For Trotskyists [Archive]

Muzk

8th July 2010, 18:35

Socialism in one country is impossible due to capitalist pressure from all borders, lack of natural resources and economic isolation. That's just about the reasons why "socialism in one country" doesn't work - without pointing at Stalin and his butt buddies.

Now with Stalin and his friends - it was used as a justification for a number of invasions of countries(social imperialism) and to dump internationalist politics once and for all.

Did I mention that this was a complete revision of the original bolshevik programme? The russian revolution can only succeed if the international circumstances allow it to, or it will degenerate into isolation. (And bureaocratisation, in this case)

Since you're too lazy to look at some links, I'll just paste it in here:

A foundation of the Stalinist political theory, introduced for the first time in 1924, after Lenin's death. The theory was in direct opposition to the Bolshevik (http://marxists.org/glossary/orgs/b/o.htm#bolshevik) theory that the success of the Russian Revolution depended on proletarian revolutions in Europe. The Stalinist theory stipulated that a socialist society could be achieved inside a single country. Later, when it was incorporated into the program and tactics of the Comintern, it became the justification for the domination of Russia in the proletarian revolution: claiming that the Soviet Union (http://marxists.org/glossary/orgs/u/n.htm#ussr) was the leader of the International proletariat.
Further Reading: Russian critiques of this theory: Vladimir Lenin, Question on Nationalities (http://marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1922/dec/testamnt/autonomy.htm); Leon Trotsky, The Third International After Lenin (http://marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1928/3rd/index.htm) .)

Stalin declared socialism to have been achieved in 1934, if I recall correctly. This was - also - a complete revision of orthodox marxism, since the USSR didn't only have a priviliged caste of bureaocrats, but also a gigantic state apparatus. But if socialism had been achieved, the state would wither away, and not grow into a giant beast.

inb4 stalinists hijacking my post / any other post / this thread / whatever

Lacrimi de Chiciură

8th July 2010, 18:49

Socialist revolution has to be international because the working class is international. "Socialism in one country" is a sell-out idea. It was a measure taken to try to placate the bourgeoisie of imperialist countries, who feared the USSR because they knew communists would fight capitalism everywhere and it would provide enormous solidarity to the workers in other countries. "Socialism in one country" means "peaceful coexistence" with capitalist countries, which is impossible because they are the class enemy.

scarletghoul

8th July 2010, 18:54

Socialism in one country is impossible due to capitalist pressure from all borders, lack of natural resources and economic isolation. That's just about the reasons why "socialism in one country" doesn't work - without pointing at Stalin and his butt buddies.

Now with Stalin and his friends - it was used as a justification for a number of invasions of countries(social imperialism) and to dump internationalist politics once and for all.

Did I mention that this was a complete revision of the original bolshevik programme? The russian revolution can only succeed if the international circumstances allow it to, or it will degenerate into isolation. (And bureaocratisation, in this case)

Since you're too lazy to look at some links, I'll just paste it in here:

Stalin declared socialism to have been achieved in 1934, if I recall correctly. This was - also - a complete revision of orthodox marxism, since the USSR didn't only have a priviliged caste of bureaocrats, but also a gigantic state apparatus. But if socialism had been achieved, the state would wither away, and not grow into a giant beast.

inb4 stalinists hijacking my post / any other post / this thread / whatever
OK but the OP wants to know what a Trotskyist proposes instead. As in, what concrete actions should the Soviet leaders have taken. Should they have invaded a load of other countries or what.

Apologies for the Stalinist interference but I've never seen a Trotskyist have any real idea of how an alternative to SIOC would be implemented. This has led me to view the Trotskyist criticism of SIOC as ultra-left opportunism. The fact is USSR was facing the choice of either socialism in one country or no socialism at all.

Muzk

8th July 2010, 18:55

Apologies not accepted. Get out. Your strawman isn't even worth answering, we've had this 100s of times already.

automattick

8th July 2010, 18:58

Socialism is one country isn't a notion only opposed by Trotskyists, but every Marxist. It is called internationalism and any Marxist worth his/her salt would support this notion.

A.R.Amistad

8th July 2010, 18:58

dearest chuck

8th July 2010, 19:02

the working class is not international, capital is.

Lacrimi de Chiciură

8th July 2010, 19:10

scarletghoul

8th July 2010, 19:14

:mad: leave us alone this is just another form of racism! :crying:
Don't get so offended comrade..

Well, for a start the Comintern could have stopped proposing the theory of "Socialism in One Country" after 1928. The Comintern could have chosen to try to aid revolution in Germany in the 1930's instead of pseudo-supporting Hitler with their retched slogan "First Hitler, than us." The Communist International used to be a proletarian tool for international solidarity and revolution. Instead, it basically just became a "friends of the Soviet Union" fan club. Its up to the leadership of the revolutionary state, as well as the revolutionary party, to always promote international revolution actively.
Are you saying the USSR didn't support international socialism ?? That's kinda strange. Just look at all the socialist regimes that emerged and sustained themselves with Soviet assistance.
http://http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/40/Communist_countries.PNG
Of course there were some poor decisions made, however in general the course of the Soviet Union's foreign policy was based on supporting international socialism. If the USSR didnt help the international struggle, why do you think socialism went to shit after the collapse of the USSR ?

If you really wanna help the world revolution, you must build socialism country by country.
file:///tmp/moz-screenshot.pngfile:///tmp/moz-screenshot-1.png

Muzk

8th July 2010, 19:20

Just look at all the socialist regimes that emerged and sustained themselves with Soviet assistance.
http://http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/40/Communist_countries.PNG

Ah I found them, here, I made a list:

Ismail

8th July 2010, 19:23

Now with Stalin and his friends - it was used as a justification for a number of invasions of countries(social imperialism)Mere invasions of countries count as social imperialism? I'm pretty sure that makes Lenin the worst social imperialist in history, then, considering that there were about 10 different White governments, a bunch of right-wing social democratic states, a whole bunch (probably 50+) of local ethnic states, etc.

Any country that came into the USSR came as an autonomous Soviet Republic with its culture intact and economic prospects raised, and most "invasions" were during the period leading up to WWII, and didn't exactly involve social-imperialism. I've written more about this before (http://www.revleft.com/vb/anti-imperialism-nationalist-t128292/index.html?t=128292).

Situations like the Soviet war in Afghanistan from 1979-1989, where practically the entire country was opposed to the Soviet invasion and wherein the Soviets had to use chemical weapons to murder uppity peasants, is a far better example of social-imperialism in action. Going into the pro-German Baltics, freeing Communists from the prisons, and having all 3 Baltic states voting to join the USSR as autonomous Soviet Republics which would benefit absolutely from joining, isn't. You have a better case for arguing that Soviet activities in Central Asia constituted "social-imperialism" under Lenin and Stalin.

Did I mention that this was a complete revision of the original bolshevik programme? The russian revolution can only succeed if the international circumstances allow it to, or it will degenerate into isolation. (And bureaocratisation, in this case)What if the international circumstances didn't allow it to immediately succeed?

"If you are unable to adapt yourself, if you are not inclined to crawl on your belly in the mud, you are not a revolutionary but a chatterbox; and I propose this, not because I like it, but because we have no other road, because history has not been kind enough to bring the revolution to maturity everywhere simultaneously." (Lenin, Political Report of the CC to the Extraordinary Seventh Congress of the RCP(B), March 7 1918, Collected Works, Vol 27).

‘The development of capitalism proceeds extremely unevenly in the various countries. It cannot be otherwise under the commodity production system. From this, it follows irrefutably that Socialism cannot achieve victory simultaneously in all countries. It will achieve victory first in one or several countries, while the others will remain bourgeois or pre-bourgeois for some time’. (V. I. Lenin: C. W. Russ. Ed. Vol. 19; p.325).

"As a matter of fact, the political power of the Soviet over all large-scale means of production, the power in the state in the hands of the proletariat, the alliance of this proletariat with the many millions of small and very small peasants, the assured leadership of the peasantry by the proletariat, etc, … is not this all that is necessary in order... to build a complete socialist society? This is not yet the building of socialist society but it is all that is necessary and sufficient for this building." (Lenin, "On Cooperation," 1923.)

Stalin declared socialism to have been achieved in 1934, if I recall correctly. This was - also - a complete revision of orthodox marxism, since the USSR didn't only have a priviliged caste of bureaocrats, but also a gigantic state apparatus.He declared that socialist society had, in the main, been built (which Hoxha noted was a wrong stand utilized later by opportunists and revisionists like Khrushchev to "build communism") and antagonistic classes had ceased to exist. But contradictions still existed within Soviet society. The buildup for World War II, the actual war itself, and post-war reconstruction had significantly delayed the further construction of socialism, hence the 1940's Soviet economists and their debates, and Stalin's rebuttal to economic revisionism via writing his work Economic Problems of Socialism in the U.S.S.R.

But if socialism had been achieved, the state would wither away, and not grow into a giant beast.As Stalin noted (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1938/01/18.htm) in 1938:

Can the victorious Socialism of one country, which is encircled by many strong capitalist countries, regard itself as being fully guaranteed against the danger of military invasion, and hence, against attempts to restore capitalism in our country?

Can our working class and our peasantry, by their own efforts, without the serious assistance of the working class in capitalist countries, overcome the bourgeoisie of other countries in the same way as we overcame our own bourgeoisie? In other words :

Can we regard the victory of Socialism in our country as final, i.e., as being free from the dangers of military attack and of attempts to restore capitalism, assuming that Socialism is victorious only in one country and that the capitalist encirclement continues to exist?...

Leninism answers these problems in the negative.

Leninism teaches that "the final victory of Socialism, in the sense of full guarantee against the restoration of bourgeois relations, is possible only on an international scale" (c.f. resolution of the Fourteenth Conference of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union). [Emphasis added]

This means that the serious assistance of the international proletariat is a force without which the problem of the final victory of Socialism in one country cannot be solved.

This, of course, does not mean that we must sit with folded arms and wait for assistance from outside.

On the contrary, this assistance of the international proletariat must be combined with our work to strengthen the defence of our country, to strengthen the Red Army and the Red Navy, to mobilise the whole country for the purpose of resisting military attack and attempts to restore bourgeois relations.

This is what Lenin says on this score :

"We are living not merely in a State but in a system of States, and it is inconceivable that the Soviet Republic should continue to coexist for a long period side by side with imperialist States. Ultimately one or other must conquer. Meanwhile, a number of terrible clashes between the Soviet Republic and the bourgeois States is inevitable. This means that if the proletariat, as the ruling class, wants to and will rule, it must prove this also by military organization." (Collected Works, Vol. 24. P. 122.)

And further :

"We are surrounded by people, classes and governments which openly express their hatred for us. We must remember that we are at all times but a hair's breadth from invasion." (Collected Works, Vol. 27. P. 117.)

This is said sharply and strongly but honestly and truthfully without embellishment as Lenin was able to speak.

On the basis of these premises Stalin stated in "Problems of Leninism" that :

"The final victory of Socialism is the full guarantee against attempts at intervention, and that means against restoration, for any serious attempt at restoration can take place only with serious support from outside, only with the support of international capital.

"Hence the support of our revolution by the workers of all countries, and still more, the victory of the workers in at least several countries, is a necessary condition for fully guaranteeing the first victorious country against attempts at intervention and restoration, a necessary condition for the final victory of Socialism," (Problems of Leninism, 1937. P. 134.)

Indeed, it would be ridiculous and stupid to close our eyes to the capitalist encirclement and to think that our external enemies, the fascists, for example, will not, if the opportunity arises, make an attempt at a military attack upon the U.S.S.R. Only blind braggarts or masked enemies who desire to lull the vigilance of our people can think like that.

[....]

Now you can judge whether the passage from the book "Problems of Leninism" on the victory of Socialism in one country is out of date or not.

I myself would very much like it to be out of date.

I would like unpleasant things like capitalist encirclement, the danger of military attack, the danger of the restoration of capitalism, etc., to be things of the past. Unfortunately, however, these unpleasant things still exist.

(Signed) J. Stalin.
February 12, 1938.

Pravda
14 February 1938
The Comintern could have chosen to try to aid revolution in Germany in the 1930's instead of pseudo-supporting Hitler with their retched slogan "First Hitler, than us."As E.H. Carr notes in his work Twilight of the Comintern (which is supportive of Trotsky's criticisms of Comintern policy), the KPD viewed Social-Democrats as moderate proto-Fascists, and viewed the Nazis as merely demagogic, petty-bourgeois socialists who would gradually lose support (as they were, in fact, losing such support up until Hitler came to power). KPD members would often chant Luxemburg's name and shout stuff to the extent of "Never again trust the treachery of social-democracy after they murdered Rosa Luxemburg!"

You're free to criticize the social-fascist line, but the fact was that at the time Social-Democrats in power saw Fascism as less of a bad thing than Communism. In Italy, Germany, France, and other places the Social-Democrats attacked Communist militias and such far more than they attacked the Fascists, and the fact that, for example, the Communist-organized German Red Front was banned by the Social-Democrats (and social-democratic police officers would often break up Communist strikes, etc.) did not help the situation. A good read on this subject is Fascism and Social Revolution by British Communist R. Palme Dutt, who provides ample evidence of Social-Democrats fearing Communism more than Fascism in virtually every country in Europe, and acting accordingly. It can be downloaded here: http://www.plp.org/books/dutt.pdf

Also, to nitpick, the word you're looking for is "quasi," not "pseudo."

