Which type of communist am I?

[Ability]

I think I am the closest to Paul Lafargue...
I agree with Lafargue with almost everything he wrote, but I'm not sure if "Lafargueism" exists as an ideology...
I belive in social equality, good life for everyone, freedom, classless society, Marxist philosophy, ... but I DO NOT SUPPORT left populism ("right to work", public works, collectivism).
Also, I belive in personal freedoms (I don't support banning religion or banning free speach).
Also, I support democracy....
Which type of communist am I?

[ComradeYoldas]

Social Democrat

[Railyon]

I don't think it matters at all what tendency you'd adhere to, but we all know communists like to put people in camps (ba-dum-tish).

What you describe right there is something I think most if not all leftists on this board agree on. So we need to look at some defining differences between tendencies, like

Do you support the concept of the vanguard party?
Are you pro-National liberation?
Are you an Internationalist?

[Ability]

I don't think it matters at all what tendency you'd adhere to, but we all know communists like to put people in camps (ba-dum-tish).

What you describe right there is something I think most if not all leftists on this board agree on. So we need to look at some defining differences between tendencies, like

Do you support the concept of the vanguard party?
Are you pro-National liberation?
Are you an Internationalist?


1.) Vanguard Party - Yes (if it's not dictatorial).
2.) National liberation - Depends, I don't like too radical conflicts.
3.) Internationalist - I support multiculturalism, international organizations, tolerance, economic connection, pacifism... I think I am internationalist in that way.

[Railyon]

I think you might want to give Trotskyism a go then, if not that maybe Bordiga type Left Communism. :confused:

I wouldn't worry about it that much as said, I think it's a process more than anything... and there will always be things you won't agree with on your "tendency line" anyway. And it's not like you can't switch tendencies if you see you disagree with them.

[daft punk]

I DO NOT SUPPORT ...."right to work", public works, collectivism.

this seems odd, why not? In socialism everyone would have a job, all work would be public works and industry would be collectively owned. Or do you mean something different?




I don't support banning religion

who does?



or banning free speach).
Also, I support democracy....


This is not a black and white issue. The Bolsheviks ended up forced to ban some opposition activity as the opposition basically became enemies if they sided with the Whites or tried to sabotage the peace deal with Germany. It was a civil war and therefore some people are enemy, just like the Nazis were the enemy of the allies in WW2, enemy is enemy, they want to kill you, so you dont publish their propaganda for them.

The Bolsheviks did have democracy at least in 1918. It fizzled out for the reasons above. The Left SR party was the main coalition partner, and they walked out of government in 1918 over the peace with Germany. Then they tried to sabotage the peace and so became enemy. Of course many of the members of these parties joined the Bolsheviks and the Red Army.




Which type of communist am I?

I give in, dunno. I will tell you which type you should be. Trotskyist. It's a no brainer. Unless you have no brain of course. Ok that's a bit contradictory but never mind.

If you are a communist you should be a Marxist and if you are a Marxist you are either Stalinist (forget that), Trotskyist, or left com. Left coms have their gripes with this and that, and basically say socialists should never leave their armchairs in case something bad happens.

[Brosa Luxemburg]

I don't know if this will help, but this is what I posted in the council communist thread.

My understanding of Council Communism is essential these points:
1. While Bolshevik tactics may have worked for Russia, they would not work for western countries.
2. Many original Council Communists believed that the soviets in Russia were tools of the ruling class and Lenin's form of democratic centralism was authoritarian and flawed.
3. The workers should rule society and their worker's state through workers councils, federations, and other direct democratic institutions.
4. The Social Democratic idea of nationalizing industries being socialism is flawed. Socialism in the Council Communist sense is direct democratic control of the factories by the workers and their communities.
5. Here I will quote Anton Pannekoek. "What can a small party, however principled, do when what is needed are the masses?" He went on to say, "...it also follows from this theory that it is not even the entire communist party that exercises dictatorship, but the Central Committee, and it does first within the party itself, where it takes it upon itself to expel individuals and uses shabby means to get rid of opposition."
6. The Kronstadt Revolt in Russia was a revolt to re-institute the true socialism that the Bolshevik's had gotten rid of by the end of the Civil War.
7. The Trade Unions are bureaucratic and don't work in the interests of the workers. The workers need to form their own revolutionary organizations.
8. Parliamentary tactics are flawed and the proletarian revolution cannot be carried out through legislative bodies.

