What Is Workers Control?

[Die Neue Zeit]

It's been awhile since I read Brinton's work on the Bolsheviks and "workers control," but I can't help think that perhaps they indeed thought of "control" in the limited terms within management thinking:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Control_(management)


Control is one of the managerial functions like planning, organizing, staffing and directing... Control in management means[:]

- Setting performance standards.
- Measurement of actual performance.
- Comparing actual performance with standards.
- Analysing deviations.
- Correcting deviations.

Is "workers control" still useful today? Would something like "workers authority" or some other term be better?

[Revolutionair]

I don't think there is anything wrong with the term 'workers' control', as long as you don't limit the term to its traditional meaning in the management sense.

[syndicat]

"control" has too limited a meaning. it's often used to merely checking or negotiating with management. "workers self-management" is a stronger term because it says workers collectively and democraticly have the power over the decisions in the workplace, not subject to any managerial hierarchy.

[bricolage]

Seeing as DNZ referred to Brinton, in the Solidarity introduction to 'The Bolsheviks and Workers' Control' a clear distinction is made between control and management, clearly in favour of the latter and has been said highlighting the limited nature of the former;


Two possible situations come to mind. In one the working class (the collective producer) takes all the fundamental decisions. It does so directly, through organisms of its own choice with which it identifies itself completely or which it feels it can totally dominate (Factory Committees, Workers' Councils, etc.). These bodies, composed of elected and revocable delegates probably federate on a regional and national basis. They decide (allowing the maximum possible autonomy for local units) what to produce, how to produce it. at what cost to produce it, at whose cost to produce it. The other possible situation is one in which these fundamental decisions are taken 'elsewhere'. 'from the outside', i.e. by the State, by the Party, or by some other organism without deep and direct roots in the productive process itself. The 'separation of the producers from the means of production' (the basis of all class society) is maintained. The oppressive effects of this type of arrangement soon manifest themselves. This happens whatever the revolutionary good intentions of the agency in question, and whatever provisions it may (or may not) make for policy decisions to be submitted from time to time for ratification or amendment.

There are words to describe these two states of affairs. To manage is to initiate the decisions oneself. as a sovereign person or collectively, in full knowledge of all the relevant facts. To control is to supervise, inspect or check decisions initiated by others. 'Control' implies a limitation of sovereignty or, at best, a state of duality of power, wherein some people determine the objectives while others see that the appropriate means are used to achieve them. Historically, controversies about workers control have tended to break out precisely in such conditions of economic dual power.

Like all forms of dual power, economic dual power is essentially unstable. It will evolve into a consolidation of bureaucratic power (with the working class exerting less and less of the control). Or it will evolve into workers' management. with the working class taking over all managerial functions. Since 1961, when 'Solidarity' started advocating 'workers' management of production others have begun to call for 'workers' direct control', 'workers' full control', etc. - so many tacit admissions of the inadequacy (or at least ambiguity) of previous formulations.

[Die Neue Zeit]

"control" has too limited a meaning. it's often used to merely checking or negotiating with management. "workers self-management" is a stronger term because it says workers collectively and democraticly have the power over the decisions in the workplace, not subject to any managerial hierarchy.

But there have been left-com issues with "self-management," haven't there? :confused:

And does "workers authority" necessarily imply a managerial hierarchy?

[ZeroNowhere]

A truly collectivist firm would set it's own principles and distribute waged based on labor given into production + surplus labor. Therefore, in a Anarchist economy the Labor theory of value is proven, not this marginalist bullshit.
You would do well to look into what the labour theory of value is.

[syndicat]

But there have been left-com issues with "self-management," haven't there?

certain marxists misconstrue workers self-management as implying autonomous firms in a market economy, which doesn't logically follow.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

Arguably, the issue is deeper - doesn't the putting-into-practice of communism problematize the organization of work itself?
That is, shouldn't getting-shit-done happen not within the alienated sphere of "the workplace" but within the self-organization of "the commune"?
Er ... in other words ... shouldn't existing structures/organization of production be called in to question of in and of themselves? Why the hell do we need capitalism's factories and networks for living communism? Shouldn't our immediate practice shape our coming communities, rather than the imposition of forms that are ... well, honestly, so compatible with existing social organization?
I mean, fuck, have y'all ever seen Parecon type shit in action? Not trying to dis folks' projects in self-management, but it's not the qualitative break that I'm looking for, y'know?

[∞]

You would do well to look into what the labour theory of value is.

What did I say that isn't LTV?

Shit...posted on the wrong thread T_T

[RED DAVE]

This discussion began in a discussion of the current politics and polices of the UCPN(M), the Maoist party in Nepa,l but wandered across the border into China. It can be seen that this question is far from academic as it involves, among other questions who is and who is not a Marxist and who is or is not a valid ally in the fight for socialism.


Cheng [of the CPC] is a market socialist, I am not one, but I view market socialism as having been and still being being a valid tendancy in the socialist movement.
What you are saying is that a system that involves the exploitation of workers by the state, which I would call state capitalism, is a "valid tendency in the socialist movement." I'd love to see what their trade union policy is.
Obviously, otherwise you exclude 95 percent of the historical socialist movement.
Obviously, otherwise you exclude 95 percent of the historical socialist movement.
Yeah, well, up to a certain point of time, the mistakes of Stalinism/Maoism, were understandable. But in this day and age, to call market socialism a valid Marxist position, is dubious.

It's time to understand that any system not based on workers control of industry, bottom to top, is not socialism.
well that is something to try and persuade people of, but there is lots of room for argument on what workers control is.
That's true, but what it's not is anything that existed in the USSR post-1928, China post-1949, Eastern Europe post-1948 or Vietnam post-1975.RED DAVE

[red cat]

So, what is workers' control and how is it to be implemented ? How will we conclude how much workers' control a given system has ?

[RED DAVE]

So, what is workers' control[?]Has this little item really escaped you in your Marxist education?

Workers control is that economic condition where the working class controls the economy of a country from the bottom to the top. This means that on every level, from the workplace to the whatever regional, national and international organs are built, the working class is in control.


[A]nd how is it to be implemented?it will be implemented in the process of revolution. The working class will set up institutions of defense and control during the revolution, they are generally called "councils" or "soviets." There are the basis of workers control. The working class will expand them from the workplace upwards as the revolution spreads to win the world.


How will we conclude how much workers' control a given system has ?We will see, concretely, who is actually making the actual, day-to-day decisions from the workplace on up.

The lie is given to the USSR and Chinese systems by the fact that workers control barely took place in the USSR, and was displaced by bureaucratic control, and was never established in China.

RED DAVE

[red cat]

Has this little item really escaped you in your Marxist education?

Yes, probably because I have been really deprived of the company of Marxists as great as those I find here.



