:

Blake's Baby

31st May 2010, 00:31

Paul Cockshott

31st May 2010, 00:49

Are you saying that Marx didn't think there would be income provided to people who were disabled and such during the lower phase of communism?

Well when you word it that way it certainly is a myth, because Marx never simply "advocated" it as some sort of "utopian fantasy" as people like Louis Blanc abstract from the material conditions of society. He traced the development of the economic structure of society to show under what conditions this free distribution would come about, and his meaning is pretty clear:
What he is foreseeing is the development of things that were put in place under the welfare state, which includes a whole variety of payments according to need. The NHS in the UK was organised according to the principle of distribution according to need, and was free at the point of delivery, but since medical resources are finite, it relies on an objective assessment of need by medical staff before treatment is provided. That is distribution according to need.
This is quite different from the proposition that people will be able to go into shops and order as much of whatever they want for nothing. Except for information goods ( available on the internet etc) , that idea of free distribution is a total utopian fantasy and would be very damaging ecologically.

Paul Cockshott

31st May 2010, 00:53

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You simply take what you need without payment of any kind.

Marx does not advocate that in CGP.
If attempted it would immediately result in shortages and queues, an mass social discontent.
Attempts to reduce the selling price of consumer goods below labour values have been the bane of socialist economic policy. The proposal to reduce all consumer goods prices to zero involves a willful disregard of history.

KlÃ©ber

31st May 2010, 01:02

Except for information goods ( available on the internet etc) , that idea of free distribution is a total utopian fantasy and would be very damaging ecologically.
Quite a few material goods and services could be communized with modern technology. Free public transport, for example, would be very beneficial ecologically. In many capitalist countries, you can legally demand a free cup of water any place that serves food. It's not a problem because the water is cheap enough to provide, people have better things to do than waste the water from public fountains all day, and you won't turn much of a profit by bottling that water and selling it on the sidewalk. As the productivity of labor is constantly increasing, there will come a day when people laugh at the idea that once upon a time you had to pay rent to get a roof over your head.

Paul Cockshott

31st May 2010, 01:03

Marx and Engels did have a clear idea about what communism was as far back a 1844. Even if some people were ‘muddled’ about it then.

These were descriptions of small communes which did not prove viable in the long run.
I know of no indication that Marx thought this sort of free distribution would be possible after he had done his economic reasearch from the mid 1850s on.

And from Lenin;

V. I. Lenin, From the Destruction of the Old Social System, To the Creation of the New

http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1920/apr/11.htm (http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1920/apr/11.htm)

Trotsky;

Kuatsky;

Karl Kautsky The Labour Revolution

III. The Economic Revolution X. MONEY

http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1924/labour/ch03_j.htm#sb (http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1924/labour/ch03_j.htm)

J. V. Stalin ANARCHISM or SOCIALISM? 1906

http://www.marx2mao.com/Stalin/AS07.html#c3 (http://www.marx2mao.com/Stalin/AS07.html#c3)

.
That is a useful survey. It looks as if the misconception about free distribution was present in the Russian Social Democrat movement in the early years of the 20th century.

Kautsky shows a confusion between communist labour accounts and money, but is otherwise more realistic.

Paul Cockshott

31st May 2010, 01:09

Comrade_Stalin

31st May 2010, 01:38

Eh? What you on about? Are you denying there has been such a thing as a capitalist revolution? What was the 1789 French revolution for instance in your considered opinion?

Name one pro-god revolution.

I am not interested in what they should have done but in what they did. The 1917 revolutuion led to the etsbalishment of state capitalism and, with that, the emergence of a new ruling state capitalist class that largely replaced the private capitalists

Tell me what made it State capitalist then. Are you against a plan economy, because there is no need for one under you take everything view of communism.

Oh well at least we all know now where you stand. Communism cant work because if it could, we would have been living together all along in a world "without money and governments". All you need to do now is recognise the thoroughly pro-capitalist nature of your political outlook

No, I said that your view of communism is in fact utopia, and will not work. I never said communism my view will not work. In fact I’m saying that your view is not COMMUNISM, and is some type of utopian socialism. What would be the point of going thought the devolvement of money if we would destroy it latter.

Comrade_Stalin

31st May 2010, 01:50

It's odd that modern humans survived approximately 245,000 years without 'money or governments' as far as we can tell, and even a few thousand more with 'governments but no money'.

I too find it very odd that anyone can call themselves a communist but still believe there will 'governments and money'.

Other right winger. Let's go back to the past were there was no need for government and money. Sounds very much like the “Golden age ideal” talk, that many tea party members and conservative talk about. I see were you guys stand, “Take what you like, and we will Take some labor for you later”. The problem with free labor is that it is much like slaver were other people take labor from you, after all, you have “Free access to labor”.

You wise for a world much like a hippie commune, which is not communist. Other word would be utopian, so you can stop calling yourself a communist and call yourself a utopian( or hippie). I will always call myself a communist, as I believe that workers should be payed their fully value. Union try to increase their wagers of their worker to fully value, and communist always support unions, so I think my version is more communist. Unless you know any communist that does not support unions.

Comrade_Stalin

31st May 2010, 02:00

Quite a few material goods and services could be communized with modern technology. Free public transport, for example, would be very beneficial ecologically. In many capitalist countries, you can legally demand a free cup of water any place that serves food. It's not a problem because the water is cheap enough to provide, people have better things to do than waste the water from public fountains all day, and you won't turn much of a profit by bottling that water and selling it on the sidewalk. As the productivity of labor is constantly increasing, there will come a day when people laugh at the idea that once upon a time you had to pay rent to get a roof over your head.

I think the current debate on this post, is about should there be money or no money. While I'm for money, I against forcing people to pay for iteams you need to live. The main reason for this is that their are times, when you can not work and there for can't make any money yo pay for the things you need. You should not have to pay for a roof over you head as you need that to live. But you should pay for the x-box that you wish to buy as that is a item you don't need in order to live. The house, food , healthcare, job security and health care should be free and payed for thougth the plan economy. THe only time you pay for these things is when you go and get an ideal that you Don't need in order to live.

robbo203

31st May 2010, 08:01

Marx does not advocate that in CGP.
If attempted it would immediately result in shortages and queues, an mass social discontent.
Attempts to reduce the selling price of consumer goods below labour values have been the bane of socialist economic policy. The proposal to reduce all consumer goods prices to zero involves a willful disregard of history.

I think it is clearly inferred in the higher phase of communism in CGP. And as DaveB has shown with the quotes he provided the concept of free distribution of goods is pretty much generally accepted as an cornerstone of higher communism. Even Lenin thought so.

Would it result in shortages and queues? Possibly for some things if attempted immediately after the revolution. Those things can be rationed for the duration. For others, free acess can be more or less immediately implemented. The point is that is that we have the technological infrastructure to provide the level of output that makes free access fully implementable but it will take a little time to turn "swords into ploughshares". The abolition of the money economy will, however, mean huge amounts of resources and manpower becoming immediately available for socially useful production - by most estimates, more than doubling the productive potential of a communist economy at a stroke. A thought to bear in mind.

I am at a loss to know what you mean when you say "Attempts to reduce the selling price of consumer goods below labour values have been the bane of socialist economic policy". Communism or socialism - these terms were used interchangeably by Marx and co - involves the abolition of the price system completely. You seem to be referring to state capitalist management of the economy which is a different matter entirely

Blake's Baby

31st May 2010, 11:18

robbo203

31st May 2010, 17:24

Paul Cockshott

31st May 2010, 21:36

I think it is clearly inferred in the higher phase of communism in CGP. And as DaveB has shown with the quotes he provided the concept of free distribution of goods is pretty much generally accepted as an cornerstone of higher communism. Even Lenin thought so.

Well Lenin was mistaken there, and the dogmatists like Khrushchev who followed him have just repeated his error.

Would it result in shortages and queues? Possibly for some things if attempted immediately after the revolution. Those things can be rationed for the duration.

This is just the sort of thing that gives socialism a bad name.

Why will there be shortages?

I was in Poland in the 1980s just before the Solidarity movement got going, there was no meat to be seen in the butchers shops. In cafes the menu prices of meat meals were ridiculously low but those dishes were rarely available.

When I got back I looked up world food organisation/ UN figures and found that meat consumption in Poland was 80Kg per head per annum. Home in Scotland the level was 54Kg per annum. But in Scotland there was always meat on the butchers shelves. In Poland with a higher meat production, there was a chronic meat shortage which was one of the mobilising calls on the part of Solidarity.

But a shortage is a social phenomenon, what appears as a shortage depends on the purchasing power relative to price. Since meat prices were held well below the value of meat in terms of the labour theory of value, the actually quite adequate supply of meat was bought up immediately it appeared -- since it was so cheap. In consequence there was a shortage that meant that people had to queue for it. This, not surprisingly was unpopular.

You propose rationing. There is a case for rationing if substantial income inequalities persist, but if Marx's proposal that workers be paid ( pre tax ) at a rate of 1 hours labour per hour worked, then substantial income inequalities are removed and there is no longer a case for rationing. People can purchase roughly equal shares ( depending on how many hours work they put in ).

I am at a loss to know what you mean when you say "Attempts to reduce the selling price of consumer goods below labour values have been the bane of socialist economic policy". Communism or socialism - these terms were used interchangeably by Marx and co - involves the abolition of the price system completely. You seem to be referring to state capitalist management of the economy which is a different matter entirely

You think yourself very different from what you call 'state capitalists' but in fact you propose the same failed utopian policies as Khrushchev Gomulka and Gierek, you share the same problematic as they had -- that communism was a matter of plenty and free distribution. You sideline the clear policy of Marx that the first stage of communism is the replacement of money by labour accounts and the full application of the labour theory of value just as they did.

robbo203

31st May 2010, 23:20

Well Lenin was mistaken there, and the dogmatists like Khrushchev who followed him have just repeated his error.

.

So you dont deny that the free distribution of goods was implicit in Marx's higher communism.? My point is that the concept of free access has far wider currency among revolutionaries than you seem to have allowed for and is certainly not confined to the long term speculations of some trots and a handful of postwar politicians from the Eastern bloc. That is an absurd suggestion. Numerous Marxists and anarchists down the ages have subscribed to the idea of free distribution and see it as the cornerstone of a communist society

This is just the sort of thing that gives socialism a bad name.

.

What? By saying some things might have to be rationed but that, for the most part, people will have free and unresticted access to the things they need without payment of any sort? I dont think so! See, you cant have it both ways. First you paint communism as some kind of "utopian fantasy" and then, when it is pointed out to you that, realistically speaking, some kinds of goods might have to be rationed to begin with you think this will put people off. Sorry but no. The workers are not dumb. We will be intensely involved in the process of organising for a communist even before it has been inaugurated and we will know what is at stake and be prepared to face such problems

Why will there be shortages?

I was in Poland in the 1980s just before the Solidarity movement got going, there was no meat to be seen in the butchers shops. In cafes the menu prices of meat meals were ridiculously low but those dishes were rarely available.

When I got back I looked up world food organisation/ UN figures and found that meat consumption in Poland was 80Kg per head per annum. Home in Scotland the level was 54Kg per annum. But in Scotland there was always meat on the butchers shelves. In Poland with a higher meat production, there was a chronic meat shortage which was one of the mobilising calls on the part of Solidarity.

But a shortage is a social phenomenon, what appears as a shortage depends on the purchasing power relative to price. Since meat prices were held well below the value of meat in terms of the labour theory of value, the actually quite adequate supply of meat was bought up immediately it appeared -- since it was so cheap. In consequence there was a shortage that meant that people had to queue for it. This, not surprisingly was unpopular..

Yes thats very interesting but, still, its got bugger all to do with a communist society. Poland was a system of state-run capitalism so naturally the phenonemon of shortages would manifest itself for reasons quite different to those in a communist society.

In a communist society one of the basic features of the production system will be, I suggest, a broadly defined and socially agreed hierarchy of production goals. The details need not detain us here but, to put it simply, what it will mean is that the allocation of resources will be skewed in favour of high prority goods - most probably those that go to satsify our basic needs - meaning that if shortages are going to occur they will arise most likely in relation to low priority goods such as luxuries. Note, I am not saying "there wont be luxuries", I am just saying this is the area where shortages are most likely to arise if they arise. How we deal with that I will come on to later

One final point - in any capitalist state , Poland and the Soviet Union, included, there is an "us" and "them" dichotomy, the governed and those who govern. When you are talking about a communist society you are talking about something quite different. You seem to have a penchant for reading into such a society the kind of systemic needs that pertain to capitalism. So you envisage a state of affairs in which discontent might arise. But against whom might such discontent be directed when we are all basically in the same boat? We are, I remind you again, talking about a classless stateless communist society

You propose rationing. There is a case for rationing if substantial income inequalities persist, but if Marx's proposal that workers be paid ( pre tax ) at a rate of 1 hours labour per hour worked, then substantial income inequalities are removed and there is no longer a case for rationing. People can purchase roughly equal shares ( depending on how many hours work they put in ).
..

I propose ratioining for some goods (see above) if required but essentially I am a proponent of free access (which means no rationing). There are many other forms of rationing than that of labour vouchers but at least Marx's system was not based on money - the vouchers do not circulate. The wages system is a money based form of rationing which I - and I presume you also - totally oppose. My own preference would be for a compensation model of rationing which is radically different to the labour voucher scheme and far more slimmed down and simple to operate. Others include a "point system" of rationing mentioned by Buick and Crump in their book on State capitalism

You think yourself very different from what you call 'state capitalists' but in fact you propose the same failed utopian policies as Khrushchev Gomulka and Gierek, you share the same problematic as they had -- that communism was a matter of plenty and free distribution. You sideline the clear policy of Marx that the first stage of communism is the replacement of money by labour accounts and the full application of the labour theory of value just as they did.

No youve got this completely cockeyed if I might say so. Khrushchev & Co did talk vaguely about the extension of the principle of free distribution over time. The CPSU in its new programme of October 1961 declared:
Today the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) is adopting its third Programme, a programme for the building of communist society . . . . The supreme goal of the Party is to build a communist society on whose banner will be inscribed: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs

Needless to say there was not a hope in hell of that happening. The problem is not that the utopian policies of Khruschev falied but rather that you have completely failed to grasp their real import.

Khrushchev & co were never seriously intent on introducing a classless communist society. No ruling class in history - the state capitalist class of the Soviet Union included - has ever voluntarily sought its own liquidation. This is just bullshit for the masses - propaganda - and I am surprised that you could fall for it so easily

But more to the point there is an important economic argument as to why it cannot happen in this way. There is no such thing as a free lunch under capitalism. What appears free is in fact supported by subsidies provided out of state funds that in turn derive from taxing the profit making enterprises within the economy. So the more goodies you provide free of charge the greater the tax burden on these enterprises until the point is reached when they can no longer function on a profitable basis. At the point - actually some time before it is reached - the subsidies dry up and the free goodies will soon rapidly disappear. We will soon enough be back to paying for everything we need.

This is the problematic framework that you are referring to and I agree with you that it is a fundamentally problematic. Its starting point is a capitalist one and from this staring point it seeks to introduce free distribution as a principle incrementally. But as we have seen this is a fallacy based on a misunderstanding about the way capitalism actually ticks

So you are quite worng. I dont share the same problematic as Khruschev & co at all. That is not how communists propose to bring about communism. It cannot be brought about from the top-down and it cannot be brought about incrementally in the refromist fashion that the CPSU programme envisaged

mikelepore

1st June 2010, 02:07

robbo203, I must disagree with your goal of a system where people will work in industry without hourly pay. I don't think such a system is workable even if it were desirable, and I don't think it is desirable even if it were workable.