The 4 main thinkers of Council Communism are Herman Gorter, Anton Pannekoek, Sylvia Pankhurst, and Otto Ruhl (in my opinion). Other thinkers Council Communists respect and look to include Rosa Luxembourg and Antonio Gramsci.

It also seems that these ideas overlap with other ideologies, such as Libertarian Marxism, Left Communism, etc.

[Offbeat]

It doesn't really matter, tendencies will be largely irrelevant when the revolution comes anyway. There's really nothing wrong with just describing yourself as a Marxist or a Communist.

[Lanky Wanker]

Why are we encouraging this tendency shit for him? I don't want to sound like the grumpy grandpa of the forum, but it's bad enough we have people even asking it in the first place as if it's important.

Tendencies do NOT matter, they're fucking pointless in leftist learning. The last thing you need to be worried about is whether you're a Trot, Stalinist, Maoist, Left Communist or whatever else. When you give yourself these labels so early on in your learning, all you do is close your mind off to any other ideas because you've settled down with a label already. Honestly ask yourself what a label like that will provide you with in the long run.

If you're down with the main man, Marx, you're a communist. Nothing more, nothing less. Again, I apologise for being an angry old man.




I give in, dunno. I will tell you which type you should be. Trotskyist. It's a no brainer. Unless you have no brain of course. Ok that's a bit contradictory but never mind.


lol funny guy... or are you being serious?

[ed miliband]

this seems odd, why not? In socialism everyone would have a job, all work would be public works and industry would be collectively owned. Or do you mean something different?




because, as paul lafargue declared, we want the right to be lazy, not the right to work that your party love marching arm-in-arm with trade union bureaucrats for.

if socialism simply meant a secure job, and it seems to with your party, it would be worthless.

[daft punk]

because, as paul lafargue declared, we want the right to be lazy, not the right to work that your party love marching arm-in-arm with trade union bureaucrats for.

if socialism simply meant a secure job, and it seems to with your party, it would be worthless.

"Equal liability of all to work."

Marx and Engels, Communist Manifesto

[The Douche]

this seems odd, why not? In socialism everyone would have a job, all work would be public works and industry would be collectively owned. Or do you mean something different?



who does?



This is not a black and white issue. The Bolsheviks ended up forced to ban some opposition activity as the opposition basically became enemies if they sided with the Whites or tried to sabotage the peace deal with Germany. It was a civil war and therefore some people are enemy, just like the Nazis were the enemy of the allies in WW2, enemy is enemy, they want to kill you, so you dont publish their propaganda for them.

The Bolsheviks did have democracy at least in 1918. It fizzled out for the reasons above. The Left SR party was the main coalition partner, and they walked out of government in 1918 over the peace with Germany. Then they tried to sabotage the peace and so became enemy. Of course many of the members of these parties joined the Bolsheviks and the Red Army.



I give in, dunno. I will tell you which type you should be. Trotskyist. It's a no brainer. Unless you have no brain of course. Ok that's a bit contradictory but never mind.

If you are a communist you should be a Marxist and if you are a Marxist you are either Stalinist (forget that), Trotskyist, or left com. Left coms have their gripes with this and that, and basically say socialists should never leave their armchairs in case something bad happens.


This is flame bait, you've been warned about this sort of stuff before, have an infraction.

[daft punk]

This is flame bait, you've been warned about this sort of stuff before, have an infraction.

Fuck you. The left coms say the Russian revolution was doomed because it was premature, in that Russia was too backward economically and in terms of the workers consciousness, which is linked. So therefore the Russian revolution should not have gone ahead. I dunno if all left coms think this but some do, I have been discussing it with them recently on here.

So if it should not have gone ahead, basically I was paraphrasing that into saying the Bolsheviks should have stayed at home.

So, I am not flame baiting I am summarising the position of left coms, or some of them.

So fuck you and fuck your infraction.

[The Douche]

Fuck you. The left coms say the Russian revolution was doomed because it was premature, in that Russia was too backward economically and in terms of the workers consciousness, which is linked. So therefore the Russian revolution should not have gone ahead. I dunno if all left coms think this but some do, I have been discussing it with them recently on here.

So if it should not have gone ahead, basically I was paraphrasing that into saying the Bolsheviks should have stayed at home.

So, I am not flame baiting I am summarising the position of left coms, or some of them.

So fuck you and fuck your infraction.


I am not flame baiting

Nah, now you're just flaming.;)

[Lanky Wanker]

Come on, fellas... let's be mature here.



z0mg ageism!!!