Wanted Man

8th July 2010, 19:42

Soviet leaders should have continued aggressively promoting socialist revolution in other countries. (no, not by invading them :confused:)

How? Do you think that we would have international socialism now if Soviet leaders had made better choices? If so, can you name any concrete measures they could and should have taken, but failed to?

As others have mentioned, the Stalinists parties failed to promote socialist revolution. Instead, they allowed Hitler to come to power

:lol:

Also, I predict that even if this thread ends up with 100 posts, no trotskyist will be able to answer the OP's questions.

S.Artesian

8th July 2010, 19:50

Invasions of countries count as social imperialism? I agree. "Social imperialism" is a distinctly un-class, unMarxist analysis. Of course, no Trotskyist I know considers me to be a Trotskyist, and I'm happy to agree with him or her-- not that I don't regard Trotsky's participation in the Russian Revolution critical to the proletariat taking power; his service in organizing the Red Army essential to preserving that power; and his critique of the failures of the 3rd International in China, Germany, France, Spain, etc. cogent and accurate analysis.

But I'm happy to say I'm not Trotskyist.

Situations like the Soviet war in Afghanistan from 1979-1989, where practically the entire country was opposed to the Soviet invasion and wherein the Soviets had to use chemical weapons to murder uppity peasants, is a far better example of social-imperialism in action.Imperialism means there is an economic necessity underlying the actions of a class or a ruling strata regarding another country. What was the economic necessity, the necessity based in accumulation for the Soviet bureaucracy to invade Afghanistan?

What if the international circumstances didn't allow it to immediately succeed?Exactly the issue, no? That's what all the debates and struggles are about-- militarization of labor, restoring trade relations with the West, import substitution, NEP, concessions, socialism at a snail's pace-- its' all about, actually, relations between city and countryside when the international revolution has not provided the technical basis for the fSU to break out of its accumulation trap-- i.e. accumulation can only be achieved by reducing consumption.

And... what if the emergent revolutionary apparatus returns the favor, and doesn't allow the international circumstances to succeed?

"If you are unable to adapt yourself, if you are not inclined to crawl on your belly in the mud, you are not a revolutionary but a chatterbox; and I propose this, not because I like it, but because we have no other road, because history has not been kind enough to bring the revolution to maturity everywhere simultaneously." (Lenin, Political Report of the CC to the Extraordinary Seventh Congress of the RCP(B), March 7 1918, Collected Works, Vol 27). Said by Lenin at the time of the engagement of the civil war, with the need for compulsory labor, compulsory grain requisitions... OK, there's necessity.

‘The development of capitalism proceeds extremely unevenly in the various countries. It cannot be otherwise under the commodity production system. From this, it follows irrefutably that Socialism cannot achieve victory simultaneously in all countries. It will achieve victory first in one or several countries, while the others will remain bourgeois or pre-bourgeois for some time’. (V. I. Lenin: C. W. Russ. Ed. Vol. 19; p.325).Formally correct, but misses the point and by a mile. The point being what content, what quality, what organization, is being given to the social relations of production in these uneven conditions when a "backward" country "leaps ahead" through seizing power.

"As a matter of fact, the political power of the Soviet over all large-scale means of production, the power in the state in the hands of the proletariat, the alliance of this proletariat with the many millions of small and very small peasants, the assured leadership of the peasantry by the proletariat, etc, … is not this all that is necessary in order... to build a complete socialist society? This is not yet the building of socialist society but it is all that is necessary and sufficient for this building." (Lenin, "On Cooperation," 1923.)Uh oh, here we go finding a virtue in necessity. No, it's necessary but it is not sufficient. Certainly the history of the fSU shows that, and shows that Lenin was wrong. It simply was not sufficient. Sufficient means it could sustain the direction of improving labor productivity, of dramatically improving agricultural productivity, of creating now social relations between city and countryside. Exactly those things that the fSU failed to achieve, with 1/3 of its population trapped in agricultural production right up to its collapse... etc. etc.

As E.H. Carr notes in his work Twilight of the Comintern (which is supportive of Trotsky's criticisms of Comintern policy), the KPD viewed Social-Democrats as moderate proto-Fascists, and viewed the Nazis as merely demagogic, petty-bourgeois socialists who would gradually lose support (as they were, in fact, losing such support up until Hitler came to power). KPD members would often chant Luxemburg's name and shout stuff to the extent of "Never again trust the treachery of social-democracy after they murdered Rosa Luxemburg!"

You're free to criticize the social-fascist line, but the fact was that at the time Social-Democrats in power saw Fascism as less of a bad thing than Communism. In Italy, Germany, France, and other places the Social-Democrats attacked Communist militias and such far more than they attacked the Fascists, and the fact that, for example, the Communist-organized German Red Front was banned by the Social-Democrats (and social-democratic police officers would often break up Communist strikes, etc.) did not help the situation. A good read on this subject is Fascism and Social Revolution by British Communist R. Palme Dutt, who provides ample evidence of Social-Democrats fearing Communism more than Fascism in virtually every country in Europe, and acting accordingly. It can be downloaded here: http://www.plp.org/books/dutt.pdfNo doubt the Social Democrats in power feared the communist revolution more than they feared the fascists. Just because they're stupid, or not stupid, but because of they're commited to capitalism, materially stupid, that's no reason to mimic the material stupidity in an organization that claims leadership of exactly that revolution.

The trick was to break the working class rank and file supporters and members of the SPD away from that leadership by agitating around the elements of common class defense.

In the last analysis what are soviets [with a small s] but the highest expression of that mediation we call the "united front"? What brought the majority, the overwhelming majority of workers in Moscow and Petrograd into agreement that only Bolshevik representatives could defend the power of the soviets? Bolshevik physical assaults on the SR and Mensheviks? Of course not. It was the organization of the class for defense of the soviet power against Kornilov, against Kerensky's All Russian Congress of Counterrevolution held in Moscow in July 1917, etc. etc.

Lenina Rosenweg

8th July 2010, 20:23

In answer to the OP. Capitalism has a fantastic ability to reproduce itself. It cannot, by definition, coexist with any other mode of production. Other modes of production-tributary, feudal, tribal, are either destroyed or subsumed into the capitalist production system.

Socialism must cover the entire planet or it cannot exist or at least it cannot be viable for long..A successful working class revolution in one country cannot be socialist.It can provide transistion to socialism. The important task is to pursue a revolutionary foreign policy and spread the revolution without, however allowing your country to be subsumed into the capitalist nation state system. Not an easy task but I think that is what Trotsky was aiming for. Some of the left communist critiques of the Bolsheviks may have some validity, but on the other hand I don't see any other direction Lenin could have gone in.

The theory of SIC is unMarxist and reactionary. It was developed to support the rule of the bureaucratic class which rapidly rose under Stalin and essentially hijacked the Bolshevik Party. It downplays support for the international working class at the cost of supporting a national bureaucratic class.

Lenina Rosenweg

8th July 2010, 20:37

How? Do you think that we would have international socialism now if Soviet leaders had made better choices? If so, can you name any concrete measures they could and should have taken, but failed to?

Many examples. Forcing the CCP in China into an alliance w/the class enemy. This led to disaster in 1927, compounded by the insane Third Period Idiocy.

Germany. The revolutionary movement in 1923 could have gone much differently. At the greatest opportunity for working class mobilization, Brandler was bouncing around Moscow looking for someone to tell him what to do. That's just the tip of the iceberg.

Spanish Civil War. Read Orwell's Homage To Catalonia. The Stalinist subverted and destroyed the Spanish Revolution.

Subverting attempts to create a US Labor party in the 1930s.

The list is endless.Read "World Revolution 1917-1936: The Rise and Fall of the Communist International" by CLR James. I think without Stalinism there is a good chance we would have socialism by now. Instead we'll probably have to wait another 70-100 years, if the human race is extinct by then.

Also, I predict that even if this thread ends up with 100 posts, no trotskyist will be able to answer the OP's questions.

I think I've done a good job. My post was a bit rough, but serviceable, I think.

HEAD ICE

8th July 2010, 20:43

nevermind

Zanthorus

8th July 2010, 21:09

OK but the OP wants to know what a Trotskyist proposes instead. As in, what concrete actions should the Soviet leaders have taken. Should they have invaded a load of other countries or what.

Apologies for the Stalinist interference but I've never seen a Trotskyist have any real idea of how an alternative to SIOC would be implemented. This has led me to view the Trotskyist criticism of SIOC as ultra-left opportunism. The fact is USSR was facing the choice of either socialism in one country or no socialism at all.

You don't need to implement an alternative to SIOC because quite simply SIOC is impossible. The only option for the RSFSR/USSR was to continue the spread of the revolution or face the option of no socialism at all. In concrete terms that would've involved dropping the Bolshevisation of the Comintern and coming to terms with the new situation in advanced capitalism instead of forcing tactics which succeeded in a country which had only abolished Feudalism in 1861 and whose Parliament had been in existence for eight months at the time of the seizure of power. If memory serves the original declaration by the Communist International on the role of Trade Unions was postponed because although the Bolsheviks were all in favour of them many of the other countries were giving reports of the Trade Unions becoming beuracrat instruments against the workers.

Are you saying the USSR didn't support international socialism ?? That's kinda strange. Just look at all the socialist regimes that emerged and sustained themselves with Soviet assistance.

You of course know that anyone who disagrees with SIOC is also going to disagree on the "socialist" character of those regimes.

If the USSR didnt help the international struggle, why do you think socialism went to shit after the collapse of the USSR?

Because the "socialism" which died with the USSR had succumbed to the International counter-revolution in the early 20's and become an ideology for the industrialisation of third world countries. Most of the left however, even the anti-stalinist Left, held on to the illusion that these states were something to do with workers power even if in a "degenerated" form or at the very least more progressive than regular capitalism so they couldn't deal with it theoretically when the "progressive" USSR came tumbling down to western liberal capitalism.

Ismail

8th July 2010, 21:40

Imperialism means there is an economic necessity underlying the actions of a class or a ruling strata regarding another country. What was the economic necessity, the necessity based in accumulation for the Soviet bureaucracy to invade Afghanistan?The Soviets were utilizing geological surveys in an attempt to find mineral wealth. The work Afghanistan: The First Five Years of Soviet Occupation (http://books.google.com/books?id=RUSNyMH1aFQC&pg=PA3&dq=Afghanistan+Soviet&hl=en&ei=HjU2TOefMMK88gbL9aHtAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=7&ved=0CEMQ6AEwBg#v=onepage&q&f=false) is a fairly good read on this, it has a chapter on economic matters (a random example: the Soviets read meters, the Afghan Government was not allowed to read meters for resources in their own country). There was, of course, the geo-strategic concerns due to inter-imperialist conflict between the USA and USSR.

And... what if the emergent revolutionary apparatus returns the favor, and doesn't allow the international circumstances to succeed?You'd need to show that Stalin was actively sabotaging such attempts, of which there is no evidence (no, not even Spain). As historians like Erik Van Ree (http://books.google.com/books?id=murUL3KaxOwC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Erik+Van+Ree&hl=en&ei=rTU2TKm0DYG88gbh9cnhAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCwQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false) have noted, Stalin consistently applied Marxism to practically every analysis he ever made, and his private works and words showcase this.

An example not from Ree:

"Stalin indeed looked forward to profiting from an Anglo-German conflict. In a letter of September 7 [1939] to Georgii Dimitrov, the head of the Communist International, Stalin wrote that 'we are not against' a war between capitalist states in which they 'would weaken each other.' Hitler, nolens volens [aka unwillingly], was on his way to destroying the capitalist system. Poland, Stalin added, was just another 'bourgeois fascist state,' and 'What would be wrong if in the destruction of Poland [as a bourgeois state] we spread the socialist system to new inhabitants in new territories?'"
(Alfred Erich Senn. Lithuania 1940: Revolution from Above. New York: 2007. p. 21.)

Said by Lenin at the time of the engagement of the civil war, with the need for compulsory labor, compulsory grain requisitions... OK, there's necessity.Actually he apparently said it with Trotsky in mind in regards to Brest-Litovsk. (Harpal Brar, Trotskyism or Leninism? pp. 16-17)

Many examples. Forcing the CCP in China into an alliance w/the class enemy. This led to disaster in 1927For China in-re Stalin, note this: http://ml-review.ca/aml/China/NotesChina.htm

As became norm, especially under Mao, the CCP ignored Stalin's cautious words in-re the Guomindang and pursued a right-wing policy.

Spanish Civil War. Read Orwell's Homage To Catalonia. The Stalinist subverted and destroyed the Spanish Revolution.You generally don't want to rely upon a person who, by his own admission, didn't even know who the POUM were when he came into Spain or... much of anything else. You could actually read scholarly works (even the anti-communist Beevor), or even ones like Spain! The Unfinished Revolution (contained within my signature) which, although you'd probably be happy to deride as "Stalinist," show that matters were not so simple.

Furthermore, note that the PCE had two wings within it. The pro-Stalin wing was led by José Díaz, and the more collaborationist wing was led by Ibárruri and Carrillo (both of whom would later condemn Stalin, and who would later pioneer Eurocommunism). In her memoirs, Ibárruri mentions how "some persons" within the PCE in 1937 wanted to outright coup the Republican Government out of frustration, but the pro-conciliation line under Ibárruri won out. The short article "History of the Spanish Civil War" (http://www.mltranslations.org/Spain/civilwar.htm) notes the main failings of the PCE.

