role of the petty-bourgeoisie in revolution in advanced capitalist countries

[scarletghoul]

Came up in http://www.revleft.com/vb/useful-ideas-mao-t147998/index.html and i thought this was interesting and worth making a new thread for.


It's worthwhile understanding what the Petty-Bourgeoisie is today. More then anything it's an ideology that most the working class pertains. It's the idea that if we work hard enough we can be Bourgeois too. If I buy 200 dollar shoes and eat at 5 star restaurants, I can be high class.

Economically, the Petty-Bourgeois are those laborers who in large part, are now wage laborers themselves. The Independent Farmer, teacher, doctor, etc. is gone.
You're confusing petty-bourgeoisie for 'middle class'. They're not the same thing- a wage labourer by definition is not any kind of bourgeoisie. Teachers etc are part of the 'middle class' a bourgeois ideological term which refers to both the petty-bourgeoisie and well-paid workers whose quality of life is elevated due mostly to excess imperial wealth.

The metaphysical bourgeois definitions of class (determined by income) are not the same as the dialectical marxist definitions (determined by relations) and should not be mixed up.


There is no Social Revolution that can take place with just the traditional old working class. It will involve Students, unemployed and Petty-Bourgeois.
Students and unemployed for sure. Petty-bourgeoisie I don't think so. They are inherently liberal and are not a very big part of the population anyway. In fact they only seem important because they are the centrepiece of capitalist ideology.

We live in advanced capitalist countries, and that means capitalism has reached its limit, and that means even the petty-bourgeoisie should not be counted as a revolutionary class. If we accept the petty-bourgeoisie we can never get beyond capitalism.

[Paulappaul]

First what's the Middle Class? It's not Metaphysical. It's based on Sociological theory and on relations. The Middle Class are those workers' who basically manipulate people rather than natural resources. The Salaried Doctors, Teachers, Lawyers, Bankers, etc.

Now what is the "Petty-Bourgeois"? Traditionally the Independent Artisan, Merchant, Shop - Keepers, etc. Small Business' owners, quite frankly. Those Workers' who have the dream they are a part of the system. Those people who at work, try to be the boss and at home, try to live like the Bourgeois.

But the Classical definition doesn't stand the test of time. The Petty Bourgeois as a distinct class has been on the slow read to death. More and more, the small buiness has been destroyed by things like Starbucks and Burger King. The Petty Bourgeois remains basically a social phenomenon. As those workers' who tend to live beyond their means on purpose, to live about the Bourgeois. Economically they become more and more like wealthy Wage Laborers - i.e. the middle class.

The Petty Bourgeois is basically the Middle Class. The in between Capitalist and Proletariat. As Workers' themselves, even as managers, they fall in with the most conservative elements of the working class. That doesn't rule them out from the possibility being more revolutionary. Infact, isn't the leader of the Starbucks I.W.W. a lawyer?

[Paulappaul]

What is the Petty Bourgeois Tactics for Change and What are the Proletarian tactics for change? And what form will the former play in a Revolutionary struggle.

The transformation of society in a democratic way, the mediation of Capital and Wage labor, the Social Democracy for which Marx struggled against as parliamentary idiocy and Petty Bourgeois. In means basically working in the existing system for the transformation of Capitalism. In that respect, Anarchists like Proudhon can be seen as Petty Bourgeois, for he confined the struggle for Socialism in building cooperatives, credits unions, etc.

The Petty Bourgeois struggle is epitomized in Parties and Unions. In the two, there was a struggle in Bourgeois Society, under its own rules and regulations. Its own methods directly related to Bourgeois economics: trade and negotiate. Its own internal organization based on bureaucracy and centralism, qualities of any Bourgeois Organization. How its revolutionary elements differed from its reactionary and conservative elements, as well as from other Bourgeois parties and unions was that it was for Socialism. Or its own brand of it, Social Democracy.

And in many ways, the same can be said for the Third International Communist Parties. The Communists after all acted organizationally and tactically in precisely the same way as the Social Democrats; the only differences were in the slogans.

Proletarian Struggles in no way resemble Petty-Bourgeois organizations and struggles. They represent a distinct break in the later in that they reject Non Violence, Domestication, Authority and Bourgeois Organizations - Unions and Parties.

They are counter culture.

So where do the Middle Class, the descenders of the Petty Bourgeois stand in Proletarian Struggles? They are too exploited by Capitalism, and while they tend to be reactionary and conservative, they can be converted towards revolutionary communism. And in a revolution, they will lump themselves alongside the traditional Blue Collar Workers.

[graymouser]

First what's the Middle Class? It's not Metaphysical. It's based on Sociological theory and on relations. The Middle Class are those workers' who basically manipulate people rather than natural resources. The Salaried Doctors, Teachers, Lawyers, Bankers, etc.

Now what is the "Petty-Bourgeois"? Traditionally the Independent Artisan, Merchant, Shop - Keepers, etc. Small Business' owners, quite frankly. Those Workers' who have the dream they are a part of the system. Those people who at work, try to be the boss and at home, try to live like the Bourgeois.

But the Classical definition doesn't stand the test of time. The Petty Bourgeois as a distinct class has been on the slow read to death. More and more, the small buiness has been destroyed by things like Starbucks and Burger King. The Petty Bourgeois remains basically a social phenomenon. As those workers' who tend to live beyond their means on purpose, to live about the Bourgeois. Economically they become more and more like wealthy Wage Laborers - i.e. the middle class.

The Petty Bourgeois is basically the Middle Class. The in between Capitalist and Proletariat. As Workers' themselves, even as managers, they fall in with the most conservative elements of the working class. That doesn't rule them out from the possibility being more revolutionary. Infact, isn't the leader of the Starbucks I.W.W. a lawyer?
The classic petty-bourgeoisie includes those layers of "professionals" that you have identified as "the middle class" - the people who exist in the interstices of capitalist society, living more on their own knowledge and skills than independent resources. What is not sociological is the pseudo-class known as the "middle class" in the media and discourse of politicians: an amalgation of the classic petty bourgeois and the upper strata of the working class, plus the lower part of the detached strata of managers attached to the capitalist class, based on income.

You say that the classic petty-bourgeois is on the slow road to death, and that's exactly right. Capitalism has been slowly crushing the gaps within the production process where independent individuals can profit, but new gaps tend to emerge (and disappear) with time. There was a fascinating book put out a few years back called Windows on the Workplace by Joan Greenbaum that goes into some detail on how this process has happened, as office work has been de-professionalized and centralized and whole categories of white-collar work have been demolished. I think it all ties in with the process that Marx described in the Manifesto that these layers are constantly being proletarianized.


What is the Petty Bourgeois Tactics for Change and What are the Proletarian tactics for change? And what form will the former play in a Revolutionary struggle.