Workers control is that economic condition where the working class controls the economy of a country from the bottom to the top. This means that on every level, from the workplace to the whatever regional, national and international organs are built, the working class is in control.

it will be implemented in the process of revolution. The working class will set up institutions of defense and control during the revolution, they are generally called "councils" or "soviets." There are the basis of workers control. The working class will expand them from the workplace upwards as the revolution spreads to win the world.

We will see, concretely, who is actually making the actual, day-to-day decisions from the workplace on up.

The lie is given to the USSR and Chinese systems by the fact that workers control barely took place in the USSR, and was displaced by bureaucratic control, and was never established in China.

RED DAVEThis is too general. I am looking for a more detailed explanation. What is the structure that allows such workers control from top to bottom ? How exactly is it organized from a single factory to the national level ? What are the resultant social conditions ? How does such a society deal with military offensives by capitalist states ?

[RED DAVE]

I am looking for a more detailed explanation. What is the structure that allows such workers control from top to bottom ? How exactly is it organized from a single factory to the national level ? What are the resultant social conditions ? How does such a society deal with military offensives by capitalist states ?You are asking what are, essentially, political questions, not theoretical.

The particular structures will be decided by the working class in the process of revolution. I will try to do some research and digest thm, but in four major revolutionary efforts to take control of society and establish socialism, the Paris Commune, the Russian Revolution, in Catalonia during the Spanish Civil War and in France in '68 (these are not the only occasions , different appraoches were used. I hope others will fill in the details. Likewise, in each case, military defense was handled differently in each case.

You will have noticed, of course, that I am not considering the establishment of the "Peoples Democracy" regimes in Eastern Europe and the "New Democracy" regimes in China and Vietnam. These are not societies in which there was workers control of the economy at the bottom, the top or in the middle. Obviously, this is one of the issues we're going to discuss here.

RED DAVE

[red cat]

You are asking what are, essentially, political questions, not theoretical.

The particular structures will be decided by the working class in the process of revolution. I will try to do some research and digest thm, but in four major revolutionary efforts to take control of society and establish socialism, the Paris Commune, the Russian Revolution, in Catalonia during the Spanish Civil War and in France in '68 (these are not the only occasions , different appraoches were used. I hope others will fill in the details. Likewise, in each case, military defense was handled differently in each case.

RED DAVE

Well, such a theory remains incomplete without its political aspects. If you explain the complete structure of workers control with respect to the Paris Commune and the Spanish Resistance, then you will also have to point out whether or not these revolutions were defeated so quickly because workers control was implemented that way.

[RED DAVE]

You are asking what are, essentially, political questions, not theoretical.

The particular structures will be decided by the working class in the process of revolution. I will try to do some research and digest thm, but in four major revolutionary efforts to take control of society and establish socialism, the Paris Commune, the Russian Revolution, in Catalonia during the Spanish Civil War and in France in '68 (these are not the only occasions , different appraoches were used. I hope others will fill in the details. Likewise, in each case, military defense was handled differently in each case.

You will have noticed, of course, that I am not considering the establishment of the "Peoples Democracy" regimes in Eastern Europe and the "New Democracy" regimes in China and Vietnam. These are not societies in which there was workers control of the economy at the bottom, the top or in the middle. Obviously, this is one of the issues we're going to discuss here.
Well, such a theory remains incomplete without its political aspects. If you explain the complete structure of workers control with respect to the Paris Commune and the Spanish Resistance, then you will also have to point out whether or not these revolutions were defeated so quickly because workers control was implemented that way.What I think you are saying in a sneaky way is that the bureaucratic aspects of Stalinism/Maoism are responsible for the relatively long-term survival of these regimes. That's a hell of a claim considering the devastation of the working class movements as a result of Stalinism/Maoism leadership.

RED DAVE

[red cat]

What I think you are saying in a sneaky way is that the bureaucratic aspects of Stalinism/Maoism are responsible for the relatively long-term survival of these regimes. That's a hell of a claim considering the devastation of the working class movements as a result of Stalinism/Maoism leadership.

RED DAVE

I am asking straight-forward questions which require straight-forward answers, nothing else.

[penguinfoot]

I am asking straight-forward questions which require straight-forward answers, nothing else.

You're also asking questions which reveal your ignorance of the whole of the Marxist tradition. You're asking people to specify the exact ways in which societies should allow for workers' control and the ways those societies should defend themselves against external aggression when Marx always argued strongly against the idea that it is possible or valuable to draw up accurate blueprints of what future societies will look like, because he believed that the creation of those societies was immanent in the historical process and that alienated individuals living under capitalism could not possibly imagine the range of institutional forms and social arrangements that would come into being through the process of revolution - this is one of the main points behind his critique of the utopian socialists and is why he restricted his vision of the communist society primarily to critical analyses of capitalism.

Learn some Marx, then come back. Unless you'd like to tell us how the base areas in India are a communist society in miniature, which you keep claiming but have never proved.

[Kotze]

You're asking people to specify the exact ways in which societies should allow for workers' control and the ways those societies should defend themselves against external aggression when Marx always argued strongly against the idea that it is possible or valuable to draw up accurate blueprints of what future societies will look like, because he believed that the creation of those societies was immanent in the historical process and that alienated individuals living under capitalism could not possibly imagine the range of institutional forms and social arrangements that would come into being through the process of revolution - this is one of the main points behind his critique of the utopian socialistsTrue, but in his decision to eschew making blueprints (note the plural) he was more utopian than the utopians, not less.

[penguinfoot]

True, but in his decision to eschew making blueprints (note the plural) he was more utopian than the utopians, not less.

No, he wasn't, because the term utopian as it is used by Marx, in the sense of the definition that can best express what is significant about the various thinkers and theorists that he labels utopian in his various works, means those thinkers who believe that the project of providing detailed descriptions of the future society is a valuable endeavor, and that the provision of these descriptions will in some respects make it easier for mankind to achieve the societies they are intended to capture. From that definition it should be clear that, for Marx at least, it would be absurdly contradictory to describe him as utopian for not providing blueprints of the future society, because providing blueprints is the essence of what utopianism is. In terms of scholarly interpretation of Marx's definition and critique of utopianism I'm following Leopold here, who, as you might know, actually argues that one of the main problems with Marx's account of the utopian socialists is that his belief in historical immanency relies on the unvoiced assumption that there is a developmental plan to the historical process and that an assumption of this kind can be considered part of a Hegelian account in which history is considered to be the unfolding or increasing self-realization of some entity but is not easily reconcilable with Marx's efforts to establish a materialist account of history.

[Die Neue Zeit]

certain marxists misconstrue workers self-management as implying autonomous firms in a market economy, which doesn't logically follow.

It's the "self" part that implies autonomous firms in a market economy. A better adjective between "workers" and "management" is needed.

