Concept of a Vanguard Party in a hypothetical US Revolution?

[RedMarxist]

How well would, in a hypothetical scenario where the US had a revolution, would a Marxist-Leninist vanguard party hold up? Would/could there be one if communism in the US were to be democratic? your opinions?

My opinion:

The way I see it is that there must be some sort of main party to essentially guide people during and after the revolution occurs(I'm referring to military guidance, not just political guidance.), yet there must be a healthy respect for democracy.

The way I could see this working is through a similar system to the Russian soviets-worker/soldier councils, only ceded a little more power. These councils would serve as a bulwark against the vanguard party just in case it got to powerful. Multiple political parties would have to exist(and of course multiple candidates from various backgrounds) if democracy were to be maintained.

excerpt from bataillescocialiste

"...The reason for this was that the soviets – the soviets as they really existed in revolutionary Russia as opposed to the ideal workers’ councils of Left Communist theory – as loose makeshift bodies were easily manipulable by a well-organized group such as were the professional revolutionaries of the Bolshevik Party under Lenin’s leadership"

to prevent a repeat of this the vanguard party could be kept at bay-if a member seemed to be gaining to much power(ie Stalin, even Lenin himself) a committee of elected soviet members could verify this and deal with him/her as they saw fit.

basically a system of checks-and-balances would be implemented in post revolutionary America.

The way I'd organize government would be as follows(top-down):

-US Vanguard party
-Council committee members who oversee the party itself, making sure it
isn't trying to usurp power from the local councils(to wedge the gap)
-the main group of 'loose' councils consisting of the citizenry

another excerpt:

"...The soviet system served the Bolsheviks’ purpose because elections to the All-Russia Congress of Soviets were neither universal nor direct nor secret. The Congress was composed of delegates from local soviets who were in their turn delegates from local factories. Its members were thus only indirectly elected. Urban areas were over-represented. There were no set procedures for the election of the delegates to the local soviets; in most cases they would have been chosen by a show of hands at a general assembly of the workforce of a factory, with all the drawbacks of this method of election."

establish a set procedure for the delegate elections of course. Equally represent urban/rural areas. directly elect members.

that is my two cents? anyone want to tell me a much more better scenario where this could work in a ML America? :confused:

[Geiseric]

I'm not sure at all, nobody will have a clue as to the specifics of the revolution until things are shaken up in other western countries and we see how those work out.

[Die Rote Fahne]

Inb4 sectarian flame war.

[RedMarxist]

how is it a sectarian flame war? I'd asked a valid question: could there be democracy in a vanguard party style government?

[eric922]

how is it a sectarian flame war? Because you'll likely get the Trotskyists giving you one answer and the Stalinists giving you another and it'll devolve into a 5 page argument as to which group is right.

[RedMarxist]

well, sorry. But can I at least have an honest opinion. Could a vanguard party also be democratic?

[Hammilton]

I don't think you can have a council overseeing the top because then they're the top and they will obtain party.

Even this won't prevent a single charismatic personality from dominating party thinking. These people naturally get others to go along with them. Unless that person is making a few powerful and serious enemies, which is more or less what they don't do, I don't think this would prevent that one person from reaching power.

[Barry]

In truth the vanguard party itself has to show a large level of democracy in its own workings with every member having a vote, Stalin was able to appoint people which aided his rise to power. The bolsheviks had been out on the fringes for a long time and didnt trust anyone outside of the party, a vanguard party during and following a revolution would have to become a product of the people with the new membership. Also democracy within the armed forces and he ability of trade unions to have their own militia's would also prevent the ease of a individual from gaining power
Furthermore with regards to the soviets and parliament of a country after a revolution merely put in place the ability of a electoral area to recall their candidate if they do not perform and replace him/her
The duty of the vanguard party in my view is to educate and aid the people not dictate what is best, so if the people wish for a different style of socialism the vanguard party must aid them in the running of this

[RedMarxist]

I agree. I believe that for a vanguard party to work there must be consent from the people first and foremost. I also agree with having a local militia for each soviet to prevent a Stalin type figure from rising to power and I do root for my earlier hypothetical National Soviet Committee that oversees the Vanguard Party itself and the local soviets to make sure no one is unfit to rule/has too much power.

Yet I guess this is all just hypothetical right? Anyways, thanks for your opinion.

[ckaihatsu]

to prevent a repeat of this the vanguard party could be kept at bay-if a member seemed to be gaining to much power(ie Stalin, even Lenin himself) a committee of elected soviet members could verify this and deal with him/her as they saw fit.


We should recall the historical conditions in that revolutionary Russia -- it was under Western imperialist siege, necessitating quicker-moving decision-making than that which could / can be afforded by lower, slower, broader-based (soviet) decision-making.





I don't think you can have a council overseeing the top because then they're the top and they will obtain party.