And what's all this about "motivation to work"? Hells bells there is a whole literature of communist anthropology on the subject. Go back to Marx's Critique of the Gotha Programme where he talks of creative work being one of lifes prime wants.

Marx didn't say that creative work, or any sort of work, is one of life's prime wants. What he said was, in judging when the higher phase (no money) will be possible, part of the answer to that is: "after labor has become not only a means of life but life's prime want."

In other words, something new (but we don't know what) would first have to occur, to cause each necessary category of work to become enjoyable in itself, and not just a means to an end, and then the higher phase would be possible.

But Marx failed to point out that this is a big "if", and there is no sign of such a change. As far as we know today, the only work that is a prime want is the atypical work that some people are already being observed to perform purely for fun, such as the work of musicians and dancers. However, most kinds of work are means to separate ends, and the number of people who are observed to perform them for inherent enjoyment is zero.

The whole thing about work is that it will be utterly transformed under free access communism.

Some degree of this transformation is certain, but its extent is unknowable. It could still be the general attitude that the worst vacation day is better than the best work day. Then economic planning would encounter a problem.

People wont work unless they are paid? Well Ive got news for you - studies have shown that, even today under capitalism, more hours are spent in unpaid labour than paid labour. The grey economy as it is called - the household sector, mutual aid projects, volunteering and charity works etc etc - is bigger in terms of labour hours expended than both the white economy (formal paid legal work) and the illegal black economy combined. What "compensation" does the guy who goes out in a lifeboat on a stormy sea to rescue people in distress get without being paid to do so, eh? He does it for no other reason than that he regards this as a matter of duty and honour that affords a sense of esteem and purpose.

Housework is something that we do for ourselves. I wash my shirt and bowl so that I will have a clean shirt and a clean bowl, or so that my own wife and kids will have them. This is evidence of selfishness, not a lack of selfishness. There is no indicator that the same instinct can get people to show up for work in industry.

Charity and rescue efforts are carried out by people who view them as emergencies. The daily running of industry cannot be perceived as an emergency. People are never going to get aroused by, "Society needs a million more inch-and-a-quarter brass door hinge screws this month! People could die, for God's sake!"

If you want to regard this as a form of "compensation" I will go along with that up to a point (since I doubt that most work in a communist will be anything but pleasant without a boss class on our backs) But there will be no material compensation - no quid pro quo arrangement, no wages, no rationed goods in a free access communist world which the workers would themselves have created in the full knowlege of what it entails . In short, they would fully recognise the sense of moral obligation to give according to their ability that goes with understanding that in a communist society everyone is dependent on everyone else.

That part summarizes your conclusion, but it doesn't add to the case for its feasibility.

soyonstout

1st June 2010, 03:18

robbo203, I must disagree with your goal of a system where people will work in industry without hourly pay. I don't think such a system is workable even if it were desirable, and I don't think it is desirable even if it were workable.

[static view of human nature]

You don't think that workers would feel some responsibility for society after they had just waged a global struggle, based on the solidarity of the working class to eradicate capitalism, facing death, reaction, torture, imprisonment, etc.? Is not the point of marxism that the political supremacy of the working class is necessary to destroy capitalism precisely because of the exploited nature of the working class, their desire to work in a different way, more efficiently so they can have more free time etc., and eventually transform the labor process into one that is more suitable to their desires/needs, etc.? If workers are the supreme class in society, they will have every interest in changing things in the direction of a) providing for their needs as workers and b) eliminating exploitation. This is I think one of the bases of the workers' movement.

Do you really think that immediately after the revolution people who've been mining coal for generations will just refuse to do it anymore? I really doubt it. If the only hope for the revolution is the solidarity of the global working class, then the revolutionary working class will feel an immense sense of responsibility to each other to continue the revolution--other workers will most likely put changes in the mining industry front and centre and try to alleviate the difficulty and danger of this kind of work as quickly as possible, not to mention the immediate measures for the shortening of the working day, etc., which will strengthen the class' bonds and understanding of themselves as a class that needs solidarity.

Certainly money won't disappear overnight, but it is necessary to eventually eliminate it if we are to eliminate capital (otherwise people could accumulate this money and eventually use it to gain power over others, etc.). If you're talking about something like a labor voucher that's only good for one week or something and can't be accumulated, you have a guaranteed way to make sure everyone works as well. Marx envisioned the eventuality of society having no need at all for such methods and living by the motto: "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need."

-soyons tout

Die Neue Zeit

1st June 2010, 03:36

But Marx failed to point out that this is a big "if", and there is no sign of such a change.

No he didn't. Marx was very sarcastic in his usage of Louis Blanc's slogan, considering Blanc's ultimately reform-coalitionist politics (like his non-sympathy for the Paris Commune) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Blanc).

Paul Cockshott

1st June 2010, 13:36

So you dont deny that the free distribution of goods was implicit in Marx's higher communism.?
I certainly deny that.

In a communist society one of the basic features of the production system will be, I suggest, a broadly defined and socially agreed hierarchy of production goals. The details need not detain us here but, to put it simply, what it will mean is that the allocation of resources will be skewed in favour of high prority goods - most probably those that go to satsify our basic needs - meaning that if shortages are going to occur they will arise most likely in relation to low priority goods such as luxuries. Note, I am not saying "there wont be luxuries", I am just saying this is the area where shortages are most likely to arise if they arise. How we deal with that I will come on to later

And in the absence of a consumer goods market how will you determine what are high priority goods -- get real. You can make a few very gross decisions about the level of public services democratically, you can not decide priorities among 100,000s of consumer goods except by a consumer goods market.

But more to the point there is an important economic argument as to why it cannot happen in this way. There is no such thing as a free lunch under capitalism. What appears free is in fact supported by subsidies provided out of state funds that in turn derive from taxing the profit making enterprises within the economy. So the more goodies you provide free of charge the greater the tax burden on these enterprises until the point is reached when they can no longer function on a profitable basis. At the point - actually some time before it is reached - the subsidies dry up and the free goodies will soon rapidly disappear. We will soon enough be back to paying for everything we need.
There is no free lunch anywhere. You are effectively proposing an income tax rate of 100%. I agree that it is better to provide free services funded out of income tax, I think that setting the rate at 100% is both foolish and likely to be very unpopular.

Paul Cockshott

1st June 2010, 13:38

No he didn't. Marx was very sarcastic in his usage of Louis Blanc's slogan, considering Blanc's ultimately reform-coalitionist politics (like his non-sympathy for the Paris Commune) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Blanc).

A timely reminder that 'from each according to abilty, to each according to need' comes not from Marx but from Blanc.

Paul Cockshott

1st June 2010, 13:40

Do you really think that immediately after the revolution people who've been mining coal for generations will just refuse to do it anymore?

If you say that they will no longer get paid for digging it, that is very much an open question.

robbo203

1st June 2010, 20:02

I certainly deny that..

Apart from simply saying ex catherdra you "deny it". it would be useful to have some idea of why you think this. You know, some kind of argument to back up your point. For instance, it seems obvious to me that Marx intended his labour voucher scheme for the lower phase of communism only as a form of rationing and that it would disappear in the higher phase. Would you agree? Assuming your answer is "yes" we have then to ask why. Again it seems to me to be quite obvious that LV scheme is dispensed with because the need to ration goods disappears in higher communism

Here is the relevant quote

In a higher phase of communist society, after the enslaving subordination of the individual to the division of labor, and with it also the antithesis between mental and physical labor, has vanished, after labor has become not only a livelihood but life's prime want, after the productive forces have increased with the all-round development of the individual, and all the springs of co-operative wealth flow more abundantly--only then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois law be left behind in its entirety and society inscribe on its banners: From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!"

Note the point about the productive forces having increased and cooperative wealth flowing more abundantly. To me this is saying loud and clear that wealth no longer needs to be rationed and the LV scheme can henceforth be dispensed with.

But if you no longer have rationing there is logically speaking only one possible mode of wealth appropriation left - that is direct free access to wealth according to self determined need. This, I submit, is the Marxian understanding of what is meant by the higher phase of communism.

And in the absence of a consumer goods market how will you determine what are high priority goods -- get real. You can make a few very gross decisions about the level of public services democratically, you can not decide priorities among 100,000s of consumer goods except by a consumer goods market...

Come come - that is not at all what I suggested! I said quite clearly - did I not? - that I was talking about a "broadly defined and socially agreed hierarchy of production goals". When did I ever suggest an ordinal ranking of 100,000 of consumer goods, eh? Thats a ridiculous assertion. Moreover, I dont think youve quite grasped the point that this is not about determing the "level of public services" or anything like that. It is about formulating and agreeing basic guidelines for the allocation of resoruces under conditions of scarcity i.e. if and when there are competing claims on a parrticular resoruces which cannot all be satsified.

For me , communism will be essentially an automatically self regulating economy - not a so called centrally planned economy at all. It is, if you like, the way the so called free market operates via decentralised decisionmaking except that, of course that there will be absolutely no market whatsoever - no prices , no wage labour, no exchange value, nothing. Just direct unmediated calculation in kind

From you comment about a "consumer goods market" I cannot quite determine whether or not you approve of the idea. Are we to understand that you accept the need for a market economy even if only for consumer goods and not factor inputs?

There is no free lunch anywhere. You are effectively proposing an income tax rate of 100%. I agree that it is better to provide free services funded out of income tax, I think that setting the rate at 100% is both foolish and likely to be very unpopular.

I have absolutely no idea what you are on about here. There no taxation in a communist economy because there is no money in any shape or form nor any "income" to tax. You dont really seem to have grasped what communism is about, have you? If you are simply using terms like "income tax " metaphorically in relation to communiusm might I suggest you dispense with this practice because really it is highly misleading and obscures rather than clarifies the issues

If what you mean by the expression "there is no free lunch" that everything has a "cost" (oportunity cost) then yes that is perfectly true. However I was referring to the application of this principle in capitalist context in which costs take a monetised form. What I was trying to get accross was the impracticality of the idea of trying to gradually intorudce the free goods or services on an incremental basis with a view to generally the pinciple of free distribution. It simply cant happen like that for the reason i explained. Sooner or later it will run up against the barrier of the profit system. The excessive taxing of profits to provide revenue to subsiside free services, will seize up the process of accumulation and bring the whole system to a grinding halt

Die Neue Zeit

2nd June 2010, 03:03

You propose rationing. There is a case for rationing if substantial income inequalities persist, but if Marx's proposal that workers be paid ( pre tax ) at a rate of 1 hours labour per hour worked, then substantial income inequalities are removed and there is no longer a case for rationing. People can purchase roughly equal shares ( depending on how many hours work they put in ).

There are cases where I do support price ceilings but planned shortages: for things like tobacco and unhealthy foods. Why? Because I don't like consumption taxes.

Paul Cockshott

3rd June 2010, 23:22

Here is the relevant quote

In a higher phase of communist society, after the enslaving subordination of the individual to the division of labor, and with it also the antithesis between mental and physical labor, has vanished, after labor has become not only a livelihood but life's prime want, after the productive forces have increased with the all-round development of the individual, and all the springs of co-operative wealth flow more abundantly--only then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois law be left behind in its entirety and society inscribe on its banners: From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!"

Note the point about the productive forces having increased and cooperative wealth flowing more abundantly. To me this is saying loud and clear that wealth no longer needs to be rationed and the LV scheme can henceforth be dispensed with.

You have to read it in the context of why the labour voucher scheme is still based on bourgeois right - it fails to compensate for ineuqualities of personal circumstance:

Further, one worker is married, another is not; one has more children than another, and so on and so forth. Thus, with an equal performance of labor, and hence an equal in the social consumption fund, one will in fact receive more than another, one will be richer than another, and so on. To avoid all these defects, right, instead of being equal, would have to be unequal.

What he is proposing here is basically a scheme of welfare benefits whereby rates of pay will be adjusted to family size and circumstances -- ie to an objective measure of need. There is no suggestion of generallly free distribution -- that would be another form of equal right, instead what is required is a set of unequal welfare benefits based on need.

Paul Cockshott

3rd June 2010, 23:45

For me , communism will be essentially an automatically self regulating economy - not a so called centrally planned economy at all. It is, if you like, the way the so called free market operates via decentralised decisionmaking except that, of course that there will be absolutely no market whatsoever - no prices , no wage labour, no exchange value, nothing. Just direct unmediated calculation in kind

From you comment about a "consumer goods market" I cannot quite determine whether or not you approve of the idea. Are we to understand that you accept the need for a market economy even if only for consumer goods and not factor inputs?

Calculation in kind is possible, and is certainly a key part of a communist economy. The basic demonstration that rational calculation in kind is mathematically possible was provided by Kantorovich. But it can only be carried out sucessfully in a fully centrally planned economy. He too wanted a self regulating or cybernetic communist economy. If you want to do it in a decentralised way, as Kantorovich wanted to do in the 60s, then you would have to introduce things very like prices : his objective valuations. I dont agree with Kantorovichon this. I favour the centralised approach since the decentralised approach tends to reintroduce market relations within the productive sector.

But calculation in kind Kantorovich style requires the 'plan ray', that is to say a specification of the proportions in which the output is to be produced. How do you obtain a specification of the proportions of the output?

We suggest that the answer is to have a consumer goods market using Marx's labour accounts. The public wholesale authority uses market demand to determine the socially prefered mix of consumer goods and specifies this to the planning authority. The planning authority then uses in kind calculations to determine the mix of intermediate goods required to produce the final output. We go into considerable detail on this in a number of publications for instance Towards a New Socialism (http://ricardo.ecn.wfu.edu/%7Ecottrell/socialism_book/)
and also Computers and Economic Democracy (http://socialsciences.scielo.org/pdf/s_rei/v1nse/scs_a01.pdf).

It seems to me that all you are putting forward is very general phrases about self regulation and calculation in kind without any concrete plan as to how it will be done. In the 21st century this lack of detail is not politically credible.

Paul Cockshott

3rd June 2010, 23:49

There are cases where I do support price ceilings but planned shortages: for things like tobacco and unhealthy foods. Why? Because I don't like consumption taxes.

I think we both reject Robbo's implicit suggestion that universal free vodka on demand would have been the answer to Soviet economic problems. But if you restrict vodka production and dont raise the price what happens ?
You get a black market and criminals appropriate the rent revenue.

Paul Cockshott

3rd June 2010, 23:54

There no taxation in a communist economy because there is no money in any shape or form nor any "income" to tax.

This is a pernicious illusion.

Whether a tax is in money, kind or labour time it is still a tax. You are proposing either a 100% income tax or a 100% labour tax, it makes no difference. Rember old Smith and Labour being the original currency. If workers are to have 100% of their labour time appropriated by the community that is a 100% tax rate, and is unlikely to be popular.

robbo203

3rd June 2010, 23:59

You have to read it in the context of why the labour voucher scheme is still based on bourgeois right - it fails to compensate for ineuqualities of personal circumstance:

What he is proposing here is basically a scheme of welfare benefits whereby rates of pay will be adjusted to family size and circumstances -- ie to an objective measure of need. There is no suggestion of generallly free distribution -- that would be another form of equal right, instead what is required is a set of unequal welfare benefits based on need.

