what is wrong with wage?

[The Dark Side of the Moon]

if there is socialism in one country, what would be the problem with that?

[Leftsolidarity]

That there is socialism in only one country...

Serious answer now, someone on here a few weeks back looked down on me for not knowing the difference between wages in a capitalist system and wages in a socialist system. I think the answer would actually depend on your tendency. Some anarchists look for complete and immediate abolishion of money afaik so I could see them having a problem with wages based on that. While some others might say that in a socialist system the workers would get a wage more equal to the amount of labor the give, unlike in a capitalist system where they are paid less than the labor they are "selling".

Honestly though I'm no expert. I just wanted to throw this out there to see if anyone agrees.

[Misanthrope]

It's inherently exploitative.

[∞]

I refuse to acknowledge the word "wrong" when it comes to these kind of things. I believe wage as it exists in a capitalist society extracts surplus value from the working class and is highly exploitative. If you look into a cooperative mutualist society, it is an improvement. But firms still compete a la cycle of business. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_cycle)

[Red Noob]

The state and ruling class (whether it's a worker's state/state capitalist/whatever you want to call it) can not cease to exist if wages exist.

I'm no expert either, it just seems like common sense.

[Mind_Zenith]

The main problem I've seen with the wage system is that it gives many workers just enough to live day-to-day (or paycheque-to-paycheque as the case may be). This means that overtime is necessary for a lot of workers who either need more money or are deciding to save up, making it harder to find other forms of employment that may suit the worker's conditions better. It is also whatever the employer decides it to be; whatever best suits their purposes is how much the worker gets, regardless of the worker's needs. There are many alternatives for the wage system postulated under Socialism, from the complete abolishment of money from the revolution (Anarcho-Communism), to having the state regulate a wage to ensure a better living standard for the worker (Marxist and Democratic Socialism)–usually with basics such as health care and access to water being freely provided–with the eventual goal of abolishing money along with the state and all forms of class (Marxist Communism).

Correct me if I'm wrong, I haven't been on these boards for a while!

[ed miliband]

I refuse to acknowledge the word "wrong" when it comes to these kind of things. I believe wage as it exists in a capitalist society extracts surplus value from the working class and is highly exploitative. If you look into a cooperative mutualist society, it is an improvement. But firms still compete a la cycle of business. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_cycle)

But surely by describing something as exploitative you imply that it is also "wrong", whether you use that word or not?

[Tim Finnegan]

Wages imply the existence of labour. Labour implies the existence of capital. Capital implies the existence of capitalism. Capitalism necessarily means the absence of socialism. Marxism 101.

[ColonelCossack]

Workers have to recieve wages that are lower in value than the commodity they made, else the capitalist gets no profit. Thus wages=exploitation.

If you were to have wages that were fair and equalled in value what the worker made, they would serve no purpose- "fair" wages is tantamount to abolishing wages alltogether.

I think that's right... :confused:

[Tim Cornelis]

Wages imply the existence of labour. Labour implies the existence of capital

That's a non-sequitur right there.


Workers have to recieve wages that are lower in value than the commodity they made, else the capitalist gets no profit. Thus wages=exploitation.

If you were to have wages that were fair and equalled in value what the worker made, they would serve no purpose- "fair" wages is tantamount to abolishing wages alltogether.

I think that's right... :confused:

I don't think that's true. Whether you receive a just wage or receive goods according to needs is different. Wages, in socialism, would theoretically be distributed according to contribution (where contribution can be measured in a multitude of ways), which is different from receiving goods according to your needs.

The problem with a wage system under socialism is that it will always have an arbitrary factor to it. There is no objective means by which you can ascertain a just wage according to some of contribution.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Wages imply the existence of labour. Labour implies the existence of capital. Capital implies the existence of capitalism. Capitalism necessarily means the absence of socialism. Marxism 101.

Correlation does not imply causation, folks.

Capitalism relies on generalized commodity production plus markets in labour and capital.

Generalized commodity production relies on wage labour systems.

Wage labour systems rely on labour.

[ColonelCossack]

I don't think that's true. Whether you receive a just wage or receive goods according to needs is different. Wages, in socialism, would theoretically be distributed according to contribution (where contribution can be measured in a multitude of ways), which is different from receiving goods according to your needs.

The problem with a wage system under socialism is that it will always have an arbitrary factor to it. There is no objective means by which you can ascertain a just wage according to some of contribution.

Fair point.

[u.s.red]

Well, they tried it in the Soviet Union, Cuba, China, Vietnam, North Korea, Venezuela, with varying degrees of success and failure. They also seem to be trying it in several countries in Europe, primarily Scandanavia. Marx and Engels thought socialism in one country would fail in a world still dominated by capitalism. I would say the jury is still out.

[u.s.red]

Wages imply the existence of labour. Labour implies the existence of capital. Capital implies the existence of capitalism. Capitalism necessarily means the absence of socialism. Marxism 101.


Labor existed millions of years before slavery, feudalism, wages or capitalism. Socialism means the transition from capitalism to communism.

[Veovis]

Workers would be in control of their workplaces, so in socialism (at least at first), they would be voting with their coworkers on how much of their labor they would take home in their check and how much would remain invested in their workplace.

[Tim Finnegan]

Correlation does not imply causation, folks.

Capitalism relies on generalized commodity production plus markets in labour and capital.

Generalized commodity production relies on wage labour systems.

Wage labour systems rely on labour.
Given that we're talking about hypothetical socialisms-in-one-country, i.e. social formations which he would understand as being post-capitalist. I think this is all pretty much given. If he'd asked about wage labour in ancient Rome or 16th century Holland, then it would be a different story.


Labor existed millions of years before slavery, feudalism, wages or capitalism. Socialism means the transition from capitalism to communism.
In Marxist thought, "labour" has a more precise definition than being a mere synonym for "work".

[Die Neue Zeit]

Given that we're talking about hypothetical socialisms-in-one-country

Either the thread title or the OP is misleading. Leftsolidarity and most others so far responded to the thread title, while only one or two responded to the OP.


In Marxist thought, "labour" has a more precise definition than being a mere synonym for "work".

Maybe or maybe not. After all, wasn't it a few left-coms here who said they were for "associated labour" as the basis of a new mode of production?

[∞]

But surely by describing something as exploitative you imply that it is also "wrong", whether you use that word or not?

No it literally does exploit a worker. I don't think its wrong because thats what cappies do.

[Q]

Well, they tried it in the Soviet Union, Cuba, China, Vietnam, North Korea, Venezuela, with varying degrees of success and failure.
Actually, the USSR is interesting (I'm not sure about the other countries) because workers didn't have a wage for their work. They did get a few Rubles for their work, but the bulk of their "income" was directly in kind. You got the vast majority of your food and clothing directly from your workplace, not in a shop. This is also why those shops looked alienating empty all the time.

So, these materials were distributed and allocated via a bureaucratic logic. The interests of the workers then was to work with their boss (a comrade!) to get as much allocated resources as possible and produce as little as possible.

This in turn necessitated draconian laws: If you don't work hard enough, you were a traitor to socialism, to be sent of to Siberia or simply shot for conspiring against the state. But your boss would hardly, if ever, actually give you up to the KGB, because that meant one less worker and therefore less allocated resources. In a situation of full employment, it was not evident to get new workers easily.

So, what was endemic in the USSR was an economy of very low production. In fact, when new machinery would arrive to improve production rates, it would very often simply stand idle, outside in the snow to rust away. Because higher production rates meant harder work, meaning higher output with the same allocated resources. So the workers very often thought "fuck that shit, I'm not playing that game".

As an aside, this is also why the whole notion of "state capitalism" is so absurd. There was no wage slavery, no exploitation in the capitalist sense of the word, no circulation of capital and other basic characteristics of capitalism. On the other hand, there was clearly also no planned economy in any rational sense of the word. The USSR had a target economy, which is very different. Compare it to a clock: Would you proudly announce that your clocks only take 50 minutes to make an hour? Of course not. Likewise, you can't double the needs of society. You can however double a target, arbitrarily, and this is exactly what bureaucrats do and the only thing they can do.


They also seem to be trying it in several countries in Europe, primarily Scandanavia.
There is no socialism in Scandinavia, despite American Republicans' insistance on it.

[Rooster]

Doesn't wage labour imply that labour power is a commodity? And doesn't Engels mention in Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, that no matter how much of a wage you got, the most you could get is the full exchange rate for your labour power, but that still leaves the surplus value you created for the person you exchanged the wage for?

[La Comédie Noire]

Why settle for a wage when you can have the world?

[Olentzero]

What's wrong with socialism in one country is that no one country can ultimately provide for all its citizen's needs. Marx and Engels argued that the economic basis for socialism - and, ultimately, communism - rests on the existence of a permanent general surplus of goods from which the world's population could freely draw as needed. This requires the sum total of the world's productive output to be feasible. With socialism in one country, you end up having to bargain and negotiate with the capitalist countries outside your borders in order to make up the shortfalls in whatever goods you either can't produce yourself or weren't able to produce enough of. Then you end up having to act like a capitalist in many ways, producing goods that won't go directly to raising the living standards of your citizens and instead for export so you can either get the goods you do need or money to purchase them.

What's wrong with wages is that they are never equivalent to the value of the goods you produce. Take, for example, working at a McDonald's - a minimum-wage job. The current minimum wage in the US is around $7-8 an hour, which is about the cost of a supersize value meal. But over the course of that same hour, how many burgers and fries can a grill cook produce? Obviously far more than just one. Furthermore, wages - if not regulated by laws such as those mandating a minimum wage - are generally determined by individual capitalists seeking to maintain as high a level of profitability as possible, and they are completely unable to influence the cost of living. Which means that workers under capitalism, no matter how relatively well-paid, are always at risk of not making enough to survive on.

[Blake's Baby]

What's wrong with socialism in one country is it's not socialism.

We're not all Leninists, we don't have to believe that 'socialism' = the dictatorship of the proletariat, nor that the dictatorship of the proletariat = the lower phase of communism, nor that either of those things should be called 'socialism''.

[Lanky Wanker]

Check out the chapter on the collectivist wage system in the Conquest of Bread by Kropotkin if you want an answer beyond "it exploits the working class". It doesn't address exploitation by greedy business owners, but looks at why wages should be done away with full stop. I know your question is regarding socialism in one country, whereas this addresses the final stage of communism, but it's still the same principle.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Actually, the USSR is interesting (I'm not sure about the other countries) because workers didn't have a wage for their work. They did get a few Rubles for their work, but the bulk of their "income" was directly in kind. You got the vast majority of your food and clothing directly from your workplace, not in a shop. This is also why those shops looked alienating empty all the time.

So, these materials were distributed and allocated via a bureaucratic logic. The interests of the workers then was to work with their boss (a comrade!) to get as much allocated resources as possible and produce as little as possible.

This in turn necessitated draconian laws: If you don't work hard enough, you were a traitor to socialism, to be sent off to Siberia or simply shot for conspiring against the state. But your boss would hardly, if ever, actually give you up to the KGB, because that meant one less worker and therefore less allocated resources. In a situation of full employment, it was not evident to get new workers easily.

Could you please provide more info on how workers got the majority of their goods directly from their enterprise-workplaces?

I downloaded an online PDF of Christopher Read's Lenin: A Revolutionary Life, and all it said about this parochial behaviour during Lenin's time was:


However, by the end of the year Russia’s cities and urban, industrial economy were in chaos. Chaos promoted shock moves by workers to try and preserve their jobs. Various methods were tried. One was so-called workers’ control, which would be better translated as ‘workers’ supervision’, which appeared to correspond with Lenin’s plans for transition. However, Lenin quickly turned against the movement because it usually meant the takeover of individual factories by their individual workforce. This then turned factories into support networks for their workers, not efficient production units. It promoted what Lenin feared to be a process of subdividing and sectionalizing the working class into competing micro-units rather than drawing them together as a whole.

[Chalk up one more strike against the bankrupt slogan "workers control."]


There was no wage slavery, no exploitation in the capitalist sense of the word, no circulation of capital and other basic characteristics of capitalism.

Sure there was still wage slavery, comrade. Workers still got their rubles and then these were used to purchase subsidized goods (subsidized only because of the turnover tax system at earlier points). Capital was very much circulated, otherwise state enterprises couldn't have working capital (via Gosbank and other institutions) to finance immediate obligations and such. What I was saying above is that wage slavery and capital circulation can exist outside markets, and also that only when combined with markets can the system be capitalist.