The transformation of society in a democratic way, the mediation of Capital and Wage labor, the Social Democracy for which Marx struggled against as parliamentary idiocy and Petty Bourgeois. In means basically working in the existing system for the transformation of Capitalism. In that respect, Anarchists like Proudhon can be seen as Petty Bourgeois, for he confined the struggle for Socialism in building cooperatives, credits unions, etc.

The Petty Bourgeois struggle is epitomized in Parties and Unions. In the two, there was a struggle in Bourgeois Society, under its own rules and regulations. Its own methods directly related to Bourgeois economics: trade and negotiate. Its own internal organization based on bureaucracy and centralism, qualities of any Bourgeois Organization. How its revolutionary elements differed from its reactionary and conservative elements, as well as from other Bourgeois parties and unions was that it was for Socialism. Or its own brand of it, Social Democracy.

And in many ways, the same can be said for the Third International Communist Parties. The Communists after all acted organizationally and tactically in precisely the same way as the Social Democrats; the only differences were in the slogans.

Proletarian Struggles in no way resemble Petty-Bourgeois organizations and struggles. They represent a distinct break in the later in that they reject Non Violence, Domestication, Authority and Bourgeois Organizations - Unions and Parties.

They are counter culture.

So where do the Middle Class, the descenders of the Petty Bourgeois stand in Proletarian Struggles? They are too exploited by Capitalism, and while they tend to be reactionary and conservative, they can be converted towards revolutionary communism. And in a revolution, they will lump themselves alongside the traditional Blue Collar Workers.
The above is rank nonsense; it seeks to identify the ways that the workers (who sociologically could be white or blue collar - this is a question of stratification and not of the class divide) can struggle with the "petty bourgeois." In reality the petty bourgeois do not act as a unified class, because they see their interests as being fundamentally separate. There is no such thing as a "petty bourgeois political party," because there are no unified interests among the petty bourgeois.

And unions fundamentally violate bourgeois rights every time they strike. A struck business is the sacred property of its owner, and by bringing it to a halt they actually end - if only temporarily - the process of accumulation of capital. This is precisely the form of the negation of capitalist society, and painting it as "petty bourgeois" is to put yourself outside of any movement that will ever win power.

[Paulappaul]

The above is rank nonsense; it seeks to identify the ways that the workers (who sociologically could be white or blue collar - this is a question of stratification and not of the class divide) can struggle with the "petty bourgeois." In reality the petty bourgeois do not act as a unified class, because they see their interests as being fundamentally separate. There is no such thing as a "petty bourgeois political party," because there are no unified interests among the petty bourgeois.Marx on the Petty Bourgeoisie in 18th Brumaire:

"Thus arose social-democracy. The new Montagne, the result of this combination, contained, apart from some supernumeraries from the working class and some socialist sectarians, the same elements as the old Montagne, but numerically stronger. However, in the course of development it had changed with the class that it represented. The peculiar character of social-democracy is epitomized in the fact that democratic-republican institutions are demanded as a means, not of doing away with two extremes, capital and wage labor, but of weakening their antagonism and transforming it into harmony. However different the means proposed for the attainment of this end may be, however much it may be trimmed with more or less revolutionary notions, the content remains the same. This content is the transformation of society in a democratic way, but a transformation within the bounds of the petty bourgeoisie. Only one must not get the narrow-minded notion that the petty bourgeoisie, on principle, wishes to enforce an egoistic class interest. Rather, it believes that the special conditions of its emancipation are the general conditions within whose frame alone modern society can be saved and the class struggle avoided. Just as little must one imagine that the democratic representatives are indeed all shopkeepers or enthusiastic champions of shopkeepers. According to their education and their individual position they may be as far apart as heaven and earth. What makes them representatives of the petty bourgeoisie is the fact that in their minds they do not get beyond the limits which the latter do not get beyond in life, that they are consequently driven, theoretically, to the same problems and solutions to which material interest and social position drive the latter practically. This is, in general, the relationship between the political and literary representatives of a class and the class they represent."

I'll get to more of what you said later.

[syndicat]

Going back to quote Marx is just an example of making a fetish of the Old Man, who was writing in the mid 19th century.

In the first half of the 19th century there were very large groups of self-employed immediate producers in what are now the "first world" countries. this included especially small farmers who owned (or rented) some small farm which they worked with the labor of their family, and also artisans who had some workshop where they produced things, sometimes just with their own family's labor, sometimes employing apprentices and journeymen, in the case of the more prosperous master craftsmen.

altho they were called "petit bourgeois" in classic Marxist analysis, this is misleading since "bourgeois" is the term for capitalits. and a capitalist has to hire wage workers. that's because capital is the capital/wage-labor relationship, as Marx always insisted.

so there is a fundmanental distinction between the self-employed and those who hire wage workers. the self-employed are often in practice highly dependent on big companies, especially nowadays. very often "self-employment" today is really an illusion...as with programmers hired as "consultants" by big high tech companies, for example, or allegedly "self-employed" truck drivers...who may even own their own trucks...totally dependent on some shipping company they work for (such as FedEx which uses the "self-employment" scam).

the small capitalists are those capital owners who hire some small number of workers but who must manage their own workers directly, and often do certain kinds of work done by professionals and managers at big companies, due to their small amount of capital. this is the small business or small capitalist class.

they are indeed a "class in between" the dominant capitalists, the plutocratic elite, and the working class. but there's another "class in between" -- the bureaucratic class, as I call them. this includes the various hired managers and high end professionals who are part of the system of control and planning in big companies and state agencies, such as high end accountants and lawyers and industrial engineers...and these people often work as consultants but that doesn't matter. whether they are employees or consultants is merely a legal technicality, not what defines their class position, which is based on the kind of power they have over workers and use of capital in social production.

the bureaucratic class isn't based on ownership of capital but on their organizational authority, the concentration of decision-making authority and key kinds of expertise, necessary to management of the state and large ventures. so this is another "class in between" the plutocracy (ruling class) and the working class.

but low-end professionals -- school teachers, programmers, RNs, computer sys admins, tech illustrators, librarians, ordinary newspaper reporters -- aren't part of the bureaucratic class because they have no signficant power to manage workers. their lower incomes, compared to high end professionals and middle management, also reflects the fact they are really a part of the "upper" or skilled section of the working class. in other words, they're in the same class position as the skilled trades...auto mechanics, aircraft mechanics, electricians, plumbers, tool & die makers, maintenance machinists, etc.

ranged below the "upper" section of the working class is the large mass of workers who work relatively unskilled jobs. I say "relatively" because no job is without any skill, but typically these are jobs that do not require a long period of learning such as a 2 to 4 year formal education program.

calling unions "petty bourgeois" probably is a reference to the problem of development of entrenched paid bureaucracies in unions in the post-World War 2 period, that is, in a period when workers have through struggle imposed the unions on management but don't continue as an actively mobilized force in their own right, so the union bureaucracy emerges as a separate stratum. i think of the labor bureaucracy as a particular faction of the bureaucratic class. their interests do not lead them towards a struggle for direct worker power.

but unionism is an inherently contradictory phenomenon as it straddles the class conflict, and at times there are forms of unionism that are of a more militant and grassroots nature, and potentially revolutionary. so there is nothing inherently "anti-working class" about unionism in itself. on the contrary, workers have to forge forms of unionism they control if they are to have the organizational means to advance the struggle against the dominating classes forward.