Yes but all this pertains to the lower phase of communism not the higher phase. There is clearly no suggestion in Marx that labour vouchers would continue into the higher phase, is there?

Agnapostate

4th June 2010, 00:16

It seems to me that all you are putting forward is very general phrases about self regulation and calculation in kind without any concrete plan as to how it will be done. In the 21st century this lack of detail is not politically credible.

Too true! The message board environment should be somewhat more informal, of course, but it's a problem that many tendencies here don't have supplementary academic material behind ambiguous rhetoric. As an anarchist, I'm painfully aware of lay texts such as the FAQ being critically important, but also of the fact that musings about horizontal federation and decentralized planning aren't sufficient for people who demand higher theoretical work. That's why I was grateful for Albert and Hahnel even as other anarchists scorned "participatory bureaucracy."

Paul Cockshott

4th June 2010, 00:29

Yes but all this pertains to the lower phase of communism not the higher phase. There is clearly no suggestion in Marx that labour vouchers would continue into the higher phase, is there?

Well I agree that Marx does not explicitly deny the theory that all distribution will be free under communism, but he certainly does not assert it either. He does not deny the Buddha's teachings on compassion either, but we would be hesitant to assert that he was a Buddhist on that account.

The point is that he focuses on the inadequacy of payment just according to labour because it does not take into account unequal needs, and says that what you actually need is a system of unequal rights -- but that carries no implications that free distribution is either necessary or possible except in certain cases. We know that free distribution of information is now possible via the internet, and it is arguable that the labour done on open source software by volunteers in their free time is a model for labour being a prime need. But for things other than copies, or goods for which supply is truely copious ( water in Norway), unrestricted free distribution is not practical.

robbo203

4th June 2010, 00:34

This is a pernicious illusion.

Whether a tax is in money, kind or labour time it is still a tax. You are proposing either a 100% income tax or a 100% labour tax, it makes no difference. Rember old Smith and Labour being the original currency. If workers are to have 100% of their labour time appropriated by the community that is a 100% tax rate, and is unlikely to be popular.

This is an absurd argument which makes absolutely no sense at all in the context of a communist society. In fact, your way of looking at the matter presupposes. I would suggest, capitalist relations of production.

I mean look at this claim

If workers are to have 100% of their labour time appropriated by the community that is a 100% tax rate, and is unlikely to be popular.

This presupposes firstly a separation bertween the workers on the one hand and community on the other - as if they are not one and the same thing. Secondly, Im utterly baffled by your observation and is unlikely to be popular, To me that sounds like you have in mind some kind of state like institution in the backgorund issuing instructions/decrees to the workers which the workers may or may not find irksome . The whole point is that communism (at least in the higher stage) is based on voluntary labour (and free access to goods and services). The voluntary nature of labour sorts of precludes the notion of the communmity (i.e you and me) appropriating the labour of its members (i.e. you and me) against their wishes

In the ordinary sense of the word a tax is a kind of charge you levy on something. (What would that be in a communist society BTW?) It is deduction that you make from gross earnings. Such a reading simply does not translate into what would go in a communist society at all.

The most charitable interpretation of your idea of a 100% labour tax that I can think of is that what you are trying to say is that people in a communist society will be obliged to contribute something to that society. Well than why not just call it a moral obligation? Calling it a tax is utterly misleading not to say illogical

robbo203

4th June 2010, 00:59

Well I agree that Marx does not explicitly deny the theory that all distribution will be free under communism, but he certainly does not assert it either. He does not deny the Buddha's teachings on compassion either, but we would be hesitant to assert that he was a Buddhist on that account..

Non sequitur

The point is that Marx advocated labour vouchers for lower communism for a reason i.e. to ration goods. He did not forsee the need for labour vouchers lasting into higher communism, did he now? Ergo, this must have meant he foresaw the reason for labour vouchers disappearing in higher communism. Which means, in short, that he did not see the need to ration goods in higher communism and that can only mean one thing - free access!

The point is that he focuses on the inadequacy of payment just according to labour because it does not take into account unequal needs, and says that what you actually need is a system of unequal rights -- but that carries no implications that free distribution is either necessary or possible except in certain cases. We know that free distribution of information is now possible via the internet, and it is arguable that the labour done on open source software by volunteers in their free time is a model for labour being a prime need. But for things other than copies, or goods for which supply is truely copious ( water in Norway), unrestricted free distribution is not practical.

Yes you keep on saying this but I see precious little in the way of hard argument to back up this claim. Really, you are simply relying on the hoary old bourgeois myth of our irredeemably greedy human nature. The whole point is that demand is not infinite and if it were it would be subject to sharply diminishing returns such that it would not matter anyway.

You take no account of the social construction of consmpution, and how greed is a reflection of capitalism itself and its status system . Nor, if I might say so, do you take any account of the huge productive advantages that a moneyless free access communist economy will enjoy over capitalism - namely the elimination of the enormous structural waste associated with capitalism and its money economy. The increase in socially useful; production that this wwill occasion will be another important factor in eliminating the need for rationing and thereby insitituting free access

robbo203

4th June 2010, 01:23

Calculation in kind is possible, and is certainly a key part of a communist economy. The basic demonstration that rational calculation in kind is mathematically possible was provided by Kantorovich. But it can only be carried out sucessfully in a fully centrally planned economy. He too wanted a self regulating or cybernetic communist economy. If you want to do it in a decentralised way, as Kantorovich wanted to do in the 60s, then you would have to introduce things very like prices : his objective valuations. I dont agree with Kantorovichon this. I favour the centralised approach since the decentralised approach tends to reintroduce market relations within the productive sector..

To me a fully centrally planned economy i.e. society wide planning is a complete non starter. It matters little even if you could theoretically determine using the most sophisticated technology the necessary inputs and outputs within some kind of gigantic Leontief matrix. The problem lies out there in the real world with its potential to continuously upset all the best laid plans of mice and men. It follows therefore that a considerable of decentralised decisionmaking is absolutely indispensable. I dont agree that that this tends to "reintroduce market relations" and I think once again you are projecting what happens in capitalism into what is afterall a radically different kind of society - communism

But calculation in kind Kantorovich style requires the 'plan ray', that is to say a specification of the proportions in which the output is to be produced. How do you obtain a specification of the proportions of the output?
..

I m not advocating Kantorovich style calculation in kind as you put it so this is not an issue with me

It seems to me that all you are putting forward is very general phrases about self regulation and calculation in kind without any concrete plan as to how it will be done. In the 21st century this lack of detail is not politically credible.

Of course. But this is just a discussion forum and comment is necessarily brief and generalised. But there is work in progress on the subject and if you are interested there is an actual working group to look into the question of the ECA at http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/ecaworkinggroup/?yguid=90109900

syndicat

4th June 2010, 01:35

If workers are to have 100% of their labour time appropriated by the community that is a 100% tax rate, and is unlikely to be popular.

This presupposes firstly a separation bertween the workers on the one hand and community on the other - as if they are not one and the same thing.

they're not one and the same, tho. People have a strong sense of "we" with their own family unit they are a part of, but as you go outward in the concentric cirlces of less and less personal connection or familiarity, the sense of identification diminishes. free sharing does occur a lot internal to a family unit.

certainly we can expect that a revolutionary struggle for worker power and expropriation of the capitalists will develop very broadly (tho not totally) within the working class stronger solidarity and a sense of "we", that still doesn't mean complete identification with the working class...and then you also have the remnants of the former boss classes or people with amoral tendencies of "what's in it for me?'

Of the total social product, some portion is presumably to be provided through systems of social provision. we do this even now to some degree, as in countries that have free health care provision. There are people who do not produce the social product....children, and those not working for any variety of reasons (between jobs, injured, retired).

Thus it seems to me reasonable to divide the contribution of the worker in social production between a portion that goes to the social provision sector and a portion that goes to provide that person's private consumption. The individual's contribution to the sector that cares for those not working can be considered a kind of tax on that person's work effort.

I'm not suggesting, tho, that anyone be remunerated for the value of their output, but for the actual sacrifices and efforts they make in their contribution to social production.

I do think that workers are likely to think that if an able bodied person is not contributing and yet still consuming, this is unjust. So I also think that total free sharing isn't likely to win out even within a highly solidaristic working class.

Paul C:
It seems to me that all you are putting forward is very general phrases about self regulation and calculation in kind without any concrete plan as to how it will be done. In the 21st century this lack of detail is not politically credible.

I think this is very true. We shouldn't be satisfied with what amounts to hand-waving.

A:

As an anarchist, I'm painfully aware of lay texts such as the FAQ being critically important, but also of the fact that musings about horizontal federation and decentralized planning aren't sufficient for people who demand higher theoretical work. That's why I was grateful for Albert and Hahnel even as other anarchists scorned "participatory bureaucracy."

same here. the anarchists who scorn what Albert & Hahnel have done aren't going to be taken seriously by a lot of people because they tend to offer only vague phrases and hand-waving assurances...and that isn't good enough at this late date.

Die Neue Zeit

4th June 2010, 01:47

I think we both reject Robbo's implicit suggestion that universal free vodka on demand would have been the answer to Soviet economic problems. But if you restrict vodka production and don't raise the price what happens ?
You get a black market and criminals appropriate the rent revenue.

That's only while money is still around, though. With non-circulable labour credits, these black markets would be limited to their own private currencies (and, individually or collectively, these currencies can be tracked and shut down by appropriate crime-busting apparatuses).

Paul Cockshott

4th June 2010, 11:46

same here. the anarchists who scorn what Albert & Hahnel have done aren't going to be taken seriously by a lot of people because they tend to offer only vague phrases and hand-waving assurances...and that isn't good enough at this late date.

I agree that what Albert and Hahnel have done is valuable, and that there is a considerable overlap between them and what Allin and I have been arguing -- once one strips away the differences in language etc that comes from anarchist versus marxian backgrounds.

Paul Cockshott

4th June 2010, 11:50

That's only while money is still around, though. With non-circulable labour credits, these black markets would be limited to their own private currencies (and, individually or collectively, these currencies can be tracked and shut down by appropriate crime-busting apparatuses).

You are right that with non-circulating labour credits there is much less freedom for a black market, but it would still exist in the form of bartering for favours. People who got to the front of the queue when the Vodka delivery got into town would have something that they could trade for favours. This amounts to tranfering a form of income to them. Anything which creates black markets of any sort brings socialism into direpute.

Paul Cockshott

4th June 2010, 11:56

But this is just a discussion forum and comment is necessarily brief and generalised. But there is work in progress on the subject and if you are interested there is an actual working group to look into the question of the ECA at http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/e...yguid=90109900 (http://www.anonym.to/?http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/ecaworkinggroup/?yguid=90109900)

That is obviously a good idea, but I can only see short discussion postings not much different to those on this forum. Do they have any position papers or reports?

Paul Cockshott

4th June 2010, 12:06

The point is that Marx advocated labour vouchers for lower communism for a reason i.e. to ration goods. He did not forsee the need for labour vouchers lasting into higher communism, did he now? Ergo, this must have meant he foresaw the reason for labour vouchers disappearing in higher communism.

I know that this is the 'Marxist' dogma, but I have seen no evidence from my reading of Marx that he subscribed to this belief. He is remarkably reticent about expressing concrete ideas about communism, and to the extent that he does come up with concrete mechanisms these center around labour credits.
I can at present think of only 3 places where he goes even this far : CGP, and a couple of remarks in Capital volume 1.
On the other hand we have the great bulk of his economic work which focuses on the concept of socially necessary labour time and how this is key to the analysis of different modes of production, so it seems folly not to attempt to apply the insights from his economic analysis to the examination of socialist economies. What you are doing is seems to me a branch off into the sort of utopian speculation of which he was always rather skeptical.

Die Neue Zeit

4th June 2010, 14:37

You are right that with non-circulating labour credits there is much less freedom for a black market, but it would still exist in the form of bartering for favours. People who got to the front of the queue when the Vodka delivery got into town would have something that they could trade for favours. This amounts to tranfering a form of income to them. Anything which creates black markets of any sort brings socialism into direpute.

Actually, I'd like to ask a question of how society should deal with this.

I'm going to generalize from vodka, hard drugs, tobacco, etc. to any other product. I quoted "Austrian" David Ramsay Steele in my old CSR work:

Any attempt to introduce a system of distribution by labor-vouchers will tend to lead to an actual distribution (after trading) which departs from one proportionate to hours worked [...] A point not explicitly noted by Pierson or Mises is that, although the vouchers might come to be used as money, if this were discouraged by making the vouchers non-transferable and expirable, then some other monetary medium would spontaneously arise - just as cigarettes have frequently emerged as money in prisons, internment camps, and hyperinflationary situations.

Notwithstanding his ignorance of the non-recognition of private currencies in the legal stores (thereby limiting the black market potential to petty barter)...

He doesn't get your subtlety about safety stocks (before short-term prices go up) and maximum inventory (before short-term prices go down). Nevertheless, how do we eliminate this barter problem?

Paul Cockshott

4th June 2010, 16:04

Actually, I'd like to ask a question of how society should deal with this.

I'm going to generalize from vodka, hard drugs, tobacco, etc. to any other product. I quoted "Austrian" David Ramsay Steele in my old CSR work:

He doesn't get your subtlety about safety stocks (before short-term prices go up) and maximum inventory (before short-term prices go down). Nevertheless, how do we eliminate this barter problem?

This goes back to M's critique of Proudhon in Poverty of Philosophy. You can not fix the selling price to be exactly the labour content. You have to allow selling price to be above value in case of goods in short supply and below for goods in excess. This is required as a feedback mechanism in any case. Marx argued that you could not fix selling prices to be exactly the embodied labour content irrespective of supply and demand.
Thus, if for social reasons the production of Opium and Alcohol are restricted, you must either ban them outright, or allow the restricted commodity to sell at well above its value in the public shops.

This is also likely to be an important factor for goods which cause CO2 pollution for example.

mikelepore

4th June 2010, 16:54

You don't think that workers would feel some responsibility for society after they had just waged a global struggle, based on the solidarity of the working class ............ Do you really think that immediately after the revolution people who've been mining coal for generations will just refuse to do it anymore

Some will and some won't. I often hear people speak of "human" traits, and they say that as thought it meant one thing for every human, as though we were talking about how an insect has six legs. What I try to inject is the idea that each individual has a different behavior, and there is a bell-shaped distribution. The transition to a classless society will change the mean and variance of our behaviors in an unknown way, but before the revolution we have some distribution, and after the revolution we will one again have some distribution.

Given that, now let's ask your question again: will people have a sense of responsibility or will they decline to do the work? It's a matter of numbers. What we don't know for certain is that, if the rate at which people consume wealth adds up to society having a need for the average worker to show up for, say, 300 hours of work per year, whether the average worker would really show up for the necessary 300 hours per year, so that the production rate will match the consumption rate. This matching between inputs and output has to be calculated and then established artificially; it won't happen by coincidence.

The most direct way to make work inputs and product outputs correspond it is to have a rule that the longer you work the more you may consume. That method is superior to the two alternative methods that come to mind, which would either a rationing of goods, or to impose punishments for failing to show up for work.

mikelepore

4th June 2010, 17:27

Originally Posted by mikelepore
.
[static view of human nature]

As I pointed out in my previous post, when people say "human nature" I have to respond by asking: which individual do you mean - or were you refering to a measurement of a statistical mean -- because each individual has a different human nature. But that was already covered.