Comrade Cockshott's TNS chapter on property relations emphasizes the role of labour markets and capital markets in the very definition of "capitalism."

[Renegade Saint]

I'm surprised at the number of people who don't know what's wrong with the wage labor system. I think that's a fairly basic thing to understand if you're going to be anti-capitalist.

The problem with the wage labor system is not simply that workers don't get the 'full value' of their labor. That problem wouldn't be solved under socialism anyway-there will still be taxes for the forseeable future (otherwise how would people like soliders, teachers, etc., receive any pay, since they don't produce or sell goods or services).

The problem is the lack of control over one's workplace (and hence, over one's life) that being a wage laborer implies. Since wage laborers don't control their means of production they receive wages only as long as they work-their labor is their only source of income.

The problem with the wage labor system is that it forces us all to be prostitutes-and not the independent contractor/expensive escort kind either-the kind that has a pimp to answer to.

[Olentzero]

The problem with the wage labor system is not simply that workers don't get the 'full value' of their labor. That problem wouldn't be solved under socialism anyway-there will still be taxes for the forseeable future (otherwise how would people like soliders, teachers, etc., receive any pay, since they don't produce or sell goods or services).
See my earlier comment about a permanent general surplus of goods.

[u.s.red]

There is no socialism in Scandinavia, despite American Republicans' insistance on it.

I used to agree with that point of view, but now I am not so sure. Scandinavia has national health insurance, national pension, workers on corporate boards of directors, free schools, centrally controlled banking (for the most part), 80% or so unionization, state participation in economic planning, etc....A lot of this is what Marx called for in the Communist Manifesto.

Scandanavia is not a "purely" socialist economy, workers do not yet own the means of production, corporations still can exploit workers in foreign countries (like the U.S.)....This is not to say that Sweden could not turn into a reactionary, fascist regime and start rounding up socialists.

Scandinavia may not be socialist, but it surely is a long way from the predatory capitalism of children working in coal mines, the Belgian and Holland slave trade, and whole populations starving.

[u.s.red]

In Marxist thought, "labour" has a more precise definition than being a mere synonym for "work".

"So far therefore as labour is a creator of use value, is useful labour, it is a necessary condition, independent of all forms of society, for the existence of the human race; it is an eternal nature-imposed necessity, without which there can be no material exchanges between man and Nature, and therefore no life." Marx, Capital, Vol I, Chapter One, Section Two.

According to Marx, labour is a necessary condition for the existence of the human race.

Did you mean to say that wages precede abstract labour used as a commodity to produce commodities in exchange for wages? Or that the payment of wages precedes the production of commodities? In all capitalist societies, the worker produces commodities before they are paid in wages, as Marx also noted.

However, Marx also said that the wage system must be destroyed before the working class could be emancipated from capital.

[Leftsolidarity]

I used to agree with that point of view, but now I am not so sure. Scandinavia has national health insurance, national pension, workers on corporate boards of directors, free schools, centrally controlled banking (for the most part), 80% or so unionization, state participation in economic planning, etc....A lot of this is what Marx called for in the Communist Manifesto.

Scandanavia is not a "purely" socialist economy, workers do not yet own the means of production, corporations still can exploit workers in foreign countries (like the U.S.)....This is not to say that Sweden could not turn into a reactionary, fascist regime and start rounding up socialists.

Scandinavia may not be socialist, but it surely is a long way from the predatory capitalism of children working in coal mines, the Belgian and Holland slave trade, and whole populations starving.

*facepalm*

What is with your distinctions between '"purely" socialist economy' and "predatory capitalism"? Is it socialist? No, you answered that yourself. Is it capitalism? Yes, just a welfare state which would be called social democracy. Just because it is "nicer" doesn't mean it is not capitalism and not exploitive. Please don't try to start calling things socialist that clearly are not.

Also, I hate when people say "oh there's no children in coal mines!" Oh yeah? WHAT THE FUCK DOES THAT CHANGE?!? Does that mean it is okay? FUCK NO! Yay, they don't have our children working the mines anymore so capitalism must be great!! :rolleyes:

[u.s.red]

Also, I hate when people say "oh there's no children in coal mines!" Oh yeah? WHAT THE FUCK DOES THAT CHANGE?!?

Well, it makes a big change in the lives of poor children. They don't have to work in coal mines. There is at least one American politician who would gladly put poor children to work cleaning the toilets of the rich. He could not do that in Sweden. Does this mean capitalism is "great?" Only if you are an idiot.


Please don't try to start calling things socialist that clearly are not.

Socialism is not going to suddenly appear one day, fully developed, with no traces of capitalism, no left over traces of exploitation. Humans did not fully evolve overnight, it took millions of years. Slavery, feudalism and capitalism did not develop overnight. Marx noted that feudalism still existed in parts of Eastern Europe in the 19th century. Slavery was a going business in the U.S. as late as 1864.

Why suppose that socialism must be perfect in its early stages?

[Q]

Socialism is not going to suddenly appear one day, fully developed, with no traces of capitalism, no left over traces of exploitation. Humans did not fully evolve overnight, it took millions of years. Slavery, feudalism and capitalism did not develop overnight. Marx noted that feudalism still existed in parts of Eastern Europe in the 19th century. Slavery was a going business in the U.S. as late as 1864.

Why suppose that socialism must be perfect in its early stages?

No one is saying that socialism/communism is going to be perfect right away. However, socialism starts with the working class seizing political power and starting to fundamentally alter society in their own collective interests. This would mean, for example, tearing down the old state machinery and replace it with a new mechanism that puts the vast majority in power, the working class itself.

Scandinavia is nothing like this. Nationalisation does not equal socialism, far from it. It is perfectly conceivable that nationalisations happen in the interests of the capitalist class, most likely those of the big industrialists. Likewise, a national health service means a higher standard of living, meaning higher productivity levels, thus better exploitation. What is there to oppose, especially if it is mostly workers themselves paying for it via taxes?

But the welfare state had also negative consequences for the capitalists, especially politically. Keynesianism and Fordism (i.e. the welfare state) did manage to embolden the working class. After the debacle (in their eyes) of 1968 in France and Italy, they swore "never again!" and started a campaign of what later became to be known as neoliberalism, putting all economic horses on financialisation and most importantly break the working class movement to disciplin it to the needs of capital. This happened via several ways: From Thatcher's breaking of the Miners Strike in the UK and subsequent deindustrialisation to the incorporation of the Trade Union bureaucracy in a tripartite cooperation for the "national interest", such as the Dutch "Poldermodel".

Even Scandinavia is rapidly moving this way and it cannot be otherwise, if it is to keep in pace with the world competition between countries. This is also why there are no (positive) national ways out of capitalism.

[u.s.red]

What does it mean, concretely, to say that the working class seizes power? In Iceland in 2008 the prime minister decided that the Icelanders (?) were going to pay for the financial mess created by the international banks. He was promptly thrown out of office and is now being prosecuted. Iceland then defaulted on its debt to the banks (Bank of London, etc.) Three years later it has one of the highest living standards of living in the world and has a better credit rating, I hear, than the U.S.

The people of Iceland seized real, concrete, political power. They then did the unthinkable: they defaulted on bonds owed to international banks. Have they seized 100% of political power and completely altered their society? No. Are they returning to the capitalism of the 19th century? No. Are they moving toward socialism? I think so.

Vietnam is another example. They seized political power in one of the bloodiest, for them, wars in history against one of the most brutal military powers in history. Without question they fundamentally altered their society in their interests. Are they 100% socialist? Obviously not. But what would you have them do? Return to the political and social structure of 1954?

Russian workers seized political power and fundamentally altered their society in 1917. They were successful enough to defeat Hitler and become a world super power. Did they ultimately fail? Yes. Does this mean socialism is a failed ideology? Only in the sick imagination of bourgeois propagandists.

My view is that history is moving toward socialism. Sometimes it runs into a ditch, sometimes runs out of gas, sometimes the tires go flat, the passengers fight with each other over who is going to drive and what is the correct path. The passengers are always falling into self-criticism, analyzing what they do or should have done. Some passengers claim to be socialists and turn out to be fascists. And the car is destroyed, the passengers build a new, better car.

But in the end the passengers and history will get to socialism.

The U.S. I would agree is definitively moving backward towards 1929. Wealth disparity, control of politics by international capital, etc. The U.S. ruling class could easily destroy the world to save it from socialism.

[aty]

They also seem to be trying it in several countries in Europe, primarily Scandanavia.
No...

[aty]

Well, it makes a big change in the lives of poor children. They don't have to work in coal mines. There is at least one American politician who would gladly put poor children to work cleaning the toilets of the rich. He could not do that in Sweden. Does this mean capitalism is "great?" Only if you are an idiot.

Instead in Sweden they put papperless immigrants cleaning the toilets of the rich for 4 dollars per hour...

And because the rich cant seem to stay away from "black labour" including the prime minister and finance minister they put in a tax-reduction for "services in homes", to get "white labour" in these service sectors. But that did not help, so the only thing they did was to get even cheaper "black labour" for the rich.

That is socialism alright!

[u.s.red]

Instead in Sweden they put papperless immigrants cleaning the toilets of the rich for 4 dollars per hour...

And because the rich cant seem to stay away from "black labour" including the prime minister and finance minister they put in a tax-reduction for "services in homes", to get "white labour" in these service sectors. But that did not help, so the only thing they did was to get even cheaper "black labour" for the rich.

That is socialism alright!

The children of the immigrants dont do the work. The children go to first rate schools, all immigrants and their families have equal access to health care and social services, they have decent housing, good nutrition, the state doesnt harass and deport them.

You would have Sweden arrest the immigrants, hand them over to the rich for use as slaves with no social benefits? Then Sweden would be truly capitalist again.

[Leftsolidarity]

The children of the immigrants dont do the work. The children go to first rate schools, all immigrants and their families have equal access to health care and social services, they have decent housing, good nutrition, the state doesnt harass and deport them.

You would have Sweden arrest the immigrants, hand them over to the rich for use as slaves with no social benefits? Then Sweden would be truly capitalist again.

:blink: What?

Do you just not understand what capitalism is? To be capitalist doesn't mean you need to have some brutal government that is sending children into the mines and rounding up all the immigrants. You can have a great deal of civil/social rights in a capitalist system. You can have a complete welfare state under a capitalist system. None of that means it is not "truly" capitalist. It is capitalist.

There is no "true" capitalism either. Is it capitalism? Yes or no. The answer is yes.

[Rooster]

I used to agree with that point of view, but now I am not so sure. Scandinavia has national health insurance, national pension, workers on corporate boards of directors, free schools, centrally controlled banking (for the most part), 80% or so unionization, state participation in economic planning, etc....A lot of this is what Marx called for in the Communist Manifesto.

Which is not what Marx called socialism. The basis of the economy is still fully capitalistic.


Scandanavia is not a "purely" socialist economy, workers do not yet own the means of production, corporations still can exploit workers in foreign countries (like the U.S.)....This is not to say that Sweden could not turn into a reactionary, fascist regime and start rounding up socialists.

So, the workers do not own the means of production so it's not socialist at all then, yeah?


Scandinavia may not be socialist, but it surely is a long way from the predatory capitalism of children working in coal mines, the Belgian and Holland slave trade, and whole populations starving.

Yeah, it's not socialist. This sort of nationalist capital is stupid. You just acknowledge in the same post that scandanvian corporations can still exploit workers in foreign countries, in countries where children work in mines, where there is still slavery and where whole populations starve. So what what you're saying is, the scandanvian economies are good because they spread their wealth with the workers of those countries even though they have the ability to, and do, exploit foreigners?

[aty]

The children of the immigrants dont do the work. The children go to first rate schools, all immigrants and their families have equal access to health care and social services, they have decent housing, good nutrition, the state doesnt harass and deport them.

You would have Sweden arrest the immigrants, hand them over to the rich for use as slaves with no social benefits? Then Sweden would be truly capitalist again.
No they dont? Have you ever been here in Sweden? Do you know how our suburbs look like? Do you know how they come and deport families in the middle of the night? People who put themselves on fire in the immigration-offices? No, we dont have free health care, there are fees.

What kind of fairytales are actually told about Sweden in the USA?
Slavery is not capitalism, wage slavery is capitalism.

Decent housing? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uyTKPNNVqU
No state harassment? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HaJwjHC4Uk

[u.s.red]

ok, you have apartments with some roaches running around, and some fires in the streets. and your point is that this proves sweden is a purely capitalist state?