Even this won't prevent a single charismatic personality from dominating party thinking. These people naturally get others to go along with them. Unless that person is making a few powerful and serious enemies, which is more or less what they don't do, I don't think this would prevent that one person from reaching power.


If a revolutionary movement can be broadly and thoroughly built from the bottom up then it will be soundly structured to resist both siege and counter-revolution while remaining agile, *without* the need for concentrated leadership. If world events move faster than the revolution is equipped to handle *then* power tends to consolidate near the top in order to respond "adequately" to such world events.

[ckaihatsu]

I'll add that this kind of thing can be envisioned with the geometry of a pyramid -- or a cone, if you like. The mass of the cone represents the ongoing political and material momentum built-up and focused into the (revolutionary) endeavor. If the efforts are more broad-based -- derived from greater numbers of people -- then the cone will be more stable from being flatter and wider, but then also probably shorter, too, since its mass will be more spread-out.

If the call for expediency prevails -- or is forced from without -- then the energies would be more concentrated to make the cone reach higher but it would do so at the expense of a broad base, thus also making it relatively top-heavy and more-precarious. This would correspond to dependence on authoritative (substitutionist) directives, and/or the politics of court, leading to palace-intrigue-like plots and factional coups.

As revolutionaries we would want a broad-based cone that can be steadily grown to a high-level focused decisive point.

[Jose Gracchus]

While nominations, motions, deliberations, etc. may be public and open in popular assemblies like soviets and committees - the secret ballot should always be employed for decisive votes (except for delegates responsible to lower constituencies). There's definitely contradictions also if strict proportionality is not maintained, and if the parties are excessively influential at lower levels of a council system. Very rapidly the strong discipline of the most popular party crowds out the responsibility of delegates to lower constituencies.

[ckaihatsu]

While nominations, motions, deliberations, etc. may be public and open in popular assemblies like soviets and committees - the secret ballot should always be employed for decisive votes (except for delegates responsible to lower constituencies). There's definitely contradictions also if strict proportionality is not maintained, and if the parties are excessively influential at lower levels of a council system. Very rapidly the strong discipline of the most popular party crowds out the responsibility of delegates to lower constituencies.


I think we can avoid getting bogged down in procedural and protocol-type formalism if we simply recognize the communications topology that exists around us -- the Internet has enabled the 'many-to-many' form of (asynchronous) interaction, as through a discussion board like RevLeft.

I'm decidedly partial to this format, throughout, for virtually *all* proletarian political matters -- the only exceptions I'd imagine would be those of a highly strategic / tactical and time-sensitive nature, wherein some temporary situational delegation may become necessary for the sake of maneuverability in realtime. For all else the public discussion board would be preferable, for reasons of transparency and accountability.





4. Ends -- Flat, all-inclusive mode of participation at all levels without delegated representatives




[In] this day and age of fluid digital-based communications, we may want to dispense with formalized representative personages altogether and just conceptualize a productive entity within a supply chain network as having 'external business' or 'external matters' to include in its regular routine of entity-collective co-administration among its participants.




Given that people make *points* on any of a number of *issues*, which may comprise some larger *topics* -- and these fall into some general *themes*, or *categories* -- wouldn't this very discussion-board format of RevLeft be altogether suitable for a massively parallel (ground-level) political participation among all those concerned, particularly workers, for *all scales* of political implementation -- ?

I think there's conventionally been a kind of lingering anxiety over the political "workload" that would confront any regular person who would work *and* wish to have active, impacting participation in real-world policy, along the lines of the examples you've provided for this thread's discussion.

But I'll note that, for any given concrete issue, not everyone would *necessarily* find the material need to individually weigh in with a distinct proposal of their own -- as I think we've seen here from our own regular participation at RevLeft, it's often the case that a simple press of the 'Thanks' button is all that's needed in many cases where a comrade has *already* put forth the words that we would have said ourselves, thereby relieving us from the task of writing that sentiment ourselves.

Would concrete issues at higher, more-generalized levels be so different, so inaccessible to the regular, affected person on the ground? Wouldn't the information gathered within such an appropriate thread of discussion "clue everyone in" as the overall situation at that level -- say, from the participants of several different countries -- ?

I'll ask if delegated representatives *are* really required anymore when our current political vehicle, the Internet-based discussion board, can facilitate massively participatory, though orderly and topic-specific conversations, across all ranges of geography and scales of populations.

tinyurl.com/concise-communism-model


Referring to the 'material cone' concept in post #11, I'll add that this first diagram, below, illustrates that people's attentions and activities can only be put towards the three general categories of pleasure, labor, and/or administration/management, meaning politics for the latter one here.

The 'material cone' can stretch up into a mass focused momentum towards (realized) 'policy' and (enacted) 'theory', as seen illustrated in the second diagram.

Finally, the same cone can likewise be placed in the conceptual environment of the third diagram, too.


