Is state capitalism a necessary step in the transition from capitalism to socialism?

[Alexenator]

I came across this graphic whilst browsing the web:
struggle.net / ALDS / transition_economies.gif (I can't post links yet)
And I began to wonder: is such a state capitalist sector of the national economy necessary at all? What do you think? Why is there still a private capitalist sector even fifty years after the proletariat revolution?

[Die Neue Zeit]

There shouldn't be a private capitalist sector, but yes "state-capitalist monopoly which is made to serve the interests of the whole people" and other state-capitalist influences are necessary.

[Alexenator]

There shouldn't be a private capitalist sector, but yes "state-capitalist monopoly which is made to serve the interests of the whole people" and other state-capitalist influences are necessary.
Why is this?

[RedAtheist]

Can't access the link so I'm not sure what you're talking about, but if you're talking about Cuba, I view it as a dictatorship and not on the way to socialism.

As I understand it, state capitalism is the name Trotskyists use for the Soviet Union under Stalin, which functioned in a very top-down bureacratic way. Such a system is similar to capitalism in that it excludes the workers from having any say in the way the economy is run. It is called 'state' capitalism, because an unelected state is in charge of the economy, in place of the capitalist class. I myself am not a Trotskyist, but I belong to a Trotskyist Party and that is how we use the term. Others (including other Trotskyists) might use it differently.

Given my understanding of state capitalism, I don't see why it would be a necessary step in the transition from capitalism to socialism. To create socialism, a large working class must exist. Such a working class comes about as a result of industrialisation, which also provides us with enough wealth to give everybody a decent standard of living. If you have an industrialised country and a proletariat, I don't see why you could not have a revolution in a capitalist society which led straight to socialism. I do not see why 'state capitalism' (as I define it) would have to play any part in this. That said, it would also be possible to move from a state capitalist society to a socialist society if the workers developed enough class consciousness to do so, trouble is they think they're already living in a 'socialist' society (with capitalism as their only alternative.)

As for why there is a private sector in Cuba. It probably has to do with the fact that they were on their own after the Soviet Union collapsed and did not have any countries to support them. They had to make concessions to capitalism so that they could find other countries to trade with. Hence Trotskyists argue that an international revolution is necessary. I'm no expert though, so don't take my word for it.

I think I'd prefer Cuba as it is now, to Cuba under Batista, though. I view Castro as a better leader than Batista, since Castro does not bow to what the US tells him. Democracy in Cuba is still preferable though and I'd like to see it brought about through a workers' revolution

[Il Medico]

I have a feeling you are wrongly conflating a Soviet style planned economy with State Capitalism, as all current nations are state capitalistic. (The states controls, to a varying degree, all modern capitalist economies). However, back to your question of whether such is a step towards socialism, the answer is absolutely not. The economy of the Soviet Union and other countries that adopted "communism" that modeled their on the Soviet's is the result of the collapse of a proletarian revolution and slipping back into capitalism. It is not a step forward, but a step back.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Actually, I had more in mind the officially recognized state capitalism of most Eastern European countries (http://www.revleft.com/vb/state-capitalism-ddr-t156747/index.html?t=156747), or of Yugoslavia, rather than left-com, Humanist, or Cliffite views on the Soviet Union.

[Il Medico]

Actually, I had more in mind the officially recognized state capitalism of most Eastern European countries (http://www.revleft.com/vb/state-capitalism-ddr-t156747/index.html?t=156747), or of Yugoslavia, rather than left-com, Humanist, or Cliffite views on the Soviet Union.
I don't see how that link helps your argument that "state capitalism is necessary". As Ismail points out the official Soviet assignment of who is 'state capitalist' and who has 'achieved socialism' is utterly arbitrary and was likely a propaganda or diplomatic tool. Not to mention that if you arguing that the achievement of the assigned title of 'State Capitalism' is a necessary step in 'achieving socialism', like Cold War-era Russia, Czechoslovakia, and Bulgaria... Well that's just laughable.