[Leo]

I think I am the closest to Paul Lafargue...
I agree with Lafargue with almost everything he wrote, but I'm not sure if "Lafargueism" exists as an ideology...
I belive in social equality, good life for everyone, freedom, classless society, Marxist philosophy, ... but I DO NOT SUPPORT left populism ("right to work", public works, collectivism).
Also, I belive in personal freedoms (I don't support banning religion or banning free speach).
Also, I support democracy....
Which type of communist am I?

I'd say check these people out: http://www.luxemburgism.lautre.net/


1. While Bolshevik tactics may have worked for Russia, they would not work for western countries.

While some argued it like this, the point was rather that the tactics such as revolutionary parliamentarianism, working with the social democratic parties and in the reactionary trade-unions and the united front advocated by the Bolsheviks wouldn't work for Western countries.


2. Many original Council Communists believed that the soviets in Russia were tools of the ruling class

This is not true at all. Soviet means council in Russia and many original council communists saw them as what they were: workers' councils.


and Lenin's form of democratic centralism was authoritarian and flawed.

I don't think the council communists made much of a point against democratic centralism, initially they were for a vanguard party, later they ended up rejecting it.

Bordiga, a left communist, criticized democratic centralism on the grounds that democracy can't be a principle for communists, and suggested the term organic centralism instead, while agreeing with the basic freedom of discussion, unity of action principle.


3. The workers should rule society and their worker's state through workers councils, federations, and other direct democratic institutions.

A side point, the formulation of a workers' state was rejected by the council communists.


Other thinkers Council Communists respect and look to include Rosa Luxembourg and Antonio Gramsci.

Council communists never respected Antonio Gramsci, who was nothing but Stalin's man in the Italian party as well as a reformist at heart.


The left coms say the Russian revolution was doomed because it was premature, in that Russia was too backward economically and in terms of the workers consciousness, which is linked. So therefore the Russian revolution should not have gone ahead. I dunno if all left coms think this but some do, I have been discussing it with them recently on here.

No left communists ever put forward such a position, or ever will. One of the things that characterizes the left communist current is the original support given to the Russian revolution. Certain thinkers who evolved into council communism from left communism did come up with such positions, but the left communist current itself regarded such as positions as semi-Menshevik positions at best.

[NewLeft]

I think I am the closest to Paul Lafargue...
I agree with Lafargue with almost everything he wrote, but I'm not sure if "Lafargueism" exists as an ideology...
I belive in social equality, good life for everyone, freedom, classless society, Marxist philosophy, ... but I DO NOT SUPPORT left populism ("right to work", public works, collectivism).
Also, I belive in personal freedoms (I don't support banning religion or banning free speach).
Also, I support democracy....
Which type of communist am I?
Isn't the "right to work" an anti-union law?

[daft punk]

" Socialism was not only impossible because Russia was an "isolated backward country", socialism was impossible because, as well as that, the subjective factor - mass socialist consciousness and the desire for a genuine socialist society (not your state owned economy) - was more or less entirely absent"

http://www.revleft.com/vb/ussri-t169497/index8.html

hence my armchair comment.

Your infraction is worthless.

[Comrade Samuel]

Why ask us? We all have our own biases and hearing our arguments you won't get a clear idea of what each tendency is. I can't say for certan what you fall under because based on this information other than one of your main inspiration being Paul Lafargue you really aren't much different than most everybody else on this site. (and there are many other like you I belive)

Study each for yourself, make an educated descisuon and dont let the mindless spam of insults stop you from examining all the options that appeal to you.

[Grenzer]

" Socialism was not only impossible because Russia was an "isolated backward country", socialism was impossible because, as well as that, the subjective factor - mass socialist consciousness and the desire for a genuine socialist society (not your state owned economy) - was more or less entirely absent"

http://www.revleft.com/vb/ussri-t169497/index8.html

hence my armchair comment.

Your infraction is worthless.

Taking things out of context as usual.

No left communist claims that Socialism was impossible in Russia. On the national level, socialism was impossible; but on the global level the conditions for socialism were good. If the revolution had spread, Russia could have been aided into socialism by the more industrialized socialist polities.

Quoting Robbo is totally irrelevant because he's an anarchist, not a left communist.

[Ostrinski]

The thing about left communism is that its such a relative position. It's not a distinct set of ideas, as it pretty much entails all Marxists who break with the Bolsheviks around the first congress or a little before.

[L.A.P.]

Forget about tendencies. The best thing to do althogether is to reject ideology. Ideology is a distortion of material social relations, and the goal of Marxism is to analyze these social relations in their fullest actuality possible. The best communist is an ideological nihilist.