[Vanguard1917]

Workers' control is not a necessity for socialism because it's a nice idea, or because it's more "ethical", "morally right" or "just" that workers control production.

Workers' control and management of the means of production is necessary because without it capitalism cannot be surpassed by a more advanced system of production which can increase the productivity of labour and the socialisation of production. In order to replace with a superior system the spontaneous allocation of resources which takes place under capitalism, socialism relies on conscious planning of production. And conscious planning is impossible without the democratic decision-making of workers, since it's not possible for any elite of bureaucrats to allocate resources in a way which can abolish spontaneity and facilitate conscious planning of material forces. For the latter to be achieved, there needs to be workers' control and management "at the bottom, the top [and] in the middle", to quote Red Dave. As Lenin pointed out, socialism presupposes the existence of workers' control of the most rigorous kind:

"Until workers’ control has become a fact, until the advanced workers have organised and carried out a victorious and ruthless crusade against the violators of this control, or against those who are careless in matters of control, it will be impossible to pass from the first step (from workers’ control) to the second step towards socialism, i.e., to pass on to workers’ regulation of production."
- Lenin, 'The Immediate Tasts of the Soviet Government (1918) http://www.marxists.org/archive/leni...18/mar/x03.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1918/mar/x03.htm)

[Devrim]

certain marxists misconstrue workers self-management as implying autonomous firms in a market economy, which doesn't logically follow.

You are right it doesn't, and there certainly can't be any socialism without workers' control.

That said there are people who do take it to mean 'autonomous firms in a market economy'.


Seeing as DNZ referred to Brinton, in the Solidarity introduction to 'The Bolsheviks and Workers' Control' a clear distinction is made between control and management, clearly in favour of the latter and has been said highlighting the limited nature of the former;

As I understand it, the confusion between the two is pretty much a semantic thing in English. Other European languages have two different words to differentiate between the two concepts contained in the English word control; To exercise power over and to check, so in Russian it would have been very clear what Lenin was referring to, and that it wasn't 'workers' control' in a management or exercising power over function, but in the way it is used in the term 'quality control' as a type of checking function.


Is "workers control" still useful today? Would something like "workers authority" or some other term be better?

It isn't necessary to invent new terms for everything.

Devrim

[4 Leaf Clover]

actually we come again into concept of authority as of something that goes exclusively from top to bottom , and not in the both ways. and as of something that is not logical , except of something that is rational. worker's management means that workers control their work places. But i don't see anywhere Socialism defined as system in which workers have direct control over their means of production , and independent from other social bodies. They make decisions and have democracy in their work place , but do not yet , own it. The definition of state capitalism fails here , because whatever profit they make , they can decide over it, and what goes into state budget over trading , ends up in their own insurance and support for their family , therefore , workers don't have to cut from their wages for this cause , and are automatically not working for their bare existence

[Communist]

.

Merged two threads in Theory on this topic.
Thanks to DNZ for the note.

.

[Kotze]

My, my, penguinfoot. Yeah, nothing in Marx was utopian, because he called others utopian but not himself, therefore he wasn't. :rolleyes: I wonder what Marx would have thought of the Biblicism among his fans in the 21st century.

Here is a bit of logic for you: Something is good or bad only in relation to something else. This society can only be called good or bad in comparison to another possible society. To postpone questions about that structure, to expect masses to work in a disciplined manner towards that structure, to even risk their lifes for it, without saying what that structure could be, is not exactly a realistic approach for getting shit done. It also leaves the door wide open for leaders to fill the void with their own sick ideas of what the road to communism is.

Non-statements like "the people will find a solution" are virtually identical to the pseudo-evolutionary babble of "free-market" advocates about solutions to any problem spontaneously arising just in time. People want to know answers to basic questions. They don't ask for exact information now about the quantities of any product or service that will ever exist, but they want to know how such quantities will be determined. They don't ask for all the laws to be written down beforehand, but they want to know how laws will come into being. How will these processes work and why will these processes be better than what we have now?

Obscurantists like you don't even attempt to answer these questions. Because of that, you pose no threat to capital.

*takes bong hit*

No wait, penguinfoot was right, I mean like, can you ever, like, reeeeeaaaaaaalllllly know the future? :P

[sanpal]

You are right it doesn't, and there certainly can't be any socialism without workers' control.

[.....]

As I understand it, the confusion between the two is pretty much a semantic thing in English. Other European languages have two different words to differentiate between the two concepts contained in the English word control; To exercise power over and to check, so in Russian it would have been very clear what Lenin was referring to, and that it wasn't 'workers' control' in a management or exercising power over function, but in the way it is used in the term 'quality control' as a type of checking function.




Hm, I've tried to translate the word "control" from English into Russian language and translator gave me such meanings:

1) management, administration; (State) government;
2) authority, power;
3) supervision, inspection, check

[Devrim]

Hm, I've tried to translate the word "control" from English into Russian language and translator gave me such meanings:

1) management, administration; (State) government;
2) authority, power;
3) supervision, inspection, check


I don't speak Russian, so I am only going on something I read, and I read it about 30 years ago. I think the best way to find out if you speak Russian would be to go back to the texts written by both Lenin and the syndicalists at the time and see what terms they use.

Devrim

[Paul Cockshott]

Workers control is that economic condition where the working class controls the economy of a country from the bottom to the top. This means that on every level, from the workplace to the whatever regional, national and international organs are built, the working class is in control.

it will be implemented in the process of revolution. The working class will set up institutions of defense and control during the revolution, they are generally called "councils" or "soviets." There are the basis of workers control. The working class will expand them from the workplace upwards as the revolution spreads to win the world.

RED DAVE
This view has some problems:


It says nothing about the structure of the economy-- is it a market economy as in the Jugoslav system of workers control, or is it a planned one.
What does control amount to, since whether planned or market, the workplace is subject to external control, either by the market or by the plan.
As a political structure, it is just an expression of the victory of hope over experience. We know from history that the soviet system, when extended beyond the factory becomes a perfect vehicle for single party dictatorship because of its indirect system of election. Your proposed solution is actually the cause of the problem.

[JamesH]

You are right it doesn't, and there certainly can't be any socialism without workers' control.


I'm not sure exactly why this is. Certainly, the Soviet Union, China, Eastern Europe, etc. did not have "workers' control" in the sense that has been defined in this discussion but why deny that these nations were socialist?

[Devrim]

I'm not sure exactly why this is. Certainly, the Soviet Union, China, Eastern Europe, etc. did not have "workers' control" in the sense that has been defined in this discussion but why deny that these nations were socialist?

Perhaps because they weren't.