[Renegade Saint]

The idea that the USSR still gets to designate who is "state capitalist" or not is pretty amusing to say the least DNZ.


As I understand it, state capitalism is the name Trotskyists use for the Soviet Union under Stalin, which functioned in a very top-down bureacratic way.
It's mostly the Trotskyists who've been influenced by Tony Cliff who say that.
Others call the USSR et al "bureaucratic collectivist", or "degenerated/deformed workers' states". I think (someone can correct me) that the primary practical difference is that those trots who reject the 'state capitalist' characterization call for critical support of the USSR, while the Cliff-influenced ones urge no support at all.

Here's the chart he linked to:
http://i693.photobucket.com/albums/vv295/JBfan88_photos/transition_economies.gif

[Die Neue Zeit]

I don't see how that link helps your argument that "state capitalism is necessary". As Ismail points out the official Soviet assignment of who is 'state capitalist' and who has 'achieved socialism' is utterly arbitrary and was likely a propaganda or diplomatic tool. Not to mention that if you arguing that the achievement of the assigned title of 'State Capitalism' is a necessary step in 'achieving socialism', like Cold War-era Russia, Czechoslovakia, and Bulgaria... Well that's just laughable.

My statement on necessity entails (1) what both Trotsky and Stalin called a "state monopoly on foreign trade," (2) taking into public ownership very significant MOP beyond just the "commanding heights" (the means being diverse, from crude expropriations to tax-to-nationalize to the Meidner Plan), (3) the implementation of economy-wide indicative planning (as opposed to more direct planning later on) though based on extensive mathematical optimization, (4) the replacement of all small-business hiring of labour for profit with cooperatives, (5) the implementation of stakeholder co-management (not just crude "workers control") in every enterprise, (6) the realization of a Fully Socialized Labour Market, etc.

In agriculture, I differ with the Eastern European models, in that all agriculture must be based on public-paid wage labour (i.e., sovkhozization by hook and by crook). Your left-com position doesn't understand in particular the need for extending wage labour during the transition.

[Hit The North]

There shouldn't be a private capitalist sector, but yes "state-capitalist monopoly which is made to serve the interests of the whole people" and other state-capitalist influences are necessary.

This sounds like a nonsense theory. How can a workers state be state capitalist, if the abolition of the capitalist relation is the necessary precondition for working class power?

A revolution that fails to abolish capitalism is a revolution that fails to emancipate the proletariat. So at best, the survival of any form of capitalism is the result of a compromised outcome of the class struggle, where the workers are not the ruling power.

Is state capitalism nevertheless a progressive point in history on the road to communism? So far, no state capitalist regime has made the leap to socialism but all have fallen back into capitalism.

[Catma]

It seems to me that if you believe that the centrally planned economy is good, and the state is necessary, state capitalism would be a step forward from private monopoly capitalism. After that you just need to have a democratic political revolution. Am I wrong?

[Enragé]

no, at most its a (bad) response to being outgunned and outproduced.

[Obs]

"state-capitalist monopoly which is made to serve the interests of the whole people".
explain materialistically how that is possible

[Die Neue Zeit]

^^^ I quoted Lenin there in his infamous definition of "socialism."

[Die Neue Zeit]

This sounds like a nonsense theory. How can a workers state be state capitalist, if the abolition of the capitalist relation is the necessary precondition for working class power?

A revolution that fails to abolish capitalism is a revolution that fails to emancipate the proletariat. So at best, the survival of any form of capitalism is the result of a compromised outcome of the class struggle, where the workers are not the ruling power.

Is state capitalism nevertheless a progressive point in history on the road to communism? So far, no state capitalist regime has made the leap to socialism but all have fallen back into capitalism.

There are various forms utilized in the transition. Most of them involve Generalized Commodity Production, including all the examples below.