[Yuppie Grinder]

I think I am the closest to Paul Lafargue...
I agree with Lafargue with almost everything he wrote, but I'm not sure if "Lafargueism" exists as an ideology...
I belive in social equality, good life for everyone, freedom, classless society, Marxist philosophy, ... but I DO NOT SUPPORT left populism ("right to work", public works, collectivism).
Also, I belive in personal freedoms (I don't support banning religion or banning free speach).
Also, I support democracy....
Which type of communist am I?
You're the type of communist who has a lot of reading and thinking to do before subscribing to a specific tendency.

[Leo]

The thing about left communism is that its such a relative position. It's not a distinct set of ideas, as it pretty much entails all Marxists who break with the Bolsheviks around the first congress or a little before.

Actually this isn't true. Left communism mainly refers to the German and the Italian left communist currents. The German communist left didn't fully break with the Communist International until after the Third Congress, and the Italian communist left until, arguably 1930 although they still had members in the party until its dissolution. The British left communists left with the Dutch and German current, and the Russians were organized as a (pretty much illegal) fraction within the Bolshevik Party till the thirties. Other left wing currents in the parties of the early Communist International started getting kicked out of the parties with the third congress and onwards till the end of the twenties and the early thirties. So it isn't a relative position, it is a political tradition.


Forget about tendencies. The best thing to do althogether is to reject ideology. Ideology is a distortion of material social relations, and the goal of Marxism is to analyze these social relations in their fullest actuality possible.

As true as your definition of ideology is, ideology does not necessarily equal a tendency. A tendency might or might not have an ideology.

[norwegianwood90]

Isn't the "right to work" an anti-union law?

Yes it is. "Right-to-work" laws hold that unions somehow restrict employment. Therefore such laws restrict or prohibit unions under the pretense of increasing employment.

[bricolage]

" Socialism was not only impossible because Russia was an "isolated backward country", socialism was impossible because, as well as that, the subjective factor - mass socialist consciousness and the desire for a genuine socialist society (not your state owned economy) - was more or less entirely absent"

http://www.revleft.com/vb/ussri-t169497/index8.html

hence my armchair comment.

Your infraction is worthless.

Quoting Robbo is totally irrelevant because he's an anarchist, not a left communist.

robbo is a neither an anarchist nor a left communist, he's an impossibilist, a political tradition completely separate from the two and one that, I think,
predates left communism.

[ed miliband]

"Equal liability of all to work."

Marx and Engels, Communist Manifesto

"In communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes, society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticise after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, herdsman or critic." - the german ideology

doesn't sound like the campaigns for everyone to have a shit job you guys support.


Isn't the "right to work" an anti-union law?

two completely different things:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_work

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-to-work_law

[bricolage]

the 'Equal liability of all to work' isn't about socialism/communism it's from the ten planks of the communist manifesto that were designed to be introduced within capitalism to cause economic crisis and set the stage for revolution. marx later admitted they were outdated.

[daft punk]

robbo is a neither an anarchist nor a left communist, he's an impossibilist, a political tradition completely separate from the two and one that, I think,
predates left communism.

well wikipedia says impossiblists are left communists so it must be right.

[daft punk]

the 'Equal liability of all to work' isn't about socialism/communism it's from the ten planks of the communist manifesto that were designed to be introduced within capitalism to cause economic crisis and set the stage for revolution. marx later admitted they were outdated.

Communist Manifesto, sooo 2009.

Er, where did M&E say it was to be introduced within capitalism to set the stage for revolution?



"We have seen above, that the first step in the revolution by the working class is to raise the proletariat to the position of ruling class to win the battle of democracy.

The proletariat will use its political supremacy to wrest, by degree, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralise all instruments of production in the hands of the State, i.e., of the proletariat organised as the ruling class; and to increase the total productive forces as rapidly as possible. Of course, in the beginning, this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property, and on the conditions of bourgeois production; by means of measures, therefore, which appear economically insufficient and untenable, but which, in the course of the movement, outstrip themselves, necessitate further inroads upon the old social order, and are unavoidable as a means of entirely revolutionising the mode of production.
These measures will, of course, be different in different countries.
Nevertheless, in most advanced countries, the following will be pretty generally applicable.
1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.
2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.
3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance.
4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.
5. Centralisation of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly.
6. Centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State.
7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State; the bringing into cultivation of waste-lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.
8. Equal liability of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.
9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.
10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labour in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, &c, &c. "

[daft punk]

As true as your definition of ideology is, ideology does not necessarily equal a tendency. A tendency might or might not have an ideology.