In this post I want to reply to your conclusion that my view of human nature is STATIC.

On the contrary, I base my argument on classical conditioning from psychology. People tend to keep doing more of whatever the environmental conditions usually reward them for doing. That's not a case of being static.

If work were voluntary and the goods were free, the society would be giving people material rewards whenever they decline to work. The length of the year is 365 days. If you work for 100 days, you will get a reward in the form of the use of all the recreational facilities and vacation resorts for the other 265 days. If you work for only 50 days, then you will get that reward for 315 days. The environment would be actively handing us tangible rewards to decline more frequently to appear at work.

robbo203

4th June 2010, 18:57

That is obviously a good idea, but I can only see short discussion postings not much different to those on this forum. Do they have any position papers or reports?

Its early days still - the discussion has only recently been formed - but you can click on the "links" at http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/e...yguid=90109900 (http://www.anonym.to/?http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/ecaworkinggroup/?yguid=90109900) where there will be some "position papers". The idea is to draw up a pamphlet of sorts critiquing the ECA for wider circulation within the non-market anti-statist sector

Paul Cockshott

5th June 2010, 13:14

Its early days still - the discussion has only recently been formed - but you can click on the "links" at http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/e...yguid=90109900 (http://www.anonym.to/?http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/ecaworkinggroup/?yguid=90109900) where there will be some "position papers". The idea is to draw up a pamphlet of sorts critiquing the ECA for wider circulation within the non-market anti-statist sector

There do not yet seem to be any visible to non group members.

Comrade_Stalin

9th June 2010, 05:42

Yes, I think we can see what their 'communism' means - classes? Yes. Money? Yes. Government? Yes.

In fact all of the same shit that we have now. Just, you know, a bit fairer. Wow. Social democrats advocating capitalism while pretending that they're communists.

Its a slightly more sophisticated version of the greedy person argument and its constant twin, the lazy person argument which are invariably wheeled out as a last resort by bourgeois ideologists to demonstrate the impossibility of communism

There is no one that is unintelligent enough to fall for your hippie utopia trap. You revisionist are not very intelligent and it is so easy to destroy you small trap of lies. First let’s destroy you greedy person and lazy person arguments.

Let’s start by defining something;
Greed: excessive desire to acquire or possess more (especially more material wealth) than one needs or deserves

Laziness - indolence: inactivity resulting from a dislike of work

These are the building blocks of yours are destroyed by the very system you hate, the Soviet Union. The Soviet union under Stalin worked on a planned pay system, where you were payed x amount every some unit of time. No pay by the hour, or pay for each unit produced. Soviet Union proved that the lazy person argument was wrong ,as people would still work for fair pay. You see you have no reason to be inactive, if you pay is good enough to cover the trouble that you have to go thought to complete it. The plan economy also disproved the greedy person argument, as it did not take any extra units over what was planned. The plan say to make 100 car and you produce 110, well the plan take 100 and you keep the extra 10. So as you can see there was no greedy or lazy persons, under the very system that you hate.

Now I will prove that you are not real communist and are only hippie "want to be communist".

Let’s start with a quote from Marx’s (wikiquote)

"The theory of the Communism may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property."
"From each, according to his ability; to each, according to his needs."
"Communism deprives no man of the ability to appropriate the fruits of his labour. The only thing it deprives him of is the ability to enslave others by means of such appropriations."
"Democracy is the road to socialism."
"Let the ruling classes tremble at a Communist revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win. Working men of all countries, unite!"

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Communism (http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Communism)

As you can see he talks about needs but never about wants. Let’s define the two

From http://www.mcwdn.org/ECONOMICS/NeedWant.html (http://www.mcwdn.org/ECONOMICS/NeedWant.html)

One important idea in economics is that of needs and wants. Needs would be defined as goods or services that are required. This would include the needs for food, clothing, shelter, health care. Wants are goods or services that are not necessary but that we desire or wish for. For example, one needs clothes, but one may not needs designer clothes. One does not need toys, entertainment, gems, etc..One needs food, but does not have to have steak or dessert. One does not need glamorous trips, mall shopping, etc..
An important part of the economics is the distribution of resources or goods so that people's needs are met. This is especially true in times of scarcity when there are not enough resources, goods or services.
Many times advertisers try to appeal to consumers in such a way that the consumers feel they needs certain goods or services when in fact they only want them.

Blake's Baby and robbo203 line is more of "From each, according to what he wish to volunteer; to each, according to his wants." One can easily see this from the fact that under their system you have free access to everything that you need and want. Both Blake's Baby and robbo203 do not have the intelligence to tell the difference between needs and wants, and instead answer back with I hate the "Soviet Union, china, everyone" line.

They are against having people paying for what they want (the so called greedy person argument), and wish not to pay for what they want. Other people should work under their system so they can take it.

They are also against “collectively paying” for what people need(the so called lazy person argument). That people who fulfill the needs of other should not be rewarded for doing so, and should give their work for free. They normally point to the public library and say that we get “free books from there” while ignoring the fact that we collectively pay for it thought the tax system.Blake's Baby and robbo203 wish for a world much like the one they had when they were young, were they got free stuff, while forgetting at the same time that other people payed for it. Much like a kid asking “why can’t I get a free car, I got a free video game when I was young why can’t I have that system.”

Do not that “collectively paying” under communims is part of the plan ecnomy and what is normally used by people like Blake's Baby and robbo203 to call it a state capitalist nation.

Karl Marx

Democracy is the road to socialism.
Form wiki

A government is the organization (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organization), or agency through which a political unit exercises its authority, controls and administers public policy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_policy), and directs and controls the actions of its members or subjects.

Democracy is a political form of government carried out either directly by the people (direct democracy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_democracy)) or by means of elected representatives of the people (representative democracy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Representative_democracy)).

As you see communism is democracy and democracy is a “form of government”. Therefore being anti-government under democracy is also being anti-communist, which Blake's Baby and robbo203 are.

It's odd that modern humans survived approximately 245,000 years without 'money or governments' as far as we can tell, and even a few thousand more with 'governments but no money'.

I too find it very odd that anyone can call themself a communist but still believe there will 'governments and money'.

Government has changed forms over the course of 245,000 years. They started out with a single person as their leader, which under Barbarism they are called an Elder, chief or Tribal Leader, which was normally the alpha male of the group. This is why the US always meets with tribal leaders to control the course of the tribal nation. US only saw these leaders as the government of each nation. Under Feudalism the government was normally the king and his Aristocracy. It then changed again to the vote buying system that we have under capitalism. The second part is money, which has also changed forms over the past 245,000 years. It first started out as food, under barbarism. Prostitution in fact got it start here when people would trade food for sexual favors. The best place to see the use of food as a form of money is in the east where rise was taxed as a form of money under feudalism. In fact money has changed form four times. Money starting out as food, then changed to precious metals, then to bank notes and then to records (debt and credit cards). Money as we know it today is medium between products. This allows for a form of collective bargaining where everyone, thought the free market or plan economy sets how many units of the medium needs to be traded for some item.

As you can see Blake's Baby and robbo203 are two hippie trying to make up for the failed hippie utopia, like Laos. There is no difference between these two and the tea baggers who go cross country protesting tax on tax build roads. Hell they can’t even prove that they are not pro-class or that we are as they have no fact to back them up that why they avoided when I point out to Blake's Baby that we have vote buying in the US, not voting and robbo203’s Volunteerism.

But I will prove to you that they have classes and we don’t. First class are define as different social groups base on how they get payed. Under capitalism there are two class the wage laborers and the owners. Wage laborers get payed by working for each unit of time, and the owners get payed because they own It (no work need).So if everyone is panned as part of the plan, then they are all in the same class. As long as no one else is payed any different, there is no second class and therefore no class system. Because there was only one type of pay system Stalin’s Soviet Union was a classless nation. Blake's Baby and robbo203 have a class system as you have people who have “free access to labor” and those who have “free access” to goods. This means that there are two ways of paying for something and their fore they have a hippie class system.

Zanthorus

9th June 2010, 16:18

Karl Marx

Democracy is the road to socialism.

That's a nice quote. Here's another one for you:

In true democracy the political state disappears.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1843/critique-hpr/ch02.htm#041

Form wiki

A government is the organization, or agency through which a political unit exercises its authority, controls and administers public policy, and directs and controls the actions of its members or subjects.

Democracy is a political form of government carried out either directly by the people (direct democracy) or by means of elected representatives of the people (representative democracy).

Wikipedia is essentially correct on this point (Apart from representative democracy is not really democracy unless things like right of recall are included). However, I think what robbo203 and Blake's Baby were saying when they were talking about the abolition of "government" (And they can jump in and correct me here if I'm wrong) is actually the abolition of the "state", that is, the public power divorced from the control of society. As Engels put it in his discussion of the Iroqouis Gens in The Origins of the Family, Private Property and the State:

The state presupposes a special public power separated from the body of the people.

When the mode of public administration is divorced from the body of the people then it becomes merely an instrument for the ruling classes to enforce their rule. On the other hand, when the "state" is replaced by forms of popular self-governance it becomes the mode of emancipation of the proletariat and eventually ceases to be a "state" as such once the proletarian dictature has ceased and the bourgeoisie has been expropriated. This conception of the state as a body seperate from the direct control of the populus is why Engels could say of the Paris Commune with it's instant recallability of delegates who were payed skilled workmen's wages that it "ceased to be a state in the true sense of the term".

Government has changed forms over the course of 245,000 years. They started out with a single person as their leader, which under Barbarism they are called an Elder, chief or Tribal Leader, which was normally the alpha male of the group. This is why the US always meets with tribal leaders to control the course of the tribal nation. US only saw these leaders as the government of each nation. Under Feudalism the government was normally the king and his Aristocracy. It then changed again to the vote buying system that we have under capitalism. The second part is money, which has also changed forms over the past 245,000 years. It first started out as food, under barbarism. Prostitution in fact got it start here when people would trade food for sexual favors. The best place to see the use of food as a form of money is in the east where rise was taxed as a form of money under feudalism. In fact money has changed form four times. Money starting out as food, then changed to precious metals, then to bank notes and then to records (debt and credit cards). Money as we know it today is medium between products. This allows for a form of collective bargaining where everyone, thought the free market or plan economy sets how many units of the medium needs to be traded for some item.

Hmmm, out with the bad but keep the good aspects of capitalism while failing to realise that the bad comes along with the good and that capitalism must be overthrown in it's totality. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that a Stalinist like yourself would be repeating the arguments of Proudhon.

ZeroNowhere

9th June 2010, 16:36

Democracy is the road to socialism.Source?

This conception of the state as a body seperate from the direct control of the populus is why Engels could say of the Paris Commune with it's instant recallability of delegates who were payed skilled workmen's wages that it "ceased to be a state in the true sense of the term".To be honest, I think that he was largely ambiguous here, what with also referring to it as the dictatorship of the proletariat, etc. Marx himself was fairly clear that the Commune was the "political rule of the producer," and had not eliminated class distinctions as yet, but was rather to serve as a 'lever' towards this. It still involved the proletariat asserting its particular interest as the general interest, rather than ceasing to exist as such.

"The theory of the Communism may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property"Given your interpretation of this not as class property, but rather individual property, capitalism would have already achieved this end given what Marx identified as, "the abolition of capital as private property within the framework of capitalist production itself." Of course, at the period of writing the above, he had identified 'private property' with capitalist property (in Capital, I believe volume 2, and the notes on Wagner, he mentions state capital and the state as capitalist), thus labeling a form of 'communism' as, "afflicted by private property, i.e., by the estrangement of man"

This is why he could attack a belief in a society in which, "[t]he community is only a community of labour, and equality of wages paid out by communal capital – by the community as the universal capitalist," on the ground that it is, "merely a manifestation of the vileness of private property, which wants to set itself up as the positive community system."

communist always support unionsThis seems rather ignorant historically.

Union try to increase their wagers of their worker to fully value, and communist always support unions, so I think my version is more communist.
At the same time, and quite apart from the general servitude involved in the wages system, the working class ought not to exaggerate to themselves the ultimate working of these everyday struggles. They ought not to forget that they are fighting with effects, but not with the causes of those effects; that they are retarding the downward movement, but not changing its direction; that they are applying palliatives, not curing the malady. They ought, therefore, not to be exclusively absorbed in these unavoidable guerilla fights incessantly springing up from the never ceasing encroachments of capital or changes of the market. They ought to understand that, with all the miseries it imposes upon them, the present system simultaneously engenders the material conditions and the social forms necessary for an economical reconstruction of society. Instead of the conservative motto: “A fair day's wage for a fair day's work!” they ought to inscribe on their banner the revolutionary watchword: “Abolition of the wages system!"-VPP

More than this, there are plenty of symptoms that the working class of this country is awakening to the consciousness that it has for some time been moving in the wrong groove [6] (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1881/05/28.htm#n6); that the present movements for higher wages and shorter hours exclusively, keep it in a vicious circle out of which there is no issue; that it is not the lowness of wages which forms the fundamental evil, but the wages system itself. This knowledge once generally spread amongst the working class, the position of Trades Unions must change considerably. They will no longer enjoy the privilege of being the only organisations of the working class. At the side of, or above, the Unions of special trades there must spring up a general Union, a political organisation of the working class as a whole.

Thus there are two points which the organised Trades would do well to consider, firstly, that the time is rapidly approaching when the working class of this country will claim, with a voice not to be mistaken, its full share of representation in Parliament. Secondly, that the time also is rapidly approaching when the working class will have understood that the struggle for high wages and short hours, and the whole action of Trades Unions as now carried on, is not an end in itself, but a means, a very necessary and effective means' but only one of several means towards a higher end: the abolition of the wages system altogether.

For the full representation of labour in Parliament, as well as for the preparation of the abolition of the wages system organisations will become necessary, not of separate Trades, but of the working class as a body. And the sooner this is done the better. There is no power in the world which could for a day resist the British working class organised as a body.-Engels, 'The Wages System'.

Zanthorus

9th June 2010, 16:45

Source?

Come to think of it, I've seen that bandied around a lot, but I've never seen it in any of Marx's works. Methinks we have another Marx myth on our hands..

EDIT:

To be honest, I think that he was largely ambiguous here, what with also referring to it as the dictatorship of the proletariat, etc. Marx himself was fairly clear that the Commune was the "political rule of the producer," and had not eliminated class distinctions as yet, but was rather to serve as a 'lever' towards this. It still involved the proletariat asserting its particular interest as the general interest, rather than ceasing to exist as such.

I believe he only referred to it as the dictatorship of the proletariat in the 1891 preface when he was battling the various reformist elements within the SPD who denounced the phrase when Engels forced the publication of Marx's Critique of the Gotha Program (Hence the "as of late, the social-democratic philistine has been terrified by the words 'dictatorship of the proletariat'"). You're right that the Paris Commune wasn't stateless. I just thought the quote helps to get the point across.

