Question about Communism and authoritarianism

[Zostrianos]

I'm hoping some of you may be able to shed light on this. I've always been shocked by the contrast between the noble aims of Marxism and Socialism, and how many governments calling themselves Communists have more often than not denied freedom to their citizens and engaged in dictatorial (and often bloody) repression of dissent (Stalin, Pol Pot, the Kims). My question is: is there any doctrine or principles in Marx's original ideas or writings that would justify repression or dictatorial power? (I'm not familiar enough with all his writings to figure this out myself...)

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Marx emphasized freedom and democracy as the road to socialism by the working class seizing control of the means of production.This is in sharp contrast to the authoritarian tendencies of the Marxist-Leninists.

Kin Jong Ill,Stalin and Pol Pot did not rule over countries which were socialist.Some here defend the murderous actions of Stalin,but hardly anyone defends the actions of the other two;infamous individuals whom haven't even paid much lip service to attaining socialism.

To answer your question though,no,people like Kim,Stalin and Pot did not take their actions from what Marx wrote about.So no,there isn't a justification.

[Agent Equality]

simply put: Those regimes were not communist, nor even socialist. Well you can't honestly go strictly by what marx said otherwise there'd be no room for improvisation and changes. Marx and his writings were not perfect, nor were they the say-all on communist and socialist theory. They merely act as a guidline, a template if you will, to start from. They are meant to be experimented with and modified. Lenin tried this and failed when he implemented the vanguard party. But he still tried(which is about all I can give him credit for personally). Communism is by its very nature not meant to be authoritarian in any manner whatsoever, neither in its implantation, nor its end result.

[#FF0000]

My question is: is there any doctrine or principles in Marx's original ideas or writings that would justify repression or dictatorial power? (I'm not familiar enough with all his writings to figure this out myself...)

Not really, but then again, Marx was pretty much focused on criticisms of capitalism.

[Apoi_Viitor]

When the workers replace the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, by their revolutionary dictatorship . . . to break down the resistance of the bourgeoisie... the workers invest the state with a revolutionary and transitional form.
—Marx

And the victorious party [in a revolution] must maintain its rule by means of the terror which its arms inspire in the reactionaries. Would the Paris Commune have lasted more than a day if it had not used the authority of the armed people against the bourgeoisie? Cannot we, on the contrary, blame it for having made too little use of that authority?
—Engels

As, therefore, the State is only a transitional institution, which is used in the struggle, in the revolution, to hold down one’s adversaries by force, it is sheer nonsense to talk of a “free people’s State”; so long as the proletariat still needs the State, it does not need it in the interests of freedom, but in order to hold down its adversaries, and, as soon as it becomes possible to speak of freedom, the State, as such, ceases to exist.
— Engels

[Os Cangaceiros]

There isn't really anywhere in Marx's writings where he endorses slaughter, to the best of my knowledge. A lot of the violence associated with communism comes from two factors IMO:

1) The fact that communists have faced vicious repression and violence from forces opposed to them, and

2) The fact that Marxism posited itself as simply the next evolution of human society, ordained by the iron laws of history, indeed the final evolution in societal development, and as such those who opposed it were retrograde throwbacks, holding all of humanity back, and as such deserved nothing but contempt.

There's nowhere in the New Testament where Jesus says "Go hither and slaughter thine enemies!", but that didn't stop a lot of people with an unquestioning belief in their own rightness and a burning vision of what society could and must look like from accomplishing that task.

[Zostrianos]

Thanks everyone, I always suspected authoritarianism wasn't an original tenet of Marxist thought - it goes against everything socialism holds dear (in my opinion)

@ Apoii Victor: The way I interpret those quotes is in the context of the revolutionary process itself, in its transitional phase - there's bound to be violence, and even a temporary need for political muscle to overcome the old system and bring about Socialism. However, in the long term I don't see it as viable in a just, free and equal society.



There's nowhere in the New Testament where Jesus says "Go hither and slaughter thine enemies!", but that didn't stop a lot of people with an unquestioning belief in their own rightness and a burning vision of what society could and must look like from accomplishing that task.

Good point :D

[Le Socialiste]

What you need to realize (and I'm sure you understand) is what these regimes pursued was the heavy repression of the working-class and its aims. One poster described them as merely paying lip service to communism and the revolution, while ensuring that neither were ever really attained by the worker. This might as well be true. There were efforts to do so, but these were often ended staring down the barrel of a gun. There is no room for authoritarianism in the realm of communist theory and practice. When the workers have joined en masse the revolutionary movement, and are prepared to fight for their emancipation, what need is there for a vanguard? The workers themselves can and will achieve communism - all we can do is do our best to be there and contribute to the cause when such efforts arise, as well as maintain an active presence in the field of workers' struggle.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

When the workers replace the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, by their revolutionary dictatorship . . . to break down the resistance of the bourgeoisie... the workers invest the state with a revolutionary and transitional form.
—Marx

And the victorious party [in a revolution] must maintain its rule by means of the terror which its arms inspire in the reactionaries. Would the Paris Commune have lasted more than a day if it had not used the authority of the armed people against the bourgeoisie? Cannot we, on the contrary, blame it for having made too little use of that authority?
—Engels

As, therefore, the State is only a transitional institution, which is used in the struggle, in the revolution, to hold down one’s adversaries by force, it is sheer nonsense to talk of a “free people’s State”; so long as the proletariat still needs the State, it does not need it in the interests of freedom, but in order to hold down its adversaries, and, as soon as it becomes possible to speak of freedom, the State, as such, ceases to exist.
— Engels

Yes but the aforementioned names used the state and used terror against the working class and against fellow leftists.

:thumbdown:

[Dave B]

J. V. Stalin ANARCHISM or SOCIALISM? 1906



........Where there are no classes, where there are neither rich nor poor, there is no need for a state, there is no need either for political power, which oppresses the poor and protects the rich. Consequently, in socialist society there will be no need for the existence of political power.



That is why Karl Marx said as far back as 1846:



"The working class in the course of its development Will substitute for the old bourgeois society an association which will exclude classes and their antagonism, and there will be no more political power properly so-called . . . " (see The Poverty of Philosophy).




That is why Engels said in 1884:



"The state, then, has not existed from all eternity. There have been societies that did without it, that had no conception of the state and state power. At a certain stage of economic development, which was necessarily bound up with the cleavage of society into classes, the state became a necessity. . . . We are now rapidly approaching a stage in the development of production at which the existence of these classes not only will have ceased to be a necessity, but will become a positive hindrance to production. They will fall as inevitably as they arose at an earlier stage. Along with them the state will inevitably fall. The society that will organise production on the basis of a free and equal association of the producers will put the whole machinery of state where it will then belong: into the Museum of Antiquities, by the side of the spinning wheel and the bronze axe"



(see The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State).


http://www.marx2mao.com/Stalin/AS07.html#c3