[2] G.U.T.S.U.C., Simplified

http://postimage.org/image/34ml2e61w/


Consciousness, A Material Definition

http://postimage.org/image/35t4i1jc4/


[1] History, Macro Micro -- Precision

http://postimage.org/image/34mjeutk4/

[Jose Gracchus]

I'm sorry, but online communication simply has anti-social characteristics and fundamental challenges which are unacceptable. While obviously I think we should take the C-SPAN concept to the next level with online and real-time mass participation and deliberation, the basic delegation concept I think must remain.

[syndicat]

if the "vanguard party" runs the military, it will rule the country. a hierarchical military structure always serves the interest of some ruling elite. the military force used to defend the revolution has to be directly controlled by the mass democratic bodies through which the working class controls the society.

[ckaihatsu]

I'm sorry, but online communication simply has anti-social characteristics and fundamental challenges which are unacceptable.


Communication is communication regardless of the format / medium. Obviously different methods will have their own distinct characteristics, such as body language for in-person conversations, but nonetheless we're a social species and use of language is integral to how we live and function.

What's of far more significance is the *context* and what's *at stake* for any given communication. I think you're invoking the anonymous Internet chatroom as the stereotypical context for Internet communication, but many other types of social contexts exist for net-based communications, of course.





While obviously I think we should take the C-SPAN concept to the next level with online and real-time mass participation and deliberation, the basic delegation concept I think must remain.


I'll politely disagree here and repeat that the asynchronous many-to-many public discussion board format is both a technical and humanistic *advancement* over previous, conventional forms of communication. Most political matters are *not* so time-sensitive and so do not require realtime attention -- moreover, politics is better with mass public access and participation, benefitting from the transparency and accountability that the online-based group format provides.

One of the biggest problems in politics is *personifying*, whereas the point of involvement should be for securing *results* based on a cohesive *policy*. By using a flattened communications space the problems of personifying and power brokering -- as from delegation -- can be avoided almost completely, in favor of developing policy from mass participation and support.

[Robocommie]

I just don't trust the internet enough to make it the cornerstone of political representation. It's far too open to abuse, far too unreliable. It's a great communications tool but I don't think it should be used to collect votes and make broad-reaching decisions.

Generally, I just don't like the idea of basing society entirely on something technological, something that could fail. When my internet connection fucks up, it's annoying because it's harder for me to get my schoolwork done at home. I wouldn't want to also have to worry about being politically and economically disenfranchised, or have an election screwed up because of a computer error.

[Ostrinski]

Vanguard party? Democracy? No.

[ckaihatsu]

I just don't trust the internet enough to make it the cornerstone of political representation. It's far too open to abuse, far too unreliable. It's a great communications tool but I don't think it should be used to collect votes and make broad-reaching decisions.

Generally, I just don't like the idea of basing society entirely on something technological, something that could fail. When my internet connection fucks up, it's annoying because it's harder for me to get my schoolwork done at home. I wouldn't want to also have to worry about being politically and economically disenfranchised, or have an election screwed up because of a computer error.


Here, as with anything political, we need to distinguish between *means* and *ends* -- if the Internet is an appropriate medium for dispatching the matters of a particular politics, then good. If it's not, then it's not. I don't argue for discussion-board usage based on any *principle*, but rather on *technical* grounds since it's a communications *tool* and not a set of politics of its own.

On the issue of technical means there *are* ways of ensuring reliability of communications over remote distances (regardless of the tool) -- that would be under the topic of protocols.

[RedMarxist]

Vanguard party? Democracy? No.

Why, and can you back this up?

Sure the examples we've seen our/were undemocratic, yet it is entirely possible that it could be different in a future revolution anywhere in the world.

What is the alternative to a vanguard party? At least some form of leadership should have to guide the revolution one way or another, else the whole movement will get out of hand sooner or later.

Why can't their be a system of checks-and-balances in place to keep it[the CP in X future revolution] within its legal limits? I earlier suggested that the councils be given more power in the form of political power as well as local popular militias. I'd like to see a future Stalin face off against a massive militia of his own people!

[Jose Gracchus]

I strongly recommend that anyone interesting in the inner workings of proper socialist democracy read Kronstadt 1917-1921: The Fate of a Soviet Democracy by Israel Getzler. His examination of the mechanisms by which base assemblies and associations of the producers and servicemen directly deliberated upon, and made policy and decisions, from the bottom up, is a key lesson. Especially interesting in light of its comparisons with the Petrograd Soviet, where decisions were haggled out amongst the political parties with the strongest representation ahead of time, and mechanically rubber-stamped in the larger assembly.

[ckaihatsu]

the topic of protocols.


Here's a protocol I developed, for illustration and/or usage:


[16] Affinity Group Workflow Tracker

http://postimage.org/image/1cqt82ps4/


[17] Prioritization Chart

http://postimage.org/image/35hop84dg/