Luisrah

8th July 2010, 21:42

Lenina Rosenweg

8th July 2010, 22:10

While I have difficulties in believing it's possible to have socialism in one country last long, I do not think a worldwide revolution is possible.
While the revolution starts in one place, the other side of the world starts making propaganda against it, and things polarize.

However, my question for the trotskyists is: If you don't believe that socialism in one country is possible, and the propagation of the revolution isn't possible, what do you do?
Faced with the fact that he couldn't/it was too hard to spread socialism, should Stalin have said to the workers ''Ok people, it was good, but not good enough, everyone go home, we can't be revolutionaires anymore''?

In effect that is exactly what Stalin did. The Popular Front tactics downplayed revolutionary politics for an alliance with the liberal wing of the bourgouise.This did not succeed.The working class subordinated their own goals to an "anti-fascist" alliance. Even Eric Hobsbawm points out that under the Pop Front support for CPs increased somewhat but support for the left did not increase overall.This weakened the move for socialism while not effectively countering fascism. In politics, as in most else in life, the best defense is a good offense.The way to counter fascism would be by an aggressive working class policy, not an unstable alliance with people who would be delighted to have you put before a firing squad.

The Spanish Civil War could have turned out much differently, as could have working class revolution in France in the 30s.

At the end of and after WWII there were socialist revolutions in France, Italy and elsewhere. The communists were the most effective part of the anti-fascist resistance.In effect the Soviets said, "we can't afford to piss off the Yanks or the Brits, so give back the occupied factories, farmland, etc." The film 1900 by Bertulluci has a scene illustrating this.

The biggest break on world revolution has been the Soviet Union, although of course the US obviously contributed. Either Bordiga or Trotsky called Stalin the "gravedigger of the revolution". He was right.

EDIT: Propagation of the revolution is always possible. That is the opposition what the SU did however.

chegitz guevara

8th July 2010, 22:12

the working class is not international, capital is.

Wrong

Zanthorus

8th July 2010, 22:18

In effect that is exactly what Stalin did. The Popular Front tactics downplayed revolutionary politics for an alliance with the liberal wing of the bourgouise.This did not succeed.The working class subordinated their own goals to an "anti-fascist" alliance. Even Eric Hobsbawm points out that under the Pop Front support for CPs increased somewhat but support for the left did not increase overall.This weakened the move for socialism while not effectively countering fascism. In politics, as in most else in life, the best defense is a good offense.The way to counter fascism would be by an aggressive working class policy, not an unstable alliance with people who would be delighted to have you put before a firing squad.

This is coming from a Trotskyist :blink:

The biggest break on world revolution has been the Soviet Union, although of course the US obviously contributed. Either Bordiga or Trotsky called Stalin the "gravedigger of the revolution". He was right.

I'm pretty certain that it was Bordiga.

Lenina Rosenweg

8th July 2010, 22:29

This is coming from a Trotskyist :blink:

As I understand this is the "orthodox Trotskyist" viewpoint. Either you or myself misunderstands Trotskyism. I hope its not me because I am in a Trotskyist organization and I've read most of the "classics". Does this sound LC to you?

Anyway read Trotsky's critiques of the Popular Front, this is what he says.

http://www.trotsky.net/trotsky_year/popularfrontism.html

It may be that I didn't express myself well.

I'm pretty certain that it was Bordiga.[/QUOTE]

Okay. He had a lot of guts.

Zanthorus

8th July 2010, 22:34

As I understand this is the "orthodox Trotskyist" viewpoint.

Indeed. The point I was trying to get at was that those criticisms could also be directed at the "united front" tactic but I probably should've elaborated a bit.

BAM

8th July 2010, 22:38

I'm pretty certain that it was Bordiga.

it was Trotsky. He said it to Stalin in front of the central committee of the party. It sealed Trotsky's fate. He was removed from the Politburo and Zinoviev and Kamenev followed.

Zanthorus

8th July 2010, 22:41

it was Trotsky. He said it to Stalin in front of the central committee of the party. It sealed Trotsky's fate. He was removed from the Politburo and Zinoviev and Kamenev followed.

Well according to Loren Goldner:

Bordiga was the last Western revolutionary who told off Stalin to his face (in 1926) as the gravedigger of the revolution and lived to tell the tale.

http://home.earthlink.net/~lrgoldner/bordiga.html

I think they probably both said it. It's not like it's some super witty remark or anything.

S.Artesian

8th July 2010, 22:46

OK but the OP wants to know what a Trotskyist proposes instead. As in, what concrete actions should the Soviet leaders have taken. Should they have invaded a load of other countries or what.

Apologies for the Stalinist interference but I've never seen a Trotskyist have any real idea of how an alternative to SIOC would be implemented. This has led me to view the Trotskyist criticism of SIOC as ultra-left opportunism. The fact is USSR was facing the choice of either socialism in one country or no socialism at all.

If you look at the origins of this "SIOC" you'll see what a political stalking horse it is without real political content. In 1919 and early 1920, you see Trotsky, supported by Lenin, arguing for "self-reliance," use of "labor-capital" for development, shock armies, militarization of labor, bringing the trade unions into line as Trotsky argues that with the international revolution delayed, the hostility from the West will force the fSU to turn to internal sources of accumulation.

In late 1920, Sokolnikov captures Lenin's ear, and there's he's optimistic there's going to be an opening to the West, a resolution of outstanding claims etc. and trade will blossom, so there's no need for the militarization of labor, and Lenin changes course-- leading to the NEP. Sokolnikov is the darling of everybody's, including the darling of the party, Bukharin's, eye.

Then of course the "opening" closes and the players start to circle around the chairs waiting for the music to begin, not end. Eventually Trotsky, who's arguments for increased industrial accumulation have been totally rejected by the party actually embraces increased foreign investment, imports of consumer goods to satisfy the peasantry etc. And Stalin changes course and embraces Preobrazhensky's "New Economics" and the necessity for industrial accumulation at the expense of the peasantry.

It doesn't matter what you call it, but the issue never was socialism in one country, because the socialist relations of production were never on either Trotsky's or Stalin's or Lenin's agenda once the civil war started. Lenin was entranced with "soviets plus electrification equals socialism" except in his enthusiasm he forgot about that "soviets" part as the Bolsheviks took upon themselves that authority, putting an end to the soviets.

The only validity there is to arguing that there were opposing sides to the "SIOC" ideology, is when it comes down to the tactics and strategy and program of the international revolution-- there the SIOC was used to raise up the fSU to God-like status so that all international class struggle was to be judged on its support for, impact upon, and submission to the fSU's interpretation of its private needs.

You never had socialism in one country, any country, and you never will. Why, you ask? Because of the need for increased productivity of labor. Capitalism doesn't exist in any one country by itself because of the world market and the need for increased profit. Overthrowing that international arrangement is what the proletarian revolution in any and every country must accomplish to unleash the full measure of emancipated labor; to augment the ability of labor to banish the socially, class imposed scarcity from the globe.

Lenina Rosenweg

8th July 2010, 22:47

BAM

8th July 2010, 22:47

I think they probably both said it. It's not like it's some super witty remark or anything.

i wonder if they were the only ones

S.Artesian

8th July 2010, 22:48

I think they probably both said it. It's not like it's some super witty remark or anything.

They both did say it -- Trotsky wrote about Stalin and his acolytes submitting applications for the position of gravedigger to the revolution. Bordiga said it to Stalin's face in 1926 at the conference of the 3rd Internatinal.

Zanthorus

8th July 2010, 22:59

That's united front vs.popular front. Communists can work with socialists, social democrats, liberals on certain things without subordinating their own goals and an independent role for the working class.Not doing so can lead to ultra left sectarian sterility.

They can work on the ground level with members of those parties especially ones critical of their leadership from a left perspective but uniting on a formal organisational level is just asking for disaster. I forget the name now but the reason an insurrection didn't begin in October '23 in Germany was because the guy didn't want to piss of the Social-Democrats, even though the pro-insurrection position could've got a two third majority. Any kind of "anti-fascism" which doesn't present fascism as a symptom of capitalism and socialism as the only cure is pretty hollow anyway.

Bordiga was interesting, I would not discount all his ideas,(his theory of agriculture and Soviet degeneration have some validity) but I feel that Gramsci had a more dialectical approach.

Ignoring the fact that Gramsci supported Stalin of course.

S.Artesian

8th July 2010, 23:05

The Soviets were utilizing geological surveys in an attempt to find mineral wealth. The work Afghanistan: The First Five Years of Soviet Occupation (http://books.google.com/books?id=RUSNyMH1aFQC&pg=PA3&dq=Afghanistan+Soviet&hl=en&ei=HjU2TOefMMK88gbL9aHtAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=7&ved=0CEMQ6AEwBg#v=onepage&q&f=false) is a fairly good read on this, it has a chapter on economic matters (a random example: the Soviets read meters, the Afghan Government was not allowed to read meters for resources in their own country). There was, of course, the geo-strategic concerns due to inter-imperialist conflict between the USA and USSR.

So your argument is that the fSU was compelled to enter Afghanistan in order to extract its mineral wealth?

Imperialism is not a geo-strategic formation. It is an economic organization of capital. Where is the underlying determining need of accumulation in the fSU propelling it across the globe to aggrandize sources of accumulation? Reading meters does not qualify

You'd need to show that Stalin was actively sabotaging such attempts, of which there is no evidence (no, not even Spain). As historians like Erik Van Ree (http://books.google.com/books?id=murUL3KaxOwC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Erik+Van+Ree&hl=en&ei=rTU2TKm0DYG88gbh9cnhAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCwQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false) have noted, Stalin consistently applied Marxism to practically every analysis he ever made, and his private works and words showcase this.

How about this old favorite of established communists-- rather than "actively" sabotaging, which implies voluntarism and "will," how about objectively sabotaging? How about no matter how right the KPD thought it was, how utterly convinced the 3rd Intl was of the correctness of its policies in Germany, in France, in Cuba, etc, those policies objectively, and effectively, lead the working class to disaster and slaughter. Yes, even in Spain. That's what a popular front does. It subordinates the working class to bourgeois limits, reforms, when the bourgeois order itself requires a savage assault on the working class.

And as for this:

An example not from Ree:

"Stalin indeed looked forward to profiting from an Anglo-German conflict. In a letter of September 7 [1939] to Georgii Dimitrov, the head of the Communist International, Stalin wrote that 'we are not against' a war between capitalist states in which they 'would weaken each other.' Hitler, nolens volens [aka unwillingly], was on his way to destroying the capitalist system. Poland, Stalin added, was just another 'bourgeois fascist state,' and 'What would be wrong if in the destruction of Poland [as a bourgeois state] we spread the socialist system to new inhabitants in new territories?'"
(Alfred Erich Senn. Lithuania 1940: Revolution from Above. New York: 2007. p. 21.)

that's not Marxist analysis. Hitler on his way to destroying the capitalist system? That's idiocy, or self-delusion, or idiotic self-delusion. Conquering other capitalist countries is not abolishing the class of capitalists, the accumulation of capital, or the profit of capital as a system. Ask GM, and Standard Oil and IBM who continued to accrue profits in Hitler's Germany. Hell, ask IG Farben.

9th July 2010, 01:44

the working class is not international, capital is.
Wait, what the hell is this? You think I can cross the border (or in my case, swim to New Zealand) and expect to find the working class completely gone?

DaComm

9th July 2010, 01:47

Thankyou very much for your clarififcation everyone that was supposed to respond. Much obliged. I find this method of asking people who are a X ideology about X ideology than asking a link which half of the time (for me at least) do not even work.

Ismail

9th July 2010, 03:00

So your argument is that the fSU was compelled to enter Afghanistan in order to extract its mineral wealth?It entered Afghanistan under the ridiculous pretext that Amin was a "CIA agent" and that the US were funding the Mujahidin, and once in completely subordinated the Afghan Government (after killing Amin) to it both economically and militarily.

Imperialism is not a geo-strategic formation. It is an economic organization of capital.The two go hand in hand in order to secure influences in markets. The US invasion of Iraq was both geo-strategic and economic. As Hoxha noted in 1980:

What interests Moscow the most is Afghanistan’s strategic position in the Middle East, its proximity to the oil resources, its key position in a major region where the savage rivalry between the two superpowers is developing...

From this angle, the events in Iran and Afghanistan are closely linked and other events of this nature could occur in that region. This shows the intensity of the rivalry between the United States of America and the Soviet Union in the Middle East and the Indian Ocean, what a great and threatening danger the two superpowers pose to the countries of that region, Their aim is to attack and suppress the revolutionary movements of the people, to stop them from breaking away from the hegemony of imperialism and social-imperialism, to obstruct the peoples from entering the road of independent national and democratic development. The barbarous aggression of the Soviet social-imperialists against Afghanistan, the ceaseless threats of aggression being made by the American imperialists and the intrigues of the Chinese social-imperialists in those regions are fraught with immense dangers... demonstrates today that aggression and the use of military force constitute the most typical feature of Soviet foreign policy. In rivalry with American imperialism, Soviet social-imperialism has done its utmost, employing all manner of means to secure new strategic positions and extend its sphere of control and domination in Asia, Africa and Latin America and everywhere else. In these efforts they utilise every means, from diplomatic and political manoeuvres to military violence....

The Albanian people express the profound conviction that the courageous people of Afghanistan will deal crushing blows to the Soviet social-imperialist aggressors and will oust them from their homeland.