Comrade_Stalin

11th June 2010, 02:00

Wikipedia is essentially correct on this point (Apart from representative democracy is not really democracy unless things like right of recall are included). However, I think what robbo203 and Blake's Baby were saying when they were talking about the abolition of "government" (And they can jump in and correct me here if I'm wrong) is actually the abolition of the "state", that is, the public power divorced from the control of society. As Engels put it in his discussion of the Iroqouis Gens in The Origins of the Family, Private Property and the State:

When the mode of public administration is divorced from the body of the people then it becomes merely an instrument for the ruling classes to enforce their rule. On the other hand, when the "state" is replaced by forms of popular self-governance it becomes the mode of emancipation of the proletariat and eventually ceases to be a "state" as such once the proletarian dictature has ceased and the bourgeoisie has been expropriated. This conception of the state as a body seperate from the direct control of the populus is why Engels could say of the Paris Commune with it's instant recallability of delegates who were payed skilled workmen's wages that it "ceased to be a state in the true sense of the term".
.

They made no effort to tell me that they where anti-state, just anti-government, and anti-money. If they were just anti-state I would agree with them as the state degrades the government from working most of the time, no less for the people that it is there to represent.

Hmmm, out with the bad but keep the good aspects of capitalism while failing to realise that the bad comes along with the good and that capitalism must be overthrown in it's totality. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that a Stalinist like yourself would be repeating the arguments of Proudhon.

10 point program of Communism
Abolition of property in land (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_tenure) and application of all rents (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renting) of land to public purposes.
A heavy progressive (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_tax) or graduated income tax.
Abolition of all right of inheritance (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inheritance).
Confiscation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confiscation) of the property of all emigrants (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emigration) and rebels (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rebellion).
Centralisation of credit (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_(finance)) in the hands of the State (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_state), by means of a national bank (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_bank) with State capital (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_(economics)) and an exclusive monopoly (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly).
Centralisation of the means of communication (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communication) and transport (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transport) in the hands of the State.
Extension of factories (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Factory) and instruments of production (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Means_of_production) owned by the State; the bringing into cultivation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tillage) of waste-lands (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wasteland), and the improvement of the soil (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soil) generally in accordance with a common plan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agricultural_science).
Equal liability (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_liability) of all to labour. Establishment of industrial armies (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Army), especially for agriculture (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture).
Combination of agriculture with manufacturing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing) industries (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industry); gradual abolition of the distinction between town (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Town) and country (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Country), by a more equitable distribution of the population (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_density) over the country.
Free education (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_education) for all children in public schools (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_schools). Abolition of children's factory labour (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Factory_labour&action=edit&redlink=1) in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production.[8] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Communist_Manifesto#cite_note-7)
If you have a problem with taking things from capitalism then you have a problem with point 6 on the Communist Manifesto as it has banks, which are clearly a capitalist ideal. THis is the reason taht I think the Communist Manifesto is out of data as there are capitalist ideals in it.

All I point out is that government and money has changed forms over the past 245,000 years and that communism (real democracy) is a form of government. You will have money under communism just like you had it before under all the other systems. You had goverment and mony under fuedalism, just because some one defends the ideal of the two under a fuedal govermetn does not mena that they are pro-capitalsit. I think it use will change instead of they of medium for exchange.

Paul Cockshott

11th June 2010, 11:11

You will have money under communism just like you had it before under all the other systems. You had goverment and mony under fuedalism, just because some one defends the ideal of the two under a fuedal govermetn does not mena that they are pro-capitalsit. I think it use will change instead of they of medium for exchange.

There is a difference between these immediate measures advocated in 1848, and which were later described as somewhat outdated but not wrong, and what Marx was saying in his Critique of the Gotha Programme. There he is definitely advocating the abolition of money and its replacement by labour accounts in the very first state of communism.

Zanthorus

11th June 2010, 12:22

If you have a problem with taking things from capitalism then you have a problem with point 6 on the Communist Manifesto as it has banks, which are clearly a capitalist ideal.

Yeah, but the points in the Manifesto were created for a specific historical reason. At the time Marx & Engels believed that capitalism was on the brink of collapse and that the coming bourgeois revolution in Germany would lead almost immediately to the formation of a "revolutionary workers government" of armed workers in local executive committees, workers councils etc alongside the bourgeois state. The "ten points" are more radical versions of the demands that the petty-bourgeois democrats were making at the time and were designed so that although they were technically feasible they would cause instability within capitalist relations of production and force the workers to make further and further attacks on private property in order to defend their gains. Eventually Marx and Engels realised how wrong they'd been about the level of development that capitalism had acquired in 1848 and Engels repudiated most of the demands as outdated.

All I point out is that government and money has changed forms over the past 245,000 years and that communism (real democracy) is a form of government. You will have money under communism just like you had it before under all the other systems. You had goverment and mony under fuedalism, just because some one defends the ideal of the two under a fuedal govermetn does not mena that they are pro-capitalsit. I think it use will change instead of they of medium for exchange.

What Paul said. The labour accounts system Marx advocated has none of the features that make money stand out under capitalism (They can't be accumulated and turned into capital is the biggest point).

Blake's Baby

18th June 2010, 17:25

...
All I point out is that government and money has changed forms over the past 245,000 years and that communism (real democracy) is a form of government. You will have money under communism just like you had it before under all the other systems...

But this just isn't true.

'Money' was only invented in 500BC. We've had it for 2,500 years out of 250,000 - ie 1% of the time modern humans have existed, or 0.1% of the time 'human-like behaviour' (technological production) has been around, 2.6 million years. And then only in some places. So it's not even the only way of organising trade (which we seem to have had for maybe a few thousand years before the invention of money).

Money is a total irrelevence. Its only purpose is to facilitate 'trade' (which there won't be in a planned economy) and its major drawback is that it can be accumulated privately. 'Communist money' is total nonsense.

robbo203

18th June 2010, 22:37

Just noticed Comrade Stalins diatribe. (Post 198),. To call it entertaining would be an understatement. It hardly needs to be dignified with a response, so piss poor are the arguments presented.

However I do want to reinforce the point that Blakes Baby is making. Marx and Engels clearly did not envisage any role for money in communism whatsoever. In Capital there are explicit reference to the abolition of money-capital in communism and in the Communist Manifesto, to the "communistic abolition of buying and selling". In advocating a labour voucher scheme Marx was concerned enough to point out that labour vouchers do not constitute money since they did not circulate. There are a number of other references to the abolition of money in communism scattered throughout their writings and anyone who can serriuously suggest that they envisaged a role for money in communism or socialism - they used these terms interchangeably - evidently does not know much about marxism.

Ditto the state. Engels wrote that the "proletariat seizes political power and turns the means of production into State property. But, in doing this, it abolishes itself as proletariat, abolishes all class distinction and class antagonisms, abolishes also the State as State." (Socialism Utopian and Scientific) Here again there is no role for a state in communism.

One final thing. Comrade Stalin talks of the "ten point programme of communism" in the Communist Manifesto. Absolute rubbish. Nowhere did Marx and Engels suggest this was communism. Rather it related to the transition to communism. In fact years later, in the 1972 preface to the Communist Manifesto, they more or less dismissed these state capitalist reforms, pointing out that no special attention needed to paid to them because to a great extent they had become "obsolete"

Only blinkered dogmatists cling to this reformist programme as if was the last word in revolutionary marxism!

Wolf Larson

24th June 2010, 19:20

Marx's Revenge was a good read. The author basically said the obvious. Capitalism has yet to run it's full course, it has yet to plateau. Any nation/area cannot become a true socialist nation until it has been through the advanced stages of capitalism. The US/globe still hasn't exhausted the capitalist system but when growth is no longer possible the system will begin to collapse. The capitalist class will endure and maintain control even through the decline of capitalism but an educated and angry mass movement/revolution will put an end to that.

The Russian revolution was premature. I guess that's my point.

"No social order ever disappears before all the productive forces for which there is room in it have been developed; and new higher relations of production never appear before the material conditions of their existence have matured in the womb of the old society itself. Therefore, mankind only sets itself such tasks as it can solve" - Marx-

Zanthorus

24th June 2010, 19:35

Capitalism has yet to run it's full course, it has yet to plateau.

I beg to differ. The world-market created by Imperialism imposed some form of capitalism on the majority of the world by 1914 and the move from the formal to the real subsumption of labour under Capital in the majority of the world was completed sometime in the 70's (Hence the rise of Neo-liberalism and the crisis of social-democracy). The fact that the productive forces continue to develop means very little. As long as humans exist within the system they will continue to innovate the productive forces. The signal that Marx told us to look for was the fact that the social relations of production increasingly begin to clash with that development.

Wolf Larson

24th June 2010, 19:54

I beg to differ. The world-market created by Imperialism imposed some form of capitalism on the majority of the world by 1914 and the move from the formal to the real subsumption of labour under Capital in the majority of the world was completed sometime in the 70's (Hence the rise of Neo-liberalism and the crisis of social-democracy). The fact that the productive forces continue to develop means very little. As long as humans exist within the system they will continue to innovate the productive forces. The signal that Marx told us to look for was the fact that the social relations of production increasingly begin to clash with that development.

I'm all for ending capitalism as soon as possible. I don't really want to believe we have another 100 years of this......I'm afraid it may be so. Only when the system can no longer expand and thus living conditions worsen will we see any substantive revolutionary movement in the west.

If only Marx were alive :) we could ask him what he meant to say before the dozens of revisions by various people. He was no fan of capitalism obviously but in order for the seed to grow into the plant and the plant to flower all stages must be completed. Cant go from the seed to flower right off. Thats what Russia tried to do.

Blake's Baby

24th June 2010, 21:46

No, that's not 'what Russia tried to do'. The October Revolution was premised on the conditions being ripe for the world revolution. That's the whole point. By the early 20th century capiatlsim had completed the world market; that's why World War One was fought, because the latecomers to the table (Germany in particular) didn't have much of a colonial empire and needed more colonies. The competition between the imperialist powers was precisely because the world market was already established and the fight was about how big a slice each country got.

This is why the Communist International declared that the world was entiring the epoch of 'war and revolution' - imperialist war, socialist revolution. Lenin thought that within a very short time - months or a few years - everywhere would be in the grip of revolution. Russia was never expected to 'make it alone' and it didn't have to, German and British industrialism was expected to make up for any 'local' (Russian) shortfall. Brest-Litovsk was negotiated and the western territories given up in the expectation that in 6 months the German revolution would have sept away the Kaiser anyway. Russia never 'needed to industrialise' because, firstly, Germany and Britain were already industrialised, and secondly, because Russia was the 5th biggest economy with 50 years of industrial development in 1914 anyway.

It was only after the failure of the world revolution, progressively from 1923-27, that Stalin invented 'socialism in one country' as an attempt to justify the position of the Soviet Union.

Wolf Larson

24th June 2010, 22:19

Key words, Lenin thought. We're talking about Marx here. And.....what happened in the end? Why isnt the world communist? Perhaps because capitalism has yet to run it's course. It's our job to speed that up (if we can?) and be there to overthrow it at it weakest point. Shit....look around, we're dropping the ball during one of the worst crisis in decades. I'd say another 30 years and capitalism may be declining for good. The US still has a 3% expansion rate and China is at 10% or there about. It's surviving off of cheap third world labor and easy credit in the west. Best way to speed up the demise is to take away the ability to grossly exploit the third and second world or destroy the credit system somehow. Hell, China has a big hand in it as well seeing they don't let workers unionize, how communist of them.

And don't let my "negative rep" fool ya. That was done by the technocracy moderators on here. :) lol

Paul Cockshott

24th June 2010, 23:29

N The October Revolution was premised on the conditions being ripe for the world revolution. That's the whole point.

That is a remarkable and idealist turn of phrase.

An argument can have premises, but a material process has causes not premises.

By the early 20th century capiatlsim had completed the world market;

I would say that it is far from complete now. It can hardly be said to be complete until the greatest part of labour is offered for sale on the
market as wage labour. So long as billions of peasant farmers exist
that process is not complete.

Blake's Baby

25th June 2010, 11:34

That is a remarkable and idealist turn of phrase.

An argument can have premises, but a material process has causes not premises...

An action is decided upon because of a thought process. Lenin's analysis of the possibility of world revolution was the premise on which he based his argument that Russia was ripe for revolution. This argument, having been accepted, was then put into action and became a process.

I would say that it is far from complete now. It can hardly be said to be complete until the greatest part of labour is offered for sale on the
market as wage labour. So long as billions of peasant farmers exist
that process is not complete.

I'm not sure whether you mean that the October Revolution was a mistake because Lenin was 120 or 200 or 250 years too early due to the continued existence of a large peasantry in the world, or, conversely, it wasn't a mistake, but I shouldn't have used the word 'completed'. It's a bit confusing if one doesn't know if you're rejecting pretty much the entire history of the revolutionary working class over 100 years, or objecting to a single word.

What do I mean by 'completed'? Certainly not completed penetration in depth, but certainly completed extension. It had finished 'growing sideways' - there was no-where else left on earth that hadn't been at least roughly absorbed into the trading empires of the main capitalist states. The only way for capitalism to 'extend its markets' in this case is, as Rosa argues, to more effectively exploit its existing markets.

I don't know if you'd have preferred me to have said something like 'all of the territories of the world had become part of some imperialist bloc or other though there was undoubtedly more room for deepening capitalist penetration'. If so, then I cheerfully accept that 'completed' might not have been the mot juste. But, as I say, I meant 'completed in extension', not in depth.

Or, alternatively; I think Lenin, the Bolsheviks, the Military Revolutionary Committee, the Petrograd Soviet and the Russian working class were absolutely right to launch the October Revolution, even if there were peasants left in the world.

On to other matters...

Wolf Larson; any parts of the above that apply to you are also equally applicable. I don't reject the last 100 years of the revolutionary movement, because no matter what the state of development of capitalism in Russia, the world revolution is what determines success or failure. Marx's schema of stages applies on a world scale not a national scale. This is the contexy of the letter to Vera Zasulich saying that it may be possible in Russia to move from the peasant commune to communism without a capitalist stage of developemnt - in the context of world revolution and German industrialisation, there was even in 1881 no need for Russia to industrialise too. Capitalism in 1914 was developed enough for world revolution to take over world capitalism and administer its productive capacity for the good of humanity. The Russian Revolution wasn't too early, the World Revolution was (is) too late.

Paul Cockshott

28th June 2010, 12:02

An action is decided upon because of a thought process. Lenin's analysis of the possibility of world revolution was the premise on which he based his argument that Russia was ripe for revolution. This argument, having been accepted, was then put into action and became a process.

A revolution is not an action that arises from one person's thought process, it is a material development on a vast scale that in the process shapes the thoughts of those involved in it, 'leaders' as much as followers.

I'm not sure whether you mean that the October Revolution was a mistake because Lenin was 120 or 200 or 250 years too early due to the continued existence of a large peasantry in the world, or, conversely, it wasn't a mistake, but I shouldn't have used the word 'completed'. It's a bit confusing if one doesn't know if you're rejecting pretty much the entire history of the revolutionary working class over 100 years, or objecting to a single word.

What do I mean by 'completed'? Certainly not completed penetration in depth, but certainly completed extension. It had finished 'growing sideways' - there was no-where else left on earth that hadn't been at least roughly absorbed into the trading empires of the main capitalist states. The only way for capitalism to 'extend its markets' in this case is, as Rosa argues, to more effectively exploit its existing markets.

.

The focus on trade is where I think you are mistaken. The focus should be on relations of production. Capitalism will only be 'completed' once the great bulk of the world population are waged workers.

Zanthorus

28th June 2010, 13:24

Trade is part of the relations of production. It is how isolated production units relate with each other in capitalism and commodity producing societies more generally.