Surely Marxism isnt an ideology anyway?

[Grenzer]

robbo is a neither an anarchist nor a left communist, he's an impossibilist, a political tradition completely separate from the two and one that, I think,
predates left communism.

Oh, his political statement said "anarcho-communist" so I just took him at his word. I don't think "impossibilism" is so much a tendency as it is an attitude towards a certain course of action.

[Ocean Seal]

I think I am the closest to Paul Lafargue...
I agree with Lafargue with almost everything he wrote, but I'm not sure if "Lafargueism" exists as an ideology...
I belive in social equality, good life for everyone, freedom, classless society, Marxist philosophy, ... but I DO NOT SUPPORT left populism ("right to work", public works, collectivism).
Also, I belive in personal freedoms (I don't support banning religion or banning free speach).
Also, I support democracy....
Which type of communist am I?

Scumbag ability supports classless society, but not collectivism.
You are either an idealist or a trollist.

[bricolage]

well wikipedia says impossiblists are left communists so it must be right.
even by your logic, no. it's in the left communism portal as a 'related topic' alongside a bunch of other things that aren't left communist.
however beyond that they are different things and like I said impossibilism existed long before left communism.

I don't think "impossibilism" is so much a tendency as it is an attitude towards a certain course of action.
I think it was initially defined by it's opposition to parliamentarism but what's important is that, it has been and is still a clear political tradition exemplified by organisations such as the SPGB, and one that comes from a different place to anarchism and left communism.

[bricolage]

Communist Manifesto, sooo 2009.

However much that state of things may have altered during the last twenty-five years, the general principles laid down in the Manifesto are, on the whole, as correct today as ever. Here and there, some detail might be improved. The practical application of the principles will depend, as the Manifesto itself states, everywhere and at all times, on the historical conditions for the time being existing, and, for that reason, no special stress is laid on the revolutionary measures proposed at the end of Section II. That passage would, in many respects, be very differently worded today. In view of the gigantic strides of Modern Industry since 1848, and of the accompanying improved and extended organization of the working class, in view of the practical experience gained, first in the February Revolution, and then, still more, in the Paris Commune, where the proletariat for the first time held political power for two whole months, this programme has in some details been antiquated.http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/preface.htm


Er, where did M&E say it was to be introduced within capitalism to set the stage for revolution?
I have to say I'm not an exper here but there was a good post from Zanthorus in a previous thread: (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1851406&postcount=16)


Probably the most useful document in this regard is this piece pointed out to me by ZeroNowhere (I should really get around to reading everything on MIA sometime): The Communists and Karl Heinzen by Friedrich Engels (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/09/26.htm)

Relevant quote:
[quote]But Herr Heinzen also promises social reforms. Of course, the indifference of the people towards his appeals has gradually forced him to. And what kind of. reforms are these? They are such as the Communists themselves suggest in preparation for the abolition of private property. The only point Herr Heinzen makes that deserves recognition he has borrowed from the Communists, the Communists whom he attacks so violently, and even that is reduced in his hands to utter nonsense and mere day-dreaming. All measures to restrict competition and the accumulation of capital in the hands of individuals, all restriction or suppression of the law of inheritance, all organisation of labour by the state, etc., all these measures are not only possible as revolutionary measures, but actually necessary. They are possible because the whole insurgent proletariat is behind them and maintains them by force of arms. They are possible, despite all the difficulties and disadvantages which are alleged against them by economists, because these very difficulties and disadvantages will compel the proletariat to go further and further until private property has been completely abolished, in order not to lose again what it has already won. They are possible as preparatory steps, temporary transitional stages towards the abolition of private property, but not in any other way.

The basic point of the demands is that they're purpose built to cause economic instability if implemented within the boundaries of capitalist production relations. In defending it's progressive gains, therefore, the proletariat would be forced to go further and further in it's attack on private property until they finally wound up at communism. The Manifesto's demands are transitional demands intendened to make society pass over through a process of "revolution in permanence" until it finally winds up at communism. The whole point of the demands is that they don't constitute socialism but are demands to be implemented while capitalist production relations still exist.