Where is the underlying determining need of accumulation in the fSU propelling it across the globe to aggrandize sources of accumulation? Reading meters does not qualifyIt was a state capitalist economy with its own bourgeoisie which exploited the Warsaw Pact states, Cuba, Afghanistan, etc. I've already cited a book which mentions the Soviet economic exploitation of Afghanistan, and I would say that not being allowed to calculate or conduct research on ones own resources in ones own country, and being forced at gunpoint to have another country conduct it, constitutes an unequal relationship.

I find it strange how Trotskyists seem to rail against Stalin and "Stalinism," yet at the same time most also seem to praise the post-Stalin USSR and absolve it from anything in foreign affairs.

that's not Marxist analysis. Hitler on his way to destroying the capitalist system? That's idiocy, or self-delusion, or idiotic self-delusion.Really? As Lenina Rosenweg said, "At the end of and after WWII there were socialist revolutions in France, Italy and elsewhere. The communists were the most effective part of the anti-fascist resistance." I wouldn't exactly call them "socialist revolutions," but WWII did do a lot in-re consolidating the role of communist parties in many countries.

Conquering other capitalist countries is not abolishing the class of capitalists, the accumulation of capital, or the profit of capital as a system. Ask GM, and Standard Oil and IBM who continued to accrue profits in Hitler's Germany. Hell, ask IG Farben.No, but as World War I showed us, it did a fine job of damaging capitalism altogether by discrediting it. I'd say Stalin's expectation, considering WWII had just barely begun, was reasonable. As Van Ree notes, Stalin alone didn't share these views, but so did Molotov, among others. They believed that Germany would find itself screwed trying to conquer France, and there would be a stagnant world war à la WWI, giving enough time for the USSR to build itself up a formidable military to invade.

From another source:
"He met uncertainty with ambiguity. He staked out the middle ground without indicating the direction in which he might move. Events would dictate... The one certainty remained his belief, rooted in Leninism, of the inevitability of war.

[....]

In the parallel negotiations with the Anglo-French and the Germans during the summer of 1939, Stalin's dual aim was to avoid being drawn into a war that he believed inevitable, and to ensure that if and when he became involved it would be under the most favourable political and military circumstances....

The Nazi-Soviet Pact did not, by contrast, involve a military alliance, and Stalin refused to conclude one with Germany over the following months. Its main advantages in Stalin's mind were to keep the Soviet Union out of the coming 'imperialist war' ... Given his assumption that the war in the West would be prolonged... Stalin envisaged gaining a necessary breathing space because 'only by 1943 could we meet the Germans on an equal footing.' ....

The fall of France shattered his illusions of a stalemate...

That Stalin was stupefied by the German attack in June 1941... [made him] the victim of self-deception based on a set of perfectly rational, if faulty, calculations. He was convinced that Hitler would never risk repeating the error of the Germans in the First World War of fighting on two fronts."
(Alfred J. Rieber, "Stalin as foreign policy-maker: avoiding war, 1927-1953" in Stalin: A New History. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. pp. 143, 146-147.)

It's not unreasonable for Marxists to expect capitalism to come crashing down in their lifetimes.

If we're looking for bad predictions, how about this one by Trotsky?

"Hitler's soldiers are German workers and peasants. . . . The armies of occupation must live side by side with the conquered peoples; they must observe the impoverishment and despair of the toiling masses; they must observe the latter's attempts at resistance and protest, at first muffled and then more and more open and bold. . . . The German soldiers, that is, the workers and peasants, will in the majority of cases have far more sympathy for the vanquished peoples than for their own ruling caste. The necessity to act at every step in the capacity of 'pacifiers' and oppressors will swiftly disintegrate the armies of occupation, infecting them with a revolutionary spirit."
("On the Future of Hitler's Armies," Writings of Leon Trotsky (1939-40), NY: Merit Publishers, 1969, p. 113.)

S.Artesian

9th July 2010, 04:35

The two go hand in hand in order to secure influences in markets. The US invasion of Iraq was both geo-strategic and economic. As Hoxha noted in 1980...

More non-Marxist realpolitik of the Rostow/Kissinger school. The invasion of Iraq appears as "geo-strategic." Reality? Overproduction, declining rates of profit. Feel free to find the declining rate of profit in your state capitalist Soviet bourgeoisie.

It was a state capitalist economy with its own bourgeoisie which exploited the Warsaw Pact states, Cuba, Afghanistan, etc. I've already cited a book which mentions the Soviet economic exploitation of Afghanistan, and I would say that not being allowed to calculate or conduct research on ones own resources in ones own country, and being forced at gunpoint to have another country conduct it, constitutes an unequal relationship.

Own bourgeoisie? When was that bourgeoisie created? Where do we find a unique relationship to a specific property form, a specific organization of labor? How did it take power without overthrowing the previous "socialist" property and relations which the fSU had supposedly achieved under Stalin?

Yes, you cited a book. You can cite any number of books, and that doesn't make anything they say, or your interpretation of what the books say accurate.

I find it strange how Trotskyists seem to rail against Stalin and "Stalinism," yet at the same time most also seem to praise the post-Stalin USSR and absolve it from anything in foreign affairs.

You missed the part where I stated I'm not a Trotskyist, and I must have missed the part where I praised post-Stalin USSR and absolved it from anything in foreign affairs.

As Lenina Rosenweg said, "At the end of and after WWII there were socialist revolutions in France, Italy and elsewhere. The communists were the most effective part of the anti-fascist resistance." I wouldn't exactly call them "socialist revolutions," but WWII did do a lot in-re consolidating the role of communist parties in many countries.

LR's statement is non-sensical. There was no socialist revolution in France, Italy, Belgium, Netherlands. There certainly were actions by the CP to enter into bourgeois governments, but there's nothing that amounts to "socialist" or "revolution" that occurs in Western Europe at the end of and after WW 2. There were revolts in countries colonized by the Dutch and French against the restoration of colonial rule, but the official CPs were hard at work suppressing those revolts.

Yeah, WW2 did a lot to re-consolidate the role of the CPs, and the CPs did a lot to reconsolidate the bourgeoisie in those same countries.

No, but as World War I showed us, it did a fine job of damaging capitalism altogether by discrediting it. I'd say Stalin's expectation, considering WWII had just barely begun, was reasonable. As Van Ree notes, Stalin alone didn't share these views, but so did Molotov, among others. They believed that Germany would find itself screwed trying to conquer France, and there would be a stagnant world war à la WWI, giving enough time for the USSR to build itself up a formidable military to invade..

Whatever Stalin expected, and whether that other paradigm of revolutionary insight Molotov agreed with him, neither that view, nor your support of it constitutes Marxism; contains a shred of Marxist analysis-- which is supposed to have something to do with class struggle, conflicts between means and relations of production, and actions of the working class to take power.

Whatever anyone expected, the fact was that the working class had suffered tremendous defeats in China, Germany, Spain, France, so to think the bourgeoisie re-apportioning value by bleeding the proletariat would lead to anything other than what it did-- wholesale and worldwide slaughter is.. hey I already called it idiocy, self-deluding idiocy. The concrete defeat of the working class counts for more than all the optimistic speculations of those who were in part if not in total responsible for those defeats.

Ismail

9th July 2010, 05:16

More non-Marxist realpolitik of the Rostow/Kissinger school. The invasion of Iraq appears as "geo-strategic." Reality? Overproduction, declining rates of profit. Feel free to find the declining rate of profit in your state capitalist Soviet bourgeoisie.The Soviet economy stagnated into the 1980's, it was clearly dependent upon finding new markets to survive owing to the inefficient "reformed" economy of Khrushchev and onwards.

Own bourgeoisie? When was that bourgeoisie created? Where do we find a unique relationship to a specific property form, a specific organization of labor?http://www.oneparty.co.uk/html/book/ussrmenu.html
http://www.marx2mao.com/Other/RCSU75.html

How did it take power without overthrowing the previous "socialist" property and relations which the fSU had supposedly achieved under Stalin?It shot "Stalinists" and condemned "Stalinism" throughout the 1950's and 60's, and ended socialist construction through various state-capitalist reforms in the same period, which were extended in the 70's (e.g. ability of Soviet managers to set wages and fire workers, etc.) There were obvious problems in Soviet society that made such a revisionist coup possible, of course, but this doesn't change the fact that it happened.

Yes, you cited a book. You can cite any number of books, and that doesn't make anything they say, or your interpretation of what the books say accurate.You asked where I got the idea that the Soviets economically exploited Afghanistan from. You're free to take a peek and criticize it, which you haven't actually done.

You missed the part where I stated I'm not a Trotskyist, and I must have missed the part where I praised post-Stalin USSR and absolved it from anything in foreign affairs.Generally defending the Soviet social-imperialist aggression in Afghanistan is a trademark of Brezhnevites and most Trots. The fact that you condemn the social-imperialist analysis shows that you're an apologist for the state-capitalist regime and its puppet states.

Whatever Stalin expected, and whether that other paradigm of revolutionary insight Molotov agreed with him, neither that view, nor your support of it constitutes Marxism; contains a shred of Marxist analysis-- which is supposed to have something to do with class struggle, conflicts between means and relations of production, and actions of the working class to take power.You're free to look at his March 1939 Central Committee speech on the (then) impending World War, which should be quite sufficient for you: http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1939/03/10.htm

Whatever anyone expected, the fact was that the working class had suffered tremendous defeats in China, Germany, Spain, FranceWe've already touched upon the right-wing revisionism in the CCP and the two lines of the PCE, along with the German issue.

As for France, see: http://ml-review.ca/aml/CommunistLeague/PopularFrontFranceSpain_Final.htm

Hoxha criticized the pre and post-war PCF in his work Eurocommunism is Anti-Communism (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hoxha/works/euroco/env2-2.htm).

The French Communist Party played a primary role in the creation of the Popular Front in France. It launched the slogan of the Popular Front at its Congress of Nantes in 1935, a slogan which quickly found an echo among the broad masses of the French people. The Comintern made a high valuation of the efforts and work of the French Communist Party for the creation of the Popular Front. However, it must be said that the party did not know how or was unable to take advantage of the situation and utilize it in favour of the working class....

The leader of the Popular Front government was a socialist, and the socialists made up a large part of the government, but the government apparatus at the centre and the base remained what it was. The army remained "la grande muette". It was commanded, just as under all former governments, by the reactionary caste of officers trained at the bourgeois military schools for the purpose of suppressing the French people and occupying colonies, but not fighting fascism and reaction.

The French Communist Party did not carry its actions through to the end, it was not organized for real struggle against fascism and reaction. The propaganda and agitation, the demonstrations and strikes it led, were not on the line of the seizure of power from the hands of the bourgeoisie. Irrespective of the fact that the basic principles of Marxism-Leninism were not denied, the activity and struggle of that party unwittingly and unconsciously assumed the nature of the struggle for reforms, for economic demands on the trade-union level. Of course, the trade-unions, play a revolutionary role when they are under correct leadership and a revolutionary situation is created in them, otherwise the trade-union movement is turned into a routine concocted by the trade-union chiefs through stands which are sometimes correct, sometimes deviationist, sometimes liberal, sometimes opportunist, but which, in the final analysis, end up in fruitless talks and compromises with the employers.

Zeus the Moose

9th July 2010, 07:23

i wonder if they were the only ones

According to the Wikis (so take with a grain of salt, perhaps) a leader of the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party accused the Soviet Union of being "Red Imperialists," and publicly attacked Stalin. This was while the man (Peljidiin Genden) was the prime minister of Mongolia, which was allied to the Soviet Union: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peljidiin_Genden

S.Artesian

9th July 2010, 13:04

The Soviet economy stagnated into the 1980's, it was clearly dependent upon finding new markets to survive owing to the inefficient "reformed" economy of Khrushchev and onwards.

Yes, it stagnated in the 1980's. Finding new markets? New markets for what, exports? What exports?New markets to supply domestic needs? The stagnation of the fSU's economy-- beginning in the 1970s, continuing through the 1980s is a subject worthy of close examination. Once you begin that examination, you'll discover that finding external "new markets" had nothing to do with that stagnation, and was not a factor in determining foreign or economic policy.

It shot "Stalinists" and condemned "Stalinism" throughout the 1950's and 60's, and ended socialist construction through various state-capitalist reforms in the same period, which were extended in the 70's (e.g. ability of Soviet managers to set wages and fire workers, etc.) There were obvious problems in Soviet society that made such a revisionist coup possible, of course, but this doesn't change the fact that it happened.Condemning Stalinism does not in itself achieve power for a counterrevolutionary class. Interesting that you mention the obvious problems in Soviet society, but if we're talking about counterrevolution and a transformation from "socialism" to "state capitalism" we need a bit more analysis than "obvious problems" and a "revisionist coup." We need a class analysis, explaining how a formerly socialist society without antagonistic classes can become a state capitalist society with antagonistic classes. We need to locate the point or organization for that emerging counter-revolutionary class in the mode of social accumulation itself-- we need to see a nascent state capitalism in the very heart of socialist accumulation, in the pre-existing socialist relations of labor and property. And that Marx2Mao stuff doesn't come close.

Generally defending the Soviet social-imperialist aggression in Afghanistan is a trademark of Brezhnevites and most Trots. The fact that you condemn the social-imperialist analysis shows that you're an apologist for the state-capitalist regime and its puppet states.Yes, I condemn the social imperialist analysis because whenever it's used it's used to avoid explaining how such social imperialism germinates from a supposedly socialist mode of accumulation. Disagreeing with you version of this evasion doesn't make me a supporter of any regime and its puppet states, except in your mind.