[u.s.red]

:There is no "true" capitalism either. Is it capitalism? Yes or no. The answer is yes.


Is a fetus a human being from the moment of conception? Yes or no? Fill in the blank: Y____ N _____.

Is an economic system slavery, feudal, capitalist or socialist? Or is it possible for any economic system to contain vestiges of a previous system or undeveloped growths of a future system?

You really believe that 21st century Sweden is economically the same system as 19th century England?

When did early primates become human beings? On July 5th, 2M yrs ago, exactly, at 12:25 pm GMT?

[aty]

ok, you have apartments with some roaches running around, and some fires in the streets. and your point is that this proves sweden is a purely capitalist state?
Yes, it is a purely capitalist state. How could it be anything else? It was also a welfare state, but as you can see it is not even a welfare state anymore.

They have privatized the welfare system in the last years and the elderly-care, health care, schools etc, is now run by Wall Street-capitalists and at the same time our elderly are starving to death because the capitalists want to make as big profits as possible. That is the reality of Sweden today.
Schools are run by capitalists also, so the education system have totally failed.

Sweden have become more capitalist than the US in the last years.

[Blake's Baby]

Roaches and fires do not make it capitalist, US Red; wages, commodity production, a class system, private property... these are what make it capitalist.

Europe is not socialist. None of Europe. Not the nationalised railway systemns, if any of them still exist; not the stste-run health-care; not the pension systems. State control is not socialism, or the US army is the most socialist institution on earth.

Just becaue the US has a form of capitalism that is still socially stuck in the late 1800s in some ways, does not make everything else socialism. We still live in capitalist societies, US Red; just not retarded 19th-century capitalisms like the USA.

And in answer to your later question, no it's not possible for capitalism to 'grow' socialism inside it. It was possible for capitalism to grow inside feudalism, and it was possible for feudalism to grow inside antique slavery, because the ruling classes of feudalism and capitalism were also exploiting classes; the senators could continue to exploit slaves, while the equites began to exploit the colonii. The lords could continue to exploit the peasants while the burghers began to exploit the craftsmen.

But how can the proletariat develop our own economic power-base inside capitalism? Who do we exploit? No-one. Because the proletariat cannot be an exploiting class. So where can our economic power come from? Only from destroying capitalism, not from finding another class to exploit and incubating it inside capitalism.

Socialism therefore can only be established after capitalism has been defeated. What you're confusing 'socialism' with is 'social democracy' which most countries (except the US) realised might be a more convenient way to organise oppression approximately 90 years ago.

[Leftsolidarity]

You really believe that 21st century Sweden is economically the same system as 19th century England?


Yes, they are both capitalist. Sweden is just a welfare state, that doesn't mean it isn't capitalist though. The bourgeoisie still control the means of production, hence still capitalist.

[Rodrigo]

Wage system is not synonymous of capitalism. Communism is the overcome of capitalism, not the negation of everything existing in capitalist society.

P.S.: Marx explain it in A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy. Also explains that money, market and capitalism are not synonymous.

[Rooster]

Wage system is not synonymous of capitalism. Communism is the overcome of capitalism, not the negation of everything existing in capitalist society.

P.S.: Marx explain it in A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy. Also explains that money, market and capitalism are not synonymous.

What exactly are you trying to say? Are you trying to defend wage labour? As possibly something that can exist within a socialist economy?

[u.s.red]

And in answer to your later question, no it's not possible for capitalism to 'grow' socialism inside it.

Didnt Marx specifically describe how communism emerges from capitalism with the birthmarks of capitalism:

"What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect, economically, morally, and intellectually, still stamped with the birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it emerges." Gotha Program


But how can the proletariat develop our own economic power-base inside capitalism? Who do we exploit? No-one.

Socialism or communism develops on the "foundations" or, as you say, the "power-base" of capitalism. As long as any class exists, it will exploit another class. The proletariat, according to Marx, I think, will suppress, exploit, and destroy the bourgeoisie; then, and only then can a classless society be created. I emphasized
can because, in my opinion, Stalin did a very effective job of destroying the capitalist class in the Soviet Union; that did not, however, prevent a capitalist class from re-emerging in Russia after the Soviet Union "withered away."

As far as the social democratic welfare states like Sweden, my point is not that they are socialist, but that they can be considered a transition phase from late capitalism to early socialism...It is certainly very true that you can go from capitalism, in a violent revolution, to socialism, like the Soviet Union, China and Cuba.

But why not evolve into socialism. The transition from feudalism to capitalism was gradual over several hundred yrs.

[Firebrand]

Didnt Marx specifically describe how communism emerges from capitalism with the birthmarks of capitalism:why not evolve into socialism. The transition from feudalism to capitalism was gradual over several hundred yrs.

Read reform or revolution by Rosa Luxemburg. It will explain the fundamental flaws with reformism.

[Blake's Baby]

Didnt Marx specifically describe how communism emerges from capitalism with the birthmarks of capitalism:

"What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect, economically, morally, and intellectually, still stamped with the birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it emerges." Gotha Program

exactly. Not as in 'grows inside' capitalism, however, but emerges from the destruction of capitalism.



Socialism or communism develops on the "foundations" or, as you say, the "power-base" of capitalism. As long as any class exists, it will exploit another class. The proletariat, according to Marx, I think, will suppress, exploit, and destroy the bourgeoisie; then, and only then can a classless society be created...

You don't understand what the word 'exploit' means here if you think that 4 billion proles are going to 'exploit' 5 million bourgeois. Do you think that 4 billion of us can seriously afford to retire and live off the effort of 5 million people? How hard do you think you'll be able to work Bill Gates before he snaps in two?

No, the working class will not 'exploit' the bourgeoisie. It's a ridiculous notion. It will destroy the bourgeoisie as a class.


...
I emphasized because, in my opinion, Stalin did a very effective job of destroying the capitalist class in the Soviet Union; that did not, however, prevent a capitalist class from re-emerging in Russia after the Soviet Union "withered away."

As far as the social democratic welfare states like Sweden, my point is not that they are socialist, but that they can be considered a transition phase from late capitalism to early socialism...It is certainly very true that you can go from capitalism, in a violent revolution, to socialism, like the Soviet Union, China and Cuba...

Not socialist. But never mind, one argument at a tiome.


...
But why not evolve into socialism. The transition from feudalism to capitalism was gradual over several hundred yrs.

Because under feudalism, the capitalist class, the burghers, was able to exploit ('derive economic benefit from putting to work') the proletariat, as I explained in my last post (and indeed as Marx explains in, ooh, the Manifesto I think). Feudalism was a class society, capitalism was a class society; a new exploiting class could grow up in the old class system until it was ready to take over society (ie, the bourgeois economic transformation took place before the bourgeois political revolution).

However, the working class cannot put the bourgeoisie or any other class to work, because if it does it becomes the bourgeoisie. As soon as workers become boisses, they cease to be workers, see? They are no longer an oppressed class and instead become an exploiting class.

So if the working class becomes a new exploiting class inside capitalism, then it is no longer the bearer of communism. This is why we must have the political revolution at the same time as (or even before) the economic transformation of society. Ergo, no 'evolution' into socialism.

If you're really not convinced, and think I'm just talking shit, then I'd advise you to read some Trotskyists who might give you answers more to your taste. 'Co-ordinator class theory' might be what you're looking for, it theorises a new 'co-ordinator' class of technocrats/bureaucrats that is after capitalism but not the working class. I think it's horseshit persoanally but it sounds like what you're groping towards. Google 'Burnham new managerial class' for some theory on it.

[u.s.red]

Read reform or revolution by Rosa Luxemburg. It will explain the fundamental flaws with reformism.

Do you have to separate reform from the goal of revolution? Here is Luxembourg in Reform or Revolution:

"At first view the title of this work may be found surprising. Can the Social-Democracy be against reforms? Can we contrapose the social revolution, the transformation of the existing order, our final goal, to social reforms? Certainly not.The daily struggle for reforms, for the amelioration of the condition of the workers within the framework of the existing social order, and for democratic institutions, offers to the Social-Democracy an indissoluble tie. The struggle for reforms is its means; the social revolution, its aim."

Why arent social reforms in Sweden, Scandanavia, etc., part of the "struggle for reforms."

[Rodrigo]

What exactly are you trying to say? Are you trying to defend wage labour? As possibly something that can exist within a socialist economy?

It's VERY funny how people always try to demonize me. :laugh: Is being paid for our work something bad? Of course not. Wage is the amount of money per hour paid to a worker; no more than that. About who pays this money is another story.

[Blake's Baby]

??? If you like capitalism it's OK. Me, I'm a communist. 'The unions should not inscribe on their banners the reformist slogan "A fair day's work for a fair day's pay" but the revolutionary slogan "Abolish wage slavery".'

Or, you're not a communist.

[Rodrigo]

Doesn't wage labour imply that labour power is a commodity? And doesn't Engels mention in Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, that no matter how much of a wage you got, the most you could get is the full exchange rate for your labour power, but that still leaves the surplus value you created for the person you exchanged the wage for?

That's how wages work in capitalism. As the person above stated: the wage slavery. There's no surplus value when there's no bourgeoisie... As I said: who's gonna pay, it's another story.

[Rodrigo]

??? If you like capitalism it's OK. Me, I'm a communist. 'The unions should not inscribe on their banners the reformist slogan "A fair day's work for a fair day's pay" but the revolutionary slogan "Abolish wage slavery".'

Or, you're not a communist.

And who's "liking" capitalism here, baby? I never said wages justify capitalism; if some does that way, it doesn't mean it's the best thing to ban them. Like banning money, selling and buying... None of that is equal to capitalism. Things work differently in different modes of productions and societies. Marxism 101.

[Rooster]

It's VERY funny how people always try to demonize me. :laugh: Is being paid for our work something bad? Of course not. Wage is the amount of money per hour paid to a worker; no more than that. About who pays this money is another story.

I'm not demonizing you. If you've noticed, I accurately pulled the nugget out of the incoherent shit you were writing. That you believe wage labour is something that should survive the socialist revolution. A wage is what happens when you exchange your labour power for money. The use-value of your labour power for the person purchasing it that it can create more value. If you haven't worked this out yet, it means there's private property relations going on.


That's how wages work in capitalism. As the person above stated: the wage slavery. There's no surplus value when there's no bourgeoisie... As I said: who's gonna pay, it's another story.

In what way is there no surplus just because there's no bourgeoisie? You are a simpleton. Who's gonna pay? The person who owns the means of production is gonna pay because they need wage labourers, people without their own means of subsistence. The labourer exchanges their labour power for the going rate for money. The person purchasing this labour power is using it to make surplus value. I'm not expecting a Stalinist to get this. Despite how clearly I've tried writing this.

[Rooster]

Marxism 101.

Marxism 101 isn't starting out by saying what the mode of production is and then shoe horning that to fit reality.

[Sputnik_1]

It's VERY funny how people always try to demonize me. :laugh: Is being paid for our work something bad? Of course not. Wage is the amount of money per hour paid to a worker; no more than that. About who pays this money is another story.

Isn't communism aiming for a stateless, moneyless, classless society?

[Blake's Baby]

And who's "liking" capitalism here, baby? I never said wages justify capitalism; if some does that way, it doesn't mean it's the best thing to ban them. Like banning money, selling and buying... None of that is equal to capitalism. Things work differently in different modes of productions and societies. Marxism 101.

It seems you are.

There will be no wages in socialism, unless you'ere a Leninist who think the word 'socialism' means the dictatorship of the proletariat, and please be assured that many of us will be saying in the workers' councils that there should be no wages in the dictatorship of the proletariat either.

And, yes, wages are a defining feature of capitalism, along with commodity production. Generalised wage labour and commodity production are what make capitalism different to feudalism, for instance.

[Rodrigo]

Of course there will be, there is and there was wages in socialism and there is nothing wrong in that. Unless you think that a communist society can be built from one day to another (even if its construction begins from a capitalist society) just after the "revolution day"; that a complex society like ours, with many problems yet to be solved after a revolution, can automatically jump the first stage of communism.

What I'm saying here is based on Marx and Engels, but what would be the problem if I was basing my ideas also on Lenin and Stalin? Because they absolutely destroyed this deturpation of Socialism you defend: the spontaneist and quasi-anarchist "Marxianism".

[Tim Finnegan]

Of course there will be, there is and there was wages in socialism and there is nothing wrong in that. Unless you think that a communist society can be built from one day to another (even if its construction begins from a capitalist society) just after the "revolution day"; that a complex society like ours, with many problems yet to be solved after a revolution, can automatically jump the first stage of communism.
That you conceive of revolution as a political event, rather than a social process, may go some way to explaining your malformed understanding of socialism.