[Leo]

well wikipedia says impossiblists are left communists so it must be right. No it doesn't, the "impossiblists" aren't mentioned in the article on left communism, nor are the left communists mentioned in the article on left communism. Someone simply added "impossiblism" to the list of related topics to left communism for whatever reason. The said current has traditionally been represented by organizations such as the Socialist Party of Great Britain and the De Leonist Socialist Labor Party of America, both of them organizations traditionally to the left of the Second International which never joined the Third whereas left communism emerged as the left wing of the Communist International. The SPGB and the SLP are both organizations participating in elections besides, the SPGB believes that socialism will come from the ballot box and the SLP believes that industrial unions will organize socialism, again diametrically opposed perspectives to the left communist current which firmly defend the idea of the taking of power and the dictatorship of the workers' councils. You can find rather fiery polemics with both organizations on our (the ICC's) website.


Surely Marxism isnt an ideology anyway? Here's how (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch01a.htm) Marx explains it: (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch01c.htm) "If in all ideology men and their circumstances appear upside-down as in a camera obscura, this phenomenon arises just as much from their historical life-process as the inversion of objects on the retina does from their physical life-process (...) Why the ideologists turn everything upside-down. Clerics, jurists, politicians. Jurists, politicians (statesmen in general), moralists, clerics. For this ideological subdivision within a class: 1) The occupation assumes an independent existence owing to division of labour. Everyone believes his craft to be the true one. Illusions regarding the connection between their craft and reality are the more likely to be cherished by them because of the very nature of the craft. In consciousness — in jurisprudence, politics, etc. — relations become concepts; since they do not go beyond these relations, the concepts of the relations also become fixed concepts in their mind. The judge, for example, applies the code, he therefore regards legislation as the real, active driving force. Respect for their goods, because their craft deals with general matters. Idea of law. Idea of state. The matter is turned upside-down in ordinary consciousness. Religion is from the outset consciousness of the transcendental arising from actually existing forces. This more popularly. Tradition, with regard to law, religion, etc. Individuals always proceeded, and always proceed, from themselves. Their relations are the relations of their real life-process. How does it happen that their relations assume an independent existence over against them? and that the forces of their own life become superior to them? In short: division of labour, the level of which depends on the development of the productive power at any particular time."

Here's how Engels explains it: (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1893/letters/93_07_14.htm) "Ideology is a process accomplished by the so-called thinker consciously, indeed, but with a false consciousness. The real motives impelling him remain unknown to him, otherwise it would not be an ideological process at all. Hence he imagines false or apparent motives. Because it is a process of thought he derives both its form and its content from pure thought, either his own or that of his predecessors. He works with mere thought material which he accepts without examination as the product of thought, he does not investigate further for a more remote process independent of thought; indeed its origin seems obvious to him, because as all action is produced through the medium of thought it also appears to him to be ultimately based upon thought."

So according to how Marx and Engels saw it, no, marxism isn't an ideology. They never called it marxism either, but anyway. What they were among the initiators of was the method of revolutionary historical materialism, which has been called marxism in short.

[Lolumad273]

I'd love to see some unity! How about in the future we simply say, "Don't align with a tendency". Avoid an off topic flame war that way...

But I'd like to point this out... How can you be a Communist but NOT believe everyone has a right to productive employment? That's like... one of the primary goals of Communists.

[daft punk]

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/preface.htm

well, it doesnt say equal liability of all to work. I'm sticking with that one. When the revolution comes, you will be provided with the opportunity of a decent job and you will be expected to do your bit.

How's it gonna work if work is optional? Everyone will stay at home.



I have to say I'm not an exper here but there was a good post from Zanthorus in a previous thread: (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1851406&postcount=16)

"The whole point of the demands is that they don't constitute socialism but are demands to be implemented while capitalist production relations still exist."

Yebbut the Manifesto makes it clear that list is for after the workers have taken power. The workers have power and are dismantling capitalism.

[Leo]

Actually the whole point about the demands in the Communist Manifesto is this (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/preface.htm):

"However much that state of things may have altered during the last twenty-five years, the general principles laid down in the Manifesto are, on the whole, as correct today as ever. Here and there, some detail might be improved. The practical application of the principles will depend, as the Manifesto itself states, everywhere and at all times, on the historical conditions for the time being existing, and, for that reason, no special stress is laid on the revolutionary measures proposed at the end of Section II (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch02.htm). That passage would, in many respects, be very differently worded today. In view of the gigantic strides of Modern Industry since 1848, and of the accompanying improved and extended organization of the working class, in view of the practical experience gained, first in the February Revolution, and then, still more, in the Paris Commune, where the proletariat for the first time held political power for two whole months, this programme has in some details been antiquated. One thing especially was proved by the Commune, viz., that 'the working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes.'" (Preface to the 1872 German Edition, Marx & Engels)