Recently released documents from the fSU, recording discussions in the executive organs of the fSU regarding actions to be taken in Afghanistan show reluctance and "anxiety" about entering Afghanistan with no consideration of "new markets." A very interesting paper was published and I think the link was posted right here on revleft. Unfortunately I don't have that link with me [I'm in Paris now- away from my home in NYC]. If somebody has that link, I'd appreciate it's reposting.

Now right, certainly the leadership could have been unaware of why it was doing what it was doing, unaware of the economics behind the decision, but you would think you would find some mention of the "benefits" to be gained, economically, from the venture into Afghanistan. You don't.

You're free to look at his March 1939 Central Committee speech on the (then) impending World War, which should be quite sufficient for you: http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1939/03/10.htm Sure will. Actually I think I have read that awhile ago. Like I said, self-deluding idiocy, but I'll review it in case I missed something.

Ismail

9th July 2010, 14:57

Yes, it stagnated in the 1980's. Finding new markets? New markets for what, exports? What exports?New markets to supply domestic needs?New markets to gain raw material and general resources.

Condemning Stalinism does not in itself achieve power for a counterrevolutionary class.It does, unfortunately, when the Party is structured in a way in which a 'palace coup' could lead to a whole different leadership taking power.

Here's another work (from Albania) on the subject of state-capitalism in the USSR: http://www.revolutionarydemocracy.org/albind/socalb2.htm

We need a class analysis, explaining how a formerly socialist society without antagonistic classes can become a state capitalist society with antagonistic classes.Because it was the revisionists who chose to restore the capitalist economy and create a new Soviet bourgeoisie, which Bland's work noted.

We need to locate the point or organization for that emerging counter-revolutionary class in the mode of social accumulation itself-- we need to see a nascent state capitalism in the very heart of socialist accumulation, in the pre-existing socialist relations of labor and property.It was because under Lenin and Stalin many relations to production and between persons were, as Grover Furr once put it, were a "'reformed' version of capitalist relationships," one which made it easy for an alienated intelligentsia to develop, among other things.

There was always a tendency, then, for a "nascent state capitalism" since Lenin because of how Soviet society was structured. After all, you certainly seem to believe that there was a sort of "nascent Stalinism," no?

Yes, I condemn the social imperialist analysis because whenever it's used it's used to avoid explaining how such social imperialism germinates from a supposedly socialist mode of accumulation.Obviously by the time Czechoslovakia was invaded, Cuba was turned into a neo-colony, Afghanistan was brutally invaded, the wars for resource exploitation in Angola and Mozambique were carried out, etc., the Soviet economy had ceased to be socialist.

Disagreeing with you version of this evasion doesn't make me a supporter of any regime and its puppet states, except in your mind.Defending the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan makes you an apologist in the same way one defending anti-immigration policies to "protect American workers" or whatever makes you an apologist for reactionary policies. The USSR by the 1970's was not progressive. At all.

Recently released documents from the fSU, recording discussions in the executive organs of the fSU regarding actions to be taken in Afghanistan show reluctance and "anxiety" about entering Afghanistan with no consideration of "new markets."Yes, people like Andropov made it very clear that if they entered they would have to face a people's war against Soviet tanks, and the Soviet puppet government in Afghanistan under Taraki was pleading for the Soviets to enter because they had no chance of ever retaining their hold on power.

See: http://publishing.cdlib.org/ucpressebooks/view?docId=ft7b69p12h&chunk.id=appd&toc.depth=1&toc.id=&brand=eschol

That they were "anxious," however, proves nothing. There were quite a few "anxious" persons in the US who opposed entering Iraq, too.

In the end, the primary concern of the Soviet social-imperialists in Afghanistan was to secure a total puppet government (Amin, who actually wanted to build up ties with other states, obviously didn't cut it so he had to be shot in mockery of the "treaties" he signed with the Soviets which were used to send in the tanks) which would be subservient to the aims of Moscow and would serve as a secure base to influence matters in Iran and Pakistan. Economic benefits were seen as quite possible (hence geological surveys to try to find materials), and those who advocated the Soviets moving in didn't expect huge, financially crippling resistance anyway.

S.Artesian

9th July 2010, 15:12

Defending the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan makes you an apologist in the same way one defending anti-immigration policies to "protect American workers" or whatever makes you an apologist for reactionary policies. The USSR by the 1970's was not progressive. At all.

I have yet to make a single statement defending the Soviet incursion into Afghanistan. I have rejected your notion as being anti-Marxist, that the invasion was economically necessary for the logic of Soviet accumulation.

Secondly, you're not now accusing of me of defending anti-immigration policies, are you.. because after making that analogy and saying "one defending anti-immigration policies" you flip to "makes you an apologist for reactionary policies."

You might want to tighten up your reading, comprehension, and replies to people otherwise the discussion becomes pointless.

Or maybe you don't.

ComradeOm

9th July 2010, 15:35

Imperialism is not a geo-strategic formation. It is an economic organization of capital. Where is the underlying determining need of accumulation in the fSU propelling it across the globe to aggrandize sources of accumulation? Reading meters does not qualifyWhile I'm not going to necessarily condone the theory that the USSR invaded Afghanistan for its mineral wealth, I may have an idea or two on the second half of your quote. Just some thoughts...

Prior to 1953 the capital employed in the construction of Soviet industry was raised from within the country itself. Most infamously this came from 'squeezing' the peasantry - by extracting grain at virtually no cost to the state and selling it on, at profit, to the urban sectors - but also from the likes of the MVD's industrial empire and the suppression of the proletariat's real wages. This coercive economy was effectively wound up in the post-Stalin period as the state sought to raise living standards and invest in agriculture. This introduced rising costs and reduced the scope for capital accumulation. Increased sales on the world market would have compensated to a degree for this economic shift but it does make sense that the USSR should develop imperialist tendencies to alleviate these new economic tensions at home

RED DAVE

9th July 2010, 15:59

Ismail

9th July 2010, 18:41

I have yet to make a single statement defending the Soviet incursion into Afghanistan.You seem to enjoy painting it as if the Soviets had no choice in the matter.

Secondly, you're not now accusing of me of defending anti-immigration policies, are you.. because after making that analogy and saying "one defending anti-immigration policies" you flip to "makes you an apologist for reactionary policies."I am not accusing you of defending anti-immigration policies, I am saying that a defense of the Soviet invasion under the claim that it was "better" or "more progressive" than alternatives objectively produces a reactionary argument. Perhaps connecting the two was a bad move, but you yourself seem to have reading comprehension problems.

And now we have another quasi-Brezhnevite Trotskyist, ComradeOm:

... but also from the likes of the MVD's industrial empire...The gulag system was not a huge economic boom to the Soviet economy of the 1930's (especially since the Great Purges tended to target managers, the intelligentsia, and others who were more valuable doing qualified jobs than digging dirt and such), as Robert W. Thurston notes in Life and Terror in Stalin's Russia.

Furthermore, by 1953 the gulags were simply unprofitable and were on their way towards disintegration. See The Economics of Forced Labor: The Soviet Gulag (http://www.hooverpress.org/productdetails.cfm?PC=1026) by a source no less anti-communist than the Hoover Institution.

S.Artesian

9th July 2010, 19:28

And now we have another quasi-Brezhnevite Trotskyist,

OK, quasi-Brezhnevite Trostskyist? That's a stretch, I mean I not contact with actual social reality is only a random occurrence with unreconstructed know-nothing Stalinists but quasi-Brezhnevite Trotskyist is requires a degree of disavowal of reality that is a stretch even for them.

As for this:

You seem to enjoy painting it as if the Soviets had no choice in the matter.

You're the one arguing that the Soviets had no choice, that they were compelled by economic reasons to enter Afghanistan-- that it was the need for markets and raw materials that compelled the fSU to enter. That's what imperialism is, an economic compulsion-- but then clearly you have no understanding of Marxist analysis of class and class relations.

Ismail

10th July 2010, 08:22

OK, quasi-Brezhnevite Trostskyist? That's a stretch, I mean I not contact with actual social reality is only a random occurrence with unreconstructed know-nothing Stalinists but quasi-Brezhnevite Trotskyist is requires a degree of disavowal of reality that is a stretch even for them.Trotskyism, Maoism, and Brezhnevism go together quite nicely. Whether it be the Workers World Party, the Sparts, the RCPUSA, or other examples, these three ideologies often mix and match, whether it be infantile condemnations of "dogmatism," defense/apologism of Soviet social-imperialism and post-Stalin revisionism (a trademark of most Trotskyists, and obviously of Brezhnevites), and a number of other issues. Coincidentally, all of these can be united in condemning Enver Hoxha for his supposed "sectarianism," "dogmatism," etc.

You're the one arguing that the Soviets had no choice, that they were compelled by economic reasons to enter Afghanistan-- that it was the need for markets and raw materials that compelled the fSU to enter. That's what imperialism is, an economic compulsion-- but then clearly you have no understanding of Marxist analysis of class and class relations.Spoken like a true Brezhnevite. I've already noted that the Soviets had an economic interest in Afghanistan, and they most certainly had a geo-strategic interest which is also a component part of imperialism (otherwise one could speculate why the US would, say, invade Grenada and support coup attempts in the Seychelles in the late 1970's). The Soviets were attempting to establish an imperialist foothold in an attempt to sway events in Iran and to put pressure on Pakistan (which was opposed to the Indians, who were pro-Soviet).

The Soviets had a choice: they could have, as Hoxha did and as actual Afghan Marxist-Leninists (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shola-y-Jaweid) did, condemned the PDPA regime and called on all workers to resist it. Instead they propped up by brutal military occupation an unpopular government that came to power via military coup, not a popular revolution.

ComradeOm

10th July 2010, 12:54

Furthermore, by 1953 the gulags were simply unprofitable and were on their way towards disintegration. See The Economics of Forced Labor: The Soviet Gulag (http://www.hooverpress.org/productdetails.cfm?PC=1026) by a source no less anti-communist than the Hoover Institution.Well yes, there was no real objection to their final closure because it was so patently obvious that the system was failing and needed reform. It was Stalin's intransigence that had held this up. The same can be said for the rest of the economy - the new emphasis on living standards and consumer goods post-'53 was first pushed by Malenkov*, not Khrushchev, and readily accepted by the rest of the party leadership

*Ironically Khrushchev would later publicly criticise Malenkov for exactly this in '55

RED DAVE

10th July 2010, 13:06

Trotskyism, Maoism, and Brezhnevism go together quite nicely. Whether it be the Workers World Party, the Sparts, the RCPUSA, or other examples, these three ideologies often mix and match, whether it be infantile condemnations of "dogmatism," defense/apologism of Soviet social-imperialism and post-Stalin revisionism (a trademark of most Trotskyists, and obviously of Brezhnevites), and a number of other issues. Coincidentally, all of these can be united in condemning Enver Hoxha for his supposed "sectarianism," "dogmatism," etc.Someone here needs to study some history instead of mouthing off. I love it how you lump together two tendencies that support bureacracy and state capitalism and one that opposes it.

RED DAVE

Ismail

10th July 2010, 21:52

Someone here needs to study some history instead of mouthing off. I love it how you lump together two tendencies that support bureacracy and state capitalism and one that opposes it.

RED DAVEAs Getty noted in Origins of the Great Purges, workers in the USSR during the 1930's often accused bureaucratic managers of Trotskyism and denounced them thusly, which is no doubt maddening information for a Trot.

Of course the idea of lumping in Trotsky with Mao seems a bit strange to an orthodox Trotskyist (even though Trotskyist-Maoist cooperation in the past and in the present is notable), but then again Brezhnevites recoil when the fact that Brezhnev was little different from Khrushchev is noted, ditto with Andropov (who was at least the smartest of the three).

RED DAVE

10th July 2010, 22:02

As Getty noted in Origins of the Great Purges, workers in the USSR during the 1930's often accused bureaucratic managers of Trotskyism and denounced them thusly, which is no doubt maddening information for a Trot.If it would piss off the bureaucrats, I'd call them Lenin's stepsons.

Of course the idea of lumping in Trotsky with Mao seems a bit strange to an orthodox TrotskyistI would say so (although I'm not an orthodox trot.

(even though Trotskyist-Maoist cooperation in the past and in the present is notable)Sure. On a critical basis, left cooperation is necessary. I will say, though, that every time I've been involved with Maoists, I ended up having surgery for the removal of a sharp, pointed object from my back.

but then again Brezhnevites recoil when the fact that Brezhnev was little different from Khrushchev is noted, ditto with Andropov (who was at least the smartest of the three).State capitalists of a feather, hang together.

RED DAVE

Zanthorus

10th July 2010, 22:05

State capitalists of a feather, hang together.

You know he's going to just throw that right back at you, since he considers both Trotskyists and Maoists as defenders of state-capitalism.

RED DAVE

10th July 2010, 22:27

State capitalists of a feather, hang together.
You know he's going to just throw that right back at you, since he considers both Trotskyists and Maoists as defenders of state-capitalism.As to Maoists, he's correct. And I would imagine that certain orthotrot groups, in the defense of the USSR, ended up as defenders of state capitalism, but I'm not up on the minutia the Trotskyist sects these days.

RED DAVE

chegitz guevara

11th July 2010, 01:38

Ignoring the fact that Gramsci supported Stalin of course.

Let's keep in mind Gramsci was in prison during the period when Stalin was in power, not really in a position to carefully examine both sides of the argument.