[Rodrigo]

I'm not demonizing you. If you've noticed, I accurately pulled the nugget out of the incoherent shit you were writing. That you believe wage labour is something that should survive the socialist revolution. A wage is what happens when you exchange your labour power for money. The use-value of your labour power for the person purchasing it that it can create more value. If you haven't worked this out yet, it means there's private property relations going on.

What you're doing is picking the definition of wage-labour in capitalist society, in private properties, and making it the one and only possible definition, without any change using it to define wages in socialism. And then you call me simpleton. Now that was funny.

The following questions destroy your wrong ideas about what I'm defending:

Who purchase labour power in collective or State properties in a socialist society?

What social class in socialist society own the means of production?

[Rodrigo]

That you conceive of revolution as a political event, rather than a social process, may go some way to explaining your malformed understanding of socialism.

I don't conceive revolution like this, that's why I put that term with quotation marks. I was referring to their idea of revolution - something that MAGICALLY can change society from one day to another.

[Rodrigo]

rooster's, Sputnik's etc communism:

rAaWvVFERVA

[Sputnik_1]

What you're doing is picking the definition of wage-labour in capitalist society, in private properties, and making it the one and only possible definition, without any change using it to define wages in socialism. And then you call me simpleton. Now that was funny.

The following questions destroy your wrong ideas about what I'm defending:

Who purchase labour power in collective or State properties in a socialist society?

What social class in socialist society own the means of production?

Class????

[Tim Finnegan]

I don't conceive revolution like this, that's why I put that term with quotation marks. I was referring to their idea of revolution - something that MAGICALLY can change society from one day to another.
At what point did anyone offer such a conception of revolution?


rooster's, Sputnik's etc communism:

rAaWvVFERVA
I don't understand why this is supposed to function as a pejorative comment. :confused:

[Rooster]

Of course there will be

Of course why? That's a pretty definite statement.


, there is and there was wages in socialism and there is nothing wrong in that. Yes there is because, as I have said, it implies that labour power is still a commodity, that has to be exchanged for the purpose of creating surplus value. Which in turn means there is still a proletariat and there is still a class that owns the means of production privately.


Unless you think that a communist society can be built from one day to another (even if its construction begins from a capitalist society) just after the "revolution day"; that a complex society like ours, with many problems yet to be solved after a revolution, can automatically jump the first stage of communism.See Tim Finnegan. I don't think there is such a thing as revolution day. Revolution is a process aiming at the destruction of the old social order and classes. You're the one implying that class antagonisms, that wage labour, capital exploitation can just wither away instead of with a revolution. Typical of a Stalinist and an American left and right wing capital propagandist.


What I'm saying here is based on Marx and EngelsNo it isn't. Show me where what you are saying is based on Marx and Engels.


, but what would be the problem if I was basing my ideas also on Lenin and Stalin? Because they absolutely destroyed this deturpation of Socialism you defend: the spontaneist and quasi-anarchist "Marxianism".I'm not a spontaneist nor a quasi-anarchist. The problem here is what you're doing is obfuscating the matter because you don't know what you're talking about and are just repeating shit you've heard from people who did try to obfuscate the matter for their own ends.


What you're doing is picking the definition of wage-labour in capitalist society, in private properties, and making it the one and only possible definition, without any change using it to define wages in socialism. And then you call me simpleton. Now that was funny.

Wage labour, be definition, is labouring for a wage. That means, exchanging your labour power for money. So that the person giving you money can generate surplus value with your labour. What other definition are you trying to make up?


The following questions destroy your wrong ideas about what I'm defending:

Who purchase labour power in collective or State properties in a socialist society?I think you mean a state capitalist society as what you're saying is that the state owns the means of production and then purchases the labour power of workers with the intent of of creating surplus value.


What social class in socialist society own the means of production?

I know you're trying to create a false line of logic here by saying that the USSR was socialist, it had wage labour, therefore wage labour can be in a socialist society. But, to answer your question properly, no social class owns the means of production in a socialist mode of production because the means of production are held in common that means there can't be an exchange for labour power with the intent of extracting surplus value from it because there is no social class that owns the means of production privately.

[Blake's Baby]

Of course there will be, there is and there was wages in socialism and there is nothing wrong in that. Unless you think that a communist society can be built from one day to another (even if its construction begins from a capitalist society) just after the "revolution day"; that a complex society like ours, with many problems yet to be solved after a revolution, can automatically jump the first stage of communism.

What I'm saying here is based on Marx and Engels, but what would be the problem if I was basing my ideas also on Lenin and Stalin? Because they absolutely destroyed this deturpation of Socialism you defend: the spontaneist and quasi-anarchist "Marxianism".

The lower stage of communism is not socialism, and nor is the lower stage of communism the same as the dictatorship of the proletariat.

[Leftsolidarity]

The lower stage of communism is not socialism, and nor is the lower stage of communism the same as the dictatorship of the proletariat.

If you are a left communist....

[Blake's Baby]

If you are a left communist....

Yes. Or a Marxist of persuasions other than Leninist; or an Anarchist of almost all persuasions.

To make that a little more clear, only Leninists and a few confused Anarchists believe that the DotP and Socialism are the same thing. Marx certainly made no such equivalence, and it is to Marx that we owe the concept of the DotP. If he's wanted to call it 'socialism' he could have.

[Tim Finnegan]

If you are a left communist....
And if you're a conservative, then communism is angry men with moustaches running around hitting people with sticks. So I guess I'm wondering why you think this contributes a counter-argument.

[Firebrand]

Do you have to separate reform from the goal of revolution? Here is Luxembourg in Reform or Revolution:

"At first view the title of this work may be found surprising. Can the Social-Democracy be against reforms? Can we contrapose the social revolution, the transformation of the existing order, our final goal, to social reforms? Certainly not.The daily struggle for reforms, for the amelioration of the condition of the workers within the framework of the existing social order, and for democratic institutions, offers to the Social-Democracy an indissoluble tie. The struggle for reforms is its means; the social revolution, its aim."

Why arent social reforms in Sweden, Scandanavia, etc., part of the "struggle for reforms."

Because of what she says here
"people who pronounce themselves in favour of the method of legislative reform in in place of and in contradistinction to the conquest of political power and social revolution, do not really choose a more tranquil, calmer and slower road to the same goal, but a different goal." Instead of taking a stand for the establishment of a new society they take a stand for modifications of the old society. If we follow the political conceptions of revisionism, we arrive at the same conclusion that is reached when we follow the economic theories of revisionism. Our program becomes not the surpression of the system of wage labour, but the diminuation of exploitation, that is the surpression of the abuses of capitalism instead of the surpression of capitalism itself."
You have to ask yourself. Are you really against capitalism in principle or do you just dislike the consequences of it. do you think that the system of wage labour is in itself immoral even if the workers are paid a living wage or do you just object to poverty. Are you really a revolutionary lefist or just a disillusioned liberal.

[Rooster]

If you are a left communist....

If you are any communist. How else are you going to explain the social process that removes classes? If you start off with classes such as the Leninist or Stalinist idea of socialism then society has to gradually move on from classes to no classes which is bullshit. It's the same thing as reformism. It's the grand revisionism of the second international. And, because you've left a marxist understanding of the world and economy, it makes it really hard to explain how a socialist society can unwind and end up full blown capitalist again (without a revolution or invading army) with no explanation other than "outside agitators"/"revisionism", which is just bullshit marxism. The same shit that capitalist propagandists pedal.

[Rodrigo]

@rooster


By what you're defending, it seems you think it's an easy task to build communist society parting from a capitalist one. Contradictions like class antagonisms etc still exist in socialism. But it's not a society ruled by the bourgeoisie any more, so everything works differently.
We can't talk about "wage labour" the same way we do when analysing capitalism, since there are no conditions prior to the existence of capitalism (or transformation of labour into capital) in a socialist society. It's dictatorship of the proletariat.
How come am I basing myself in Marx and Engels? Well, mainly in Marx when explaining the genesis of market economy and how market, money and mode of production are not the same thing. (Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy)

@Sputnik


You asked about classes:
1. Industrial workers
2. Peasants
3. Intellectuals
4. Soldiers

[Rodrigo]

Yes. Or a Marxist of persuasions other than Leninist; or an Anarchist of almost all persuasions.

To make that a little more clear, only Leninists and a few confused Anarchists believe that the DotP and Socialism are the same thing. Marx certainly made no such equivalence, and it is to Marx that we owe the concept of the DotP. If he's wanted to call it 'socialism' he could have.

Marx said there's a lesser and a higher stage of communism. The lesser one was called socialism by Lenin, and it's this definition, which equals to socialist society, we're all using.

[Rodrigo]

By the way, mediums of exchange are still necessary in both stages of communism for faster development of society.

Those who think bartering and craftsmen guilds are the future will obviously disagree. Like an anarchist who said to Trotsky in prison: "Who needs trains in anarchism?" :D

[Tim Finnegan]

By the way, mediums of exchange are still necessary in both stages of communism for faster development of society.
So, in your view, humanity will never supersede market relations, merely transition to some sort of "socialist market relations"?


@Sputnik


You asked about classes:
1. Industrial workers
2. Peasants
3. Intellectuals
4. Soldiers
Just to pick on the point that is most likely to produce a coherent response, and rather than a confused torrent of nonsensical Stalinist barking, I'm going to ask: what is the material distinction between workers on the one hand, and intellectuals and soldiers on the other? In capitalism, the distinction comes from role of the latter as the attendants of capital, but in your so-called "workers' state", that should no longer be true. So either those categories do not exist as separate classes, which rather suggests that you don't really understand the Marxist notion of class, or that capital still exists as something alienated from and ruling over the working class, which means that there is no socialism. So how do you resolve this?

[Rodrigo]

What defines a social class is its relation to the means of production and their role in society. The groups I mentioned have different roles even though they're all workers. And, almost forgot to say: for some time there's still bourgeois individuals (not bourgeoisie since it's disorganised in socialism) - only "small" and "medium proprietaries", since there's no proletarian revolution out of nothing and, as history taught us, to apply in practice the slogan "to each one according to his/her needs" is not possible until productive forces are greatly developed.

Face reality, left communists.

[Rodrigo]

"So, in your view, humanity will never supersede market relations, merely transition to some sort of "socialist market relations"?"
^
|
Mr. Simpleton speaking. Hehe

Economical transaction is not equal to capitalism; it exists - like mediums of exchange - long before capitalism. Will these transactions cease in communism? How could one get a good he/she wants with barter, in nowadays advanced societies? "Craftsmen-guilds-socialism, here we go!"?

[Tim Finnegan]

What defines a social class is its relation to the means of production and their role in society. The groups I mentioned have different roles even though they're all workers. And, almost forgot to say: for some time there's still bourgeois individuals (not bourgeoisie since it's disorganised in socialism) - only "small" and "medium proprietaries", since there's no proletarian revolution out of nothing and, as history taught us, to apply in practice the slogan "to each one according to his/her needs" is not possible until productive forces are greatly developed.
The first definition of class is positivist nonsense- Marxism channelled through the distorting lens of commodity-fetishism- and is, in fact, in contradiction to your second definition, because a class cannot simultaneously be determined by its relationship to things and by its relationship to people. My assumption is that you don't really understand either, and have attempted to pursue some middle path.
The second definition is the broadly accurate one, in that class is a relationship between individuals in the process of production, can be described as the social "role" of the individuals in question. However, this conception of "role" can't be understood in the tranhistorical functionalist terms which you employ here, in which intellectuals are separated from workers because they are engaged in a different sort of productive activity, but in, funnily enough, Marxian terms, which means the terms of the dichotomy of labour and capital. An individual either supplies the labour which is appropriated by capital- the workers- or they administer capital- the bourgeoisie (or nomenklatura) and their attendant bureaucrats, intellectuals, and security/military personnel. Socialism, in constituting the negation of socialism, dissolves these relationships, and so dissolves class as such. All that's left is distinctions of utilitarian function, in which the "intellectual" is a category not in the same sense as "proletarian", but in the same sense as "mechanic".

Also, why the seemingly unthinking assumption that the forces of production are necessarily in need of tremendous, multi-generational improvement, just because that happened to be the case in Germany, 1863, or Russia, 1917? Are you so hopelessly dogmatic that you find it that impossible to offer a critical perspective on your canon informed by contemporary analysis?