Paul Cockshott

28th June 2010, 22:29

Trade is part of the relations of production. It is how isolated production units relate with each other in capitalism and commodity producing societies more generally.

It is stretching the concept to call it that, and can be misleading. Focusing on trade causes you not to focus on the key issue - the mode of surplus extraction. Trade can occur between dissimilar modes of production so that one can not identify the spread of trade with the spread of a mode of production. The fact that capitalist economies traded world wide by say 1910 did not mean that capitalism existed world wide.

Blake's Baby

29th June 2010, 12:11

A revolution is not an action that arises from one person's thought process, it is a material development on a vast scale that in the process shapes the thoughts of those involved in it, 'leaders' as much as followers...

...
The focus on trade is where I think you are mistaken. The focus should be on relations of production. Capitalism will only be 'completed' once the great bulk of the world population are waged workers.

So what you're saying is, Lenin wasn't wrong because he didn't theorise the Revolution, but the Russian working class was wrong because there are peasants even now, and Lenin and Trotsky were only wrong after that when they said at the foundation of the Communist International that capitalism had completed its historic tasks and entered the epoch of wars and revolutions.

Obviously, I pretty much reject all of that. Capitalism completed the world market before 1914. To deny that is to deny the historical validity of the proletarian revolution, and the revolutionary movement it created.

Wolf Larson

29th June 2010, 21:51

On to other matters...

Wolf Larson; any parts of the above that apply to you are also equally applicable. I don't reject the last 100 years of the revolutionary movement, because no matter what the state of development of capitalism in Russia, the world revolution is what determines success or failure. Marx's schema of stages applies on a world scale not a national scale. This is the contexy of the letter to Vera Zasulich saying that it may be possible in Russia to move from the peasant commune to communism without a capitalist stage of developemnt - in the context of world revolution and German industrialisation, there was even in 1881 no need for Russia to industrialise too. Capitalism in 1914 was developed enough for world revolution to take over world capitalism and administer its productive capacity for the good of humanity. The Russian Revolution wasn't too early, the World Revolution was (is) too late.

Marx didn't say revolution was possible when capitalism went global it was when capitalism could no longer expand. Lenin and many others revised much of Marx's works.

Some people think Moores Law will trigger it - once capitalism becomes stagnant we will indeed see a revolution:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%27s_law

Blake's Baby

30th June 2010, 22:08

But the point, and I think what I'm trying to get at with Paul Cockshott too, is what does 'expand' actually signify in this context? Everywhere pretty much was carved up at the end of the 19th century; there was nowhere for capitalism to 'expand'. Hence the generalised imperialist war of 1914, hence the declaration by the CI of 'the era of wars and revolutions', hence masterly works on imperialism by Bukharin, Rosa and Lenin.

It seems to me that claiming that capitalism still had room for real expansion (rather than more thorough penetration) means that the CI was wrong and the Russian revolution was a mistake. History had been short-circuited somehow and the Russian proletariat had foolishly overleaped itself. There was no place for a proletarian revolution while capitalism still had work to do. It should have waited until the bourgeoisie had accomplished the historic role of developing the means of production in Russia (and elsewhere) and intensifying capitalisation. So the Russian revolution was a mistake.

On the other hand, if you're arguing that it's the increased penetration of capitalism into all aspects of life (commodification of leisure etc) that is the motor for capitalist 'expansion' (in other words, what you call 'expansion' I call 'penetration') then this process can go on indefinitely. If we have to wait for capitalism to exhaust the potential to commodify our existence before a revolution, we could wait for ever.

I don't see why Moore's Law is at all significant. The development of capitalism hardly relied on the microchip, I don't think it will 'stagnate' after 2020 because of technological obsolecence.

I'm rather of the opinion that the 'objective' conditions (ie, the state of capitalism) have been such that revolution has been not only possible but necessary for a century.

The failure of the revolution then rests with the 'subjective' conditions - primarily, the abject failure of the organisations that were supposed to serve the working class; and, as a result of this, the working class's own retreat from revolutionary consciousness.

Paul Cockshott

30th June 2010, 22:25

So what you're saying is, Lenin wasn't wrong because he didn't theorise the Revolution,

I dont recall saying that, nor do I understand how you interpret me to be saying that.

but the Russian working class was wrong because there are peasants even now,

It is inappropriate to apply the word wrong to a social class, it has no clear meaning.

and Lenin and Trotsky were only wrong after that when they said at the foundation of the Communist International that capitalism had completed its historic tasks and entered the epoch of wars and revolutions.

To talk of capitalism having tasks is to slip from materialism into teleology. In Trotsky, and to a lesser extent Lenin, there is a coquetting with this teleological language. If Lenin talked about capitalism having exhausted its ability to develop the economy, and I am not sure that he said this, then with hindsight we can see that he was wrong. To the extent that he and the commintern based their strategy on wars leading to revolution, they were basically correct up to 1945. Stalin clung to this view right up to 1952 by which point it had definitely become outdated.

Obviously, I pretty much reject all of that. Capitalism completed the world market before 1914. To deny that is to deny the historical validity of the proletarian revolution, and the revolutionary movement it created.

There seems again to be philosophical confusion in your use of language. What is 'historical validity'. It only makes sense as an assesment of the truth of some account of things that happened in the past. If a revisionist claims that there were no gas chambers at Auschwitz then that claim has no historical validity. But in what sense can a proletarian revolution have validity?
One can ask whether the statement that there was a revolution in Russia in 1917 is valid, but one can not ask whether the historical event itself was valid.

Blake's Baby

30th June 2010, 22:28

Do things happen for a reason, or is history just a big mess of stuff?

Zanthorus

30th June 2010, 22:49

To talk of capitalism having tasks is to slip from materialism into teleology.

No, it is to take up a definite standpoint from which to judge instead of pretending to be able to put yourself magically outside of the motor forces of history and observe everything neturally from on high (The latter being completely unmaterialist).

Paul Cockshott

30th June 2010, 22:57

Do things happen for a reason, or is history just a big mess of stuff?
Things have causes and actions have consequences, but there are no reasons. The search for reasons is a hangover from christian religious ideology, and has no place in an atheistic materialist approach to reality.

Darwin, by the way, whom I'm reading just now, is absolutely splendid. There was one aspect of teleology that had yet to be demolished, and that has now been done. Never before has so grandiose an attempt been made to demonstrate historical evolution in Nature, and certainly never to such good effect. One does, of course, have to put up with the crude English method.(Engels to Marx, Dec 1859)

Darwin’s work is most important and suits my purpose in that it provides a basis in natural science for the historical class struggle. One does, of course, have to put up with the clumsy English style of argument. Despite all shortcomings, it is here that, for the first time, ‘teleology’ in natural science is not only dealt a mortal blow but its rational meaning is empirically explained.(Marx to Lassalle 1861)

Paul Cockshott

30th June 2010, 23:05

No, it is to take up a definite standpoint from which to judge instead of pretending to be able to put yourself magically outside of the motor forces of history and observe everything neturally from on high (The latter being completely unmaterialist).

I beg to differ. To talk of modes of production having tasks is teleology in the strict sense of there being a state in the future that causes an event in the past. As such it a direct adaption of Aristotles idea of final cause, a causal model which was later incorporated into catholic theology.

Zanthorus

30th June 2010, 23:17

I beg to differ. To talk of modes of production having tasks is teleology in the strict sense of there being a state in the future that causes an event in the past. As such it a direct adaption of Aristotles idea of final cause, a causal model which was later incorporated into catholic theology.

Well maybe "tasks" is the wrong word but what Blake's Baby was trying to get at I think was that there are certain things that capitalism does that are favourable from a certain point of view (That is "the standpoint of... human society or social humanity" - Marx, Theses on Feuerbach), but that once it has completed these it has run it's course both objectively (Capitalist relations of production become a fetter on the productive forces) and subjectively (There is no reason to continue making demands of the old society because it has already laid the basis for the new).

Wolf Larson

1st July 2010, 00:25

But the point, and I think what I'm trying to get at with Paul Cockshott too, is what does 'expand' actually signify in this context?
falling rate of profit (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falling_rate_of_profit) and hence living standards of the workers. Once this happens a revolution will be possible (when the market can no longer expand). Not until the first world becomes second can the capitalist class be overthrown. You cannot overthrow a thing most people in the west support (even if we could it would = cold war/mutual destruction). Capitalism was not done expanding in Lenins time and it may not be done for another 50 years? It will take a sharp decline (end of expansion)....capitalism must remain fluid/ever expanding....like a great white shark must swim to breath. Not until the shark stops swimming will it be ready to die ;) when the capitalist system does halt capitalists will still have the ability to maintain power- this is why a class conscious population is necessary in order to facilitate a socialist revolution or else fascism will probably prevail and human progress will be halted. People had been saying (in Lenin's time) that capitalism was just about ready to peak. That it would no longer "support further progress" and was ready to be overthrown. Marx didn't see capitalism as a entirely negative thing- he saw it as a necessary step in human social evolution. A step up from feudalism/manorialism/ mercantilism but not the end of human progress.

But anyway, that (classical falling rate of profit) is just one way for the system to become stagnant-computer chip technology is the thing which keeps the market expanding now...this wasn't around in Marx's time. This is why things like Moores law are important. Or it could be a crisis of overproduction which sparks a revolution.....who knows how it will happen- the point is it (revolution) will happen at capitalism's weakest point (which wasn't in Lenin's lifetime) but only if the working class is ready-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%27s_law

Why would I bring up Moores Law? Computer chips are the foundation of our modern capitalist economy. They must keep coming out with smaller and smaller chips every 15 months or so to keep the market going- at a certain point, unless they come up with nanotechnology, the market will cease to expand because of the inability to make computer chips small enough. This may be one avenue or road to revolution. Who knows? Again the point is it isn't going to happen until capitalism is at it's weakest point, this is where Lenin jumped the gun and this is how Marx's works were 'revised' (perverted) to fit an overzealous following. I wonder why Marx said he wasn't a Marxist?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxAB7iBz8JU

EDIT: also, read no 9 below on the list (half way down the wiki page), I can quote marx himself explaining this:

"No social order ever disappears before all the productive forces for which there is room in it have been developed; and new higher relations of production never appear before the material conditions of their existence have matured in the womb of the old society itself. Therefore, mankind only sets itself such tasks as it can solve" Marx

Social progress is driven by progress in the material, productive forces a society has at its disposal (technology (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technology), labour (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labour_%28economics%29), capital goods (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_goods), etc.)
Humans are inevitably involved in production relations (roughly speaking, economic relationships or institutions (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institution)), which constitute our most decisive social relations (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_relations).
Production relations progress, with a degree of inevitability, following and corresponding to the development of the productive forces (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Productive_forces).
Relations of production (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relations_of_production) help determine the degree and types of the development of the forces of production. For example, capitalism tends to increase the rate at which the forces develop and stresses the accumulation of capital (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_accumulation).
Both productive forces (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Productive_forces) and production relations progress independently of mankind's strategic intentions or will.
The superstructure (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base_and_superstructure_%28Marxism%29) -- the cultural and institutional features of a society, its ideological materials—is ultimately an expression of the mode of production (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mode_of_production) (which combines both the forces and relations of production (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relations_of_production)) on which the society is founded.
Every type of state (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_state) is a powerful institution (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institution) of the ruling class; the state is an instrument which one class uses to secure its rule and enforce its preferred production relations (and its exploitation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploitation)) onto society.
State power is usually only transferred from one class to another by social and political upheaval.
When a given style of production relations no longer supports further progress in the productive forces, either further progress is strangled, or 'revolution' must occur.
The actual historical process is not predetermined but depends on the class struggle, especially the organization and consciousness of the working class (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_class).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_materialism

sanpal

6th July 2010, 22:08

Revolutionary leftists have differing views on the nature of the "actually existing socialist" states of the former Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, China, Vietnam, Cuba, etc.

.....................

If the FSU was SC, when and how did this happen?

Prehistory of state capitalism is such: Lenin and Bukharin argued on this theme in the beginning of the last century. Bukharin's position was that, that at the dictatorship of the proletariat essentially there can not be no state capitalism, Lenin considered that Marx & Engels have told nothing about state capitalism in general, but thus Lenin considered, that the state capitalism is necessary for Russia to overcome its petty-bourgeois character. Anybody from them has not won this dispute (see. " Bukharin. The political biography ", 1888 - 1938).

NEP in Russia actually was state capitalism at DotP. On state enterprises the goods for next selling for cash were made, wage labour was used, and a wage system existed, the convertible currency (a golden tchervonets) was used, i.e. there were all attributes of state capitalism.

But this state capitalism existed only until Stalin "has closed" NEP, submitting to requirements of those bolsheviks (as a matter of fact the left communists) who during civil war battled against bourgeoisie, and now (in period of NEP) the bourgeoisie was gathering force once again. It was the situation as in modern China. The Communist Party was ruling, Stalin was the general secretary, they should search for the decision. And Stalin has found an "exit", having organized instead of state capitalism the economy a la Duhring. But such economy meant in practice both absence of high-grade state capitalism, and absence of high-grade communism though there was a mixture both one and another in one something that looked as economic "germofrodit" and that Engels has earlier characterized as utopia of Duhring.

From here the conclusion follows: the state capitalism in the USSR was only at period of NEP.

The conclusion. The left communists guess state capitalism an unnecessary deviation. Actually, if to follow Marx in " Criticism of the Gotha program ", the high-grade state capitalism would be objectively necessary. If someone asks, why? The answer would be such: Marx speaks about transformation of capitalism into communism. At dictatorship of the bourgeoisie it is practically impossible. And at dictatorship of the proletariat it is unique, as it by force of authority of the proletariat, will create all necessary conditions for transformation of state capitalism into communism.

The scheme of such transformation is submitted in my chart http://www.revleft.com/vb/album.php?albumid=526&pictureid=4503 (unfortunately the text in this chart is too smal and unvisible and i don't know what to undertake)

Paulappaul

8th July 2010, 03:00

I'll mess with the "Soviet Union wasn't State Capitalist" later first,

Actually, if to follow Marx in " Criticism of the Gotha program ", the high-grade state capitalism would be objectively necessary. If someone asks, why? The answer would be such: Marx speaks about transformation of capitalism into communism. At dictatorship of the bourgeoisie it is practically impossible.

Hence why there is a "Lower phase of Communism" and a "Higher Phase of Communism". The lower phased is described by Marx in Gotha Program as "the cooperative society based on common ownership of the means of production" and continues in the following paragraph by laying out the Foundations of Labor certificates as opposed to money.

He then goes on to explain the conditions of the Higher Phase, which is achieved through the Lower Phase following a Social Revolution at which point the last vestige of Capitalism is destroyed and the foundation of Communism as been successfully built.

That's what Gotha Program says. How you derived a theory State Capitalism - Communism from that I don't know.

And at dictatorship of the proletariat it is unique, as it by force of authority of the proletariat, will create all necessary conditions for transformation of state capitalism into communism.
Socialism will be a state of devastation during a World Wide Revolution, during which the Workers' Government must first, establish voluntary Full Employment with which to build up all destroyed and advance current Means of Production and infrastructure. Second it will solidify the Socialist Commonwealth in the form of an Industrial Union or Nation wide Workers' Council. Third it will collaborate with other countries facing their own revolution and build armies of solidarity. Socialism will be naturally international and would only come into flourishing when most the world has achieved it's revolution.