[daft punk]

No it doesn't, the "impossiblists" aren't mentioned in the article on left communism, nor are the left communists mentioned in the article on left communism. Someone simply added "impossiblism" to the list of related topics to left communism for whatever reason. The said current has traditionally been represented by organizations such as the Socialist Party of Great Britain and the De Leonist Socialist Labor Party of America, both of them organizations traditionally to the left of the Second International which never joined the Third whereas left communism emerged as the left wing of the Communist International. The SPGB and the SLP are both organizations participating in elections besides, the SPGB believes that socialism will come from the ballot box and the SLP believes that industrial unions will organize socialism, again diametrically opposed perspectives to the left communist current which firmly defend the idea of the taking of power and the dictatorship of the workers' councils. You can find rather fiery polemics with both organizations on our (the ICC's) website.


I wonder if Robbo considers himself a left com? Anyway, is it just the impossiblists who consider the Russian revolution premature or did some of the (other?) left coms? Where do impossiblists fit around left coms and anarchists, in between? Or is that too simplistic? I always thought of the SPGB as being borderline anarchist but I dont know loads about them.

Oh look, my 'flame baiting' provoked some interesting debate and exchange of knowledge. Well fuck me sideways with a barge pole.

Btw, wiki lists De Leon as a Left Com and describes him as an impossiblist, influencing the SPGB, so there is a bit in there actually.

Wiki says the Russian left coms argued against Brest Litovsk, and in favour of quicker nationalisation. It doesnt say anything about them before 1918.

[Luís Henrique]

robbo is a neither an anarchist nor a left communist, he's an impossibilist, a political tradition completely separate from the two and one that, I think, predates left communism.

He seems to be quite idiosyncratic in his positions; I don't think he can be nailed down to any relevant current in the working class movement.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

Btw, wiki lists De Leon as a Left Com and describes him as an impossiblist, influencing the SPGB, so there is a bit in there actually.

First General and Immutable Rule of Epystemology:


If Wikipedia says so, then it quite certainly isn't.

Epystemological libertarianism amounts to a bad satire of Mandeville.


Private vices, public virtues


Private ignorance, public wisdom

Luís Henrique

[bricolage]

well, it doesnt say equal liability of all to work. I'm sticking with that one.
read the preface that me and leo both posted, it directly refers to the ten planks.

[daft punk]

read the preface that me and leo both posted, it directly refers to the ten planks.
yeah but it just says some of it needs updating.

[human strike]

Welcome to Revleft, the ideological supermarket.

http://i40.tinypic.com/21dkd9l.png

[bricolage]

yeah but it just says some of it needs updating.
yes it says,

"That passage would, in many respects, be very differently worded today. In view of the gigantic strides of Modern Industry since 1848, and of the accompanying improved and extended organization of the working class, in view of the practical experience gained, first in the February Revolution, and then, still more, in the Paris Commune, where the proletariat for the first time held political power for two whole months, this programme has in some details been antiquated."

which means if marx thought it was 'antiquated' and would 'be very differently worded today' in 1872 it seems a bit ridiculous to take it as law in 2012.

[Anderson]

You say you believe in classless society. But to reach that stage do you accept subordination to the working class in the current class divided social reality?:)

[daft punk]

yes it says,

"That passage would, in many respects, be very differently worded today. In view of the gigantic strides of Modern Industry since 1848, and of the accompanying improved and extended organization of the working class, in view of the practical experience gained, first in the February Revolution, and then, still more, in the Paris Commune, where the proletariat for the first time held political power for two whole months, this programme has in some details been antiquated."

which means if marx thought it was 'antiquated' and would 'be very differently worded today' in 1872 it seems a bit ridiculous to take it as law in 2012.

so you think people can opt not to work but still get paid?

[Manic Impressive]

Both traditions of Left communists come from different parts of Leninism, impossiblism pre-dates that. Here's our critique of Pannekoek vs Bordiga (http://theoryandpractice.org.uk/library/more-lenin-or-less-lenin-socialist-standard-2004)

[el_chavista]

Trivia: in Spanish you say "cafeteria commie" instead of "couch commie" :lol:

[bricolage]

so you think people can opt not to work but still get paid?
that's such a loaded question, but ok...

I think if people are doing 'work' and getting 'paid' then that aint socialism/communism, considering the whole thing is about the abolition of work and the wage labour relationship.