Devrim

[syndicat]

It's the "self" part that implies autonomous firms in a market economy. A better adjective between "workers" and "management" is needed.

this is pedantic nonsense.

people need to control decisions in so far as they are afected by them. this means that in workplaces, where there are many decisions that mainly affect, govern the activieis of, the workers, the workers need to have an organization that manages that workplace collectively, without a top-down hierarchy of bosses. if there's a top-down hierarcy of bosses (as there was in China, Russia etc), then it's not authentic worker power over that workplace. (and, contrary to Red Dave, this happened in Russia long before 1928. by 1920 workers were subordinate to management.)

it's true that there are decisions that affect people outside that workplace, such as consumers or the surrounding community (in the case of enviromental effects). so this suggests a variety of institutions of self-management. there is social self-management...control over social affairs by the mass of the people. there is control by a community over access to the environmental commons (which affects all those in that area).

but there can't be real power for the working class if workers are subordinate to a boss hierarchy where they work. this is fundamental. the advantage to the participatory planning model is that it shows how significant level of power of workers over workplace is consistent with social planning. this occurs, in that model, through local neighborhood assemblies, regional congresses/councils, etc. negotiating with worker organizations over what will be produced, with communities & regions developing plans for what they will request from production, and worker organizations developing their own plans for production, not having a plan imposed on them.

[Die Neue Zeit]

this is pedantic nonsense.

I was more much pedantic about pedantic frameworks of "control" outside this thread, but at least now you appreciate my beef with the word "control."

[Milk Sheikh]

The term 'workers control' is too abstract and vague, since there are millions of them the world over. Not all of them are going to be in control of MoP, so that leaves us with representatives. In short, workers' control should be understood to mean: workers party's control.

[ComradeOm]

As I understand it, the confusion between the two is pretty much a semantic thing in English. Other European languages have two different words to differentiate between the two concepts contained in the English word control; To exercise power over and to check, so in Russian it would have been very clear what Lenin was referring to, and that it wasn't 'workers' control' in a management or exercising power over function, but in the way it is used in the term 'quality control' as a type of checking function Specifically, IIRC, the relevant terms used are uchot (meaning control as in oversight of accounts) and vedeniye (meaning outright management of operations). In the context of Russia "workers' control" almost invariably means the former


and, contrary to Red Dave, this happened in Russia long before 1928. by 1920 workers were subordinate to managementExcept that they weren't. The role of the management board, itself often containing elected workers, in post-revolution factories (until the dismantlement of the NEP) was the coordination of operations. Beyond this the management had relatively little authority and was effectively counterbalanced by the local party cell and the factory committee. This was the treugol'nik (triangle) structure that predominated in the factories until the introduction of edinonachalie (one-man management) in the late 1920s. Lenin's calls for the latter in 1918 were roundly ignored on the ground; there remained serious fetters on managerial authority right until the end of the NEP period

This is not to say that what developed in Russia was workers' control, but the situation is infinitely more nuanced than you portray it to be. To baldly state that "by 1920 workers were subordinate to management" is false. It also raises two obvious questions which, for the sake of vanity I'll both pose and answer: 1) What system was present before 1920... real workers' control?, and 2) Why was there no reaction from a revolutionary proletariat to such an apparent enforcement of management prerogatives?

In the first case, workers' control never got off the ground to begin with, and ideas of workers' management were never on the table. Yet there were real gains made from the Revolution and, despite Lenin's call for edinonachalie, the power of the working class within the factory was massively increased. Its later emasculation during the late 1920s was only possible because there was genuine faith that the structures subverted by the Stalinists (the factory committee, the unions, the RKK, etc) were representative of worker interests. This is the answer to the second question

[RED DAVE]

The term 'workers control' is too abstract and vague, since there are millions of them the world over. Not all of them are going to be in control of MoP, so that leaves us with representatives. In short, workers' control should be understood to mean: workers party's control.Nope, that's Stalinism. Workers control means that from the workplace on up, workers make the decision. Yes, there will have to be a certain amount of delegation, but so long as the workers remain firmly in control at the base, this can be dealt with.

RED DAVE

[RED DAVE]

I don't see why [the USSR, etc., was] not [socialism]. Although these economies had many differences between them, they all had many broadly socialist programs, such as free housing, healthcare, full employment, and state ownership of most industries.Any one of these can be established by social democracy or state capitalism. What makes these things socialism is when they are coupled with workers control.


Moreover, in regards to the Soviet Union at least, there was a very different, non-market, method of surplus extraction; no longer was the appropriation of surplus value decided by the many localized battles over wages but instead through a centralized plan. I don't know what perspective you are coming from but Marx insisted that this was the main way of distinguishing between different economic forms. From Capital Vol.1 Chapter 9:

"The essential difference between the various economic forms of society, between, for instance, a society based on slave-labour, and one based on wage-labour, lies only in the mode in which this surplus-labour is in each case extracted from the actual producer, the labourer."You have missed the entire point of what Marx meant. When he talks about the "mode,' what he means is the mechanisms of extraction and how they're controlled. Under slavery, the slave has no control. Under wage-labor, the workers struggle with the capitalists for control, but the balance of power is vastly in favor of the capitalists, who control the means of production and the state.

Under socialism, the workers control the means of production: they control the extraction of surplus value from the bottom up. Anything else is not socialism.

RED DAVE

[Paul Cockshott]

yes but how? it requires plebicites on overall tax levels and broad headings of public services. This is political democracy not workers control.

[nickdlc]

yes but how? it requires plebicites on overall tax levels and broad headings of public services. This is political democracy not workers control.

It is workers control because it is workers own organisations that are making these decisions. We are assuming the communist political democracy to have been created by institutions of workers control.

I don't see why this is so hard to understand. Through workers councils, factory committees and other creations of workers control we decide:
1) what we want to create
2) under what conditions use-values will be created
3) the social prices of these use values expressed in labour hours
4) If finished use values are to be distributed by labour tokens/rationing or if they are to be distributed according to need.

This is an dynamic process just like capitalism except that production is geared toward fulfiling human needs.

[JamesH]

Any one of these can be established by social democracy or state capitalism. What makes these things socialism is when they are coupled with workers control.

You have missed the entire point of what Marx meant. When he talks about the "mode,' what he means is the mechanisms of extraction and how they're controlled. Under slavery, the slave has no control. Under wage-labor, the workers struggle with the capitalists for control, but the balance of power is vastly in favor of the capitalists, who control the means of production and the state.

Under socialism, the workers control the means of production: they control the extraction of surplus value from the bottom up. Anything else is not socialism.

RED DAVE

As Paul noted, how the mechanisms are controlled is a separate question from the mechanism itself. Marx does not say what you claim he means; he simply asserts that the mechanism itself is the way in which to categorize different economic forms. Marx would surely have envisaged a socialism where the workers controlled these mechanisms, but this does not mean a lack of control changes the economic form of society; it only alters the political form.