[Paulappaul]

Going back to quote Marx is just an example of making a fetish of the Old Man, who was writing in the mid 19th century.

I did so, only because graymouser was doing so. Sorta to present a contradiction to his claims to defend Marx.

[MarxistMan]

I THINK THAT THE ONLY HOPE AND LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL IN USA IS THE LOWER CLASS AND THE EXTREME POORS !!

I think that the biggest problem of USA is the middle class. The thing is that most Oligarchic-Republics like USA, Mexico, Europe, etc. have 3 major economic classes (Upper, Middle and Lower). Of the 3 major classes, 2 are oppressor, exploiter, and anti-change class, and only the lower-class like low-wage workers, the homeless, the desperate americans who can't even sleep at night because they are scared, affraid and stressed by their monthly bills, and the people who because they are so economically limited live an abnormal life, like not being able to get married, single frustrated people, the unemployed, the elderly and the americans rejected, and totally alienated from participating in the money, wealth and pleasures of America.

But like i said the upper-class like Donald Trump, Rockefellers and millionaires we all know are an oppressor class and we almost don't have physical contact with them. Because they are off-limits to the average joes.

However the real middle class (doctors, lawyers, small business owners and people who earn between 75,000 and 200,000 dollars a year) a year), and who drive luxury vehicles, who eat at Olive Garden, Charlies Restaurants, Luxury buffets, who go out to have fun to operas, who have economic security for the future of their children, and who enjoy perfect health, are also oppressors, an enemy class, and who might be nice people, friendly, and have social kills and are not personally angry and evil. But at the voting booth they are traitors, counter-revolutionaries, anti-socialism, anti-change, and pro-imperialism, pro-free markets, pro-zionism, and pro-wars, at elections, the middle class yuppies show their true colors by casting their evil votes for blue dog Rockefeller-capitalist-Democrats, and Rockefeller Rotshchilds, Zionist Republicans like Bush, Clinton and Obama.

So again the middle class is one of the biggest impediments that we have in the USA so that we can see a real change in America and a hope for some day to have a real Humanist, anti-war, workers people's government, where the gold, oil and wealth of America would belong to all americans, not to the 5% oligarchic corporate fat cats.

So our only hope in USA is the lower classes and the extremely poors. So what we should do is to create a United Socialist Front composed of poor people, low income americans, low wage workers, and the oppressed sectors alienated from participating in the wealth of America like American Indians, poor blacks, poor whites and poor illegal workers.

.





Came up in and i thought this was interesting and worth making a new thread for.


You're confusing petty-bourgeoisie for 'middle class'. They're not the same thing- a wage labourer by definition is not any kind of bourgeoisie. Teachers etc are part of the 'middle class' a bourgeois ideological term which refers to both the petty-bourgeoisie and well-paid workers whose quality of life is elevated due mostly to excess imperial wealth.

The metaphysical bourgeois definitions of class (determined by income) are not the same as the dialectical marxist definitions (determined by relations) and should not be mixed up.


Students and unemployed for sure. Petty-bourgeoisie I don't think so. They are inherently liberal and are not a very big part of the population anyway. In fact they only seem important because they are the centrepiece of capitalist ideology.

We live in advanced capitalist countries, and that means capitalism has reached its limit, and that means even the petty-bourgeoisie should not be counted as a revolutionary class. If we accept the petty-bourgeoisie we can never get beyond capitalism.

[Kamil]

During the embryonic stages of a revolutionary movement in an advanced capitalist society, elements of market socialism and/or social democracy could work to draw in the petty bourgeosis closer to our line and would serve as transitional tools. Conditions similar to a social democracy should be the first reforms initiated by the incumbent workers party during the lower phase of building socialism. In such a scenario as that I could see social democratic ideals as being potentially and temporarily usefull. Something vaguely akin to Mao's new democracy could momentarily be applied to the so-called first world so that the workers party could consolidate itself. Lenin's New Economic policy would be an example of this. The problem is that petty bourgeosis could prove to be a conservative force fettering the class conciousness of others, they would emerge as subversive forces spreading the illusion of upward mobility. They would prove to be a counter-revolutionary resistance to change. In this way, it could easily degenerate into a complete restoration of capitalism. The revolution could suffer the same fate as China.

[Paulappaul]

You're a dickhead. And stupid.

The first part of your post was shit, but this was really what sent me over the edge,


However the real middle class (doctors, lawyers, small business owners and people who earn between 75,000 and 200,000 dollars a year) a year), and who drive luxury vehicles, who eat at Olive Garden, Charlies Restaurants, Luxury buffets, who go out to have fun to operas, who have economic security for the future of their children, and who enjoy perfect health, are also oppressors, an enemy class, and who might be nice people, friendly, and have social kills and are not personally angry and evil. But at the voting booth they are traitors, counter-revolutionaries, anti-socialism, anti-change, and pro-imperialism, pro-free markets, pro-zionism, and pro-wars, at elections, the middle class yuppies show their true colors by casting their evil votes for blue dog Rockefeller-capitalist-Democrats, and Rockefeller Rotshchilds, Zionist Republicans like Bush, Clinton and Obama.

Fun Fact: The Republican Parties' base is in the South, with the poorest Americans. The poorest Americans are actually the same ones who are pro-war, rigidly anti-socialist and anti-change. Want to see Pro-War? Go into a trailer park. Have you seen Tea Party conventions, tea party gatherings? I see the most lowest end people that buy that shit. You're a tard if you think the lowest end of income spectrum is always revolutionary.

Infact, oddly enough it's actually in the cities where you find Socialist gatherings. It's unfortunate, but it's true.

And you know what? My family makes about 80,000 dollars a year. Guess what? We have one 80's Truck for me and 1 90's truck for the family. Both with way over 100,000 miles. We don't eat eat at Olive Garden, we don't have perfect health - infact we can't afford dental - we can't afford opera, we watch when they return to theatre.

[syndicat]

Fun Fact: The Republican Parties' base is in the South, with the poorest Americans. The poorest Americans are actually the same ones who are pro-war, rigidly anti-socialist and anti-change. Want to see Pro-War? Go into a trailer park. Have you seen Tea Party conventions, tea party gatherings? I see the most lowest end people that buy that shit. You're a tard if you think the lowest end of income spectrum is always revolutionary.



actually studies of Tea Party members paint the typical one as middle class, white, middle-aged, male, not "poor", and often active Republican party supporters. they don't live in trailer parks.