There's extensive, real state capitalism to start, not just government spending as a percentage of GDP, or mere protectionism, dirigisme, and all that crap. The core of this is a minimum of indicative planning. Worker coops "with state aid" (Lassalleans, Eisenarchers) could be promoted. With nationalizations, this is the minimum market socialism.

Then there's Lenin's "state-capitalist monopoly which is made to serve the interests of the whole people" definition of "socialism," derived from Kautsky's The Social Revolution and in fact less radical than the more directives-based Stalinist economy. When applied to a particular sector, in this scenario the state owns all of the MOP in that sector (no small enterprises or even coops), but market socialism with indicative planning is still the norm. Consumers buy and sell at market prices, and more importantly, so do state enterprises (labour markets and capital markets).

When I said that "all agriculture must be based on public-paid wage labour (i.e., sovkhozization by hook and by crook)," here's an example of a sector that should be subject to this state-capitalist monopoly (which the Soviets, much less the Eastern Europeans, never had):

http://www.revleft.com/vb/national-democratization-industrial-t143922/index.html

A Fully Socialized Labour Market, whereby the state is the de jure employer of everybody, would contract all labour out to all of the above and to what's below (which the Soviets didn't have, thus having chronic problems with enterprises hoarding labour):

http://www.revleft.com/vb/supply-side-political-t152098/index.html

Then there's the directive-based economy, but one that retains money. When applied to a particular sector, in this scenario the state owns all of the MOP in that sector, and directive planning throughout that sector is applied. Indeed, there are no labour markets or capital markets. However, Generalized Commodity Production is still retained; money is still retained because things like working capital, current assets less current liabilities, need to be taken into account.

An example of a sector that should be subject to this directive-based economy is none other than the socialist polity's defense industry, thus having a Fully Socialized Defense Industry:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/us-deficit-debate-t158896/index.html?p=2191600

[A Marxist Historian]

Can't access the link so I'm not sure what you're talking about, but if you're talking about Cuba, I view it as a dictatorship and not on the way to socialism.

As I understand it, state capitalism is the name Trotskyists use for the Soviet Union under Stalin, which functioned in a very top-down bureacratic way. Such a system is similar to capitalism in that it excludes the workers from having any say in the way the economy is run. It is called 'state' capitalism, because an unelected state is in charge of the economy, in place of the capitalist class. I myself am not a Trotskyist, but I belong to a Trotskyist Party and that is how we use the term. Others (including other Trotskyists) might use it differently.

Given my understanding of state capitalism, I don't see why it would be a necessary step in the transition from capitalism to socialism. To create socialism, a large working class must exist. Such a working class comes about as a result of industrialisation, which also provides us with enough wealth to give everybody a decent standard of living. If you have an industrialised country and a proletariat, I don't see why you could not have a revolution in a capitalist society which led straight to socialism. I do not see why 'state capitalism' (as I define it) would have to play any part in this. That said, it would also be possible to move from a state capitalist society to a socialist society if the workers developed enough class consciousness to do so, trouble is they think they're already living in a 'socialist' society (with capitalism as their only alternative.)

As for why there is a private sector in Cuba. It probably has to do with the fact that they were on their own after the Soviet Union collapsed and did not have any countries to support them. They had to make concessions to capitalism so that they could find other countries to trade with. Hence Trotskyists argue that an international revolution is necessary. I'm no expert though, so don't take my word for it.

I think I'd prefer Cuba as it is now, to Cuba under Batista, though. I view Castro as a better leader than Batista, since Castro does not bow to what the US tells him. Democracy in Cuba is still preferable though and I'd like to see it brought about through a workers' revolution

Trotsky himself always denied quite insistently that the USSR was "state capitalist." The term was used by Lenin to describe measures of a workers state to encourage private capitalism, foreign investment etc. to get the collapsed Russian economy going again. Had its peak in the NEP. DNZ quoted the usual phrase Lenin used.