Barry Lyndon

11th July 2010, 08:20

Ismail:
Everything the USSR did under the divinity Josef Stalin did was good, and everything the USSR did after his death was evil. See, Enver Hoxha said so: [Post quote].

Ismail

11th July 2010, 09:00

Ismail:
Everything the USSR did under the divinity Josef Stalin did was good, and everything the USSR did after his death was evil. See, Enver Hoxha said so: [Post quote].I don't consider restoring capitalism, pursuing a social-imperialist policy in foreign affairs, turning Eastern Europe into vassal states, collaborating with US imperialism, and pursuing an overall reactionary policy both internally and across the whole world to be positive examples of emulation in the USSR post-Stalin, nor do I consider the offspring of Soviet revisionism in Cuba, Angola, Mozambique, South Yemen, etc. to have been good, either.

Then again, you've actually referred to the Second Spanish Republic as being "socialist" before, as you have claimed the same with the Paris Commune (which Marx himself said was not socialist (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1881/letters/81_02_22.htm)), so I don't expect you to be particularly informed on anything beyond simplistic apologism for Soviet reaction and in being a tankie.

In a similar vein I don't see how one could support the Chinese, who defended reactionary anti-communists like Pinochet and Mobutu, and who advocated allying with the US against the Soviets.

Nothing Human Is Alien

11th July 2010, 09:03

collaborating with US imperialism

http://phobos.ramapo.edu/%7Etheed/Cold_War/b_Stalin_era/b_Yalta/Images/FDR_Stalin.jpg

Ismail

11th July 2010, 09:09

Maoists (particularly of the "Mao was a saint" variety like MIM—though they tended to say "It's better than Molotov-Ribbentrop") point to Stalin working with FDR and Churchill to defeat Fascism as equivocal with Mao meeting with Nixon, so it isn't surprising to see a Brezhnevite-Trot like you pull the same stunt.

"At the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in February, 1956... Khrushchev made it clear that he was prepared to give up international class struggle... reassuring capitalist governments by emphasising 'peaceful transition to socialism' or the Parliamentary road as the only correct line for communist parties everywhere...

The 'creative development of Marxism-Leninism' which Khrushchev was advancing was simply the division of the world into Soviet and American spheres of influence... 'Then', Khrushchev was to say, 'if any mad man wanted war, we, the two strongest countries in the world, would have but to shake our fingers to warn him off' ... Khrushchev was going to use the Soviet Union's nuclear capacity to get in on the act. That this was the case was demonstrated later on when Albania's opposition to the Khrushchev line prompted the threat from Kozlov, a member of the Central Committee of the Soviet Party, that 'either the Albanians will accept peaceful co-existence or an atom bomb from the imperialists will turn Albania into a heap of ashes and leave no Albanian alive'."
(William Ash. Pickaxe and Rifle: The Story of the Albanian People. London: Howard Baker Press Ltd. 1974. pp. 183-184.)

rednordman

11th July 2010, 09:32

[QUOTE=Fly Pan Dulce;1796624]As others have mentioned, the Stalinists parties failed to promote socialist revolution. Instead, they allowed Hitler to come to power[QUOTE]Im sorry but exactly how did the 'stalinists' allow hitler to come to power? Im confused.

Ismail

11th July 2010, 11:33

As others have mentioned, the Stalinists parties failed to promote socialist revolution. Instead, they allowed Hitler to come to powerIm sorry but exactly how did the 'stalinists' allow hitler to come to power? Im confused.They "allowed Hitler to come to power" because they had the audacity to note the vacillating nature of the German social-democrats and their right-wing, anti-communist line. Ive already responded to the argument (see bottom of this post (http://www.revleft.com/vb/trotskyists-t138207/index.html?p=1796639#post1796639)).

chegitz guevara

11th July 2010, 16:20

As others have mentioned, the Stalinists parties failed to promote socialist revolution. Instead, they allowed Hitler to come to powerIm sorry but exactly how did the 'stalinists' allow hitler to come to power? Im confused.

At first, the Comintern did not truly appreciate the danger of fascism in Germany. Instead, they concentrated their attacks on the social democrats, calling them "social fascists" saying that they were the true danger. Even after the Nazis won the plurality in 1932, and Hitler was appointed Chancellor a year later, the KPD was under the illusions that the Nazis were a flash in the pan. "After Hitler, us," thinking that the Nazis would fail and the German masses would turn to the Communists.

They might have been right too, as even the Nazis noted in their analysis of the elections that half of their vote was a protest vote. Of course, only idiots should have expected the Nazis to play fair.

Fietsketting

11th July 2010, 17:16

Are you saying the USSR didn't support international socialism ?? That's kinda strange. Just look at all the socialist regimes that emerged and sustained themselves with Soviet assistance.

Yeah, look at Spain. Nice touch on the regime part.
http://http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/40/Communist_countries.PNG

Die Neue Zeit

12th July 2010, 05:58

It doesn't matter what you call it, but the issue never was socialism in one country, because the socialist relations of production were never on either Trotsky's or Stalin's or Lenin's agenda once the civil war started. Lenin was entranced with "soviets plus electrification equals socialism" except in his enthusiasm he forgot about that "soviets" part as the Bolsheviks took upon themselves that authority, putting an end to the soviets.

The issue was one of building SIOC or abject defeatism and submission to foreign investment. Building <> Achieving.

Die Neue Zeit

12th July 2010, 06:05

Prior to 1953 the capital employed in the construction of Soviet industry was raised from within the country itself. Most infamously this came from 'squeezing' the peasantry - by extracting grain at virtually no cost to the state and selling it on, at profit, to the urban sectors - but also from the likes of the MVD's industrial empire and the suppression of the proletariat's real wages. This coercive economy was effectively wound up in the post-Stalin period as the state sought to raise living standards and invest in agriculture. This introduced rising costs and reduced the scope for capital accumulation.

This is a structural change which typical Trotskyists (as opposed to post-Trots) can't understand: the end of "socialist primitive accumulation."

Furthermore, by 1953 the gulags were simply unprofitable and were on their way towards disintegration. See The Economics of Forced Labor: The Soviet Gulag (http://www.hooverpress.org/productdetails.cfm?PC=1026) by a source no less anti-communist than the Hoover Institution.

Stalin's Wars is a more credible source, in that the late Stalin regime itself was planning to dismantle the gulag system. The problem, of course, is that it wasn't Stalin who personally wanted to end this, but the folks running the Council of Ministers and freeing their boss to hold his kitchen cabinet meetings. The other means to end "socialist primitive accumulation" were simply not considered until his death, so "Stalinism" as being bureaucratic continuity from Stalin to Brezhnev is ridiculous.

The Ben G

12th July 2010, 06:13

Saorsa

12th July 2010, 06:50

Socialism in one country will just collapse on itself, as shown in the past. Whether it be by external forces or internal forces, eventually it will collapse. A Dictatorship or Capitalism will either be retained under the banner of Socialism, as shown in the USSR, Albania, China, etc.

Yeah... so we might as well just give up ae. It's hopeless. Unless revolution can rapidly sweep the entire globe, it is inevitable that it will fail. So those people in Nepal, and India, and Latin America and so on might as well stop wasting their time because they're gonna lose, no matter what they try or what they do.

We know this because a white European leftist told us so and those stupid backward brown people are totally incapable of holding out against imperialism unless the white workers come to their aid.

S.Artesian

12th July 2010, 10:08

The issue was one of building SIOC or abject defeatism and submission to foreign investment. Building <> Achieving.

No, that never was the issue either. That, again, is a stalking horse. The issue facing the fSU was what social relations of production could support economic development, and what social relations could in turn be supported by economic development.

Building socialism means building socialist relations of production. Certainly that requires a certain technical level of development, which the fSU lacked.

Not just Trotsky, but all the Bolsheviks [almost all] were a bit too predisposed by the "administrative side of things," to paraphrase Lenin's characterization of Trotsky. Somewhere in all their struggles, almost all the Bolsheviks forgot that socialism is a social relation of production, of living labor, not a quantity of accumulated past labor.

The question was, and was always, how can agricultural productivity be improved to provide greater surplus to support industrial expansion, when the domestic industry itself is not capable of reciprocally supporting improved agricultural productivity?

The debates that rage in the fSU from 1919 through 1928 have nothing to do with "socialism" in one country but everything to do with Russia's relations with the world markets-- when the world markets have trumped the world revolution as the "mediation" for Russia's internal economic conundrum.

Does that make the fSU in this period "state capitalist"? Let's recall that Lenin said state capitalism would have been an improvement for what Russia really was at the close of its civil war-- a petty-producer state. Of course, in all it's policies for development-- from NEP on, the state acted as an analogue for capitalism-- different historical origin, serving a similar function [that doesn't make the bureaucrats, administrators of that state a class]. Absent, or even with, the international revolution, there was no alternative to this analogous functioning.

The truth that puts the lie to "SIOC" is that the first 5 year plan relied on twin "anti-socialism in one country" mechanisms-- one being dramatic lowering of consumption levels to support 'primitive accumulation,' the other being imports of capital goods from the advanced capitalist countries.

The issues in the debates were never abject defeatism and "submission to foreign investment." Those weren't the issues when Sokolnikov was convinced, and convincing others, of the "opening" to the west; that wasn't the issue when Bukharin was urging the peasants to enrich themselves; that was not the issue when Trotsky was arguing for the introduction of "productivity coefficients" to measure the efficiency of Russian industry, allocate resources, and determine prices.

Nobody was arguing for, nor did their arguments contain defeatism and "submission to foreign capital."

Die Neue Zeit

12th July 2010, 14:04

Lyev

12th July 2010, 14:27

Yeah... so we might as well just give up ae. It's hopeless. Unless revolution can rapidly sweep the entire globe, it is inevitable that it will fail. So those people in Nepal, and India, and Latin America and so on might as well stop wasting their time because they're gonna lose, no matter what they try or what they do.

We know this because a white European leftist told us so and those stupid backward brown people are totally incapable of holding out against imperialism unless the white workers come to their aid.Oh so being against SIOC = racism? Nice one!

Zanthorus

12th July 2010, 14:42

We know this because a white European leftist told us so and those stupid backward brown people are totally incapable of holding out against imperialism unless the white workers come to their aid.

Following this line of reasoning through we could say that Marxism as a whole is a racist ideology since it holds that in Renaissance europe a social formation sprung up which was superior to all previous social formations. Obviously when Marx and Engels said that capitalism had a great civilising effect they were justifying eurocentrism and white privilege.

Oh well, I guess we should all abandon communism and go find some ideology to help support the heroic "anti-imperialists" in third world countries in their quest to industrialise. It wouldn't be much different from what we have now anyway except we'd just be throwing off all the "Marxist" rhetoric.

Saorsa

12th July 2010, 15:25

Following this line of reasoning through we could say that Marxism as a whole is a racist ideology since it holds that in Renaissance europe a social formation sprung up which was superior to all previous social formations. Obviously when Marx and Engels said that capitalism had a great civilising effect they were justifying eurocentrism and white privilege

I know this will be a difficult concept for you to grasp, but believe it or not the world has actually changes a tiny wee bit since then.

Oh so being against SIOC = racism? Nice one!

It's more deterministic, idealistic, inevitablistic, pessimistic and defeatist than racist.

Seriously, this is such a ridiculous line to draw. This false debate is being imagined into existence between the SIOC camp and the heroic world revolution camp opposed to it. As if the debate is really between people who want socialism to stay in one country, and people who want it to sweep the world.

There is no 'pro-world revolution' camp. All Marxists support world revolution. And if you support the idea of the working class and the peasantry seizing political and social power in one country if that is the only area where conditions have ripened to the point where that's immediately possible... then you support socialism in one country.

Socialism is the transitionary period between capitalism and communism in which the working class and its allies exercise a dictatorship over those who seek to overthrow it. You're all talking as if socialism is some kind of fixed, static society that compared to capitalism is like black as to white. That's not how it works. The new society comes into the world covered in the blood and crap of the previous society, and it takes time and struggle to clean it up.

I see no reason whatsoever why, following a succesful revolutionary seizure of power by the oppressed, the oppressed cannot construct a system in which they can exercise control over society indefinitely until the revolution spreads. Yes, it will be hard. Yes, all attempts to do it so far have been defeated. But that doesn't make it impossible. The Trotskyist conception of SIOC is a fundamentally defeatist and deterministic concept, one that says an isolated country that has a revolution will inevitably experience a counter-revolution. I've seen a lot of dogma and assertion to back this up, but nothing in the way of definitive concrete proof. In fact I don't think you can 'prove' an assertion like that.

What the hysteria about SIOC really offers is an easy, convenient explanation for why socialism was destroyed in the USSR and elsewhere. Rather than accepting that this is an incredibly difficult question which requires study in order to arrive at a tentative answer... rather than accepting that it's not actually possibly to definitively say in advance how we can prevent capitalist restoration.... Trots and those like them operate in the realm of pure, convenient theory, saying that the reason the Russian revolution was eventually defeated is that the revolution didn't spread making this defeat inevitable.

Zanthorus

12th July 2010, 17:41

I know this will be a difficult concept for you to grasp, but believe it or not the world has actually changes a tiny wee bit since then.

Indeed. Capitalism as a system has spread across the Globe and transcended the boundaries of any one nation state creating a world-market and and international division of labour making it impossible for any single country to escape it's grip. This only increases the validity of the case that Engels made against socialism in one country in The Principles of Communism.