[S.Artesian]

Paulapaul is just wrong about the Tea Party. I think everyone should go back and take a look at their big national meeting some time ago. These weren't hard-scrabble people with hands worn, fingers bent from manual labor. These weren't your "country folk," your small shopkeepers, etc etc. These people are not poor, and not lower middle class. They are better described economically as "comfortable," and they want to keep it that way.

They fear taxes more than anything else except for one thing-- and that's black people not minding their manners, knowing their place, and acting like something other than entertainers, athletes, or gangsters.

Fun fact: the South is or was the fastest growing region in the US and the one that has, shall we say, a less than "progressive" history? As was the case post Civil War-- the supposed "poor whites'" hostility towards African-Americans is nothing compared to the institutions of racism supported by and supporting the well-off whites.

The "poorest Americans" that earned the South its designation of "backward" are the poorest black Americans.

[Jose Gracchus]

actually studies of Tea Party members paint the typical one as middle class, white, middle-aged, male, not "poor", and often
active Republican party supporters. they don't live in trailer parks.

These seems to be a matter of some dispute and confusion. There are the statisticalled polled "sympathizers" - which could mean anything depending on sampling techniques and the sample questions - and I believe they've been correlated with median upper incomes. However, I severely doubt that the average 'sympathizer' actually puts on his tennis shoes and pounds pavement and goes to these rallies. I bet those strata have different characteristics than the "self-identified on the phone" Tea Partiers.

[Amphictyonis]

In fact they only seem important because they are the centerpiece of capitalist ideology.


Well put. The "American dream" is a mirage and they are what we see.

[Paulappaul]

actually studies of Tea Party members paint the typical one as middle class, white, middle-aged, male, not "poor", and often active Republican party supporters. they don't live in trailer parks.

I wasn't talking about the Tea party with regards to this:


The Republican Parties' base is in the South, with the poorest Americans. The poorest Americans are actually the same ones who are pro-war, rigidly anti-socialist and anti-change. Want to see Pro-War? Go into a trailer park.

Whites making under 50,000 voted in serious mass for the Republican Party in the 2008 elections. In my own state of Oregon, the counties that voted Republican are the rural, farming and lower class counties, with traditionalist values for which the Republican Party attracts.



Paulapaul is just wrong about the Tea Party. I think everyone should go back and take a look at their big national meeting some time ago. These weren't hard-scrabble people with hands worn, fingers bent from manual labor. These weren't your "country folk," your small shopkeepers, etc etc. These people are not poor, and not lower middle class. They are better described economically as "comfortable," and they want to keep it that way.

I'm not going to deny that they're wealthy elements of that movement, but frankly, look at these people (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUPMjC9mq5Y).

Those aren't your run in the muck middle class people.

[Jose Gracchus]

Paul, could you provide some of those statistical indicators? I'd like to see some of the breakdowns in class of voters.

[Paulappaul]

Paul, could you provide some of those statistical indicators? I'd like to see some of the breakdowns in class of voters.

http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/main.results/

Look under "Exit Polls" for breakdown by Income and Race.

[fatboy]

Scarlet Ghoul, Marx said that the petty bourgeois would be absorbed into the proletariat in the revolution.

[red cat]

Scarlet Ghoul, Marx said that the petty bourgeois would be absorbed into the proletariat in the revolution.

Can you please provide sources for this ?

[scarletghoul]

That's interesting, and yeah a source would be great. I would like to see his reasoning.

But I still think that, as the most developed areas of the world, we can easily go on without any capitalist classes (including petty bourgeoisie) on our side.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Actually, Marx and Engels said that the proletariat had to organize independently of the petty-bourgeoisie and reject their influence.

"In the event of a struggle against a common enemy a special alliance is unnecessary. As soon as such an enemy has to be fought directly, the interests of both parties will coincide for the moment and an association of momentary expedience will arise spontaneously in the future, as it has in the past. It goes without saying that in the bloody conflicts to come, as in all others, it will be the workers, with their courage, resolution and self-sacrifice, who will be chiefly responsible for achieving victory. As in the past, so in the coming struggle also, the petty-bourgeoisie, to a man, will hesitate as long as possible and remain fearful, irresolute and inactive; but when victory is certain it will claim it for itself and will call upon the workers to behave in an orderly fashion, to return to work and to prevent so-called excesses, and it will exclude the proletariat from the fruits of victory." - Marx

"The democratic petty bourgeois, far from wanting to transform the whole society in the interests of the revolutionary proletarians, only aspire to a change in social conditions which will make the existing society as tolerable and comfortable for themselves as possible. They therefore demand above all else a reduction in government spending through a restriction of the bureaucracy and the transference of the major tax burden into the large landowners and bourgeoisie. They further demand the removal of the pressure exerted by big capital on small capital through the establishment of public credit institutions and the passing of laws against usury, whereby it would be possible for themselves and the peasants to receive advances on favourable terms from the state instead of from capitalists; also, the introduction of bourgeois property relationships on land through the complete abolition of feudalism. In order to achieve all this they require a democratic form of government, either constitutional or republican, which would give them and their peasant allies the majority; they also require a democratic system of local government to give them direct control over municipal property and over a series of political offices at present in the hands of the bureaucrats.

"The rule of capital and its rapid accumulation is to be further counteracted, partly by a curtailment of the right of inheritance, and partly by the transference of as much employment as possible to the state. As far as the workers are concerned one thing, above all, is definite: they are to remain wage labourers as before. However, the democratic petty bourgeois want better wages and security for the workers, and hope to achieve this by an extension of state employment and by welfare measures; in short, they hope to bribe the workers with a more or less disguised form of alms and to break their revolutionary strength by temporarily rendering their situation tolerable." - Marx

"We cannot, therefore, go along with people who openly claim that the workers are too ignorant to emancipate themselves but must first be emancipated from the top down, by the philanthropic big and petty bourgeois." - Marx & Engels

"...the democratic petty bourgeois want better wages and security for the workers, and hope to achieve this by an extension of state employment and by welfare measures; in short, they hope to bribe the workers with a more or less disguised form of alms and to break their revolutionary strength by temporarily rendering their situation tolerable. ... Our concern cannot simply be to modify private property, but to abolish it, not to hush up class antagonisms but to abolish classes, not to improve the existing society but to found a new one." - Marx

"The relationship of the revolutionary workers' party to the petty-bourgeois democrats is this: it cooperates with them against the party which they aim to overthrow; it opposes them wherever they wish to secure their own position." - Marx & Engels

"...when such people from other classes join the proletarian movement, the first demand upon them must be that they do not bring with them any remnants of bourgeois, petty-bourgeois, etc., prejudices, but that they irreversibly assimilate the proletarian viewpoint. But those gentlemen, as has been shown, adhere overwhelmingly to petty-bourgeois conceptions. …in a labor party, they are a falsifying element. If there are grounds which necessitate tolerating them, it is a duty only to tolerate them, to allow them no influence in party leadership, and to keep in mind that a break with them is only a matter of time.... In any case, the time seems to have come..." - Engels (1879).