Why were such measures necessary? Because, as Trotsky liked to explain, you can't build socialism in one country. It's a world economy, and a socialist enclave in a capitalist world is impossible, even if the country in which you're attempting to build your socialist island is industrialized. East Germany and Czechoslovakia were highly industrialized, but nonetheless they were economic failures, which is the real reason they collapsed, not just Stalinist repression.

Though when you get right down to it, democracy is just as necessary for economic reasons as any other. A "command economy" run from the top can't work in the long run.

A lot of different people have caracterized the old Soviet system as "state capitalism," including some folk who call themselves Trotskyist on other grounds, notably the late Tony Cliff and his followers. Cliff expanded Lenin's conception of the USSR under NEP as using state capitalist methods to an overall conception of the USSR as "state capitalist."

In this he was following the example of Gregory Zinoviev, who was briefly more or less in charge of the Soviet state in between Lenin and Stalin. Zinoviev at first sided with Stalin vs. Trotsky, and then had a big falling out with Stalin and joined Trotsky's Left Opposition, and then capitulated to Stalin. Arrested, tried and shot during the Great Terror of the 1930s.

-M.H.-

[A Marxist Historian]

This sounds like a nonsense theory. How can a workers state be state capitalist, if the abolition of the capitalist relation is the necessary precondition for working class power?

A revolution that fails to abolish capitalism is a revolution that fails to emancipate the proletariat. So at best, the survival of any form of capitalism is the result of a compromised outcome of the class struggle, where the workers are not the ruling power.

Is state capitalism nevertheless a progressive point in history on the road to communism? So far, no state capitalist regime has made the leap to socialism but all have fallen back into capitalism.

States are about power, not economics. A workers state is a tool for the workers to rule over society, suppressing the capitalists and keeping other classes in line as necessary also. If non-socialist socialist economic measures are necessary, this does not mean that power is not in the hands of the workers. But a state like the former Soviet Union, with no unemployment, a planned economy (albeit often badly planned), free medical care and education, no homelessness, etc. is obviously not overseeing a capitalist society.

In the long run, a revolution that fails to abolish capitalism indeed will not emancipate the workers. But you just can't abolish all capitalism overnight. The construction of a socialist society is a lengthy and difficult process, and can't be completed except on a world scale. Can't be done in one country. Marx was very clear on that, it's not just a Trotskyist notion.

The attempt to abolish capitalism and introduce socialism overnight can have disastrous consequences, as most obviously with the forced collectivization of agriculture in the Soviet Union by Stalin, which led to a famine in which millions of people died. "War communism" under Lenin didn't work well either. Lenin and Trotsky's turn to capitalist methods through the NEP was absolutely necessary to avoid catastrophe.

-M.H.-

[A Marxist Historian]

explain materialistically how that is possible

That was DNZ's quote from Lenin which I referred to. He was talking about the situation of the USSR after the Civil War, with a collapsed economy, non or poorly functioning industry, mass starvation, and the great majority of the Russian working class leaving the factories for the Red Army, or becoming bureaucrats, or fleeing to the countryside to squabble with the peasants over land to grow vegetables and avoid starving. Or just plain dying, which a lot of them did.

So he wanted state monopoly measures over key economic links that would *encourage* capitalist investment from abroad and private capitalist enterprise to get the economy moving again. There never was any foreign investment worth noticing, as foreign capitalists hated the USSR too much--unlike contemporary China. But private enterprise blossomed in the USSR in the 1920s, with the "NEPmen" in the cities and the "kulaks" in the countryside. And got out of hand, but that is another story.

