Ruling class

[Savior]

Come revolution time, what would the left do if memebers of the Ruling class were to want to/do switch sides or in other words; join the revolutionairies. As in contribute their resources and support to the revolution.

What would be the Left's or your personal reaction?

[Omsk]

Thats not going to happen..
If some of the less important members of the ruling class want to switch sides,all right,i don't think they will cause too much reactions,but if high position officials want to do it,people will see it as a potential chance to escape without punishment.
Thats not so easy,do you think that the comrades from the Red Army let fascist join them?Do you think they would just let them switch sides after all they did?
Maybe the Americans allowed that,but true friends of liberty and peace would not react in that way.
Do you think that the revolutionaries in 1917 just let petty-bourgeoisie let them switch sides?The same petty-bourgeoisie that treated their workers like slaves?The same petty-bourgeoisie that enjoyed meat and wine while their workers ate bread or starved?

[Dimentio]

Thats not going to happen..
If some of the less important members of the ruling class want to switch sides,all right,i don't think they will cause too much reactions,but if high position officials want to do it,people will see it as a potential chance to escape without punishment.
Thats not so easy,do you think that the comrades from the Red Army let fascist join them?Do you think they would just let them switch sides after all they did?
Maybe the Americans allowed that,but true friends of liberty and peace would not react in that way.
Do you think that the revolutionaries in 1917 just let petty-bourgeoisie let them switch sides?The same petty-bourgeoisie that treated their workers like slaves?The same petty-bourgeoisie that enjoyed meat and wine while their workers ate bread or starved?

In many cases they did. Also, a lot of the leadership of the Bolshevik party consisted of the "lumpen bourgeois" elements of society. Dzhezinsky was a nobleman, Stalin was the son of a shoe-maker, Lenin was from a family of bureaucrats.

If they want to switch sides, that is fine with me. One would be a fool to not be lenient with those who are surrendering, since it would urge others to surrender.

Like, if they surrender, give them ice-cream.

If they don't surrender, lock them into the USA-room (was a room inside my granpa's barn where we used to torture captured kids from the enemy side when we were small and played war, one wall was painted as the American flag).

[Omsk]

Im not saying they didn't switch sides,im saying that the workers should be careful when accepting the surrender of the 'changes of side' when it comes from the petty
bourgeoisie.If they are young,promising men who decided to change their paths,all right,let them join the revolution,but if they are old men who want to save their behinds,don't.Simple as that.

Dzhezinsky was a nobleman, Stalin was the son of a shoe-maker, Lenin was from a family of bureaucrats.
Well,you cant chose your family,what matters is what you are going to be.
(people who come from petty bourgeoisie families should not be sanctionised if they have revolutionary spirit,if we throw away all who come from such families,the revolutions would be significantly smaller.


(was a room inside my granpa's barn where we used to torture captured kids from the enemy side when we were small and played war, one wall was painted as the American flag).
Did you have a 'Russian' room? :lol:

[Savior]

What if members of the ruling class were Marxists, or/and supported workers struggles before the revolution...?

Would that not be a great help in carring out the revolution if the workers were provide weapons and other nessecities?

Sorry for my grammar, my computer is messd.

[ExUnoDisceOmnes]

If they truly surrender their wealth and means of production, they are no longer ruling class economically. If they leave their social circle in favor of revolutionaries, they are no longer ruling class socially.

Therefore they cease to be bourgeoisie of any kind. There's no reason not to accept them.

[syndicat]

these people, and many professionals also, are a problem because they come with their ingrained belief in their entitlement to be the people who make the decisions, due to their superior formal educations and so forth. this has to be overtly faught against. this has to be faught against thru methods of organization that emphasize rank and file control, and building skills and knowledge of working people so they are not dependent on "professionals" to do their thinking for them.

[Savior]

If they turn over their means of production and help the revolution succeed should they not be able to keep their wealth until we can switch over to a monetized society?

[Savior]

If they turn over their means of production and help the revolution succeed should they not be able to keep their wealth until we can switch over to a non
monetized society?

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

I think it would be quite obvious, at a time of revolution, if people were acting as wreckers and spies.

If people give up their individual means of production for the masses and exchange social circles and reject the bourgeoisie, then that is absolutely fine by me. The more people we have on our side the better, whether they are Joe Smith or some formerly wealthy double barrelled surname.

[eric922]

Personally I think when the Revolution comes we should accept whoever is willing to fight alongside us as long as they are sincere. If they were former millionaires who realized the error of their ways or if they have always sympathized with workers and tried to treat them fairly.

[ChampionDishWasher]

I would be very cautious about that happening.
You cannot expect the beneficiaries of a system to change it.

[eric922]

I would be very cautious about that happening.
You cannot expect the beneficiaries of a system to change it.
See I have a small problem with that. While it is true the vast majority of bourgeoisie will fight alongside the capitaists, I do think it is possible there will be some will want to fight on the side of the workers because they finally see their system as flawed and wrong. If we say that people will always act only in their self-interest, then, in a way, aren't we saying the capitalist are right and socialism does go against human nature? Of course, we know better.

[Lenina Rosenweg]

I can't find the quote offhand but i the Communist Manifesto Marx and Engels predicted that some of the bourgeois would go over to the working class in the event of a revolution.

[Niccolò Rossi]

I can't find the quote offhand but i the Communist Manifesto Marx and Engels predicted that some of the bourgeois would go over to the working class in the event of a revolution.