There is a fallacy (no offense to Paul) called "no true Scotsman," which really ought to be re-titled "no true socialism." Just because the mechanism was undemocratic in no way undermines the claim that the Soviet Union was not socialist. Would we allow the right to claim that, because capitalism is all about the freedom of the individual and limited government, since Hitler and Pinochet had highly repressive governments, they weren't in fact capitalist? In fact, since state intervention is what socialism is all about, these leaders were in fact socialist! This is sheer nonsense of course, as an analysis of the social and economic relations of Chile and Germany would show. Such claims represent an unwarranted moral intrusion on scientific political economy.

[RED DAVE]

As Paul noted, how the mechanisms are controlled is a separate question from the mechanism itself. Marx does not say what you claim he means; he simply asserts that the mechanism itself is the way in which to categorize different economic forms. Marx would surely have envisaged a socialism where the workers controlled these mechanisms, but this does not mean a lack of control changes the economic form of society; it only alters the political form.If I understand you, nonsense.

The essence of socialism is workers control. Stalinists, Maoists, etc., can muddy or piss in the water all they want but what socialism is is clear. if there is no workers control of production through institutions constructed and controlled by the working class, there is no socialism.


There is a fallacy (no offense to Paul) called "no true Scotsman," which really ought to be re-titled "no true socialism." Just because the mechanism was undemocratic in no way undermines the claim that the Soviet Union was not socialist.Of course it does. If the "mechanism" is undemocratic, then the workers do not control the economy, and it isn't socialism.


Would we allow the right to claim that, because capitalism is all about the freedom of the individual and limited government, since Hitler and Pinochet had highly repressive governments, they weren't in fact capitalist?Capitalism is about bourgeois control of production. Under Hitler, Pinochet, Mussolini or George Bush, the bourgeoisie retained control of production.

However, under socialism, since the workers can only control production as a whole through, to use your term, mechanisms, the issue of democratic control of these mechanisms is the issue of class control.


In fact, since state intervention is what socialism is all aboutStop right there! Socialism is not about state intervention. Socialism is about working class control. Whatever state exists under socialism, whatever mechanisms exist, are for the purpose of workers control. If this control does not exist, there is no socialism.

I'll go one step further here and say that the kind of state constructed by the Stalinists in Russia and the Maoists in China is, like the bourgeois states, a mechanism of class control and had nothing to do with socialism. Orthodox Trotskyism notwithstanding, it would not have been possible, through a "political revolution," revolution, for the working class to take over these states and institute, or reinstitute socialism. What could and did happen is that the private capitalist wing of the capitalist class took over these states and went on its way merrily to introduce private, as opposed to state, capitalism.


[T]hese leaders were in fact socialist! This is sheer nonsense of course, as an analysis of the social and economic relations of Chile and Germany would show. Such claims represent an unwarranted moral intrusion on scientific political economy.Of course they do. But so does your claim that China and the USSR were socialist.

If they were socialist, explain how the now-existing bourgeoisie arose under socialism and why bourgeois rule, which would be a counter-revolution, took place without the working class of these countries fighting to retain control of their socialist society.

RED DAVE

[Paul Cockshott]

Yes dave but you have to ask if it would be democratic if retired people, the disabled, home makers, farmers and members of the army and navy had no vote or representation. A constitution that only gave citizenship to employeees would not be viable.

[RED DAVE]

Yes dave but you have to ask if it would be democratic if retired people, the disabled, home makers, farmers and members of the army and navy had no vote or representation. A constitution that only gave citizenship to employeees would not be viable.Jeez what a statist you are. You need to be locked in a small room for 24 hours with a dozen teenage anarchists. Maybe you'll learn something. :D

Don't you have any concept of the dynamics of the working class?

Do you really believe that working class, numbering in the tens of millions in a major industrial country, is not going to work these things out? Do you really believe that the members of the armed forces, who will revolt and take on the remnant of the armed forces who stay loyal to the ancien regime, will not get a share in society? Do you really believe that the working class is going to disenfranchise the home workers, the older workers or the small farmers? Where do you get these chicken-shit fears?

And do you believe that all the goodies of the revolution are going to be enshrined in a constitution?

However, if we read even a paragraph from your book, Transition to 21st Century Socialism in the European Union and get an idea of what your conception of socialism is, some light is shed.


In addition we take seriously Marx's aphorism that the liberation of the working classes must be the work of the working classes themselves. this is reflected in our advocacy of direct participative democracy rather than cabinet or party government and also affects our philophy of how a transition to socialism has to take place. Instead of the old Social Dmocratic emphasis on the direct action of the state in nationalising and taking over private companies, we advocate the establishment of positive legal rights for labour. These rights will, when collectively exercised by workers, end the exploitation of labour by capital.http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/transition-to-21st-century-socialism-in-the-european-union/6443810 (Page 6)

What the fuck is being put forward here? "We advocate the establishment of positive legal rights for workers." Is this the culmination of the struggle for socialism? Some state (unspecified but presumably the bourgeois state since there is no reference to revolution and the establishment of a revolutionary workers state) is going to grant "positive legal rights to workers."

Wow.

And then, "These rights will, when collectively exercised by workers, end the exploitation of labour by capital." No social struggle. No strikes, demos, general strikes, insurrections. Just "collective expression."

Double wow.

So:

STEP 1 - Workers rights are established.

STEP 2 - Workers exercise these rights.

STEP 3 - Socialism.

No wonder, with this – I would call it some form of legalistic social democracy – you're worried about the rights of retired workers, home workers, etc. (By the way, whatever happened under this schema to the rights of repressed minorities, women, etc.) The bourgeoisie doesn't grant such rights in its constitution, so why should the workers?

Triple Wow!

RED DAVE

[JamesH]

If I understand you, nonsense.

The essence of socialism is workers control. Stalinists, Maoists, etc., can muddy or piss in the water all they want but what socialism is is clear. if there is no workers control of production through institutions constructed and controlled by the working class, there is no socialism.



If this is how you wish to define socialism, that's fine but you can't pass this off as the viewpoint of Marx. He insisted that the economic form of society determines its political form, not the other way round.

I think you are confusing the arguments that the right makes with beliefs that I hold. When the neoliberals argue that capitalism is a system based on freedom and individual choice, they are making moral arguments on the basis of the kind of societies that they wish to see; these arguments aren't based on any understanding of objective structures, forces, etc., common to the capitalist mode of production. This is similar to how modern libertarians claim that the economic crisis was not due to the free market but due to government perversions of the market ("a REAL free market wouldn't have let this happen") I assert that you are doing something similar for socialism, moving the goal posts in order to put socialism beyond the criticism of twentieth century experience. Just as capitalism can exist in both authoritarian and relatively open societies, so can socialism, I believe, exist in both democratic and undemocratic forms.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Specifically, IIRC, the relevant terms used are uchot (meaning control as in oversight of accounts) and vedeniye (meaning outright management of operations). In the context of Russia "workers' control" almost invariably means the former

With this elaboration on things, can someone please explain why even the reformist concept of co-determination isn't more radical than uchot?