-M.H.-

[Dave B]

From September 1917;

For socialism is merely the next step forward from state-capitalist monopoly. Or, in other words, socialism is merely state-capitalist monopoly which is made to serve the interests of the whole people and has to that extent ceased to be capitalist monopoly.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/ichtci/11.htm


And April 1918;

What is state capitalism under Soviet power? To achieve state capitalism at the present time means putting into effect the accounting and control that the capitalist classes carried out. We see a sample of state capitalism in Germany. We know that Germany has proved superior to us. But if you reflect even slightly on what it would mean if the foundations of such state capitalism were established in Russia, Soviet Russia, everyone who is not out of his senses and has not stuffed his head with fragments of book learning, would have to say that state capitalism would be our salvation.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1918/apr/29.htm


Trotsky 1922;


this is explicable in part by an incomprehension of an expression frequently used by us, that we now have state capitalism. I shall not enter into an evaluation of this term; for in any case we need only to qualify what we understand by it. By state capitalism we all understood property belonging to the state which itself was in the hands of the bourgeoisie, which exploited the working class. Our state undertakings operate along commercial lines based on the market. But who stands in power here? The working class. Herein lies the principled distinction of our state ‘capitalism’ in inverted commas from state capitalism without inverted commas.
What does this mean in perspective? Just this. The more state capitalism say, in Hohenzollern Germany, as it was, developed, the more powerfully the class of junkers and capitalists of Germany could hold down the working class. The more our ‘state capitalism’ develops the richer the working class will become, that is the firmer will become the foundation of socialism.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1922/youth/youth.htm


if you want we can have it that Lenin’s and Trotsky’s Soviet Russia was state capitalism and it progressed(?) to a degenerate workers state under Stalin.

[cheguvera]

if karl marx,cheguevara or lenin could come back from death, all of them would have heart attacks if they could see so called communism in russia or china.
sorry about my english...

[Lucretia]

This question invites a lot of analytical confusion. What does the OP mean by "state capitalism"? Does he/she mean an economy of commodity production and exchange controlled by a centralized nation-state government (not an international organization) of the type envisioned by Bukharin but which never really existed historically except as a result of deflected permanent revolution?

The transition to socialism at this point will be away from capitalism, not toward it, and certainly not away from some other mode of production, through some kind of capitalist style scheme, toward socialism (as might have been necessary in an isolated and backward country 70 years ago).

[Dave B]

Yes, but is state capitalism a ‘transitional phase’ between feudalism and a ‘degenerate workers state’?

[Die Neue Zeit]

That was DNZ's quote from Lenin which I referred to. He was talking about the situation of the USSR after the Civil War

No he wasn't. Lenin's quote was from just before the Bolsheviks took power.


Does he/she mean an economy of commodity production and exchange controlled by a centralized nation-state government (not an international organization) of the type envisioned by Bukharin but which never really existed historically except as a result of deflected permanent revolution?

The transition to socialism at this point will be away from capitalism, not toward it, and certainly not away from some other mode of production, through some kind of capitalist style scheme, toward socialism (as might have been necessary in an isolated and backward country 70 years ago).

Again, just because the transition is away from capitalism doesn't mean it has to be away from generalized commodity production (GCP). The former is characterized by GCP + labour markets + capital markets. A transitional GCP could combine minimum market socialism ("state capitalism"), maximum market socialism ("state-capitalist monopoly"), and a directively planned GCP component.

[cheguvera]

According to the last known study, 78 per cent of the Russian elite (http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,454486,00.html) have a KGB background. And Putinist propaganda, never a subtle affair to being with, has lately assumed a unmistakable neo-Soviet style. Consider the All-Russia People's Front (http://en.rian.ru/russia/20110607/164494398.html), a Kremlin-concocted “grassroots” organisation that adores United Russia, the ruling party, and yet which registers signatories at the speed of quantum mechanics. In a single day, 39,000 employees of the Siberian Business Union joined, no doubt without many of them even being aware of the Front’s existence. Membership is so easy that a few weeks back I registered as a Muscovite housewife called Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Nope,
socialism has become a transition to state capitalism. When you give in to dictators to do socialism, they get established as a elite society in communist state.Then they turned the communism to capitalism or corrupt semi-democratic capitalism as in russia, china today.
Only anarchism can bring socialism.fucking dicators will not bring any good to working class.dicators become elite & betray the real revolution.That is why we are yet to see a socialism on this earth.