[fatboy]

"In countries where modern civilization has become fully developed, a new class of petty bourgeois has been formed, fluctuating between proletariat and bourgeoisie, and ever renewing itself as a supplementary part of bourgeois society. The individual members of this class, however, are being constantly hurled down into the proletariat by the action of competition, and, as modern industry develops, they even see the moment approaching when they will completely disappear as an independent section of modern society, to be replaced in manufactures, agriculture and commerce, by overlookers, bailiffs and shopmen"

[fatboy]

"In countries where modern civilization has become fully developed, a new class of petty bourgeois has been formed, fluctuating between proletariat and bourgeoisie, and ever renewing itself as a supplementary part of bourgeois society. The individual members of this class, however, are being constantly hurled down into the proletariat by the action of competition, and, as modern industry develops, they even see the moment approaching when they will completely disappear as an independent section of modern society, to be replaced in manufactures, agriculture and commerce, by overlookers, bailiffs and shopmen"

Communist Manifesto Chapter 3 Section B.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

"In countries where modern civilization has become fully developed, a new class of petty bourgeois has been formed, fluctuating between proletariat and bourgeoisie, and ever renewing itself as a supplementary part of bourgeois society. The individual members of this class, however, are being constantly hurled down into the proletariat by the action of competition, and, as modern industry develops, they even see the moment approaching when they will completely disappear as an independent section of modern society, to be replaced in manufactures, agriculture and commerce, by overlookers, bailiffs and shopmen"

Their point was that the traditional petty-bourgeoisie, as an independent class, was disappearing; and that rather that join the proletariat, individual members of the class were taking up new positions as managers of the means of production and state apparatus (as bureaucrats, managers, administers, private security guards--like pinkertons, cops, etc).

[S.Artesian]

"In countries where modern civilization has become fully developed, a new class of petty bourgeois has been formed, fluctuating between proletariat and bourgeoisie, and ever renewing itself as a supplementary part of bourgeois society. The individual members of this class, however, are being constantly hurled down into the proletariat by the action of competition, and, as modern industry develops, they even see the moment approaching when they will completely disappear as an independent section of modern society, to be replaced in manufactures, agriculture and commerce, by overlookers, bailiffs and shopmen"

The point being the petit-bourgeoisie has no future as an independent social force. It can be ruined, terrified, enraged by capitalism, but they have no social relationship to production enabling it to overthrow, expropriate, replace of the bourgeoisie. It can be molded, armed, and turned out in uniform, but it will be so molded, armed, and tailored in the service of capitalism.

[Die Neue Zeit]

The point being the petit-bourgeoisie has no future as an independent social force. It can be ruined, terrified, enraged by capitalism, but they have no social relationship to production enabling it to overthrow, expropriate, replace of the bourgeoisie. It can be molded, armed, and turned out in uniform, but it will be so molded, armed, and tailored in the service of capitalism.

It has a present and future as an independent political force, though.

[S.Artesian]

It has a present and future as an independent political force, though.

no it does not. That's the lesson of China, Vietnam, the ANC, etc.

[RED DAVE]

[The petit-bourgeoisie] has a present and future as an independent political force, though.You are directly revising Marxism now, and, of course, violating truth. The petit-bourgeoisie never acts as an independent political force. It either allies itself with the bourgeoisie itself, or, hopefully, someday, with the working class.

How about an example for us to consider of he petit-bourgeoisie acting as an independent force in and for itself?

RED DAVE

[Die Neue Zeit]

no it does not. That's the lesson of China, Vietnam, the ANC, etc.

I didn't say "permanent future" for a reason. In the short- and even medium-term for the Third World, my assertion stands.


You are directly revising Marxism now, and, of course, violating truth. The petit-bourgeoisie never acts as an independent political force. It either allies itself with the bourgeoisie itself, or, hopefully, someday, with the working class.

How about an example for us to consider of the petit-bourgeoisie acting as an independent force in and for itself?

I'm not revising "Trotskyism," which you're really referring to. The peasant revolutions are examples of the rural petit-bourgeoisie acting as an independent political force. Mike Macnair was correct in distinguishes between the social and the political. The considerations of "Late Marx" (Russian preface to the Manifesto, plus Teodor Shanin's work) tilted towards this distinction.

[RED DAVE]

How about an example for us to consider of the petit-bourgeoisie acting as an independent force in and for itself?
The peasant revolutions are examples of the rural petit-bourgeoisie acting as an independent political force.Actually, the success of peasant movements depends on their relationship with other classes.

If you think otherwise, how about an actual historical example of a peasant movement that actd in and for itself and acted as an independent force.

RED DAVE

[S.Artesian]

I didn't say "permanent future" for a reason. In the short- and even medium-term for the Third World, my assertion stands.

Saying it's so does not make it so. Everything we've seen shows that the petit-bourgeois, in "radical configuration," moved to power only by living off the remnants of the Russian Revolution. After the final extinguishing of that revolution, the petit bourgeois don't even pretend to a radical configuration.

As far as the "3rd world" goes, if you're talking about "national" struggles a la Morales, Correa, or even Chavez, what really stands out is this: the "national revolution" pretends at having a future in substituting for the proletariat's revolution; it's actual future depends upon acting as the handmaiden to international capital, throwing back the proletariat's revolution.

You might call that a future, in your inside out, back asswards framework of little Caesars. In reality it's simply a repetition of the past. That might only have meaning to someone who actually studied the revolutionary struggles of the past in the "3rd world," but it's worth the effort. Look at the actual history of the MNR in Bolivia, the various radical petit-bourgeois movements in Brazil. Look at Africa.




I'm not revising "Trotskyism," which you're really referring to. The peasant revolutions are examples of the rural petit-bourgeoisie acting as an independent political force. Mike Macnair was correct in distinguishes between the social and the political. The considerations of "Late Marx" (Russian preface to the Manifesto, plus Teodor Shanin's work) tilted towards this distinction.

I can think of numerous peasant revolutions. I can't think of which ones had the peasantry acting as an independent force establishing their power as an independent class. Can you?

Mexico 1910-1940? Nope, not that one. China 1949-- whenever? Not hardly. Never would have survived without the support of the USSR, and a mere 25 years after that revolution and 15 or so years after the break with the USSR-- you get the great opening to the West.
Vietnam? Not hardly.

Can the peasant revolution act as a battering ram against the old order? No doubt. Has it ever taken power and developed an independent peasant mode of production? No. As a matter of fact the inability of the "battering ram" to overcome the impaired productivity of peasant based production is one of the critical failures of these revolutions.