Face reality, left communistsThose espousing historically elite projects such as Marxism-Leninism have little business lecturing others about reality.

[Rodrigo]

Each group I mentioned have very specific interests, different from the interests of the other groups. So, they are social classes, but differently from capitalist society, they are not antagonistic. That explains better, because some of them are not part of means of production, like intellectuals and military or even the clergy (in some countries they are still powerful).

(Hint: The Poverty of Philosophy)

To fulfil everyone's needs first it's necessary to have greatly developed productive forces, so it's possible to produce all necessary goods in sufficient quantity to each individual. If that's already the case where you live in (and practice will tell us if that's really true), good for you, but in my place it isn't.

[Rodrigo]

It seems you are the dogmatic ones here, dudes. Ah, these "Marxian" purists and leftists...

[Leftsolidarity]

And if you're a conservative, then communism is angry men with moustaches running around hitting people with sticks. So I guess I'm wondering why you think this contributes a counter-argument.

I wasn't trying to give a counter-argument and I've been following this and been agreeing with what you are saying. I just wanted to point out that different tendencies have different positions on that subject.

[Rooster]

@rooster


By what you're defending, it seems you think it's an easy task to build communist society parting from a capitalist one. Contradictions like class antagonisms etc still exist in socialism.

Bullshit. Even Stalin said that socialism is the removal of all class antagonisms. Besides, like I said, if you think otherwise then you're just a social democrat reformer because you think that classes can just be made to gradually disappear instead of through revolution. See Marx:


Originally posted by Marx

Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master(3) (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm#a3) and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes.
But it's not a society ruled by the bourgeoisie any more, so everything works differently.Which is just you saying so. Explain how wages would work differently.


We can't talk about "wage labour" the same way we do when analysing capitalism, since there are no conditions prior to the existence of capitalism (or transformation of labour into capital) in a socialist society. It's dictatorship of the proletariat.Wage labour, the exchange of labour power for money. The other person paying for it getting the surplus value of the wage. What other definition are you trying to come up with? You just saying that it's the DotP doesn't make it any different. Just because the state is now the one purchasing labour power doesn't make it any different. Here's Engels from Socialism: Utopian and Scientific:


Originally posted by Engels

The modern state, no matter what its form, is essentially a capitalist machine — the state of the capitalists, the ideal personification of the total national capital. The more it proceeds to the taking over of productive forces, the more does it actually become the national capitalist, the more citizens does it exploit. The workers remain wage-workers — proletarians. The capitalist relation is not done away with. It is, rather, brought to a head. But, brought to a head, it topples over. State-ownership of the productive forces is not the solution of the conflict, but concealed within it are the technical conditions that form the elements of that solution.I'm sure you haven't noticed this but, wage labour is a self reproducing system. If the state works by purchasing labour power with the intent of creating surplus value, then it must have a proletariat class, a class of wage earners. Engels here says that state ownership is not the solution of this conflict.

Also, here in the same document:


Originally posted by Engels

It was shown that the appropriation of unpaid labor is the basis of the capitalist mode of production and of the exploitation of the worker that occurs under it; that even if the capitalist buys the labor power of his laborer at its full value as a commodity on the market, he yet extracts more value from it than he paid for; and that in the ultimate analysis, this surplus-value forms those sums of value from which are heaped up constantly increasing masses of capital in the hands of the possessing classes. The genesis of capitalist production and the production of capital were both explained.
How come am I basing myself in Marx and Engels? Well, mainly in Marx when explaining the genesis of market economy and how market, money and mode of production are not the same thing. (Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy)Go on, where does it mention all of this. Incidentally, have you ever read wage labour and capital? I'm guessing you haven't.


Originally posted by Marx

capital and wage-labour are two sides of one and the same relation.And a little further down


Originally posted by Marx

As long as the wage-labourer remains a wage-labourer, his lot is dependent upon capital.
Marx said there's a lesser and a higher stage of communism. The lesser one was called socialism by Lenin, and it's this definition, which equals to socialist society, we're all using.

He said that there was a lower and a higher stage of communism. He never equated the DotP with the lower stage, where there were still class antagonisms. Show me where Marx did. And, that definition, that you're using, that socialism is the DotP and that the DotP is the same as the lower phase of communism, is revisionism.


It seems you are the dogmatic ones here, dudes. Ah, these "Marxian" purists and leftists...

You can be a revisionist reformer all you want. But could you please at least try to give a response instead of posting stupid one liner insults?

[Sputnik_1]

@Sputnik


You asked about classes:
1. Industrial workers
2. Peasants
3. Intellectuals
4. Soldiers

Communism is a classless society. Distinction you're making between socialism and communism is not marxist, they're the same thing. I don't see what's the difference between your vision of socialism and recent system. Basically none, you'd just call the guys on the top DotP but everything else would stay the same.

[Tim Finnegan]

Each group I mentioned have very specific interests, different from the interests of the other groups. So, they are social classes, but differently from capitalist society, they are not antagonistic. That explains better, because some of them are not part of means of production, like intellectuals and military or even the clergy (in some countries they are still powerful).

(Hint: The Poverty of Philosophy)
This doesn't really make sense. The interests of labour are determined by its opposition to capital, so with the negation of capital, the proletariat ceases to embody a distinct set of class interests, and instead realises itself as the universal class, its interests becoming those of humanity. The intelligentsia and peasantry, lacking any united interests or the ability to organise as a class-for-itself in pursuit of them (as Marx is at pains to make clear in his discussions of the French peasantry in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte), can only attach themselves to either labour or capital, and with the dissolution of the latter, they are obliged by necessity to support the former, and participate in the movement towards the dissolution of class, i.e. communism. This means that their interests can be nothing but sectional interests, the same as might be expressed by, say, street-sweepers or clerical workers, and do not constitute a distinct set of class interests.


To fulfil everyone's needs first it's necessary to have greatly developed productive forces, so it's possible to produce all necessary goods in sufficient quantity to each individual. If that's already the case where you live in (and practice will tell us if that's really true), good for you, but in my place it isn't.You don't imagine your socialism to be international?


I wasn't trying to give a counter-argument and I've been following this and been agreeing with what you are saying. I just wanted to point out that different tendencies have different positions on that subject.
I get that, I'm just saying that they can't all be right. If we want a scientific rather than than utopian socialism (although I've honestly never liked the term "scientific socialism" in English), then we have to try to reach some sort of vaguely objective conclusions.

[Blake's Baby]

Marx said there's a lesser and a higher stage of communism. The lesser one was called socialism by Lenin, and it's this definition, which equals to socialist society, we're all using.

Marx called them the lower and higher phases of communism, yes.

Lenin called the lower phase 'socialism', yes. He also called the dictatorship of the proletariat 'socialism' which doesn't help matters, as it's not the same as the lower phase of communism.

'Everyone' using that definition is... some Leninists, like yourself, and a few confused anarchists. Marxists, and the majority of anarchists, do not refer to either the dictatorship of the proletariat, or the lower phase of communism, as 'socialism'.

[28350]

Sometimes I think we need new, unsmeared terms

[Blake's Baby]

Understanding the ones we have would be a start.

Though as Rodrigo believes that there would be nations, wages, buying and selling in communism, then perhaps understanding terms is not the issue.

[Rodrigo]

Communism is a classless society. Distinction you're making between socialism and communism is not marxist, they're the same thing. I don't see what's the difference between your vision of socialism and recent system. Basically none, you'd just call the guys on the top DotP but everything else would stay the same.

Did I mention proletariat or bourgeoisie?

[Rodrigo]

This doesn't really make sense. The interests of labour are determined by its opposition to capital, so with the negation of capital, the proletariat ceases to embody a distinct set of class interests, and instead realises itself as the universal class, its interests becoming those of humanity. BLA BLA BLA

Er... That's no different from what I've been saying. So let's make it clear, OK? When I say "different interests" I'm not saying ones would have bourgeois interests and others would have proletarian ones, since in communist society this contradiction would be overcame.


You don't imagine your socialism to be international?

There's no international "socialist" society (Proletarian internationalism is one thing, "international socialism" is another), but international communist society (or non-national hehe). You don't expect that revolutions happen in all places of the world at the same time, do you?

[Rooster]

Did I mention proletariat or bourgeoisie?

Yes, you did. You mentioned a class of people who sold their labour power and a class of people who purchased it.

[Firebrand]

There's no international "socialist" society (Proletarian internationalism is one thing, "international socialism" is another), but international communist society (or non-national hehe). You don't expect that revolutions happen in all places of the world at the same time, do you?

If they don't all happen within a reasonably close timeframe then the revolution is doomed. As long as there are capitalist interests in the world class and state cannot be fully done away with, because capitalist interests will not allow the existance of communism. There will be war in some form and a state of some kind will be needed to co-ordinate defence. Thus meaning that the society created is no longer truely communist and you end up with at best Cuba and at worst North Korea

[Rodrigo]

Bullshit. Even Stalin said that socialism is the removal of all class antagonisms.

So I have to say everything Stalin said because I'm a Marxist-Leninist. Oh, great. :laugh:

If he had said "communism" (which would mean its second stage) I would agree. But in a socialist society, a society transitioning to communism, there do is class struggle still.


Besides, like I said, if you think otherwise then you're just a social democrat reformer because you think that classes can just be made to gradually disappear instead of through revolution.No, I'm not a social democrat. Social democrats want to reform capitalism. Marxists are for constant revolution.


Which is just you saying so. Explain how wages would work differently.Not the wages, but the way workers would earn it. With no individual owner of their workforce/no people accumulating capital/extracting surplus-value/etc.


Wage labour, the exchange of labour power for money. The other person paying for it getting the surplus value of the wage."Wage labour", "the other person BLA BLA BLA" is not equal to "the exchange of labour power for money". You're using a definition proper of a capitalist society and transporting it to a definition of labour in a socialist society. People exchange labour power for money even before capitalism came to exist. It will be no more a necessity only if we develop so much our productive forces that producing anything would cost nothing (including workforce, which is ideally all robotic and computational, automatic - or instantaneous), so there would be no need for mediums of exchange since every product would also cost nothing. But... We don't live in Star Trek times yet. Hehe


Just because the state is now the one purchasing labour power doesn't make it any different.How does the State "purchase labour power"?


He said that there was a lower and a higher stage of communism. He never equated the DotP with the lower stage, where there were still class antagonisms. Show me where Marx did. And, that definition, that you're using, that socialism is the DotP and that the DotP is the same as the lower phase of communism, is revisionism.Now, as for myself, I do not claim to have discovered either the existence of classes in modern society or the struggle between them. Long before me, bourgeois historians had described the historical development of this struggle between the classes, as had bourgeois economists their economic anatomy. My own contribution was (1) to show that the existence of classes is merely bound up with certain historical phases in the development of production; (2) that the class struggle necessarily leads to the dictatorship of the proletariat; [and] (3) that this dictatorship, itself, constitutes no more than a transition to the abolition of all classesand to a classless society.

Karl Marx to Joseph Weydemeyer, 1852 letter


You can be a revisionist reformer all you want. But could you please at least try to give a response instead of posting stupid one liner insults?Hahaha you people are so funny. First I'm a "Stalinist", then a "capitalist" and now a social democrat reformer. OMG RevLeft is a circus... It's full of clowns :laugh:

[Rodrigo]

Yes, you did. You mentioned a class of people who sold their labour power and a class of people who purchased it.

When?

[Rodrigo]

If they don't all happen within a reasonably close timeframe then the revolution is doomed. As long as there are capitalist interests in the world class and state cannot be fully done away with, because capitalist interests will not allow the existance of communism. There will be war in some form and a state of some kind will be needed to co-ordinate defence. Thus meaning that the society created is no longer truely communist and you end up with at best Cuba and at worst North Korea

Shit! Who are you to say Cuba and North Korea are not "truly communist"?! Ah, I see... It's because they don't fill your idealist Anarcho-"Marxist" expectations. Hehe

By the way, the DPRK holds a socialist society since 1948. Stable even 60+ years later, even with the fall of USSR's and China's revolutionaries, the end of many socialist countries and turbulences in the international communist movement. Same with Cuba, alive since 1959. And some say Belarus too. If you like or not their specific kinds of socialism, it doesn't matter, leave your jealousy to you, the fact is they hold still even since that time. So no, if revolutions through all the world don't happen in close time frame, the revolution is NOT doomed. What really doomed communism was the capitalist restoration which began in East Europe, revisionism, and all their consequences within almost every socialist country.