Socialism is the transitionary period between capitalism and communism in which the working class and its allies exercise a dictatorship over those who seek to overthrow it.

And this is where we differ.

Lyev

12th July 2010, 18:32

The fundmentals tenants that underlie Trotskyism.Determinism, idealism, defeatism and pessimism are what originally drew me towards Trotsky's line of thought, yes. And you're quite right when you say criticism without positing a better alternative is "meaningless", hence why Trotsky spent a while formulating "permanent revolution", as a counter-tendency to SIOC. And to say that Trotsky et al were all "country-revolutionary" anyway is poppycock. The Opposition had wide support; the central committees of the mass-based parties in Poland and France protested against the attacks on Trotsky. Anyway, on the subject, in his own words (emphasis mine):
In the event of a decisive victory of the revolution, power will pass into the hands of that class which plays a leading role in the struggle - in other words, into the hands of the proletariat... The political domination of the proletariat is incompatible with its economic enslavement. No matter under what political flag the proletariat has come to power, it is obliged to take the path of socialist policy.

[...]

Should the Russian proletariat find itself in power..., it will encounter the organized hostility of world reaction, and on the other hand will find a readiness on the part of the world proletariat to give organized support... It will have no alternative but to link the fate of its political rule, and, hence, the fate of the whole Russian revolution, with the fate of the socialist revolution in Europe.Following the defeat of the Spartacists in Germany in 1919 the immediate possibility of revolution quickly "spreading" became less and less tangible. So the bureaucratic clique sat down and decided to start building socialism "at a snail's pace", in Bukharin's words. The same quotes seem to be dug up every time a debate concerning SIOC appears, but I'll dig them out anyway. With the threat of imperialist invasion ever-looming, why on earth did the regime start preparing for long-term isolation and entrenchment? A prerequisite for the socialist transition is utilizing to their utmost the most advanced productive forces. As Marx said:
...this development of productive forces... is an absolutely necessary practical premise [of socialism] 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 yet Stalin time and time again claims that "socialism" is achievable within national boundaries.
If we knew in advance that we are not equal to the task [of building socialism in Russia by itself], then why the devil did we have to make the October revolution? If we have managed for eight years, why should we not manage in the ninth, tenth or fortieth year?
The party always took as its starting point the idea that the victory of socialism in one country means the possibility to build socialism in that country, and that this task can be accomplished with the forces of a singly country!
...we are capable of completely building a socialist society by our own efforts and without the victory of the revolution in the West, but that, by itself alone, our country cannot guarantee itself against encroachments by international capital—for that the victory of the revolution in several Western countries is needed. The possibility of completely building socialism in our country is one thing, the possibility of guaranteeing our country against encroachments by international capital is another.Stalin thought there was "no need to inject the international factor into our [Russia's] socialist development." One of the main qualms I have Stalin and co.'s analysis is that they perceived military intervention as the only threat to the development of socialism. Following this, a monopoly on foreign trade was established, without consideration of the USSR's relationship with other capitalist powers, on the whole, in the world economy. Whilst this was a valuable tool for defence, it clearly highlighted Soviet dependence on the world economy, and its relative weakness in productive forces, next to the western developed capitalist countries. Hence why the Left Opposition tried to fight for a much quicker development of industry, and modernisation at a much greater rate. As Trotsky wrote:
Marxism takes its point of departure from world economy, not as a sum of national parts but as a mighty and independent reality which has been created by the international division of labor and the world market, and which in our epoch imperiously dominates the national markets. The productive forces of capitalist society have long ago outgrown the national boundaries. The imperialist war (of 1914-1918) was one of the expressions of this fact. In respect of the technique of production, socialist society must represent a stage higher than capitalism. To aim at building a nationally isolated socialist society means, in spite of all passing successes, to pull the productive forces backward even as compared with capitalism. To attempt, regardless of the geographical, cultural and historical conditions of the country’s development, which constitutes a part of the world unity, to realize a shut-off proportionality of all branches of economy within a national framework, means to pursue a reactionary utopia.I'll also add that if we conclude that socialism is, indeed, suitable in one country, and re-orientate production to develop "at a snail's pace", then this can only lead to defencist policies, as regards Soviet foreign policy in relation to the international proletarian movement on the whole. Building for socialism in this defensive way, in Russia alone, with the bureaucrats crossing their fingers against foreign intervention leads to "a collaborationist policy toward the foreign bourgeoisie with the object of averting intervention", as Trotsky said. Just one example of this is the Soviet Union joining the League of Nations, which in Bolshevik party program, drafted at the 1919 Congress by Lenin "will direct its future efforts to the suppression of revolutionary movements." I think that just about covers everything, I'll come back to this later. There's also the matter of the nationalist sentiment stirred up by SIOC, especially when it was adopted as the official policy of the Comintern. It was used to justify the Soviet dominance in the worldwide movement, and their role as "leaders" of the international proletariat.

S.Artesian

12th July 2010, 20:38

Care to explain, then, to explain Lenin's "steps toward socialism"?

Could Karl Kautsky - the ‘pope’ turned ‘renegade’ of orthodox Marxism - have influenced Vladimir Ilych’s ‘April theses’? (http://www.revleft.com/vb/prospects-russian-revolution-t126942/index.html)

If that' directed to me, actually I don't. More than happy to discuss the real content of the debates that consumed the Bolsheviks in after the seizure of power. Not at all interested in who influenced whom.

Saorsa

13th July 2010, 01:31

'Permanent revolution' is an extremely vague concept, and not one that Trotsky can even claim credit for.

If we knew in advance that we are not equal to the task [of building socialism in Russia by itself], then why the devil did we have to make the October revolution? If we have managed for eight years, why should we not manage in the ninth, tenth or fortieth year?

This is a valid question, one that I've asked myself and have not yet received an answer for. If there is a single country in which revolutionary forces have developed the strength to topple the ruling class and build a system in which the oppressed hold power, what should they do? The logical conclusion of the Trotskyist line of thought is that unless there is a revolutionary situation around the world they shouldn't bother. After all, it is *inevitable* that their revolution will be defeated. Why should they bother? What's the point?

History shows us clearly that even in times of great revolutionary upheaval, revolutions tend to only succeed in one or a few isolated countries at a time. The task in front of us is to figure out how to help the revolution survive in an isolated country while hastening and awaiting the spread of the revolution overseas.

It's not enough to just say unless the revolution spreads it's inevitably doomed and leave it at that. That offers you a seemingly satisfactory explanation for what went wrong in the USSR, but it's not a constructive position. You can't spread a revolution around the world through willpower! We need to study the question of what went wrong in the 20th century revolutions a lot more deeply than the usual Trotskyist analysis goes.

Lyev

13th July 2010, 02:02

'Permanent revolution' is an extremely vague concept, and not one that Trotsky can even claim credit for.

This is a valid question, one that I've asked myself and have not yet received an answer for. If there is a single country in which revolutionary forces have developed the strength to topple the ruling class and build a system in which the oppressed hold power, what should they do? The logical conclusion of the Trotskyist line of thought is that unless there is a revolutionary situation around the world they shouldn't bother. After all, it is *inevitable* that their revolution will be defeated. Why should they bother? What's the point?

History shows us clearly that even in times of great revolutionary upheaval, revolutions tend to only succeed in one or a few isolated countries at a time. The task in front of us is to figure out how to help the revolution survive in an isolated country while hastening and awaiting the spread of the revolution overseas.

It's not enough to just say unless the revolution spreads it's inevitably doomed and leave it at that. That offers you a seemingly satisfactory explanation for what went wrong in the USSR, but it's not a constructive position. You can't spread a revolution around the world through willpower! We need to study the question of what went wrong in the 20th century revolutions a lot more deeply than the usual Trotskyist analysis goes.I'm not sure you read my post? The qualm I have isn't directly with the socialism existing in one country, or committed revolutionaries trying to build socialism whilst the revolution hasn't spread, it's with "socialism in one country", as expounded by Stalin, Bukharin et al. Firstly, after the revolution failed to "spread", after things went pear-shaped in Germany, the ruling bureaucracy in Russia entrenched themselves in for the long haul, with the intention of building socialism "at a snail's pace", rather than industrialize and modernize at a faster pace to keep up with the leading capitalist powers. At the time, there didn't seem to be much of a conception of the Soviet relations to the world economy on a whole. Russia isolated itself: Stalin bluntly insisted that there was "no need to inject the international factor into our socialist development." Russia, with it's domination of Comintern as a tool for defence of the interests of Soviet national policy, knowingly or not, began to sever its interests with that of the global proletariat movement.

As Trotsky (rightly so, in my opinion) pointed out, this mindset and policy only had one end to it's nationalist route. He said building socialism in isolation, in this defencist manner could only lead to "a collaborationist policy toward the foreign bourgeoisie with the object of averting intervention." This was demonstrated in the example I gave of the Soviet Union's inauguration into the League of Nations, whereby the bureaucratic clique chose to side with the national bourgeoisie, of foreign capitalist countries, rather than serve the interests of the international proletarian movement on a whole. Of the League of Nations Lenin remarked, in the draft program of the 1919 Congress, that it "will direct its future efforts to the suppression of revolutionary movements." Do you see what I'm getting at? "Socialism in one country" --> isolationism, defencism, autarky, "snail's pace" --> subordination of international proletariat in favour of immediate Soviet national interests.

Die Neue Zeit

13th July 2010, 03:02

I'm not sure you read my post? The qualm I have isn't directly with the socialism existing in one country, or committed revolutionaries trying to build socialism whilst the revolution hasn't spread, it's with "socialism in one country", as expounded by Stalin, Bukharin et al. Firstly, after the revolution failed to "spread", after things went pear-shaped in Germany, the ruling bureaucracy in Russia entrenched themselves in for the long haul, with the intention of building socialism "at a snail's pace", rather than industrialize and modernize at a faster pace to keep up with the leading capitalist powers.

I think you've got the wrong policies there. Rapid industrialization and modernization in a single country could have fitted into an overall program of Kautsky's / Lenin's "steps toward socialism" or Third-Periodist "building socialism in one country." This was exactly the policy that Stalin pursued, but it could only come from "socialist primitive accumulation."

Lyev

13th July 2010, 10:31

I think you've got the wrong policies there. Rapid industrialization and modernization in a single country could have fitted into an overall program of Kautsky's / Lenin's "steps toward socialism" or Third-Periodist "building socialism in one country." This was exactly the policy that Stalin pursued, but it could only come from "socialist primitive accumulation."Yes, when I want to say so many things, I find myself tripping over my words somewhat. The Left Opposition, Trotsky included, put forward "socialist primitive accumulation" as a solver to the "scissors" problem, and to help modernization on the whole. It was a policy which as far I know Stalin initially opposed, but then he later adopted with enthusiasm and vigour. Obviously the "snail's pace" quickly abandoned with the news of the impending Second World War, but the bureaucracy still had Soviet autarky as a goal, I think.

S.Artesian

13th July 2010, 11:34

Yes, when I want to say so many things, I find myself tripping over my words somewhat. The Left Opposition, Trotsky included, put forward "socialist primitive accumulation" as a solver to the "scissors" problem, and to help modernization on the whole. It was a policy which as far I know Stalin initially opposed, but then he later adopted with enthusiasm and vigour. Obviously the "snail's pace" quickly abandoned with the news of the impending Second World War, but the bureaucracy still had Soviet autarky as a goal, I think.

Actually, Trotsky did not put forward "socialist primitive accumulation." Preobrazhensky did, and Trotsky was a bit wary of that formulation. Moreover, socialist primitive accumulation was not designed to resolve the scissors problem, but to take advantage of it, to institutionalized the scissor as the mechanism for primitive socialist accumulation. The "resolution" was in how far the scissor was allowed to open, and for how long the scissor maintained that degree of opening.

Stalin did not always oppose socialist primitive accumulation. He actually embraces it [although refrains from calling it that], I believe in or around 1926 and Preobrazhensky leaves the left opposition to reintegrate himself with Stalin's apparatus.

"Snail's pace" is falling by the wayside the same time and Bukharin recoils in horror while Stalin is lining up the cross-hairs of his bureaucratic rifle. Snail's pace was gone long before WW2. Let's not reproduce the error others make, award such foresight to the center, or right, facts of the bureaucracy. They acted out of the political moment, not the long term.

See Richard B. Day's treatment [which is far better than either Trotsky's or Deutscher's] in Leon Trotsky and the Politics of Economic Isolation.

ComradeOm

13th July 2010, 12:49

Stalin did not always oppose socialist primitive accumulation. He actually embraces it [although refrains from calling it that], I believe in or around 1926 and Preobrazhensky leaves the left opposition to reintegrate himself with Stalin's apparatus1929 I believe. Which ultimately led to the sickening sight of Preobrazhensky 'confessing' all before the 17th C Congress...