[Die Neue Zeit]

As far as the "3rd world" goes, if you're talking about "national" struggles a la Morales, Correa, or even Chavez, what really stands out is this: the "national revolution" pretends at having a future in substituting for the proletariat's revolution; it's actual future depends upon acting as the handmaiden to international capital, throwing back the proletariat's revolution.

All the populist regimes oppose the neoliberal Washington Consensus. That's hardly being a "handmaiden to international capital."


You might call that a future, in your inside out, back asswards framework of little Caesars.

The only "back-asswards" framework that I see was that shared by Engels, Luxemburg (re. the peasantry: "they're inert"), Parvus and of course Trotsky and his unique possibility of open civil war against the peasantry (http://en.internationalism.org/forum/1056/devoration1/3994/permanent-revolution-still-best-choice#comment-1966)!

Even the *turned-renegade* Kautsky's own approach to "permanent revolution" in 1917 itself was superior to the framework above:

Did Trotsky Abandon his original Theory of Permanent Revolution? (http://www.revleft.com/vb/did-trotsky-abandon-t143419/index.html)

Prospects of the Russian Revolution (1917) (http://www.revleft.com/vb/prospects-russian-revolution-t126942/index.html) by Karl Kautsky, Introduction by Lars Lih, and Review by Jacob Richter

[Translation: at least the rural petit-bourgeoisie is capable of, if not transcending commodity production altogether, at least major "steps toward socialism." This is part of a broader Third World framework which I call "Caesarean Socialism."]


I can think of numerous peasant revolutions. I can't think of which ones had the peasantry acting as an independent force establishing their power as an independent class. Can you?

Mexico 1910-1940? Nope, not that one. China 1949-- whenever? Not hardly. Never would have survived without the support of the USSR, and a mere 25 years after that revolution and 15 or so years after the break with the USSR-- you get the great opening to the West.
Vietnam? Not hardly.

Stalin still preferred the GMD over Mao, seeing a CPC-controlled China in the immediate future as an inevitable rival. The Soviet military support between 1946 and 1953 was very minimal, and economic support was harder to grab (meat from a tiger's mouth, according to Mao). :confused:

[RED DAVE]

All the populist regimes don't like the neoliberal Washington Consensus. That's hardly being a "handmaiden to international capital."(emph added)

That's what I call a really tough political position: that they don't like something.

("What wrong with World Bank, Comrade?" "I don't like it.")

Meanwhile, these countries engage in massive trading, on a capitalist basis, on the international market.

And, of course, to get back to the point, Chavez, et al., do not demonstrate the existence of the peasantry or the petit-bourgeoisie as a politically independent class.

RED DAVE

[Die Neue Zeit]

So what? I edited my post above for stronger language. They oppose said neoliberal Washington Consensus. Can't you afford me the odd conversational English every now and then? :rolleyes:

[S.Artesian]

Opposing "neo-liberal" Washington Consensus hardly qualifies as being opposed to capitalist accumulation, or international capitalist accumulation. By your measure, Lula qualifies as an opponent of capitalism, as do Malaysia, the Kirchners etc.

What you lack is any comprehension of class- the necessary relationship between class and mode of production; the necessary relationship between class and the overthrow of the mode of production.

And you still haven't answered the question-- where has the peasantry taken power and installed a "peasant mode of production"? Where has the peasantry taken power and abolished the capitalist mode of production?

[Die Neue Zeit]

Opposing "neo-liberal" Washington Consensus hardly qualifies as being opposed to capitalist accumulation, or international capitalist accumulation. By your measure, Lula qualifies as an opponent of capitalism, as do Malaysia, the Kirchners etc.

You said they were "handmaidens of international capital." See, when I hear "international capital," I don't think "the capitalist system as a whole." I think "foreign capitalists." So I knocked you down from your pedestal. :rolleyes:


What you lack is any comprehension of class- the necessary relationship between class and mode of production; the necessary relationship between class and the overthrow of the mode of production.

Not at all. Cockshott and I are on the same page re. scrapping commodity production altogether even in the "lower phase," unlike your monetary fantasies. The DOTP is the means to achieve this "lower phase" politically.

In much of the Third World, demographics go against arguments for an immediate DOTP, so a progressive yet thoroughly anti-bourgeois solution is needed. Go check out my new History thread on Trotsky.

[S.Artesian]

You said they were "handmaidens of international capital." See, when I hear "international capital," I don't think "the capitalist system as a whole." I think "foreign capitalists." So I knocked you down from your pedestal. :rolleyes:

So you imposed your own ignorance of what capitalism is, how international capitalism functions, for any actual analysis of these supposedly "independent petit-bourgeois" governments. Thanks for your candor.

That's a real knock down you delivered. Wow.


Not at all. Cockshott and I are on the same page re. scrapping commodity production altogether even in the "lower phase," unlike your monetary fantasies. The DOTP is the means to achieve this "lower phase" politically.
Really? Cockshott's on the same page as you? What page is that? Is that the page that says post WW2-pre Thatcher Britain was about 1/3 "socialist"? Is that the page? Besides, I haven't actually seen comrade Cockshott leaping onto his steed and charging into the fray to defend your formulations of "Caesarism" and the independence of the petit-bourgeois.

So comrade Cockshott, if you're out there, can you tell us if you're on this page... as more than footnote Mr. DNZ likes to wield to his own greater glory?



In much of the Third World, demographics go against arguments for an immediate DOTP, so a progressive yet thoroughly anti-bourgeois solution is needed. Go check out my new History thread on Trotsky.More advertisements for yourself? Nothing wrong with your self-confidence I'll say that for you. You're advertising is just dandy. The problem is with what you're selling-- which is, using the German expression, dreck.

Hey here's a story about knockdowns. Once upon a time a beer salesman and boxer from Bayonne NJ, Chuck Wepner, was picked to be the opponent of Muhammed Ali. Chuck was better known in the ring as the Bayonne Bleeder.

Anyway, the night of the fight, before he leaves the hotel, where incidentally, Ali was also staying, Wepner says to his wife: "Wear something sexy tonight, honey. When I get home, you're going to be sleeping with the heavyweight champion of the world."

Needless to say, things didn't go as Chuck planned. He was able to "knock" Ali down, by stepping on Ali's foot as Ali moved back to slip a punch, thus essentially tripping Ali. But Ali beat the living snot out of Chuck, putting more lumps on Chuck's face, and cutting him so badly that old Chuck looked like his face had had a very close encounter with a meat tenderizing mallet.

So Chuck get's back to his hotel, opens the door, and there's his wife, wearing 5 inch heels, a g-string, push-up bra, all made-up, with a filmy negligee revealing all that was, and was not underneath.