[Firebrand]

Shit! Who are you to say Cuba and North Korea are not "truly communist"?! Ah, I see... It's because they don't fill your idealist Anarcho-"Marxist" expectations. Hehe

By the way, the DPRK holds a socialist society since 1948. Stable even 60+ years later, even with the fall of USSR's and China's revolutionaries, the end of many socialist countries and turbulences in the international communist movement. Same with Cuba, alive since 1959. And some say Belarus too. If you like or not their specific kinds of socialism, it doesn't matter, leave your jealousy to you, the fact is they hold still even since that time. So no, if revolutions through all the world don't happen in close time frame, the revolution is NOT doomed. What really doomed communism was the capitalist restoration which began in East Europe, revisionism, and all their consequences within almost every socialist country.

Now you conflate communism and socialism. socialism is meant to be a TRANSITIONARY phase. Its not a place you are supposeded to stay for 60 years. And i'm sorry but if leader worship and public executions of people who try to leave is socialism then you can stick it where the sun don't shine.

And as long as there is a state there is no communism and the revolution is doomed. As long as there is capitalist opposition a state is necessary.

[Blake's Baby]

...

Now, as for myself, I do not claim to have discovered either the existence of classes in modern society or the struggle between them. Long before me, bourgeois historians had described the historical development of this struggle between the classes, as had bourgeois economists their economic anatomy. My own contribution was (1) to show that the existence of classes is merely bound up with certain historical phases in the development of production; (2) that the class struggle necessarily leads to the dictatorship of the proletariat; [and] (3) that this dictatorship, itself, constitutes no more than a transition to the abolition of all classesand to a classless society.

Karl Marx to Joseph Weydemeyer, 1852 letter...

Wow. Seriously, you quoted Marx, trying to back up your argument, and it totally says what Rooster is arguing, and completely demolishes your own position? I realise English isn't your first language (and kudos to you, none of us could find Marx quotes in Portuguese) but seriously: read what it says. The dictatorship of the proletariat is only the transition. The classless society (Marx's lower stage) comes after the dictatorship.

[Blake's Baby]

Now you conflate communism and socialism. socialism is meant to be a TRANSITIONARY phase...

No it isn't. The dictatorship of the proletariat is a transitional phase. Socialism = Communism to Marx.


...Its not a place you are supposeded to stay for 60 years. And i'm sorry but if leader worship and public executions of people who try to leave is socialism then you can stick it where the sun don't shine.

And as long as there is a state there is no communism and the revolution is doomed. As long as there is capitalist opposition a state is necessary.

That's all fair enough. There is no 'communsit state' because communism is classless and stateless (no classes = no states), ie worldwide. But don't think that 'socialism' = 'the lower stage of communism' or 'the dictatorship of the proletariat' - both bits of Leninist revionism.

[Rooster]

So I have to say everything Stalin said because I'm a Marxist-Leninist. Oh, great. :laugh:

If he had said "communism" (which would mean its second stage) I would agree. But in a socialist society, a society transitioning to communism, there do is class struggle still.

Explain to me then, how class antagonisms can be resolved without revolution.


No, I'm not a social democrat. Social democrats want to reform capitalism. Marxists are for constant revolution.Nope, social democrat. You don't understand that class antagonisms can only be resolved through revolution and instead insist on a gradualist approach. And the thing that you call socialism still has wages, classes, a state, etc. So basically, you, like every other Stalinist, is a social democrat, one trying to reform society through capitalism without revolution.


Not the wages, but the way workers would earn it. With no individual owner of their workforce/no people accumulating capital/extracting surplus-value/etc.You're not making any sense. A worker earns wages differently under socialism? Now you bring up this point again of no individual owner is purchasing it? You just mentioned the state in a previous post. Could you please at least try to make up your mind and give me a coherent statement?


"Wage labour", "the other person BLA BLA BLA" is not equal to "the exchange of labour power for money". Yes, yes it is. How else would you define a wage?


You're using a definition proper of a capitalist society and transporting it to a definition of labour in a socialist society.I think you're the one doing that :rolleyes:


People exchange labour power for money even before capitalism came to exist. People also had their own means of subsistence before capitalism and were not full time wage earners.


It will be no more a necessity only if we develop so much our productive forces that producing anything would cost nothingWhy are you conflating cost with value? :confused:


(including workforce, which is ideally all robotic and computational, automatic - or instantaneous), so there would be no need for mediums of exchange since every product would also cost nothing. But... We don't live in Star Trek times yet. HeheAnyway, I can't understand what you are writing. Are you saying that you have to go through capitalism to begin communism? Ideally?


How does the State "purchase labour power"?By owning the means of production and then paying out money to the worker for his labour power. How is this hard to understand?


Now, as for myself, I do not claim to have discovered either the existence of classes in modern society or the struggle between them. Long before me, bourgeois historians had described the historical development of this struggle between the classes, as had bourgeois economists their economic anatomy. My own contribution was (1) to show that the existence of classes is merely bound up with certain historical phases in the development of production; (2) that the class struggle necessarily leads to the dictatorship of the proletariat; [and] (3) that this dictatorship, itself, constitutes no more than a transition to the abolition of all classesand to a classless society.

Karl Marx to Joseph Weydemeyer, 1852 letterThanks for providing a quote for me.


Hahaha you people are so funny. First I'm a "Stalinist", then a "capitalist" and now a social democrat reformer. OMG RevLeft is a circus... It's full of clowns :laugh:You dismiss the idea that class antagonisms can only be resolved through revolution = reformism. You want to keep in place capital exploitation thinking that it can be reformed (see previous sentence) = social democrat. All that equals Stalinist. Sounds pretty much like revisionism to me.

[Rooster]

When?

Consistently throughout the thread when you have been mentioning that there would exist a class of wage earners.

[StalinFanboy]

apparently the concept of alienation is completely lost on stalinists...

there is no exchange in communism.

[Tim Finnegan]

Er... That's no different from what I've been saying. So let's make it clear, OK? When I say "different interests" I'm not saying ones would have bourgeois interests and others would have proletarian ones, since in communist society this contradiction would be overcame.
What other form could "class interests" take? Do you actually understand what "class" is?


There's no international "socialist" society (Proletarian internationalism is one thing, "international socialism" is another), but international communist society (or non-national hehe). You don't expect that revolutions happen in all places of the world at the same time, do you? Not at the same time, but not separately, either. It's a universalising process, not just something that pops up here and there like mushrooms.

[Die Neue Zeit]

On the original topic, I'd like to ask a very specific question: Since left-coms are averse to wage relations (even transitionally speaking), how would they deal with scrapping wage relations in agriculture while trying to "communize" production there?

[Blake's Baby]

Sorry DNZ, as is often the case I don't understand your question.

1 - Left Comms don't 'deal with scrapping wage relations'. We don't set ourselves up as a politburo or assembly of people's commissars or whatever. The Left Comm organisations are not the new 'government'. It is up to the workers' councils/soviets in the agricultural areas how socialisation proceeds. We all help in the process but it's not enforced by the Paris Central Committee (or, you know, Florence, Naples, Loren Golder's Aeroplane of Left Communist Awesomness, whatever).

2 - what does 'averse to wage relations, even transitionally speaking' mean? Do we want to destroy capitalism? Yes. Do we think that capitalism will stop on day 1 of the revolution? No. Will the dictatorship of the proletariat use some state capitalist measures? Yes, I think it probably will. Might these include wages? I hope not. But might it? Yes.

Of course, I don't speak for any Left Communist other than myself.

[Firebrand]

No it isn't. The dictatorship of the proletariat is a transitional phase. Socialism = Communism to Marx.



That's all fair enough. There is no 'communsit state' because communism is classless and stateless (no classes = no states), ie worldwide. But don't think that 'socialism' = 'the lower stage of communism' or 'the dictatorship of the proletariat' - both bits of Leninist revionism.

I am not and do not plan to become involved in your petty argument over the semantics of lower stages of communism, dictatorship of the proletariat etc.
The point I have been trying to make is that anyone who is aiming for the messed up failure that is the socialist experiment in North Korea is totally missing the point of marxism. We should be aiming for a "Classless, stateless society". Any transitional/transitionary stages should not be lasting for 60+ years and if the country is not both classless and statless it must therefore still be in a transitional stage. IMO any transitional stage shouldn't last much longer than a year, i reckon any longer than that and you start getting an entrenched bureaucracy.

[Rooster]

I am not and do not plan to become involved in your petty argument over the semantics of lower stages of communism, dictatorship of the proletariat etc.

The rest of your post indicates that you don't think it's petty.


The point I have been trying to make is that anyone who is aiming for the messed up failure that is the socialist experiment in North Korea is totally missing the point of marxism. We should be aiming for a "Classless, stateless society". Any transitional/transitionary stages should not be lasting for 60+ years and if the country is not both classless and statless it must therefore still be in a transitional stage. IMO any transitional stage shouldn't last much longer than a year, i reckon any longer than that and you start getting an entrenched bureaucracy.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Sorry DNZ, as is often the case I don't understand your question.

1 - Left Comms don't 'deal with scrapping wage relations'. We don't set ourselves up as a politburo or assembly of people's commissars or whatever. The Left Comm organisations are not the new 'government'. It is up to the workers' councils/soviets in the agricultural areas how socialisation proceeds. We all help in the process but it's not enforced by the Paris Central Committee (or, you know, Florence, Naples, Loren Golder's Aeroplane of Left Communist Awesomness, whatever).

What I meant was that, typically, left-coms tend to be against state ownership of the means of production. However, this hostility leads to being against the creation and proliferation of state farms. Historically, of course, state farms operated on a wage basis, whereby every farm worker was paid a wage.

[Firebrand]

The rest of your post indicates that you don't think it's petty.

I think arguing over semantics is petty. You know what i'm talking about, and you know that i'm right. North Korea is not what we should be aiming for. The only important definition is that a "classless stateless society" is what we are aiming for. Anything short of that is either a transitional phase or a failure neither of which should last for 60+ years. Merely existing for a long time is not evidence of merit. I believe the roman empire lasted a pretty long time.

[Blake's Baby]

... petty ...

I think it's important to know what we're talking about. I don't think that's petty, I think being clear is vital. To be honest, I'd rather make myself clear and you think I was a total arse, than to be unclear and you think I was a nice guy.


...
The point I have been trying to make is that anyone who is aiming for the messed up failure that is the socialist experiment in North Korea is totally missing the point of marxism. We should be aiming for a "Classless, stateless society". Any transitional/transitionary stages should not be lasting for 60+ years and if the country is not both classless and statless it must therefore still be in a transitional stage...

I absolutely agree with all of this, couldn't have said it more clearly myself.


...
IMO any transitional stage shouldn't last much longer than a year, i reckon any longer than that and you start getting an entrenched bureaucracy.

This may be true but I think you may be a bit optimistic about how quickly we can re-organise society. The 'transitional stage', if you're still talking about the dictatorship of the proletariat, will last as long as pro-capitalists are fighting revolutionaries; while the world civil war is going on, in other words. I don't think we'll have won the world civil war in a year, unfortunately.

Obviously, I'd like to be wrong about that.

The answer it seems to me is for the soviets to be real living organs of class power not rubber-stamping local bodies subservient to an all-powerful 'Moscow (or anywhere else) Central'.

[Firebrand]

I think it's important to know what we're talking about. I don't think that's petty, I think being clear is vital. To be honest, I'd rather make myself clear and you think I was a total arse, than to be unclear and you think I was a nice guy..

Fair enough, I think we probably both just got confused over which distinctions were important to the argument and whether terms could just be understood from the context and so we got bogged down in whether clarifications were necessary or not. Not to worry, I'm not always the clearest of people.


This may be true but I think you may be a bit optimistic about how quickly we can re-organise society. The 'transitional stage', if you're still talking about the dictatorship of the proletariat, will last as long as pro-capitalists are fighting revolutionaries; while the world civil war is going on, in other words. I don't think we'll have won the world civil war in a year, unfortunately.

Obviously, I'd like to be wrong about that..

Well the aim is to get all the pro-capitalists out of the way during the revolution. In the process of seizing political and economic power the working class will probably come into conflict with most of the irreconcilable pro-capitalists and hopefully crush them. Ideally we would avoid civil war, they tend to lead to complications in the revolutionary process. Wars need two sides. If the majority of the popultaion mobilises in favour of change the capitalists won't have anything left to fight with.
We would have control of all production including weapons so they would not only be outnumbered but severely outgunned, not to mention having the advantage in food supplies and general support from the population.