The idea behind it is the so-called "Demokratisierung der Arbeitswelt" (literally: "democratisation of the working world" = "industrial democracy"), that the employees of a big company should have a say in important decisions and the general management. The problem is that the salaries of the "Aufsichtsrat" members are... quite impressive so that the representatives of the workers tend to forget who they represent, become part of the labour aristocracy and betray workers interests for "the sake of the company" = keeping their positions in the "Aufsichtsrat" and thus there salaries by coming to agreements with the capitalists. I am not completely sure since I haven't read the texts in question but I guess I know why the Trots denounce it: co-determination is "Mitbestimmung" in German, which in this context reminds of the "Mitbestimmungsgesetz" (co-determination law): Representatives of the workers and of the trade unions take part in the "Aufsichtsrat" (supervisory board) of big companies in order to supervise the management and make decisions together with the capitalists. Usually it's fifty-fifty, so if the Aufsichtsrat contains 12 members it's 6 employee representatives and 6 shareholder representatives.

[ComradeOm]

With this elaboration on things, can someone please explain why even the reformist concept of co-determination isn't more radical than uchot?Because workers' supervision is placed firmly in the context of the DOTP; that is, the 'control' is exercised through the organs of the workers' state. It must also be made clear that control, as in supervision, was not merely passive but involved aggressive worker intrusion into many areas that were formally under the jurisdiction of management. So it wasn't just capitalism with employee oversight bolted on

[Die Neue Zeit]

I don't buy that. Trotsky included the slogan "workers control" way before the slogan for nationalizing the top such-and-such for a reason. He referred to something occurring before the DOTP, under the bourgeois political power.

[RED DAVE]

The essence of socialism is workers control. Stalinists, Maoists, etc., can muddy or piss in the water all they want but what socialism is is clear. if there is no workers control of production through institutions constructed and controlled by the working class, there is no socialism.
If this is how you wish to define socialism, that's fine but you can't pass this off as the viewpoint of Marx. He insisted that the economic form of society determines its political form, not the other way round.I'll discuss this further below, but show me where Marx said this. One thing is clear about capitalism: it's economic form, the forcible extraction of surplus value an the production of commodities for exchange does not determine its political form. Capitalism has taken the forms of bourgeois democracy, military dictatorship, fascism, monarchy, social democracy, etc. All of these political forms are differentl.

And what you fail to understand is that under socialism, the economic and politics forms are fused. This is not the rule of the bourgeoisie, which retains ownership and control of its property and control of the economy whether there is a bourgeois democracy or dictatorship.

The working class controls through institutions that are political, and which it has constructed for the purpose of controlling the economy. If it loses control of those institutions, the soviets or councils, the express train away from socialism is running without a stop. Workers democracy equals socialism not because its nice, as a previous poster wrote, but because socialism is workers democratic control. Without it, something else is present: state capitalism.

You say that the "economic form determines the political form." What is the economic form of socialism but workers control of surplus value and the production of commodities for use? What form would you posit except one that is a form of workers democracy?


I think you are confusing the arguments that the right makes with beliefs that I hold.I'm not exactly sure what beliefs you hold.


When the neoliberals argue that capitalism is a system based on freedom and individual choice, they are making moral arguments on the basis of the kind of societies that they wish to see[.]Okay.


[T]hese arguments aren't based on any understanding of objective structures, forces, etc., common to the capitalist mode of production.Okay.


This is similar to how modern libertarians claim that the economic crisis was not due to the free market but due to government perversions of the market ("a REAL free market wouldn't have let this happen")[.]Okay.


I assert that you are doing something similar for socialism[.]Let's see.


[You are] moving the goal posts in order to put socialism beyond the criticism of twentieth century experience.What you're really saying is that I'm defining socialism as workers control of the economy and this is not what Stalinism or Maoism were/are. True.


Just as capitalism can exist in both authoritarian and relatively open societies, so can socialism, I believe, exist in both democratic and undemocratic forms.As I've demonstrated above, you believe wrongly about socialism. In the absence of workers democratic control, there is no socialism.

As a subsidiary question, answer this: if the USSR and China were socialist, albeit authoritarian and undemocratic, and therefore as socialism they were run for the benefit of the workers, why is it that he workers in the two largest "socialist" countries in the world accepted the "overthrow" of socialism and their replacement with a new class, with no fight back? Where was the massive civil war that should have happened when the workers state was taken away from the workers and capitalism put in its place?

RED DAVE

[penguinfoot]

And what you fail to understand is that under socialism, the economic an politics forms are fused. This is not the rule of the bourgeoisie, which retains ownership and control of its property and control of the economy whether there is a bourgeois democracy or dictatorship.

Right on. This is the most important point.

[ComradeOm]

I don't buy that. Trotsky included the slogan "workers control" way before the slogan for nationalizing the top such-and-such for a reason. He referred to something occurring before the DOTP, under the bourgeois political power.Since when did I care what Trotsky said? ;)

The practice of combining workers' control with existing capitalist management was tried, in the typical ad hoc manner, after October 1917. It did not work as both were found to be entirely incompatible. The result was the nationalisation programme brought about by strong pressure from the grassroots

[Die Neue Zeit]

Going back to my example of Mitbestimmung, it's more than just mere oversight (unless it's the restrictive Sweden):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Co-determination
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codetermination_in_Germany

Where it really rivals "workers control" is Operational Co-Determination:


Operational codetermination (Betriebliche Mitbestimmung) concerns the organisation of the business, job arrangements, personal planning, guidelines for hiring, social services, time registration and performance assessments. This is found in the Betriebsverfassungsgesetz (BetrVG, Industrial Relations Law).

The Betriebsrat or works council is the organ of operational codetermination. In the public sector it is known as the Personalrat (or staff council).


Workers committees: The workers committee has two main functions: it elects representatives to the Board of Directors and serves as an advisory body to the trade union regarding plant-level working conditions, insurance, economic assistance and related issues. The committee is elected by all the workers employed in a plant.

Thanks to the years during which a co-operative culture has been in place, management requests from workers for proposals to improve operations or increase productivity, for example, are no longer considered mere legal formalities; they represent recognition of the fact that workers play an important part in plant success. In tandem, a practical approach has evolved among both parties, with each aiming to reach decisions based on consensus. In addition, worker representatives no longer automatically reject every proposal for structural reform, increased efficiency of even layoffs; instead, they examine each suggestion from an inclusive, long-term perspective. At the core of this approach is transparency of information, such as economic data. Co-determination is thus practised at every level, from the local plant to firm headquarters.