And she says to our bleeder "Which room is Ali's? I've been promised that I would be sleeping with the heavyweight champion of the world tonight?"

So listen, Chuck-DNZ, [no relation to Run-DMC] don't be making any promises to Mrs. Kautsky as you are only bound to disappoint her.

[Die Neue Zeit]

So you imposed your own ignorance of what capitalism is, how international capitalism functions, for any actual analysis of these supposedly "independent petit-bourgeois" governments. Thanks for your candor.

"International capitalism" doesn't have the same conspiracist connotations as "international capital."


Really? Cockshott's on the same page as you? What page is that? Is that the page that says post WW2-pre Thatcher Britain was about 1/3 "socialist"? Is that the page? Besides, I haven't actually seen comrade Cockshott leaping onto his steed and charging into the fray to defend your formulations of "Caesarism" and the independence of the petit-bourgeois.

In his paper Ideas of Leadership and Democracy (http://reality.gn.apc.org/polemic/leadershipconcepts.pdf):

Caesar, who was famously assasinated by senators putatively anxious to protect the Roman Republic from tyranny, died in fact because he proposed a land reform to would redistribute common land seized by the senatorial class to demobilised soldiers and proletarianised peasants. Caesar in this case rested his political power both on the voting support of the plebeians and on a victorious army drawn from the lower classes.

[...]

11. On this see Michael Parenti’s book The assassination of Julius Caesar.

In fact, it was this brief remark and footnote that ultimately led me to arrive at contemporary political conclusions for the Third World using unconventional Roman history.

[S.Artesian]

Wasn't it EDIT: Graymouser who exposed how superficial, and just flat out inaccurate Parenti's book is?

Good to see that a little thing like historical accuracy can't dissuade you from your chosen course.

I refer die alte Kautsky to my previous remarks.

-- the most of important of which-- after the Chuck Wepner story-- is the one where I say what you lack above all is a conception of class, the necessary relation of class to the mode of production, the necessary relation of class to the overthrow of a mode of production

Discussing things with you is like trying to discuss the class struggle in France with somebody who thinks he is De Gaulle.

Not sorry, you're back on the ignore list.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Good to see that a little thing like historical accuracy can't dissuade you from your chosen course.

Unfortunately to see that a little thing like gentlemen's history can't dissuade you from your chosen course.

[Jose Gracchus]

I like how the Trotskyists here, more interested with tearing DNZ down than discussing the claim, in any way, shape, or form, that demographics in the Third World often work against formation of a DOTP, just as in Russia in 1917.

Anyone care to address this problem substantively, maybe actually get some constructive discussion going?

[S.Artesian]

I like how the Trotskyists here, more interested with tearing DNZ down than discussing the claim, in any way, shape, or form, that demographics in the Third World often work against formation of a DOTP, just as in Russia in 1917.

Anyone care to address this problem substantively, maybe actually get some constructive discussion going?

First, I'm not Trotskyist, and secondly it has been discussed substantively as to the actual configuration of classes and modes of production. DNZ however insists he can transplant a misrepresentation of a struggle some 2100 years ago and graft it onto the current struggles with international capitalism.

It isn't demographics that determine the course of class struggle, it's mode of production.

It wasn't the demographics that worked against Russia 1917, it was the legacy of uneven and combined development of capitalism and the defeat of the revolution in the advanced countries that "worked against" the DOTP.

Not to put too fine of a Marxist point on it......

All DNZ offers is on the one hand "state capitalism" with a "less unpleasant" superstructure on the one hand, and/or "slave labor on the other.

Thanks but no thanks.

So the substantive question that needs to be answered is where exactly has the peasant war created an independent mode of production, an independent peasant mode of production, and an independent peasant and/or petit-bourgeois state during a revolution?

Not to put too fine a Marxist point on it....

[Jose Gracchus]

That's ridiculous. You're positing there's an either/or dichotomy between demographic qualities on one hand, and "Marxism", in the other? "Mode of production determines it?" The success of the revolution will have to deal with demagraphic realities. And yes, there was no squaring away a revolution dominated by a single workers' party in a country where the vast majority of the country remained peasants represented in their own revolutionary party. As four Bolshevik narkoms put it, "The only way to maintain a purely Bolshevik government is by political terror."

In any case, where we may be lucky in the Third World today, poor tenants, the revolution will be most successful where it can co-opt a clear revolutionary majority led by revolutionary workers.

[S.Artesian]

That's ridiculous. You're positing there's an either/or dichotomy between demographic qualities on one hand, and "Marxism", in the other? "Mode of production determines it?" The success of the revolution will have to deal with demagraphic realities. And yes, there was no squaring away a revolution dominated by a single workers' party in a country where the vast majority of the country remained peasants represented in their own revolutionary party. As four Bolshevik narkoms put it, "The only way to maintain a purely Bolshevik government is by political terror."

In any case, where we may be lucky in the Third World today, poor tenants, the revolution will be most successful where it can co-opt a clear revolutionary majority led by revolutionary workers.

Right, it's ridiculous. What was the working class confronted with after seizing power? Being outnumbered by vast numbers of peasants, or a peasant-based agriculture without a sufficient industrial base to provide commodities for reciprocal exchange?

All this talk about "contempt for the peasantry" is nothing but the same old, same old that was put forth by Bukharin, and the Stalin-Zinoviev-Kamenev Bolsheviks to maintain party control over the economy and not come to grips with the necessity for a program of industrialization, which program, in order to have a connection to the peasantry, to have a connection to transforming the peasantry rather than simply expropriating it, would have required a) a real workers' democracy, extending itself into the countryside, and b) success of revolution internationally.

The problem wasn't that workers were more favorably treated, or had disproportional votes, the problem was that the workers had been dispossessed from their very own revolution... and that dispossession started way before Stalin had cemented his dominance.

You claim:


there was no squaring away a revolution dominated by a single workers' party in a country where the vast majority of the country remained peasants represented in their own revolutionary party

What was that "revolutionary party" that represented that vast majority? The SRs? The Right SRs? The SRs? Those groups that supported the Constituent Assembly, that supported transferring power from the government of soviets to the Constituent Assembly?

There were basically two fractions of the SRs that were revolutionary and both of those fractions supported soviet power, that is to say, state power as represented in and by the councils of workers' deputies in the major cities. Those 2 fractions were the SR Maximalists and the Left SRs. The Left SRs remained in the soviet government until the latter part of 1918 when their assassination of Mirbach, certainly one of the stupidest moves in the history of stupid moves, gave the Bolsheviks the excuse to expel them from government and arrest them.

There simply was no revolutionary party as revolutionary, and as a party representing the peasantry. That was one problem, based on the economic basis of peasant agriculture and not the numbers of peasants.

The other problem is that the party that the workers looked to for defense of the soviets absolutely constituted itself as a power, authority, above the soviets, above the workers, and actually above the revolution itself.