[cheguvera]

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/michaelweiss/100098831/the-kremlin-is-furious-about-americas-visa-blacklist-but-there-is-nothing-barack-obama-can-do-about-it/

[Luís Henrique]

By state capitalism we all understood property belonging to the state which itself was in the hands of the bourgeoisie, which exploited the working class. Our state undertakings operate along commercial lines based on the market. But who stands in power here? The working class. Herein lies the principled distinction of our state ‘capitalism’ in inverted commas from state capitalism without inverted commas.

Yup, this is the distincion that is necessary to make, in order to avoid confusion between Soviet Russia and Imperial Germany.

However, there is a flaw in Trotsky's reasoning, here: "But who stands in power here? The working class." This would have to be explained; the Russian working class was being overworked in the factories - and those who are being overworked in factories usually aren't standing in power in my reckoning. So what does Trotsky mean by "the working class stands in power"?

Luís Henrique

[Hit The North]

^^^ Was Trotsky referring to the government of the Russian Communist Party (the presumed proxy of the Russian working class) and those appointed to crack the whip over the toiling workers?

[cheguvera]

the working class stands in power"?

surely long standing dictators are not belonged to working class.Dictators could not bring socialism to us.They will never make socialism reality.No one should be allowed to hold in to power even for couple of years.Some people become communists because they are greedy to rule.May be lenin,cheguevara,karl marx are real communists, real socialists.But people who governed so called communists states are no where near socialism.

[Dave B]

Well never mind the oft mistaken Trotsky. Lenin’s view was that it was a vanguard ‘proxy’ (which didn’t embrace the whole of the working class) that ‘stands in power here’.



V. I. Lenin The Trade Unions, The Present Situation
And Trotsky’s Mistakes



But the dictatorship of the proletariat cannot be exercised through an organisation embracing the whole of that class, because in all capitalist countries (and not only over here, in one of the most backward) the proletariat is still so divided, so degraded, and so corrupted in parts (by imperialism in some countries) that an organisation taking in the whole proletariat cannot directly exercise proletarian dictatorship.

It can be exercised only by a vanguard


http://marxists.anu.edu.au/archive/lenin/works/1920/dec/30.htm

It was a ‘communist’ party of a state capitalist junkerist vanguard nomenklatura who were proud to say ‘we are the 1%’.

And as the membership peaked at that period at about 800,000 they were probably less than that.

And from Trotsky in the same year;




we must have discipline, firm, iron discipline! While honour and respect is due to the honest, self-sacrificing worker who devotes himself wholly to work for the common good, because we have no capitalists and work for the people as a whole; while, I say, the honest worker deserves respect and honour, and we must see to it that he enjoys the best conditions, through rewards and bonuses – the self-seeking worker must meet with contempt and punishment! Bonuses to the worker who gives the country more than the average. The normal wage to the worker who makes the average contribution. Punishment to the worker who is lazy and careless.


http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1920/military/ch40.htm


A regular little Stakhanovite Stalinist in his day!

[ckaihatsu]

I have a feeling you are wrongly conflating a Soviet style planned economy with State Capitalism, as all current nations are state capitalistic. (The states controls, to a varying degree, all modern capitalist economies). However, back to your question of whether such is a step towards socialism, the answer is absolutely not. The economy of the Soviet Union and other countries that adopted "communism" that modeled their on the Soviet's is the result of the collapse of a proletarian revolution and slipping back into capitalism. It is not a step forward, but a step back.


This is a key argument that cannot be overemphasized.

As an analogy, no one would want to characterize *themselves* based on the episodes from life that are less-than-palatable, and that are particularly determined by external forces. We would rather like to think that we are solidly in control of our fate, and that we describe a life story made by our own volition.

So, by extension, why would we want to *plan* for a world future using blueprints that are the equivalent of a car's spare tire -- ?? -- !