The answer it seems to me is for the soviets to be real living organs of class power not rubber-stamping local bodies subservient to an all-powerful 'Moscow (or anywhere else) Central'.
Amen to that. No system which relies on the real organs of working class power being subservient to bureaucratic centralised power can in all honesty call itself communist.

[Rodrigo]

there is no exchange in communism.

Let's take the example of workers in socialist society.
They don't work e.g. in rubber factories because they necessarily need rubber, but because they need to work/contribute to society, so they can get <X> (which will be much more closer to the real value of their work since there's no one accumulating capital and extracting surplus value) to exchange it for the products they want. And they get <X> by selling the exceeding rubber to other workers. With <X> they can have products which aren't rubber, exchanging an amount of <X> for them.
But I think the best example might be workers producing something related to entertainment, like video-games, since this production -- instead of rubber, iron ore, food, etc -- isn't essential, the result is not a basic necessity of everyone's lives. There's not the need, in this industry, to "give away" part of the production to feed others -- which is the case of industries dealing with raw material.


What other form could "class interests" take? Do you actually understand what "class" is?

A non-antagonistic form.


Not at the same time, but not separately, either. It's a universalising process, not just something that pops up here and there like mushrooms.

And I completely agree with your phrase.

[Blake's Baby]

Let's take the example of workers in socialist society.
They don't work e.g. in rubber factories because they necessarily need rubber, but because they need to work/contribute to society, so they can get <X> (which will be much more closer to the real value of their work since there's no one accumulating capital and extracting surplus value) to exchange it for the products they want. And they get <X> by selling the exceeding rubber to other workers. With <X> they can have products which aren't rubber, exchanging an amount of <X> for them...

These words don't make any sense together to most of us. You talk about selling and exchange under socialism. We reject not just the terms but the conception behind them.

Re-written in a way we ('Free-Access Communists', or 'Marxists', 'Marxian Socialists' and/or 'Anarchist-Communists' as we call variously ourselves) would understand it:

Let's take the example of workers in socialist society.
They don't work e.g. in rubber factories because they necessarily need rubber (BUT SOMEONE MUST), but because they need to work/contribute to society, (BECAUSE SOCIETY IS WORDWIDE AND NOT EVERYWHERE PRODUCES RUBBER). And they get <X> by (HAVING <X> SENT TO THEM WHILE SENDING) the exceeding rubber to other workers (WITH NO ACCOUNTING OR EXCHANGE - JUST RUBBER WORKERS PRODUCING NECESSARY RUBBER AND OTHER WORKERS PRODUCING NECESSARY <X>).

[Blake's Baby]

... Ideally we would avoid civil war, they tend to lead to complications in the revolutionary process...

The world civil war is the world revolution. The global war of the workers against the capitalists, everywhere. Until the revolution has triumphed worldwide, the revolution has not triumphed (because the triumph of the revolution can only be worldwide); in this case, the global civil war is still being fought.

So to only use one term at a time, the revolution won't have succeeded worldwide in a year, I don't think.

[Rooster]

Let's take the example of workers in socialist society.

Okay but I'd rather argue that the category of "worker" would fall away once we moved into a classless society and when we've overcome alienation so that we all just become people, but what ever.


They don't work e.g. in rubber factories because they necessarily need rubber

Why else would anyone work in a rubber factory?


, but because they need to work/contribute to society, so they can get <X> (which will be much more closer to the real value of their work since there's no one accumulating capital and extracting surplus value) to exchange it for the products they want. And they get <X> by selling the exceeding rubber to other workers. With <X> they can have products which aren't rubber, exchanging an amount of <X> for them.

So you're a market socialist then? :confused:


But I think the best example might be workers producing something related to entertainment, like video-games, since this production -- instead of rubber, iron ore, food, etc -- isn't essential, the result is not a basic necessity of everyone's lives. There's not the need, in this industry, to "give away" part of the production to feed others -- which is the case of industries dealing with raw material.

I have absolutely no idea what you are trying to say here at all.


A non-antagonistic form.

Which would be no class.

[Rodrigo]

Okay but I'd rather argue that the category of "worker" would fall away once we moved into a classless society and when we've overcome alienation so that we all just become people, but what ever.

I understand, but people can be workers, peasants, students or even none if they're not able to do any of these things or are too young/old.


Why else would anyone work in a rubber factory?

Because there are people wanting to work in this kind of industry? :) Plus, rubber - like plastic - is necessary for making many useful products (or parts of them). Anyway, it was only an example, so you can change the word rubber for any other you'd like.

I didn't really understand this question. It seems to have a bit of prejudice against manual labour.


So you're a market socialist then? :confused:

You can call it whatever you want, utopian. I'm not the kind of Marxist who only read this and that of Marx and Engels (common sense communists who fall like a glove in that video about "communism in Star Trek", specially when someone say something about "non material needs") and automatically gets drown in a dream, defending everything opposed to anything existing in capitalist society, labelling everything "capitalist". Thus I know that what you're all calling "market" is not equal to "capitalism".


I have absolutely no idea what you are trying to say here at all.Those are not essential products for people (or for the development of science, technology, industry, etc) so there's no need to increase their production and distribute them like what should happen with food for example.


Which would be no class.Bourgeoisie and proletariat are not the only social classes after capitalism. It's not because the contradiction between them is the main contradiction of modern capitalist society that these are the only ones existing within it - and that within other classes there aren't also specific interests. :)

[Rodrigo]

Communists who want to live the Middle Ages?
Only at RevLeft! :lol:

[Leftsolidarity]

^Fucking trolling at this point

[Rooster]

Because there are people wanting to work in this kind of industry? :) Plus, rubber - like plastic - is necessary for making many useful products (or parts of them). Anyway, it was only an example, so you can change the word rubber for any other you'd like.

I didn't really understand this question. It seems to have a bit of prejudice against manual labour.

The whole tone of the thing the example you gave just smacks of making people work for the sake of working, not because they'd want to do their work but just to make sure that they contributed to society.


You can call it whatever you want, utopian.

Well, you advocate wage labour, private ownership of the means of production and commodity exchange. Sounds pretty much like having a market to me.


I'm not the kind of Marxist who only read this and that of Marx and Engels

I'm not even sure you've even read any Marx and Engels


(common sense communists who fall like a glove in that video about "communism in Star Trek", specially when someone say something about "non material needs")

No idea what you are talking about.


and automatically gets drown in a dream, defending everything opposed to anything existing in capitalist society, labelling everything "capitalist". Thus I know that what you're all calling "market" is not equal to "capitalism".

You don't even know what capitalism is and what constitutes it. You want to keep all the same old things that are in capitalism, wage labour, surplus value extraction, private ownership of the means of production, money. Your only solution to this is to take away the capitalists which doesn't make any sense. I'm also pretty sure you don't even know what utopian means.


Those are not essential products for people (or for the development of science, technology, industry, etc) so there's no need to increase their production and distribute them like what should happen with food for example.

So now there's going to be someone who's going to judge what gets made and what doesn't? The only essential things for people are food, clothing and shelter. Doesn't make for an interesting life. Besides, I still have no idea where you were going with this.


Bourgeoisie and proletariat are not the only social classes after capitalism. It's not because the contradiction between them is the main contradiction of modern capitalist society that these are the only ones existing within it - and that within other classes there aren't also specific interests. :)

You've mentioned other classes but not how they relate to production or even why they wouldn't be antagonistic (funny feeling that you won't be able to).

The fact is, you've not outlined a coherent thing at all through out this whole thread. You've demonstrated a lack of knowledge about basic capitalism, a complete lack of knowledge of class and class struggle. You've shown no way forward through what most people here see as the struggle between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie. All you have said is that you have to remove the capitalist but you still want to keep the capitalist system and you still want a class society even when the goal of communists is to have no classes.

[Tim Finnegan]

Communists who want to live the Middle Ages?
Only at RevLeft! :lol:

Oh, fuck off.

[Rodrigo]

The whole tone of the thing the example you gave just smacks of making people work for the sake of working, not because they'd want to do their work but just to make sure that they contributed to society.

I used the example of that precise product because inspiring in a factory here in Brazil, a rubber barrel factory controlled by a collective of workers called Flaskô. Well, I recommend you watch some videos about it on YouTube before posting again.

People work in what they know to do, like to and keep doing it if they want to. Not talking about capitalism now! -- in case you think about accusing me of something...

Workplaces are created because there are demand for some types of work, what is obviously the case of Flaskô. Communist society, second phase, will necessarily need people working in any productive job related to the essential things you mentioned (and the other ones I will mention later in this post). What's the problem with this fact? Are you one of those leisure lovers?


Well, you advocate wage labour

Yes, but not the way you're thinking about "wage labour". Wordplay.


private ownership of the means of production

¬¬'
When?


and commodity exchange.

Wordplay again.


Sounds pretty much like having a market to me.

As I've already said before, "market" equals to "selling and buying". If there's demand for a product, there's "market". You better read William Bill Bland's text called The Market Under Socialism (http://marxism.halkcephesi.net/Bill%20Bland/the%20market%20under%20socialism.htm). What can define it capitalist is the existence of a capitalist economical structure in control of economy, what in socialism is absent.

It's not necessarily with private ownership of production, extraction of suplus value and a ruling bourgeoisie. What prevents groups of workers from selling the products they made and buying others, in communist societies? The only things preventing it would be "The Dictatorship of Those-Without-Material-Needs". Sounds much more like a Christian or Buddhist heaven.


I'm not even sure you've even read any Marx and Engels

I recommended you read The German Ideology again, specially "Part 5. Development of the Productive Forces as a Material Premise of Communism".

An idea of great importance from this book:
"Communism is for us not a state of affairs which is to be established, an ideal to which reality [will] have to adjust itself. We call communism the real movement which abolishes the present state of things. The conditions of this movement result from the premises now in existence."

That's why I said before that capitalism must be overcame, and that it doesn't mean everything being destroyed by a decree, instantaneously, like playing Civilization. If things were that easy, there would still exist the USSR, for example. With the dictatorship of the proletariat, the State/collective economy in the foreground and changes in the productive relations (no ruling bourgeoisie and now ruling working class) ... begins the overcoming of capitalism and, simultaneously, the building of communism. Communism is not created out of nothing like magic or divine blessing; it's built "from the corpse" of capitalist society and it takes time to complete this "rotting" process. And some things, like "money", as already explained, are still needed in a communist society in construction.


No idea what you are talking about.

Non-essential products wouldn't be distributed since they're not basic needs, as you yourself stated in the last post, correct? This portion of economy is market until productive forces aren't so highly developed the cost or time for producing anything would be almost zero. When this situation gets real in our world, then we can talk about a moneyless society.


You don't even know what capitalism is and what constitutes it.

You're the one who thinks earning "money" from your work, selling and buying are all equal to capitalism.


You want to keep all the same old things that are in capitalism

The medium of exchange (what we call now money) is much older than capitalism and it was developed for faster exchange of one product for another. It cannot be considered capitalist or "originated from private-ownership". One thing is one, another thing is another.

Wage labour doesn't need surplus value extraction or private ownership of the means of production. I'm not talking about getting wages from a capitalist, I'm talking about the workers organized exchanging the result of their labour for "money" (if, of course - they're not producing something related to a basic need, and if they want) because there's no place anywhere, anymore, for the archaic barter economy.


Your only solution to this is to take away the capitalists which doesn't make any sense.

I'm not really sure if you read my posts entirely, but you missed a very important point: for communism to reach its second phase, the development of productive forces is necessary. Along with the social, political and economical revolution of the proletariat, of course.


So now there's going to be someone who's going to judge what gets made and what doesn't?

That will be decided by referendum.


The only essential things for people are food, clothing and shelter.

And family, friends, healthcare, education, entertainment... This is the essential for everyone, but every person decides what will be their friendships, where their health will be treated, where they will be educated, how they will get entertained, etc.


Doesn't make for an interesting life.

That's where entertainment enters as a need.


Besides, I still have no idea where you were going with this.

If someone is in need of anything beyond all of those things we mentioned, then it means they are non-essential to society/everyone. So, as I said... This portion of economy has a market until productive forces aren't so highly developed the cost/time for producing anything would be zero, or almost.


You've mentioned other classes but not how they relate to production or even why they wouldn't be antagonistic (funny feeling that you won't be able to).