The quote you're after is this one:


"Finally, in times when the class struggle nears the decisive hour, the progress of dissolution going on within the ruling class, in fact within the whole range of old society, assumes such a violent, glaring character, that a small section of the ruling class cuts itself adrift, and joins the revolutionary class, the class that holds the future in its hands. Just as, therefore, at an earlier period, a section of the nobility went over to the bourgeoisie, so now a portion of the bourgeoisie goes over to the proletariat, and in particular, a portion of the bourgeois ideologists, who have raised themselves to the level of comprehending theoretically the historical movement as a whole."

There is another quote I am trying to recall. I think in a private letter by Engels where he goes on about bourgeois elements who come over to the side of revolution needing to abandon all ruling class ideological baggage or some such? Maybe I'm butchering the meaning. NHIA or one the SPGB/WSM people are good with quotes, so I'll let me give it a go. I think it's relevant.

Nic.

[ExUnoDisceOmnes]

The response to this question should be completely circumstantial.

[Die Neue Zeit]

these people, and many professionals also, are a problem because they come with their ingrained belief in their entitlement to be the people who make the decisions, due to their superior formal educations and so forth. this has to be overtly faught against. this has to be faught against thru methods of organization that emphasize rank and file control, and building skills and knowledge of working people so they are not dependent on "professionals" to do their thinking for them.

The bottom line is a workers-only voting membership policy, really. Whichever bourgeois, petit-bourgeois, and other non-worker elements switch sides, well, give them a role but outside the party until they have assimilated into the working class.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

The bottom line is a workers-only voting membership policy, really. Whichever bourgeois, petit-bourgeois, and other non-worker elements switch sides, well, give them a role but outside the party until they have assimilated into the working class.

Who decides when they have assimilated into the working class? The all powerful party? C'mon mate.

As we are talking of revolution, is it not the case that the process would generally be a revolutionary, instantaneous one?

[Tim Finnegan]

Who decides when they have assimilated into the working class? The all powerful party? C'mon mate.
Their fellow workers, of course. Why do people always seem to assume that anything even vaguely unobvious must necessarily fall into the domain of Big Brother? :confused:


As we are talking of revolution, is it not the case that the process would generally be a revolutionary, instantaneous one?Revolution is properly understood as a process, not an event.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Workers in the party, or the wider working class? If the former, then the anti-democratic argument comes into play. If the latter, then you have huge logistical problems and it's quite un-enforceable and open to bastardisation.

I was talking about the transition of individuals - formerly of the bourgeoisie - to the working class. Surely the process of renouncing ones former class and dissipating ones ownership of property, capital etc., would be majorly an instantaneous event, not a process.

[Tim Finnegan]

Workers in the party, or the wider working class? If the former, then the anti-democratic argument comes into play. If the latter, then you have huge logistical problems and it's quite un-enforceable and open to bastardisation.
I imagine it would be something undertaken locally. That's how most issues of party membership are dealt with even among existing parties, after all.


I was talking about the transition of individuals - formerly of the bourgeoisie - to the working class. Surely the process of renouncing ones former class and dissipating ones ownership of property, capital etc., would be majorly an instantaneous event, not a process.Well, even if these individuals did have a road-to-Damascus moment, they'd still need to prove it, so a period of provisional membership is necessary. Can't have them playing the Bonaparte and trying to appropriate the party to re-establish their own authority.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Who decides when they have assimilated into the working class? The all powerful party? C'mon mate.

One key indicator, comrade, is getting a working-class job if capable of doing so.

Without this, then no matter how much working-class cultural assimilation one gets himself or herself into, he or she isn't working-class.


Workers in the party, or the wider working class? If the former, then the anti-democratic argument comes into play. If the latter, then you have huge logistical problems and it's quite un-enforceable and open to bastardisation.

Both, and party membership rules are very, very enforceable.


Well, even if these individuals did have a road-to-Damascus moment, they'd still need to prove it, so a period of provisional membership is necessary. Can't have them playing the Bonaparte and trying to appropriate the party to re-establish their own authority.

No non-worker (by "worker" I include working-class retirees and at-home spouses of workers) should even be granted provisional membership until getting a job. "Redefining Membership" says that only a select few non-workers should be granted things like honorary membership (I clearly mean specifically non-working-class intellectuals here, like tenured academics with subordinate research staff).

[Tim Finnegan]

No non-worker (by "worker" I include working-class retirees and at-home spouses of workers) should even be granted provisional membership until getting a job. "Redefining Membership" says that only a select few non-workers should be granted things like honorary membership (I clearly mean specifically non-working-class intellectuals here, like tenured academics with subordinate research staff).
Well, I mean to suggest that, after getting a job, those formerly not of the working class may be expected to pass through a position of provisional membership, in which rights of participation in decision-making are at least partially curtailed, as I've been told some organisations demand for new members.

[Die Neue Zeit]

I've got no problems with that one. You've assimilated my stuff very quickly, comrade! ;)

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

One key indicator, comrade, is getting a working-class job if capable of doing so.

Without this, then no matter how much working-class cultural assimilation one gets himself or herself into, he or she isn't working-class.



Surely in the process of revolution, that is a given. I doubt anybody is going to shout about being a Chief Executive during a revolution, comrade;)

It also depends what you would call a working class job. What about those jobs of the petty bourgeoisie? The jobs that esteemed comrades such as Fidel Castro occupied...

[El Chuncho]

What if members of the ruling class were Marxists, or/and supported workers struggles before the revolution...?

That would mean that they gave up their official titles, so I would have no problem in allowing them to stay. They are human and thus some would be socialists, and if they are actively socialists I do not see why other socialist should treat them any differently.

[Rafiq]

Can't remember where I read this, but some members of the catolian bourgeoisie joined the workers in anarchist Spain