These conditions will create a Social Revolution during which Full Employment and reasonable distribution and regulation on behave of a Workers' Council will result a Superabundance of Goods, i.e. more goods then possibly consumable thus creating a Stateless society as the Regulation of material goods is no longer needed and thus any form of administration is rendered useless.

This is basic Marxism and it's stated quite clearly in Gotha Program. Your theory of State Capitalism provides some of the above mentioned but fails to be Marxist at all. While State Capitalism provides Full Employment, it cannot implement a Social and Cultural Revolution lead by the Workers' Councils, during which physical and psychological re adaption of sharing resources in according of "from each according to his ability..." begins.

Furthermore it fails to be proletarian. Public Property the aspired form of property by State Capitalists does not entitle Workers' Control over their respective means of production, it sells them out to an all power full Capitalist, the state. Marx and Engels denounced such Socialists which aspired Proletarian Power through the state, which was the whole point of Gotha Program. Marx and Engels were inherently anti-statist and yet you've built a whole theory on how they were.

But this state capitalism existed only until Stalin "has closed" NEP, submitting to requirements of those bolsheviks (as a matter of fact the left communists) who during civil war battled against bourgeoisie, and now (in period of NEP) the bourgeoisie was gathering force once again. It was the situation as in modern China. The Communist Party was ruling, Stalin was the general secretary, they should search for the decision. And Stalin has found an "exit", having organized instead of state capitalism the economy a la Duhring. But such economy meant in practice both absence of high-grade state capitalism, and absence of high-grade communism though there was a mixture both one and another in one something that looked as economic "germofrodit" and that Engels has earlier characterized as utopia of Duhring

From here the conclusion follows: the state capitalism in the USSR was only at period of NEP.

The above conclusions show how the USSR was not Marxist. Communism is a product of Marxism. Communism is characterized by the "withering away" of the State and the Superabundance of Goods. The USSR was not Communist or Marxist.

Was it Socialist? Not in the Marxist, Libertarian or Anarchist sense of the word. The USSR related alot to the theories of the Fabians and other Continental State Socialists, so I would Maintain it was Socialist in ideology. It strove for world wide Communism and created some progressive actions which improved the State of the Russian Proletarit, but in the end, it failed to be anything short a Workers' Government, Particularly under Stalin.

So yes I kinda of agree with on this point. The USSR was at one point State Capitalist, however during the Stalin period and later years it was State Socialist, which we've seen to be just as exploitative as Capitalism and thus must be cased down as unproletarian at every instance.

Hyacinth

8th July 2010, 06:45

[I]t a direct adaption of Aristotles idea of final cause, a causal model which was later incorporated into catholic theology.
To be fair to Aristotle, his conception of final cause (telos) was considerably more sophisticated than the caricatured way in which it often employed by metaphysicians. Aristotle's term for cause 'aition' is perhaps for contemporary readers better translated as 'explanation'. There's a tendency for modern readers, who associate causation with what Aristotle would have dubbed 'efficient causation' to subsume all modes of explanation under efficient causation, which is where the weird view that teleology requires backwards causation. If we regard instead, as Aristotle did, that the telos of a thing is merely its purpose, end, aim, or goal then teleological explanations are demystified and perfectly easy to understand.

Not that this is necessarily material to the point you were making, I just thought it useful to clarify this point.

Soviet dude

15th July 2010, 19:38

One of the more striking things about this nonsensical idea is how it can actually explain anything about the decisions taken by the "state capitalist" bureaucracy. In capitalism, it is the very logic of capital that compels the capitalist class to do what they do. They are not just inherently evil people who got ahold of some money and started exploiting everyone, while laughing it up with their other billionaire capitalist buddies.

For instance, say you inherit a huge business. You try to do the right thing, pay workers well, give them benefits, etc. Your profit margin starts to shrink, you have less money to invest than your competitors, they expand and you don't, and the business you inherited stagnates and eventually dies to the competition. The very fact that you tried to go against the logic of the system is what got you kicked out of the capitalist club. It had nothing to do with your personality.

But a "State Capitalist" bureaucrat doesn't have any compulsion to behave a certain way. If you're a low level bureaucrat, you might have a production quota you have to meet, otherwise you'll be replaced, but this is hardly the same as the logic of capital. If you're the highest "State Capitalist" bureaucrat, setting the production quotas for everyone else, the problem is even more complex. It doesn't appear you have any possible compelling logic to do any particular production goals, except for maybe to make sure people are happy, least they overthrow you.

How does this resemble capitalism in any fashion?

Zanthorus

15th July 2010, 19:57

How does this resemble capitalism in any fashion?

Because the conditions of production still confront the producers instead of the producers appropriating them collectively, the workers are still alienated from the material human community.

Which is not to mention the fact that the U"SS"R didn't exist in isolation but was part of the world market and the logic of that market imposed itself on the f"S"U.

Soviet dude

15th July 2010, 20:17

Because the conditions of production still confront the producers instead of the producers appropriating them collectively, the workers are still alienated from the material human community.

How so? Nothing in "state capitalism" logically compels any particular outcome of how production goals are set. It could be there is a committee of workers who set the goals themselves. It could be the workers elect their low-level bureaucrats, who in turn elect higher levels bureaucratic bodies, and they decide the production goals. It could be there is just some alien overlord that does it. The point is the system itself has no compelling logic to act in any particular way with how production goals are set, except for possibly it has to meet the bare minimum for people to stay alive. Capitalism is different, because the capitalist must behave a certain way if he is going to continue being a capitalist. The capitalist must exploit workers as much as possible. There is no systematic reason the "state capitalist" bureaucrat must do this.

Which is not to mention the fact that the U"SS"R didn't exist in isolation but was part of the world market and the logic of that market imposed itself on the f"S"U.

I would not only say this is not the case at all, but that it is trivially easy to imagine a society that exists amongst capitalist nations that doesn't operate by the dictates of capitalism. Indeed, if the nation has everything it needs to sustain itself within its own borders, one could imagine the nation simply does not engage in any international trade whatsoever. The only time market mechanisms would determine anything is at the point of trade: if country A will give me more money or commodities for my widgets than country B, then it will trade with country A for the widgets. It doesn't appear like it would affect the production goals for other goods and services much at all.

RED DAVE

15th July 2010, 20:23

Two crucial points: (A) the USSR and other state cap countries most certainly did participate on the world market; (B) they were in military competition with the Western powers. Both of these made it imperative that they exploit their workers and extract surplus value in order to purchase and sell on the world market and keep up with the US, especially, militarily.

RED DAVE

Communist

15th July 2010, 20:27

.

Merged this thread with the already existing one on the same topic in the same forum.

.

Zanthorus

15th July 2010, 20:33

How so? Nothing in "state capitalism" logically compels any particular outcome of how production goals are set. It could be there is a committee of workers who set the goals themselves. It could be the workers elect their low-level bureaucrats, who in turn elect higher levels bureaucratic bodies, and they decide the production goals.

Except in both those cases the producers would collectively and democratically be appropriating their conditions of production. The point about "state-capitalism" is that this didn't happen in the USSR.

Adil3tr

15th July 2010, 20:37

I'm ISO. I believe it is capitalist because of the wage system, the primitive accumulation of Stalin, the endless reinvestment in heavy industries and military capability, and the relations of the workers to the managers and bureaucrats who are now capitalists in name too.

Soviet dude

15th July 2010, 21:05

Except in both those cases the producers would collectively and democratically be appropriating their conditions of production. The point about "state-capitalism" is that this didn't happen in the USSR.

This is beside the point. A "state capitalist" society is supposed to be essentially a capitalist society of a different type. Yet it doesn't appear to behave in any fashion like a capitalist society. The concept seems to be actually devoid of any meaningful description of how a "state capitalist" society operates at all, whereas we know very well how a capitalist society functions.

Societies are divided into classes, no? In a capitalist society, there are workers and there are capitalists. In a "State Capitalist" society, presumably there are workers and there are "State Capitalist" bureaucrats. In capitalism, there is a direct relationship to the exploitation of workers by the capitalists. Capitalists must do this to continue existing as capitalists. The system compels them to act in certain ways under force of extinction, so even Mr. Nice Capitalist must act just like Mr. Evil Capitalist or else cease to exist.

There doesn't appear to be any such relationship to exploitation or any such compulsion in "State Capitalism." There could conceivably be bad "State Capitalists" (the alien overlord) or good ones (workers committees). The production goals set by good or bad "State Capitalists" doesn't appear to have any compelling reason to do anything. The alien overlord could almost make random product goals and it not mean much to his existence as a "State Capitalist," except possibly get him overthrown if people get too angry.

Soviet dude

15th July 2010, 21:09

A post of mine seems to gone missing because my thread was moved. I spent 20 minutes writing it, and I don't appreciate having my thread moved. There are a lot of issues being discussed in this thread that have nothing at all to do with my point, and I don't expect many people will fill compelled to discuss them on the 12th page of a long, mostly pointless thread like this.

RED DAVE

15th July 2010, 21:13

There doesn't appear to be any such relationship to exploitation or any such compulsion in "State Capitalism."You have missed the essential points:

(1) In state capitalism, the state as a whole is, essentially, one giant corporation with a corporate hierarchy similiar to the corporate hierarchy of a capitalist corporation. Members of the hierarchy prosper as a class as the state prospers.

(2) Surplus value is extracted from the working class, out of their control, for the purpose of building the state and prospering the bureaucracy.

(3) The state capitalist countries participated in the world market and in the world arms race. The increased economic and military pressure on these countries led to the collapse of state capitalism and its replacement with private capitalism.

RED DAVE

Zanthorus

15th July 2010, 21:29

There doesn't appear to be any such relationship to exploitation or any such compulsion in "State Capitalism." There could conceivably be bad "State Capitalists" (the alien overlord) or good ones (workers committees). The production goals set by good or bad "State Capitalists" doesn't appear to have any compelling reason to do anything. The alien overlord could almost make random product goals and it not mean much to his existence as a "State Capitalist," except possibly get him overthrown if people get too angry.

You seem to be conflating "state capitalism" with a planned economy. This is a mistake. A planned economy controlled by workers committees would be socialism. A planned economy controlled by unnacountable beuracrats is state capitalism because the workers don't control production, are alienated from the conditions of production, from the material human community.

Soviet dude

15th July 2010, 22:31

I had wrote a long response to RED DAVE that was eaten by Communist USA merging my thread with this thread that was already a week old and had nothing to do with the point I was trying to make. Rather than re-writing that response, I will just respond to his newest post.

(1) In state capitalism, the state as a whole is, essentially, one giant corporation with a corporate hierarchy similiar to the corporate hierarchy of a capitalist corporation. Members of the hierarchy prosper as a class as the state prospers

A corporation is compelled by the logic of capitalism to behave in a certain way. It doesn't appear there is any such compulsion in this sort of scenario. Even if there are many members of the "State Capitalist" bureaucracy that live a somewhat privileged existence and want to continue it, nothing about the system dictates the level of exploitation. It could be minor to non-existent, as Tony Cliff himself argues, or it could be worse. It is arbitrary (unlike capitalism) and tells us nothing about the nature of the system.

(2) Surplus value is extracted from the working class, out of their control, for the purpose of building the state and prospering the bureaucracy.

Say we assume the existence of the "State Capitalist" bureaucracy who have privilege and want to maintain it. For this they have to use some of the surplus value produced by society toward that end. Again, everything about this is arbitrary and "State Capitalism" describes no compelling mechanism for why anyone does anything. Maybe one day the "State Capitalist" bureaucracy wakes up and they decide to be good bureaucrats and get rid of their privilege while maintaining their position. Nothing in the system compels them to do otherwise, unlike capitalism. If the Western capitalist class suddenly woke up one day and decided to be good bosses while still maintaining their ownership, the logic of the system would eventually do away with them.

What you're describing with "State Capitalism" is not a system that has rules and a logic that can be studied, but essentially fictive society where the "State Capitalists" are just evil rulers in a non-capitalist system, where there is no explanation for why they are "State Capitalists" in the first place, or why they behave like they do. I suppose you could resort to some "human nature" argument, but then your 'analysis' leaves the realm of economics all together and goes into political pop-psychology of the right-libertarian kind.

(3) The state capitalist countries participated in the world market and in the world arms race.

Even being a lone "State Capitalist" country surrounded by capitalist states doesn't compel the "State Capitalist" bureaucrats to do anything. Perhaps the "State Capitalist" country is self-sufficient and simply chooses not to engage in any international trade. There is no necessary compulsion under threat of extinction to do so for the "State Capitalist" bureaucrat. Market mechanisms would only possibly operate at the level of trade. If country A gives more for widgets than country B, then the "State Capitalist" bureaucrat would probably trade with country A. But even this is not necessarily so. Since the "State Capitalist" bureaucrat can act mostly arbitrarily, they could choose to trade with country B for whatever reason. Maybe the "State Capitalist" bureaucrat is the alien overlord, and he likes that country B sacrifices children and wants to be friends with that country, and decides to trade with them instead. There is no compelling logic of "State Capitalism" forcing him not to, unlike in capitalism.

(B) they were in military competition with the Western powers.

The Tony Cliff thesis. I fail to see how Cliff makes the case that a country must act with capitalist dynamics simply because of military competition. But let's make some assumptions:

1. Hostile capitalist countries threaten by force of extinction the position of the "State Capitalist" bureaucrats.

2. There is no solution for the "State Capitalist" bureaucrats but military competition.

Assuming both of these thing (which are generous assumptions), there is still no systematic, compulsive force that makes the "State Capitalist" bureaucrat act in any particular fashion beyond the minimum required to defend their state. If the "State Capitalist" society is significantly better off economically than the hostile Western powers, they may only need to devote a tiny fraction of resources and labor to maintain the system, and the rest could be as arbitrary as desired.

Soviet dude

15th July 2010, 22:45

You seem to be conflating "state capitalism" with a planned economy. This is a mistake. A planned economy controlled by workers committees would be socialism. A planned economy controlled by unnacountable beuracrats is state capitalism because the workers don't control production, are alienated from the conditions of production, from the material human community.

Again, the point is to show that the system described as "State Capitalism" isn't dictated by any compelling force as in capitalism. When people describe a country as "State Capitalism," it appears what they mean is a planned economy where, for whatever reason, real or imagined, they don't like the decision making that takes place. But the concept doesn't actually describe any capitalist economy of a different type.

Rusty Shackleford

16th July 2010, 11:09

if the soviet union had state controlled property and there was a split between the bureaucracy and the proletariat. id say it was a socialist-usufructarian state.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usufruct

Usufruct is the legal right to use and derive profit or benefit from property (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Property) that belongs to another person, as long as the property is not damaged. In many legal usufruct systems of property, such as the traditional ejido (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ejido) system in Mexico, individuals or groups may only acquire the usufruct of the property, not legal land ownership.
Usufruct originates from civil law (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_law_%28legal_system%29), where it is a real right of limited duration on the property of another. The holder of an usufruct, known as the usufructuary, has the right to use and enjoy the property, as well as the right to receive profits from the fruits of the property. The English word usufruct derives from the Latin expression usus et fructus, meaning "use and enjoyment".
basically the state is just a giant collective tool shed made for the whole of society.

just a thought at least.

by the way, before NAFTA, farmland in mexico was held in usufruct and organized in ejidos under article 27 in the mexican constitution which was removed when nafta was implemented. farmland was communal but state owned. a product of the mexican revolution. mexican corn was more expensive, but because of this, many mexicans had a job and a right to work farm land.