Talking about local production, everyone is the same, when the production relations of capitalism is not the ruling; and there's not capitalism neither in industry, neither in agriculture. But that's not the only characteristic defining social class. And the social role of each group? The difference of interests between them is still existent and derives from their different qualities, analyzing the situation universally, but in a society without an organized bourgeoisie, these interests cannot clash; because all of them are united against the remnant, former bourgeois individuals. I think it's very clear that I'm NOT for a class society, doesn't it? I now expect you to get it right.

[Geiseric]

Holy shit, the only reason we have wages are so part of the money made by selling something is given to the worker and so the rest of the cost is put into the cost of using the constant costs of production, and at the end the price is raise so profit can be made. Wages are only around so that money can be extracted from the cost of something and given to the "Owner." A wage system is completely pointless in a socialist society since:
1. nobody will be extracting any profit from a worker, unless an owner is included in the cycle of buying and selling
2. There won't be any money, since money is just a measure of social status, and there will be no classes.
3. There won't be any buying or selling of commodities, which are made not to be used, but to be sold. It is an alienating process.
NO CLASSES. No bourgeois, no workers. Everybody will own everything, thus the profit gained by a theoretical wage system will just go back to whoever made it.

You call yourself a Marxist Leninist Maoist, but have you ever read any marx or lenin? I suggest you read Wage Labor and Capital and try to argue with that, because it doesn't get any more orthodox marxist than getting rid of wages.

[Rodrigo]

Don't be cynical. It's the ultra-leftists who need to read at least every classic by Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin. From this topic everyone who completed this task can see how doing the same is a must for leftists.

"No classes" mean no bourgeois and no proletariat. "Proletariat" is not the same as "workers".



"1. nobody will be extracting any profit from a worker, unless an owner is included in the cycle of buying and selling"
Agreed. There's no surplus-value in socialism since there's not anyone to extract it.

"2. There won't be any money, since money is just a measure of social status, and there will be no classes."
Because this is the way money works in capitalism it does NOT mean that IN SOCIALISM it will be the same; different societies have different structures and it means different ideas about everything. Don't forget too: money is OLDER than capitalism and isn't always a measure of status, it was originally created only to ease the exchange of products. You're seeing hair in eggs.

"3. There won't be any buying or selling of commodities, which are made not to be used, but to be sold."
And this fact doesn't change another: there's no capitalism in workers earning money by selling something they made if they want to (and of course if it's not something essential like food, as I already explained), there's NO CREATION OF CAPITAL in this process, no intent of "profiting".

Almost everything is made to be used; just because in capitalist society the main interest of capitalists is to sell the product, it doesn't mean there are no uses for the same product (whatever the economical system is).

[Rodrigo]

Oh, yeah, and to those who think the task of working can be considered "capitalist", that "workers" = "proletariat": working doesn't mean that capital exists. What would you say about capital in a Neanderthal society from 12 thousand years ago? :)

[Kadir Ateş]

Again, why do communists bother with degenerates like Rodrigo? They are nothing but garbage and being so, are bourgeois. They give perfect arguments for left-wing capitalism, but little else.

[Rooster]

Again, why do communists bother with degenerates like Rodrigo? They are nothing but garbage and being so, are bourgeois. They give perfect arguments for left-wing capitalism, but little else.

Left wing capitalists are amusing. In the same way it's amusing arguing with any other liberal.


Don't be cynical. It's the ultra-leftists who need to read at least every classic by Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin. From this topic everyone who completed this task can see how doing the same is a must for leftists.

I'll get back to the part where you mention Stalin later as you contradict yourself somewhat.


"No classes" mean no bourgeois and no proletariat. "Proletariat" is not the same as "workers".And workers isn't a class or no class. Class is related to a person's relation to the means of production.


"1. nobody will be extracting any profit from a worker, unless an owner is included in the cycle of buying and selling"
Agreed. There's no surplus-value in socialism since there's not anyone to extract it.That isn't what surplus value is. And if we were to read Stalin (see my link below) there is surplus value in socialism. Why wouldn't there be surplus values in society? You'll notice as well as you've changed the quoted word "profit" to fit in with your phrase "surplus value". Both of which are not the same thing, the same way that price and value are not the same.


"2. There won't be any money, since money is just a measure of social status, and there will be no classes."
Because this is the way money works in capitalism it does NOT mean that IN SOCIALISM it will be the same; different societies have different structures and it means different ideas about everything. Don't forget too: money is OLDER than capitalism and isn't always a measure of status, it was originally created only to ease the exchange of products. You're seeing hair in eggs.Syd has got the way money works in capitalism wrong. Money is a commodity under capitalism, it is a means of exchange the same way that gold is. It has always been a commodity. Our aim is to get rid of commodity production.


"3. There won't be any buying or selling of commodities, which are made not to be used, but to be sold."
And this fact doesn't change another: there's no capitalism in workers earning money by selling something they made if they want to (and of course if it's not something essential like food, as I already explained), there's NO CREATION OF CAPITAL in this process, no intent of "profiting".Oh, so you're a market socialist then just like I said? What you're proposing is production of commodities for their exchange value; "earning money by selling".


Almost everything is made to be used; just because in capitalist society the main interest of capitalists is to sell the product, it doesn't mean there are no uses for the same product (whatever the economical system is).Which is just a matter of fact, but you seem to gloss over the actual fact of what a commodity is, how that relates to commodity to production, the labour process, wage labour and division of labour.

[Rooster]

Oh, yeah, and to those who think the task of working can be considered "capitalist", that "workers" = "proletariat": working doesn't mean that capital exists. What would you say about capital in a Neanderthal society from 12 thousand years ago? :)

Did someone mention straw man? You always come out with stuff that makes it seem like you have never read any Marx. Really. I'm quite baffled by this :confused:

[A Marxist Historian]

Holy shit, the only reason we have wages are so part of the money made by selling something is given to the worker and so the rest of the cost is put into the cost of using the constant costs of production, and at the end the price is raise so profit can be made. Wages are only around so that money can be extracted from the cost of something and given to the "Owner." A wage system is completely pointless in a socialist society since:
1. nobody will be extracting any profit from a worker, unless an owner is included in the cycle of buying and selling
2. There won't be any money, since money is just a measure of social status, and there will be no classes.
3. There won't be any buying or selling of commodities, which are made not to be used, but to be sold. It is an alienating process.
NO CLASSES. No bourgeois, no workers. Everybody will own everything, thus the profit gained by a theoretical wage system will just go back to whoever made it.

You call yourself a Marxist Leninist Maoist, but have you ever read any marx or lenin? I suggest you read Wage Labor and Capital and try to argue with that, because it doesn't get any more orthodox marxist than getting rid of wages.

Syd, you're certainly right about a fullblown socialist society, but your posting could be interpreted to mean that you don't think there'd be wages in a workers state overseeing the transition to socialism, like the USSR under Lenin, either. I'm sure that's not what you intended.

A dangerous mistake, with all our so-called "Marxist Leninists" here who don't understand the difference between a workers state and socialism--being as they think what you had under Stalin was "socialism."

On the more general issue of wages and socialism and workers' states, I just made a posting to the other thread on this subject here in Learning that people might want to look at, which includes an article on the subject.

http://www.revleft.com/vb/wages-workers-state-t166833/index.html

Currently the last posting to the topic, but probably not for much longer...

-M.H.-

[Rodrigo]

Did someone mention straw man? You always come out with stuff that makes it seem like you have never read any Marx. Really. I'm quite baffled by this :confused:

I said that because this is the Learning section. Duh.

[Rodrigo]

Left wing capitalists are amusing.

Oh my, look who's telling me I didn't read any Marx! Haha From this phrase anyone concludes you don't even know what a capitalist is. Neither you or that guy who said I'm bourgeois.


Workers isn't a class or no class. Class is related to a person's relation to the means of production.

But this is not the only definition. You and your friends (the only ones who can be called degenerated here) simply ignore other various definitions and think this simplification of social class, based in a single book about a single society is a divine dogma. And I was called "the orthodox!"


That isn't what surplus value is. And if we were to read Stalin (see my link below) there is surplus value in socialism.

You quoted a text you didn't read and what's more dishonoured: got the phrases completely out of context (both in this post and in your signature) just to criticize Stalin.

"The law of value is primarily a law of commodity production. It existed before capitalism, and, like commodity production, will continue to exist after the overthrow of capitalism, as it does, for instance, in our country, although, it is true, with a restricted sphere of operation. Having a wide sphere of operation in capitalist conditions, the law of value, of course, plays a big part in the development of capitalist production. But not only does it not determine the essence of capitalist production and the principles of capitalist profit; it does not even pose these problems. Therefore, it cannot be the basic economic law of modern capitalism.
(...)
Most appropriate to the concept of a basic economic law of capitalism is the law of surplus value, the law of the origin and growth of capitalist profit. It really does determine the basic features of capitalist production."

Now look what we got here:
"commodity production, will continue to exist after the overthrow of capitalism, as it does, for instance, in our country, although, it is true, with a restricted sphere of operation. Having a wide sphere of operation in capitalist conditions (...)"

And:
"the concept of a basic economic law of capitalism is the law of surplus value"

When he said "Is the law of value the basic economic law of capitalism? No." he was referring not to surplus value, but simply, value.


Why wouldn't there be surplus values in society? You'll notice as well as you've changed the quoted word "profit" to fit in with your phrase "surplus value". Both of which are not the same thing, the same way that price and value are not the same.

If you say there's surplus value in communist society, then you have to prove it.


Syd has got the way money works in capitalism wrong.

What he said is not a lie and I'm certain he doesn't believe money just have that one characteristic. Just like, ironically, social class can't be simply defined as that! :)


Money is a commodity under capitalism, it is a means of exchange the same way that gold is.

I hope with this post you didn't try to equal "means of exchange" with "commodity". This commentary was just to alert newbies, as we're posting in the Learning section.


Oh, so you're a market socialist then just like I said? What you're proposing is production of commodities for their exchange value; "earning money by selling".

No, I'm not a "market socialist". Those who dare to call themselves Marxists should know there's no contradiction between market and socialism, because market is not intrinsecally capitalist: if there's demand for X product, there's market; then, if there's market, this product is a commodity. In communism, there isn't any demand for any product? There is, of course, so there's market in communism! Knowing that doesn't make me a... "market socialist". I've ALREADY explained word-by-word in this same thread I'm not defending capitalism, but do people in RevLeft read my posts?! No.


Which is just a matter of fact, but you seem to gloss over the actual fact of what a commodity is, how that relates to commodity to production, the labour process, wage labour and division of labour.

You and your friends are the ones doing that. Just read the first post of this thread, the guy is talking about SOCIALISM and you're all using concepts of a CAPITALIST society over and over again, universalizing the divine concepts, adaptating it to any condition, any society, any era, etc. For example, what's the relation of the clerks, military (with different names in some ancient societies and they still play a big role in politics and world relations), nobles, scribes (Ancient Egypt), etc. to the means of production? None necessarily! So how could they be defined as social classes? Because one's relation to production is not the only defining factor for his/her social class, damnit! -.-'

On Bukharin's ABC Of Communism he says "The production of commodities leads necessarily to the existence of private property". I already used the example of Flaskô here and now I'll use it again. Flaskô is not private property, has a collective management with participation of every worker and still, they produce commodities (= something not produced for subsistence) in order to, at the end of the month, get the amount of money (which is not "paid by someone", OK, rooster?) they democratically decided to earn with the selling of their products, then using this money to exchange for other products (and, because they live in a capitalist country, also paying for water, food, eletricity, clothes and other essential items) and they seek nationalization so they will be considered public property. Where's extraction of surplus-value? Of course they won't receive 100% for their work, since it's impossible because there are other costs beyond their payment e.g. maintenance of machines, but that's not what surplus-value means. There isn't anyone extracting surplus-value in socialized properties. Other examples would be USSR's Kolkhoz and Sovkhoz.

Well, guess I already said everything I wanted to say in this thread, this conversation is just getting boring and I have more important things to do this year than punching doors...*oops*...I mean, debating with ultra-leftist dogmatists, so I'll quit the thread. Good debate for those who stay.

[MotherCossack]

The thing is....
are we really that likely to ever see such a 'letter of the law'
or a 'by the book' kind of a revolution ...? the likes of which you have comprehensively alluded to...
Don't get me wrong... this is a straightforward question, not an underhand implication that I am convinced we will not.
It just seems that , we are so focused on doctrines written when things were a bit different.... Not vastly, not in substance, but surely in detail....
It just seems that we might be better served finding a way to update these fundamentally sound doctrines. So that they are more attractive to the people who might be future comrades [in arms, even?], revolutionaries and without whose engagement we will never prevail.