I certainly appreciate those who are able to delineate the various characteristics and histories throughout, but in terms of forward motion let's just plan on going as directly as possible to what the world *needs* -- ! (I am *not* a market socialist!)


Centralization-Abstraction Diagram of Political Forms

http://postimage.org/image/35ru6ztic/

[A Marxist Historian]

Yup, this is the distincion that is necessary to make, in order to avoid confusion between Soviet Russia and Imperial Germany.

However, there is a flaw in Trotsky's reasoning, here: "But who stands in power here? The working class." This would have to be explained; the Russian working class was being overworked in the factories - and those who are being overworked in factories usually aren't standing in power in my reckoning. So what does Trotsky mean by "the working class stands in power"?

Luís Henrique

One needs to differentiate here, as Trotsky does, between a political and a sociological understanding of the state.

Politically speaking, the workers did not control the country, rather you had a petty-bourgeois bureaucracy running things. So the USSR was not a workers' government.

But what is a state, in sociological terms? Lenin put it most clearly in State and Revolution. It's an armed body of men enforcing certain property relations. In a capitalist state, that means capitalism. Feudalist state, like the old absolute monarchies, feudalism. In a workers state, it means the defense of proletarian property relations.

And the old Soviet state did indeed suppress private capitalism, and maintained a social setup with planned (albeit bureaucratically therefore badly planned) production, instead of anarchic free market capitalist production. So it was a workers state, albeit bureaucratically deformed, ultimately based on the passive consent of the working class to its rule in their name.

The petty-bourgeois bureaucrats did not have an independent base in a nonexistent domestic capitalist class, but rather balanced between world imperialism and the popular masses, much like trade union bureaucrats in the West balance between their membership and the capitalists.

-M.H.-

[A Marxist Historian]

Well never mind the oft mistaken Trotsky. Lenin’s view was that it was a vanguard ‘proxy’ (which didn’t embrace the whole of the working class) that ‘stands in power here’.



V. I. Lenin The Trade Unions, The Present Situation
And Trotsky’s Mistakes





http://marxists.anu.edu.au/archive/lenin/works/1920/dec/30.htm

It was a ‘communist’ party of a state capitalist junkerist vanguard nomenklatura who were proud to say ‘we are the 1%’.

And as the membership peaked at that period at about 800,000 they were probably less than that.

And from Trotsky in the same year;



.


http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1920/military/ch40.htm


A regular little Stakhanovite Stalinist in his day!

The trouble with Stakhanovism was that it was a fraud. It was an attempt (fairly successful) on the part of the Soviet bureacracy to create a labor aristocracy within the working class that would provide them with a solid basis of support, just as the labor aristocracy is or was the social basis of Social Democracy in the West.

In fact, the creation of artificial "labor heroes" disrupted production. To artificially create single superefficient heroes who would be paid some four-five times as much as the rank and file the productivity of the rest of the workers was lowered. To make them look good on paper, basic safety and machine wear conditions were ignored, resulting in breakage of machinery and low quality products.

It was an ugly twisted parody of Trotsky's original ideas during the "Military Communism" period, like so many other Stalinist notions of the late '20s and 1930s, and Trotsky was the first to condemn it.

"Military Communism" was an ultraleft mistake, in a period when backward disintegrated Russia with its collapsed economy and industry needed to make a partial return to capitalism. Something Trotsky was the first to advocate. The "militarization of labor" etc. was an error on Trotsky's part, but only because "war communism" itself was an error. In the context of "war communism," the policies Trotsky briefly advocated were necessary survival measures, thankfully dropped as soon as the NEP was introduced.

-M.H.-

[Die Neue Zeit]

You might wish to re-evaluate Stakhanovism re. a labour aristocracy. Any sort of Soviet labour aristocracy and worse, coordinator-class growth came from the Lenin Levy and emphasis on engineer education, not from Stakhanovism. Extolling workers to fulfill and overfulfill production targets in principle isn't a bad idea.