RED DAVE

16th July 2010, 14:00

Again, the point is to show that the system described as "State Capitalism" isn't dictated by any compelling force as in capitalism.Crudely, capitalism is an economic system dominated by the capitalist ruling class, which extracts surplus value from the working class and uses it for private profit and constructs a state which regulates the system. The capitalists profit as individuals but rule as a class.

Under state capitalism, the capitalist ruling class rules as a class but does not profit individually. State capitalism is a system that is transitional between feudalism and private capitalism in societies where the bourgeoisie is too weak to accomplish its historic tasks. Once a certain level of accumulation has taken place, state capitalism morphs into private capitalism. Taiwan was basically developed by state capitalism without the trappings or rhetoric of socialism.

When people describe a country as "State Capitalism," it appears what they mean is a planned economy where, for whatever reason, real or imagined, they don't like the decision making that takes place.Funny that you would describe the USSR or China as planned economies without any reference to which class is doing the planning. It is clear that in the USSR and China, the working class was not doing the planning. It was playing the same role as it plays in other capitalist countries: creating surplus value and being exploited.

But the concept doesn't actually describe any capitalist economy of a different type.Ah, but it clearly does.

Question: if China and the USSR were some kind of socialism, why didn't the working class rise up and attempt to defend its very own society as it transformed, bloodlessly, into private capitalism. Compare the way the Russian working class fought to defend the workers state against the Whites and the foreign invaders. And compare the savage battles inside the Russian CP, culminating in the purges. Nothing like that happened in the USSR as state capitalism replaced private capitalism and the workers received a new set of chains.

RED DAVE

Soviet dude

16th July 2010, 19:33

Crudely, capitalism is an economic system dominated by the capitalist ruling class, which extracts surplus value from the working class and uses it for private profit and constructs a state which regulates the system. The capitalists profit as individuals but rule as a class.

What you are missing here is that the very logic of the system compels the capitalist class to act in a certain fashion. This is discussed extensively by Marx. The capitalist class aren't just a bunch of evil people who one day took power away from the feudal lords of old and always had evil descendants, with the occasional new evil person joining their ranks. Capitalism is a system that can be studied even outside of its real-world history because of this. Where is the corollary to "State Capitalism" in this regard? It appears there is none.

Under state capitalism, the capitalist ruling class rules as a class but does not profit individually.

This gets into even more absurdities, like whether or not the spouse and children of a "State Capitalist" are themselves "State Capitalist." The children of the capitalist class are themselves members of the bourgeoisie, even though they have no official relationship to property. But I digress...

State capitalism is a system that is transitional between feudalism and private capitalism in societies where the bourgeoisie is too weak to accomplish its historic tasks.

This is bizarre. Do you have any examples of this happening that aren't when Marxists take state power away from the capitalist class? This seems more like shoe-horning an incredibly wrong theory to fit history.

Once a certain level of accumulation has taken place, state capitalism morphs into private capitalism.

This doesn't seem to help explain anything about the collapse of the USSR and the Eastern Bloc.

Taiwan was basically developed by state capitalism without the trappings or rhetoric of socialism.

This seems to make the "State Capitalist" theory make even less sense. To you, it seems it can describe economies where there is no private ownership of the means of production and no rich people, to one where there is extensive private ownership and many millionaires and billionaires, because there is some degree of state management. It would seem your idea of "State Capitalism" could apply to anything and everything, and hence actually describes nothing.

Funny that you would describe the USSR or China as planned economies without any reference to which class is doing the planning.

In fact, I don't believe I did, because this is supposed to be a thought experiment about what the concept of "State Capitalism" actually describes. It seems the proponents of this theory are unable to actually describe a coherent economic system that resembles anything like capitalism, and instead are describing a planned economy in which decisions are made in a way which is "undemocratic." Or in your case, it seems it can also describe capitalist economies with private ownership and millionaires and billionaires.

It is clear that in the USSR and China, the working class was not doing the planning.

To digress to historical discussion, it is not at all clear this is a case, or whether or not you are importing a certain (and potentially unreasonable) idea of what the working class "doing the planning" entails. In fact, many people, even non-Marxists, have argued otherwise throughout the decades. But this is beside the point, which is whether the concept of "State Capitalism" describes anything meaningful at all.

It was playing the same role as it plays in other capitalist countries: creating surplus value and being exploited.

If you have a strict Marxist understanding of the meaning of exploitation, it is clear people will be "exploited" in socialism and communism as well. In socialism, there will be children, elderly, and disabled who produce little or no surplus value who will be taken care of by the rest of society's labor. There will be all kinds of things built and done using surplus value that doesn't directly impact the lives of the majority of the working class. Maybe the government will subsidize artists that a minority of the working class hates. All this is possible, and in a technical sense of the Marxist meaning of 'exploitation,' will undoubtedly happen. In communism, it is build right into the principle slogan "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need." There will be many people producing more value than they use, and others who will not (again, children, the disabled, the elderly). It is simply not an issue of whether or not you get back all the value your labor creates. That is foolishness. Marxists don't oppose the bourgeoisie because they exploit workers. They oppose them because of what the system leads to. Capitalism always leads to imperialism, always leads to economic crisis, hinders the productive capacity of humanity, horribly distributes the products of humanity's labor, etc.

Ah, but it clearly does.

Actually, no, you definitely have failed to (at the least) demonstrate anything "clearly" where anyone can understand it.

Question: if China and the USSR were some kind of socialism, why didn't the working class rise up and attempt to defend its very own society as it transformed, bloodlessly, into private capitalism.

The first question I would ask is why you bring in the assumption the working class would necessarily defend a socialist government with violence? Even if we assume the working class would necessarily defend their socialist system with violence, it does not guarantee conflict. The working class could be confused to what the changes at the top actually mean, and think their government will largely be the same with different leadership, and only realize things have gone horribly wrong when it is too late.

Even with this criteria as a test, I would argue the USSR during WW2 is an example where the vast majority of the USSR did understand their socialist system was under attack and enthusiastically supported the government to defend the social system, to great cost to themselves (27 million dead).

China is another question altogether. Many argue it is still socialist in the sense that it qualifies as a Dictatorship of the Proletariat. After all, Russia didn't have a socialist economy in 1917, but it did have a Dictatorship of the Proletariat. But that is a question outside the scope of what my thread was supposed to be about.

Compare the way the Russian working class fought to defend the workers state against the Whites and the foreign invaders. And compare the savage battles inside the Russian CP, culminating in the purges. Nothing like that happened in the USSR as state capitalism replaced private capitalism and the workers received a new set of chains.

This is a strange interpretation of history. Are you suggesting the USSR became "State Capitalist" during the 1930s when certain people were purged from the party, and that if the USSR was truly socialist, people would have rose up to stop this? This is quite a bizarre notion indeed, and has many, many historical assumptions built into the meaning of these events.

Again, I would argue the way the Russian working class fought during the Civil War is comparable to the way they fought in WW2 to defend their system, both times when their society was under direct threat of ceasing to be the way it was. It is not clear at all why you think the events of the 1930s should have been viewed the same way. On the contrary, all evidence I've read seems to indicate there was mass participation in the so-called purges, and that it overwhelming affected mid to high level party members who were viewed as elements hostile to their society that were in collaboration with foreign powers. But again, I digress, because this is not really the point of my original thread.

Paul Cockshott

20th July 2010, 23:51

Die Neue Zeit

21st July 2010, 14:20

What Blake doesn't realize is that he's going against what Luxemburg said, and that you agree with her. In any of the pre-WWI imperialist blocs, normal capitalist development co-existed with abnormal barbarism. Of course, David Harvey goes further in his accumulation by dispossession material, saying that even "normal capitalist development" had internal dispossessions that went under Marx's Capital radar. As per my programmatic commentary, we're seeing this today in things like intellectual property rights.

mountainfire

22nd July 2010, 17:15

Hostile capitalist countries threaten by force of extinction the position of the "State Capitalist" bureaucrats.

I find this an entirely reasonable assumption, if it can even be considered an assumption at all. The birth of the Soviet republic provoked the intervention of more than ten foreign armies which conducted a prolonged war of aggression against the Soviet state in cooperation with the domestic forces of reaction, with the Soviet state thereafter finding itself isolated internationally, and even in those cases where capitalist relations of production were not overthrown, as in China in 1949, where the revolution did not exceed bourgeois-democratic limits and fulfilled the tasks of the bourgeois-democratic revolution in only a partial way, the fact that the interests of the imperialist powers at a regional level were threatened meant that there were inevitably attempts to restore governments and social forces which would have facilitated imperialist penetration and not offered support to other progressive forces around the world - consider the support offered to the KMT by the United States throughout the final stage of the Chinese Civil War and during the first decade of the People's Republic. Stalin openly recognized the inability of any society to exist without encountering challenges from other actors when he asserted that it was necessary for the USSR to develop her economy "in ten years" so as to avoid being crushed by the "advanced countries", and Mao articulated the Great Leap Forward in almost the exact same terms. The outbreak of WW2 and the invasion of Stalinist Russia showed that Stalin was right to assume that Russia would eventually encounter external challenges in the form of military invasion.

By suggesting that it is in fact possible for a society to exist in isolation from the rest of the imperialist world-system for any extended period of time, you are adopting a liberal view of international relations, which characterizes interactions between countries as based on mutual agreement and advantage, and rejects any notion that the imperialist stage of capitalism involves an unavoidable tendency towards competition and the periodic re-division of the world's territories and resources. The fact that this tendency does exist means that societies, or more accurately the ruling classes of particular societies, will inevitably face pressure to develop their economies so as to defend their privileges against external challenges, especially societies that are relatively underdeveloped, in the same way that the forces of market competition within individual countries and industries compel particular enterprises to maximize surplus value and invest as much of their surplus as possible into the upgrading of technology, or, in Marxist terms, constant capital, compared to what they use for their own consumption, thereby allowing for a reduction in labour time, and allowing the capitalist to remain part of the ruling class. In fact, you yourself recognize the existence of these forces, which constitute alienation from the viewpoint of the bourgeoisie, in your previous post, so why you think they do not also apply at the level of international politics, with similar consequences for the choices available to ruling classes, is not clear.

mountainfire

22nd July 2010, 17:55

To develop the above:

If the Western capitalist class suddenly woke up one day and decided to be good bosses while still maintaining their ownership, the logic of the system would eventually do away with them.

And, at an international level, if the ruling class of a state-capitalist society sought to be "good" bureaucrats by not using coercive and exploitative methods to develop their economies and industries as quickly as possible, they would also be done away with, because the challenges posed by rival imperialist powers would lead to them being toppled from power without being able to adequately defend themselves. In other words, if the Stalinist bureaucracy had not developed an industrial and military base in the 1930s, at the expense of working-class power and living standards, the USSR would have been defeated by Nazi Germany during WW2. Now, let's be clear: the extent and kind of concessions and decisions that ruling classes will be forced to make in order to preserve their interests against the ruling classes of other societies, including whether these concessions and decisions are reconcilable with the attainment of socialism and defense of working-class power, is a matter of debate, in that nothing is definitively proven by pointing to the existence of geo-political competition, but to suggest that there is no such thing as the logic of international competition and that you can study countries in isolation from the imperialist world-system, such that socialism really can be built in one country without any adaptions having to be made whatsoever, goes against the entirety of the Marxist approach to international politics, as well as the statements of even the most degenerated Stalinist governments and leaders.

Zanthorus

22nd July 2010, 19:03

What you are missing here is that the very logic of the system compels the capitalist class to act in a certain fashion.

Yes, but the way in which individual capitalists are compelled to act doesn't necessarily preserve the interests of the capitalist class as a whole. Individual capitalists can drive down working conditions for their own immediate gain even though the social unrest it causes creates problems for the capitalist system as a whole. In these cases it is necessary for the total social capital acting through the medium of the state, and often with the support of the working class themselves, to enact measures like provision of welfare and nationalisation of key services like healthcare which enforce the general interests of the preservation of the capitalist system against the particular interests of individual capitalists. We could see the USSR as a particularly extreme example of this trend where the state took control of the total social capital. Remember that individual enterprises did still exist in the Soviet Union and what is more they competed with each other, even if only for the fulfillment of planning quotas.

Capitalism is a system that can be studied even outside of its real-world history because of this.

Do you remember one of the examples that Marx used in the course of that study of specifically the laws of the centralisation of capital? Where he was explaining what the limit of such centralisation was?

Here is Marx in Chapter twenty five of volume one:

In any given branch of industry centralisation would reach its extreme limit if all the individual capitals invested in it were fused into a single capital. In a given society the limit would be reached only when the entire social capital was united in the hands of either a single capitalist or a single capitalist company.

This is incredibly important. The laws of motion of capitalism will not change even if the entire social capital is united in the hands of a single capitalist or capitalist company (Which could feasibly be the state). The only thing that changes is the mode of appropriation.

Where is the corollary to "State Capitalism" in this regard? It appears there is none.

There have been plenty of efforts to elaborate on the political economy of state-capitalism, you are just ignorant.

The analysis by the Aufheben group rests on Marx's circuits of capital. Specifically the circuit of productive-capital. During the original five year plans, both consumption (The circuit of commodity-capital) and circulation (The circuit of money-capital) were subordinated to the expansion of the means of production. The contradictions produced by this subordination of everything to the needs of production however supposedly produced the immense waste characteristic of the Soviet economy.

Another thesis is Chattopadhyay's about state-capitalism only being able to reach the extensive phase of capital accumulation. To accumulate capital the Soviet state had to kieep bringing in raw materialis and workers into the process of production. It was unable to make the leap into intensive accumulation and the constant revolutionising of production and subsequently failed.

Hillel Ticktin, although not a state-capitalist theorist, also made an analysis of the political economy of the Soviet Union based on the contradiction between the interests of the SU's powerful labour force and the beuracracy. The workers held so much sway in production that the beuracrats couldn't terrorise them enough to meet production outputs. So a compromise had to be made in favour of meeting the quantitative demands of the planning authorities while ignoring the qualitative. The key characteristic of soviet production was thus said to be the contradiction between ideal use-values and real use-values.

So we can analyse laws and tendencies of planned economies.

This is bizarre. Do you have any examples of this happening that aren't when Marxists take state power away from the capitalist class? This seems more like shoe-horning an incredibly wrong theory to fit history.

Bismarck's Germany. Germany was underdeveloped compared to Britain and the USA when it unified in 1866 and it produced a kind of state-capitalism, although not as extreme as the Soviet Unions. It was what made a lot of second international theorists believe that state-capitalism was a progressive tendency away from regular capitalism rather than a move from feudalism to capitalism on the basis of underdeveloped capitalism attempting to compete with advanced market capitalism.

This seems to make the "State Capitalist" theory make even less sense. To you, it seems it can describe economies where there is no private ownership of the means of production and no rich people, to one where there is extensive private ownership and many millionaires and billionaires, because there is some degree of state management. It would seem your idea of "State Capitalism" could apply to anything and everything, and hence actually describes nothing.

No, it clearly describes the state taking control of the productive forces while retaining capitalist relations of production. You are simply being an obscurantist because you don't want to admit that the glorious socialist motherland was actually a capitalist wasteland.