Co-determination enjoys intractable support among Germans in principle. In practice, there are many calls for amendments to the laws in various ways. One of the main achievements seems to be that workers are more involved and have more of a voice in their workplaces, which sees a return in high productivity. Furthermore, industrial relations are more harmonious with low levels of strike actions, while better pay and conditions are secured for employees.

In a way it combines the two corporate cultures of hierarchical control and "empowerment," formalizing the latter within the framework of the former.

[syndicat]

The working class controls through institutions that are political, and which it has constructed for the purpose of controlling the economy. If it loses control of those institutions, the soviets or councils, the express train away from socialism is running without a stop. Workers democracy equals socialism not because its nice, as a previous poster wrote, but because socialism is workers democratic control. Without it, something else is present: state capitalism.



Red Dave is right. within an authentic socialism, the only socialism worth considering, political and economic power of the working class are fused. that's because there is no authentic socialism without the power of the working class, the producers, over social production and social affairs. if workers are subordinate to some managerial/bureaucratic elite, you have no socialism, but some form of class society.

because Lenin and others used "workers control" in a weaker sense than actual worker power of management over production, i prefer to say that workers self-management is a necessary condition of an authentic socialism, rather than the vaguer and weaker phrase "worker control."

[Die Neue Zeit]

A comradely criticism is in order for the EU transition document now that I'm working on issues regarding "workers control":


If unions won court actions giving employees the full value that they created, then there is a danger that some firms would attempt to close down and fire workers rather than continue in business. Thus legislation aimed at protecting the rights of labour would have to include the right, after a suitable ballot of employees, for employees to elect the majority of the board of any company.

There are at least three concerns with this “right to industrial democracy”:

1) Considering that they advocate the replacement of all elections to all political and related administrative offices with random selections, it is surprising that elections have been suggested for “industrial democracy” according to this new interpretation.

2) It should be noted that boards of directors are charged with mere oversight and some monitoring, the former of which is very different from the functions of management (planning, organizing, leading or directing, and the fourth function mislabelled "control"), the latter of which include decisions on outsourcing and layoffs.

3) Regarding the limitation of the discussion to the level of the board, this ignores issues like more grassroots-level “enforcement of the veto of the workforce against the closure of establishments which are not threatened by insolvency” – to quote the March 2010 draft party program of Die Linke.

[red cat]

Yes, probably because I have been really deprived of the company of Marxists as great as those I find here.

This is too general. I am looking for a more detailed explanation. What is the structure that allows such workers control from top to bottom ? How exactly is it organized from a single factory to the national level ? What are the resultant social conditions ? How does such a society deal with military offensives by capitalist states ?

Did I miss something or did no one answer my questions yet ?

[Communist]

.

Attempted to split the discussion which veered away from DNZ's original topic, and placed the new thread here (http://www.revleft.com/vb/split-workers-power-t145122/index.html).

.

[syndicat]

This is too general. I am looking for a more detailed explanation. What is the structure that allows such workers control from top to bottom ? How exactly is it organized from a single factory to the national level ? What are the resultant social conditions ? How does such a society deal with military offensives by capitalist states ?

power of workers over social production has to start at its base with the workers assembly...the general meeting of all the workers in a particular workplace. this is where the rank and file workers can insert themselves into the process of decision making in regard to their own work and industry, and the relations of the organized workers to society in general.

workers can't collectively self-manage production without ensuring that the decisions in production which affect primarily them are directly controlled by them.

they can of course also elect an administrative committee for purposes of coordination, ensuring that decisions are carried out. and workers can be rotated on and off such committees to ensure it does not become an entrenched bureaucracy. and the work of the delegates needs to be always brought back to the assemblies. and special committees can be set up to do research and come up with proposals on matters that are of concern to the workers.

there can also be congresses of workers delegates who are sent from the worker assemblies throughout a region, say. and here they can take up concerns that affect working people of the whole region. defense of their power over the economy is one such concern, and a militia can be organized for this purpose.

another aspect of worker control over production is to re-organize the jobs so that the work of decision-making, coordinating and conceptualization is mixed with doing the physical work, so that every worker has at least some skill and expertise, so that they can participate effectively in the general decision-making, in the workplace but also in society. this would require a major change in the way that education is organized.

but the working class doesn't just consist of those currently working, but also those who did work or would if they could, or who are retired. Moreover, workers are part of communities, and there is a legitimate sphere of decision-making that affects people in a particular community, such as the pollution of that place from local industry or the presence or absence of adequate edudation, child care, public transportation, adequate housing, etc.

there is thus a place for neighborhood assemblies, where the working class can assemble in their position as members of a particular community to also exert a control over, for example, collective consumption. what are the things that the community wants the worker organizations to produce?

a governance system directly controlled by the mass of the people can be built, then, on the basis of the assemblies in the workplaces and the neighborhoods. through regional congresses and election of coordinating committees for areas such as defense or economic coordination, it is possible to conduct defense and make other decisions that affect the entire working masses of a region.

[red cat]

Can you please elaborate on the military question ? If the enemies rapidly centralize a huge force then how are small units of workers with no central command supposed to defeat them ?

[syndicat]

well, i didn't say that a workers miliitia has no overall coordination. the overall congress of delegates for a region, or the workers of that region in some way (such as directly by assemblies), can elect a defense council, delegates who are responsible for the overall coordination of the defense effort. the work of the various worker-managed industry organizations are also important because they need to supply the people's militia.

but i personally think if this is to be a workers' militia, the officers in the various units will need to be elected, so that they have the support and trust of the people in that unit who they are directing or coordinating. in various revolutionary situations this demand of the members of a militia to elect their officers keeps coming up...the American revolution, the early days of the Russian revolution and Spanish revolution.

the militia itself needs to be directly accountable to the worker congresses of the revolutionary region. this means that the overall policies and selection of the members of the defense council lies ultimately with the working masses, discussed in the local assemblies, and with proposals brought to the congresses, and also with reports back to the base from the defense council which is responsible for the direction of the defense effort.

the workers are the ones who will be fighting and dying to defend their revolution. they need to have a real sense it is theirs, through the actual control they have over how it is carried on.

[red cat]

How can a workers militia alone hold out against an army ? They will not have matching skills in using a gun, let alone flying aircrafts or sailing warships. Moreover, sometimes the conditions of war themselves make it impossible for workers to meet and have elections. What is to be done then ?

[RED DAVE]

How can a workers militia alone hold out against an army ? They will not have matching skills in using a gun, let alone flying aircrafts or sailing warships. Moreover, sometimes the conditions of war themselves make it impossible for workers to meet and have elections. What is to be done then ?Probably can't. The "workers militia" of the future, to the extent that one is needed in the overthrow of capitalism, will come from recruitment from the armed forces themselves, even by entire units.

RED DAVE

[red cat]

Probably can't. The "workers militia" of the future, to the extent that one is needed in the overthrow of capitalism, will come from recruitment from the armed forces themselves, even by entire units.