You know that my chief error consisted in... elaborating the law of primitive socialist accumulation... I thought that by exploiting the peasants, by concentrating the resources of the peasant economy in the hands of the state, one could build a socialist industry and develop industrialisation... Events totally disproved my ideas, and those prognoses triumphed which Lenin made and which the party made reality under the leadership of Comrade Stalin... You know that neither Marx nor Engels, who wrote a great deal about the problems of socialism in the village, had any definite idea about how this transformation would come about. You know that Engels thought that this would be a fairly lengthy evolutionary process. In this question what was needed was the greater far-sightedness of Comrade Stalin, his great courage in the formulation of new tasks, the greatest hardness in carrying them out, and the deepest understanding of the epoch and of the relationship of class forces(Quoted in Nove's Economic History of the USSR)

It would be funny if it wasn't so tragic. Of course the USSR hadn't undertaken "primitive socialist accumulation" and of course Stalin had trumped the blinkered vision of Marx and Engels. All Preobrazhensky's ideas were entirely discredited by the later, um, "concentration of the resources of the peasant economy in the hands of the state" *cough*. The audience must have gotten the point... if it wasn't swooning to the praise of Stalin's wisdom and "hardness". Preobrazhensky was executed three years later

Die Neue Zeit

13th July 2010, 13:51

Yes it did. It's just that "socialist primitive accumulation" took on a form well beyond that of merely extracting surplus value from the peasants: depressing real wages of workers (and even managers) and the gulag, both of which were scrapped by the "revisionists."

Moreover, socialist primitive accumulation was not designed to resolve the scissors problem, but to take advantage of it, to institutionalized the scissor as the mechanism for primitive socialist accumulation. The "resolution" was in how far the scissor was allowed to open, and for how long the scissor maintained that degree of opening.

The Depression closed whatever opening the scissors presented, and so collectivization (both wrong kolkhozization and right sovkhozization) meant selling as much as possible food to the abroad at albeit bulk prices.

the bureaucracy still had Soviet autarky as a goal, I think

They were still not self-sufficient in food production. Lots of "Anti-Revisionists" here will say that the Soviets pursued specialization in the satellite states, specifically that they should become new bread baskets (look at the lack of kolkhozization let alone sovkhozization in Poland and Hungary :glare: ).

Really, the goal of the COMECON as a whole should have been self sufficiency and greater political integration, even if it resulted in tiny Albania being a bread basket, East Germany being an industrial powerhouse, or Bulgaria and Mongolia becoming Soviet republics.

S.Artesian

13th July 2010, 20:42

Yes it did. It's just that "socialist primitive accumulation" took on a form well beyond that of merely extracting surplus value from the peasants: depressing real wages of workers (and even managers) and the gulag, both of which were scrapped by the "revisionists."

"Yes, it did"??? What did what? PSA resolved the scissors crisis? No, it didn't as agricultural productivity in the fSU remained far below that of the advanced capitalist countries

The Depression closed whatever opening the scissors presented, and so collectivization (both wrong kolkhozization and right sovkhozization) meant selling as much as possible food to the abroad at albeit bulk prices..

Really? Don't have all my sources with me [spending 2 months in Paris. Call me Mr. Pitiful], but what were the volumes and the value of USSR imports and exports in the second 5 year plan? Capital imports in the 2nd plan were way down compared to the 1st plan, don't recall about grain exports.

Relatively speaking, after the chaos of the 1st plan, the 2nd plan registered some real gains in workers compensation [not just wages] and consumption.

They were still not self-sufficient in food production. Lots of "Anti-Revisionists" here will say that the Soviets pursued specialization in the satellite states, specifically that they should become new bread baskets (look at the lack of kolkhozization let alone sovkhozization in Poland and Hungary :glare: ).

Really, the goal of the COMECON as a whole should have been self sufficiency and greater political integration, even if it resulted in tiny Albania being a bread basket, East Germany being an industrial powerhouse, or Bulgaria and Mongolia becoming Soviet republics.

There is no such thing as self-sufficiency in food production. That's the point, and maybe, in the last analysis, the whole point to international revolution. No way technological development could be sufficient even on the an expanded SSR concept to support the social relations of production necessary to eliminate scarcity.

It's all about relations between city and countryside.

Lyev

14th July 2010, 03:43

Actually, Trotsky did not put forward "socialist primitive accumulation."
The proletariat . . . is compelled to embark upon a phase which may be described as that of primitive socialist accumulation. We cannot content ourselves with using our pre-1914 industrial plant. This has been destroyed and must be reconstructed step by step by way of a colossal exertion on the part of our labour force.What's your opinions on this then? And on the "snail's pace", my knowledge of that is a bit patchy, which is probably reflected in the jumbled-up manner of my thoughts, but the point regarding the isolation and "defencism", still stands for the most part. As I said, the interests of international proletariat seemed to become subordinate to the immediate interests of the Soviet Union on a purely national level.

Die Neue Zeit

14th July 2010, 04:23

"Yes, it did"??? What did what? PSA resolved the scissors crisis? No, it didn't as agricultural productivity in the fSU remained far below that of the advanced capitalist countries

My reply was to ComradeOm's assertion that Stalin didn't pursue PSA. He did.

Really? Don't have all my sources with me [spending 2 months in Paris. Call me Mr. Pitiful], but what were the volumes and the value of USSR imports and exports in the second 5 year plan? Capital imports in the 2nd plan were way down compared to the 1st plan, don't recall about grain exports.

Relatively speaking, after the chaos of the 1st plan, the 2nd plan registered some real gains in workers compensation [not just wages] and consumption.

Well, any real gains in worker compensation and consumption started from a low base. Also:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five-Year_Plans_for_the_National_Economy_of_the_Soviet_ Union#The_Second_Plan.2C_1933.E2.80.931937

The sum total of The Second Five-Year Plan was a deterioration of the standard of living because the focus of "planners' preferences" replaced consumer preferences in the country's economy, with an emphasis on military goods and heavy industry, so that is what the economy provided. This resulted in a much lower quality and quantity of available consumer goods.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five-Year_Plans_for_the_National_Economy_of_the_Soviet_ Union#The_Third_Plan.2C_1938.E2.80.931941

As war approached, more resources were put into developing armaments, tanks and weapons.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five-Year_Plans_for_the_National_Economy_of_the_Soviet_ Union#The_Fourth_and_Fifth_Plans.2C_1946.E2.80.931 950_and_1951.E2.80.931955

After the Second World War, the emphasis was on reconstruction, and Stalin in 1945 promised that the USSR would be the leading industrial power by 1960.

[...]

By 1947, food rationing had ended, but agricultural production was barely above the 1940 level by 1952. However, industrial production in 1952 was nearly double the 1941 level.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five-Year_Plans_for_the_National_Economy_of_the_Soviet_ Union#The_Sixth_Plan.2C_1956.E2.80.931960

Some of Khrushchev's policies included nationalization, the Virgin Lands Campaign, creation of a minimum wage and the production of consumer goods which raised the living standards of the Russians in return.

And:

There is no such thing as self-sufficiency in food production. That's the point, and maybe, in the last analysis, the whole point to international revolution. No way technological development could be sufficient even on the an expanded SSR concept to support the social relations of production necessary to eliminate scarcity.

You're repeating Malthus's line on food and population. There just needs to be as much consensus as possible on the the required staple and making sure the average staple meets or exceeds this. Besides, why is there all the talk of wasted food and food overproduction along with mass hunger if there really is a food shortage globally?

Today, for example, I see the whole European continent as being self-sufficient in food production.

S.Artesian

14th July 2010, 08:52

You're repeating Malthus's line on food and population. There just needs to be as much consensus as possible on the the required staple and making sure the average staple meets or exceeds this. Besides, why is there all the talk of wasted food and food overproduction along with mass hunger if there really is a food shortage globally?

Today, for example, I see the whole European continent as being self-sufficient in food production.

WTF? Malthus' "line" is not about self-sufficiency or international development. His line is about maintaining scarcity. Europe is not "self-sufficient" in food production, neither is the US even though the US runs a balance of trade surplus in it agricultural sector.

The US imports billions of dollars worth of food annually. Is that because the US is following the Malthus line? Of course not, it is because capital is capital and everywhere seeks a profit.

Malthus' line is that productivity cannot overcome scarcity. Marx's "line" which I think I'm reiterating is that productivity certainly can and does overcome scarcity, but that such productivity cannot be achieved in "one country" or "one trading bloc."

The social relations of production will drive the advance or inhibition of productivity

ComradeOm

14th July 2010, 11:59

Yes it didSarcasm

PSA resolved the scissors crisis? No, it didn't as agricultural productivity in the fSU remained far below that of the advanced capitalist countriesActually PSA - a new buzzword but what the hell - resolved the scissors crisis in that it made it irrelevant. The entire purpose of collective farms (and the 'Urals-Siberian method') was to forcibly extract the maximum amount of grain at the minimum cost - hence there was no need to balance the prices of industrial and agricultural goods. This scissors crisis was a feature of the NEP and not the Stalinist economy. The trade-off being that there was absolutely no incentive to increase agricultural production in the future

Relatively speaking, after the chaos of the 1st plan, the 2nd plan registered some real gains in workers compensation [not just wages] and consumptionThe key word being 'relatively'. During the period of the 2YP living standards slowly climbed out from the hole into which they had been plunged during the first. As I detailed here (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1780465&postcount=21), daily calorie consumption in 1939, and indeed 1953, still remained well below NEP levels. It was not until the post-1953 period that there was a real and sustained improvement in Soviet living standards

S.Artesian

14th July 2010, 12:26

Sarcasm

Actually PSA - a new buzzword but what the hell - resolved the scissors crisis in that it made it irrelevant. The entire purpose of collective farms (and the 'Urals-Siberian method') was to forcibly extract the maximum amount of grain at the minimum cost - hence there was no need to balance the prices of industrial and agricultural goods. This scissors crisis was a feature of the NEP and not the Stalinist economy. The trade-off being that there was absolutely no incentive to increase agricultural production in the future

I agree with that, except I don't think that the "ultra" method was what Preobrazhensky had in mind, or what Trotsky cautiously endorsed with the PSA.

The key word being 'relatively'. During the period of the 2YP living standards slowly climbed out from the hole into which they had been plunged during the first. As I detailed here (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1780465&postcount=21), daily calorie consumption in 1939, and indeed 1953, still remained well below NEP levels. It was not until the post-1953 period that there was a real and sustained improvement in Soviet living standards

Agree again. Nothing concerns me more than actually agreeing with people.

ComradeOm

14th July 2010, 13:39

I agree with that, except I don't think that the "ultra" method was what Preobrazhensky had in mind, or what Trotsky cautiously endorsed with the PSACorrect, and this is why I'm somewhat wary of talk of 'PSA'. Its also what Preobrazhensky was talking about in that quote above. The core of Preobrazhensky's theories of primitive socialist accumulation - "concentrating the resources of the peasant economy in the hands of the state" - were carried out but he never advocated the shock of collectivisation. Hence the rather pointed reference to Engels' belief in "a fairly lengthy evolutionary process"

Die Neue Zeit

14th July 2010, 14:22

I'm reiterating is that productivity certainly can and does overcome scarcity, but that such productivity cannot be achieved in "one country" or "one trading bloc."

Then you're definitely a defeatist by opposing the construction of socialist production in a sufficiently large (if not necessarily global) trading bloc.

Europe is not "self-sufficient" in food production, neither is the US even though the US runs a balance of trade surplus in its agricultural sector.

Even without the trade surplus, the US can redistribute its food production to eliminate hunger amongst its poor people. The EU subsidizes its agriculture so it can compete at an advantage against imported food.

Malthus' "line" is not about self-sufficiency or international development. His line is about maintaining scarcity.

His line was that population growth was exponential while food production growth was linear. You are asserting his line that even large trading blocs aren't self-sufficient in food.

The US imports billions of dollars worth of food annually.

Let's go back to Ricardo on specialization, shall we? Rice can't grow in every single arable area. Only some areas can grow rice. Where a particular country can't grow sufficient rice, it has to import. Where those areas can grow rice better than some other crop, rice should be grown. Repeat with grain and wheat, and go further down the list to olives, which are grown in the Mediterranean more than anywhere else for a climate reason or two.

[Something Hoxhaists can't get re. a "self-sufficient" Albania :glare: ]

S.Artesian

14th July 2010, 14:41

Then you're definitely a defeatist by opposing the construction of socialist production in a sufficiently large (if not necessarily global) trading bloc.

Geez, do you reflect on anything before you respond or just make it up as you go along. I said earlier in this thread this argument about defeatism and SOIC is a stalking horse, as is the assertion that anybody was opposd to construction of "socialist production" in any country or trading bloc.

The point was what social relations of production were going to be developed to sustain and be sustained by the different proposals then and now.

It's utopian horseshit to think that the very same social relations that were maintained by the bureaucracy could or would have been suddenly transformed into relations where the workers in the Comecon countries would have been able to organize production across borders for the use of all, for the elimination of scarcity.

It's anti-historical moralizing to argue that the bureaucrats, wedded to organization of social relations of production that excluded the proletariat from doing that, would somehow have a collective epiphany and be able to, in and of itself as a bureaucracy, decide on establishing such cross-border collective rationality.

That's the point.

The other point is that it always tickles me to see , how the positions of the pro-Stalin forces and the ardent social-democratic pro-Kautsky forces merge and reinforce each other. There's more to popular frontism than just the popular front.

It's ignorant pandering to think that the US can or will redirect its food production towards the satisfaction of its "internal needs," through a "national revolution" isolating itself from the world market. That sort of pandering leads to jingoist, anti-immigration, anti-internationalist reaction.

Take a real close look at US agriculture and just try and figure the time and the disruption that will be incurred in shifting production to satisfaction of internal needs.

Even for the most advanced of the advanced countries, international exchange is essential for maximizing productivity, for rational development of production, for eliminating scarcity.

Again, that doesn't mean everybody waits for everybody to have a revolution before anybody has a revolution. It does mean "economic" policies cannot be divorced from the critical social relation, and the preliminary essential social relation is the expansion of the revolution to its global stage.