Revolution became an exercise in preserving the power of the party, and its ideology, rather than rule of the class through its own class organizations.

It would have been difficult under the better of circumstances to do that, given the threats the October Revolution faced, but the actions of the Bolsheviks-- depleting its most proletarian elements by sending them into the army, or worse, into the countryside in grain seizing missions did not help.

It would have been much less difficult under the best of conditions, those conditions being the success of revolution in, above all, Germany.

As for the peasantry itself-- again it was not the numbers of the peasantry that needed to be reconciled to the workers' government. It was the inability of the revolution to transform agricultural production; to differentiate between "rich" peasants-- who were a tiny minority-- and y peasants in their grain seizure measures that determines the weakness and ultimately, the failure, of the October Revolution.

Which is kind of the point we started out with-- that the peasantry is incapable of introducing, maintaining, a revolutionary mode of production. There can be peasant wars, peasant insurrections, but peasant revolutions
introducing an independent mode of production simply do not occur.

After all that, I agree in part with your last point-- I think the "3rd world" is much more proletarian than our erstwhile Kautskyists, or Maoists are capable of grasping.

[Son of a Strummer]

Concerning the topic at hand...

It does seem that theorizing about the petty-bourgeoisie as a potential agent of radical change has experienced something of a revival in recent years. Roberto M. Unger for example, has with his theories attracted considerable commentary from social theorists and philosophers as various as Cornel West, Richard Rorty and Perry Anderson, as well as influenced popular movements in Latin America. Warning - do not mistake me as an advocate. I have just noticed that this trend exists and would like to understand it. And I am interested in what y'all think of it. Here follows a link to a chapter entitled "An Agent: Worker's Wanting to be Petty-Bourgeois" from Unger's book "The Left Alternative."

http://www.law.harvard.edu/faculty/unger/english/pdfs/left_alternative/chap4.pdf

and here is an excerpt:

"The Left committed no greater strategic mistake in the course of its history over the last two centuries than to elect the petty-bourgeoisie as its enemy, or its ally of convenience, and to define as its core constituency the organized industrial working class. Everywhere in the world this segment of the working class is a diminishing part of the labour force. Everywhere it is seen, and ultimately comes to see itself, as one more special interest among others, clamoring for protection and favor. The class that the left abandoned became the social base of the political movements that defeated it. We contemporaries are, in large numbers, petty-bourgeois now, in imaginative orientation if not by economic fact.
The interest that the Left rejected, supposing it wedded to selfish reaction, has now become the stand-in for a universal aspiration. That is so as much in the United States and Europe as in China and India. If progressives could meet this aspiration, on its own terms, and provide it with a vocabulary of institutions and practices richer than the device of traditional isolated small business, and with a standard of value, more reliable than family selfishness they would gain the most powerful of all allies, and remove a major cause of their historical defeats."

[S.Artesian]

I think this is just another liberal way of ascribing to an anonymous left some universal mistake. He could just as well argue the direct opposite-- that the mistake the left has made since the end of WW2 is to link "revolutionary success" to some other, any other, class-- like the petit bourgeois-- than the working class. Look at the history of the left and its fetishization of "heroic guerrillas," "peoples' war," "Bolivarianismo," etc etc.

And FWIW, I think this guy's timing is hilariously bad-- he writes this when? When workers in France, Greece, Spain, are waging sustained battles against austerity?

[Die Neue Zeit]

In any case, where we may be lucky in the Third World today, poor tenants, the revolution will be most successful where it can co-opt a clear revolutionary majority led by revolutionary workers.


Which is kind of the point we started out with-- that the peasantry is incapable of introducing, maintaining, a revolutionary mode of production. There can be peasant wars, peasant insurrections, but peasant revolutions introducing an independent mode of production simply do not occur.

After all that, I agree in part with your last point-- I think the "3rd world" is much more proletarian than our erstwhile Kautskyists, or Maoists are capable of grasping.

"Erstwhile"? :rolleyes:

S. Artesian the Trot-in-denial doesn't get the linguistic nuances of "co-opt a clear revolutionary majority led by revolutionary workers." This means that the Third World political revolution and radical social reform (and some transformation but not all-the-way social revolution) is led by some other class. The success of this class depends on co-opting revolutionary workers as partners.

That's the point of the Bloc of Dispossessed Classes and National Petit-Bourgeoisie.


It does seem that theorizing about the petty-bourgeoisie as a potential agent of radical change has experienced something of a revival in recent years.

But they didn't base their conclusion on the historical precedent set by the Julius Caesar of people's history, did they? Also, their "radical change" stuff is too spontaneous. It relies purely on urban petit-bourgeois democratism, disregarding peasant patrimonialism on the one hand and independent working-class political organization on the other.


"The Left committed no greater strategic mistake in the course of its history over the last two centuries than to elect the petty-bourgeoisie as its enemy, or its ally of convenience, and to define as its core constituency the organized industrial working class. Everywhere in the world this segment of the working class is a diminishing part of the labour force. Everywhere it is seen, and ultimately comes to see itself, as one more special interest among others, clamoring for protection and favor. The class that the left abandoned became the social base of the political movements that defeated it. We contemporaries are, in large numbers, petty-bourgeois now, in imaginative orientation if not by economic fact.
The interest that the Left rejected, supposing it wedded to selfish reaction, has now become the stand-in for a universal aspiration. That is so as much in the United States and Europe as in China and India. If progressives could meet this aspiration, on its own terms, and provide it with a vocabulary of institutions and practices richer than the device of traditional isolated small business, and with a standard of value, more reliable than family selfishness they would gain the most powerful of all allies, and remove a major cause of their historical defeats."

The petit-bourgeoisie class, really self-employed class, and coordinator class in advanced capitalist countries are reactionary. I mean, look at the "consumerism" / consumptionism that inhibits policy discourse and related political action. "Aspirational socialism" as discussed within the UK Labour Party itself is hollow in policies.

Even in my thread on political consciousness, dealing with petit-bourgeois democratism in the First World has limits.


He could just as well argue the direct opposite-- that the mistake the left has made since the end of WW2 is to link "revolutionary success" to some other, any other, class-- like the petit bourgeois-- than the working class. Look at the history of the left and its fetishization of "heroic guerrillas," "peoples' war," "Bolivarianismo," etc etc.

I never said here the petit-bourgeoisie and other non-worker classes in the Third World were capable of full-blown social revolution.

Caesarean Socialism will still have state-aided cooperatives, shopkeepers, small tenant farmers, sharecroppers, non-industrial fishermen, and non-worker intellectuals doing their thing, and will still have really self-employed schmucks doing their services and bullying the consumer goods and services market through guild-like organizations. Stakeholder co-management will be on a more populist basis (in essence becoming "co-determination" without the bourgeoisie) than a working-class basis.