RED DAVE

What about the overall structure of the armed forces ? How effective would they be without it against a foreign invading army and an internal resistance ?

[syndicat]

well, Red Dave is talking about a different issue. this is the question of the period of transition, where the working class movement is trying to gain control of the society. in that situation it is essential to try to get soldiers or whole sections of the army to defect. it would be unlikely for a militia formed by a workers movement in a revolutionary situation to defeat the army by itself. for example, in the Spanish revolutiion in 1936, a large part of the rank and file of the heavily armed paramilitary Republican Assault Guard went over to the side of the workers, and almost the entire navy mutinied with sailors electing ship committees and killing or arresting their officers. but then you will have the question of the control of the military forces being brought to the side of the working class alliance. in the Spanish revolution, the anarcho-syndicalist union proposed that the people's militia be controlled by a defense council formed by the unions, to ensure control of the armed forces by the organized working class.

I was talking about how the society is then organized as the workers gain control. the issue, after all, is what workers control of society means. and this means also a transformation of the army, from being a top-down, hierarchical apparatus to a more democratic body directly controlled by the mass working class democratic institutions, such as I described above. i describe this change by referring to the armed forces as a people's militia. There is no intention for it to be a permanent standing army tho it may have staff organizations that do certain things that are continuous.

Consider the Swiss defense system for example. I believe each male citizen is required to do military training and to keep a rifle or machine gun at home. Defense is based on the idea of mass mobilization of an armed people. For example, when the Germans invaded Poland in 1939, the Swiss had more than 500,000 armed men on the German border within hours.

so when i call the military forces a people's militia, I am not supposing that it has just been formed by workers and is not based on systematic training and the various kinds of weapons systems.

[red cat]

For the time being let's concentrate on a transitional period. Say, the army is almost intact and the revolutionaries have armed forces that are not powerful enough to fight it along with an external invasion. All this happening in a country with almost no industrial base, its working class mainly being from the agricultural sector. What would be the military aspects of workers control in such a situation?

[syndicat]

but it seems to me you've described a fairly hopeless situation.

let's suppose that the revolution has its base in agricultural worker unions, which have a democratic character, and village assemblies and councils that they elect. then their militia would have to be built by them in that situation, as best they can. in the situation you describe it would have to be a workers militia, built by the agricultural worker organizations. they might use guerrilla methods, harrassing enemy forces. worker control in that situation means control over the land and the farming, democratic control over their villages and some sort of regional congress structure so they can make democratic decisions, accountable to the base, about the movement and its defense effort.

if it's a party army of the sort that Communist Parties built in places like China, it will tend to be a state in embryo, and be the power base for a new bureaucratic class regime.

a more likely scenario would be for example a revolutionary process in the southern cone of South America, that develops in a number of countries, like Chile, Bolivia, Argentina, Uruguay, Brazil. this region is large, predominantly urban (70 percent live in cities), and has a wide range of resources available to it. this would put it in a stronger position as far as being able to defeat an external & internal military force. the third world has undergone a tremendous amount of industrialization and urbanization in recent years, so there aren't many places where you have an overwhelmingly agricultural lower class.

[red cat]

What if the enemy forces overrun and occupy an area in large numbers for a long time ? How will the guerrilla and militia units interact with the masses ?

Also, for having a central structure to combat concentrated attacks by enemy forces, isn't a Leninist vanguard party necessary ? If so, can workers control within the army be substituted by that of such a democratic-centralist party in times of need ?

[syndicat]

not if the aim is workers control of society. any substitutionist party-state apparatus will tend to become self-perpetuating. no bureaucratic layer gives up its power voluntarily.

[red cat]

not if the aim is workers control of society. any substitutionist party-state apparatus will tend to become self-perpetuating. no bureaucratic layer gives up its power voluntarily.

Do you mean to say that the notion of a democratic centralist or Leninist vanguard party is always inherently opposed to workers control ?

[RED DAVE]

For the time being let's concentrate on a transitional period. Say, the army is almost intact and the revolutionaries have armed forces that are not powerful enough to fight it along with an external invasion. All this happening in a country with almost no industrial base, its working class mainly being from the agricultural sector. What would be the military aspects of workers control in such a situation?Since you're really talking about Nepal here, let's examine the situation.

(1) The Maoists have built a military force that was unable to overcome the existing army. Apparently, they had little effect in trying to recruit in the army.

(2) The Maoists, while having popular support in the cities, have never helped to prepare the workers for the seizure of power. They have never called for the workers to form councils. They have view the process of seizing power as basically following the Maoist pattern of capturing the cities from without.

(3) This process having failed, the Maoists are stuck. They can't overcome the existing army, and they have failed in their duty to aid the working class to take power because they don't believe that the Nepalese working class, which is small, can really take power.

(4) Of course they have no problem the bourgeoisie in power, which is the current situation. They are engaged heavily in the process of building a capitalist government of which they will be a part. This has nothing to do with Marxism.

So, when red cat asks, "What would be the military aspects of workers control in such a situation?" what his is talking about is obscure. The "military aspects of workers control" should involve the relationship between the workers revolt in the cities and the peasant revolt in the countryside (largely situated in the military conflict).

What might have happened was that the Maoists, in the process of building their revolutionary army in the countryside, could have also worked to build a revolutionary working class structure in the cities. Then, when the military situation in the countryside became critical, the working class and the peasantry could have united.

RED DAVE

[red cat]

Since you're really talking about Nepal here, let's examine the situation.

(1) The Maoists have built a military force that was unable to overcome the existing army. Apparently, they had little effect in trying to recruit in the army.

(2) The Maoists, while having popular support in the cities, have never helped to prepare the workers for the seizure of power. They have never called for the workers to form councils. They have view the process of seizing power as basically following the Maoist pattern of capturing the cities from without.

(3) This process having failed, the Maoists are stuck. They can't overcome the existing army, and they have failed in their duty to aid the working class to take power because they don't believe that the Nepalese working class, which is small, can really take power.

(4) Of course they have no problem the bourgeoisie in power, which is the current situation.They are engaged heavily in the process of building a capitalist government of which they will be a part. This has nothing to do with Marxism.

So, when red cat asks, "What would be the military aspects of workers control in such a situation?" what his is talking about is obscure. The "military aspects of workers control" should involve the relationship between the workers revolt in the cities and the peasant revolt in the countryside (largely situated in the military conflict).

What might have happened was that the Maoists, in the process of building their revolutionary army in the countryside, could have also worked to build a revolutionary working class structure in the cities. Then, when the military situation in the countryside became critical, the working class and the peasantry could have united.

RED DAVE

No, I am not asking about Nepal here. Your post has largely nothing to do with my question. Please stick to answering the questions I ask. But thank you for writing such a lot in your very enlightening post on Nepal nevertheless .