I think that limiting ourselves to 'right to work' arguments is a mistake and misses the point that we do these jobs because we have to in order to survive not because we want to, and keeping them but under different management does nothing to affect the alienation they create. Here's someone putting it a lot better than me:

Let me give you instead two other categories, units of time. A long time ago Robert Blauner wrote a book on alienation in which he dealt with several industries, chapter by chapter. In the chapter on the automobile industry he noted, this was in the early sixties that the average job in the industry took a little less than 60 seconds to do. By the time that the Lordstown plant was built, the average job on the assembly line at Lordstown took about 36 seconds to do. While obviously, jobs vary even within a particular factory, depending upon whether you work on a machine or on an assembly line, the basic drive is for greater productivity. The point is to reduce the time it takes to do any job.

Consider these two units of time: 36 seconds, the rest of your life. The job that takes 36 seconds to do that you're going to do for the rest of your life. I don't know a better definition of alienation than that. The job can be quiet, which they rarely are; it can be clean, which they are usually not; it can be light and easy, but 36 seconds to do a job for the rest of your life"” nobody will ever convince me that higher wages, fringe benefits, a vacation cottage, a motor boat, a second car, and sending your kids to college will reduce the oppression of that reality. It is that alienation, which Time saw years ago, which is at the root of working class resistance and working class struggle. It is the kind of thing which is virtually impossible to measure. There are certain things you can't count. You can't operate on the principle that if you can't count it, it ain't true; or, if you can't count it, it doesn't exist.

Obviously job cuts now are ways to rebalance capital and launch assaults on working class living standard, however the contradiction is always the same, what serves that purpose now (much like automation) would serve a completely different one under communism.

I think that seeing as the vast majority of jobs are revolved around functions of the capitalist economy that communism would abolish the vast majority would disappear. In addition those sectors that remain (ie, healthcare, education etc) would be structured in a completely different way to how they are now, I don't know exactly how this would look but I know it wouldn't be fordism but with better lunch breaks.

Regarding 'equal liability of all to work' I think that using a text by Marx that Marx later turned his back on is a poor way to frame an argument, especially in the little that Marx wrote about communism it looked completely different. I'll broadly agree with this quote that was posted earlier:


"In communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes, society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticise after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, herdsman or critic."

[Leo]

I wonder if Robbo considers himself a left com?

I don't think it is particularly relevant.


Anyway, is it just the impossiblists who consider the Russian revolution premature or did some of the (other?) left coms?

Again, the impossiblists aren't left coms. As I think I said, a certain current within the Dutch/German left communists who evolved into council communism did end up with such a position. Left communists consider the councilist position on the Russian revolution to be a semi-Menshevik one at best.


Where do impossiblists fit around left coms and anarchists, in between? Or is that too simplistic? I always thought of the SPGB as being borderline anarchist but I dont know loads about them.

Too simplistic. Their position on the Russian revolution isn't the one thing which determines where these parties stand in the political spectrum.


Btw, wiki lists De Leon as a Left Com and describes him as an impossiblist

The list of people in wiki is not fully reliable. Also included in the same list is E.T. Kingsley for whatever reason, who was a parliamentary politician.


Wiki says the Russian left coms argued against Brest Litovsk, and in favour of quicker nationalisation. It doesnt say anything about them before 1918.

That's because they didn't exist as a distinct current before 1918. As I said, left communism emerged as the left wing of the Communist International and its parties.


yeah but it just says some of it needs updating.

No, it says the demands are outdated on the basis that the working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes. So the point isn't about replacing or updating the demands.


If Wikipedia says so, then it quite certainly isn't.

Actually, wikipedia is almost as accurate as Encyclopedia Britannica according to Encyclopedia Britannica itself. Not everything there is correct, of course, but I really don't see the point in this attitude.


Both traditions of Left communists come from different parts of Leninism

This is not really possible, since the left communist tradition predates "Leninism" which didn't exist until after Lenin's death.

[daft punk]

Well, be that as it may, you will work or we will shoot you. :)

[bricolage]

Well, be that as it may, you will work or we will shoot you. :)
or you could give an actual reply?

[Brosa Luxemburg]

I'd say check these people out: http://www.luxemburgism.lautre.net/



While some argued it like this, the point was rather that the tactics such as revolutionary parliamentarianism, working with the social democratic parties and in the reactionary trade-unions and the united front advocated by the Bolsheviks wouldn't work for Western countries.



This is not true at all. Soviet means council in Russia and many original council communists saw them as what they were: workers' councils.



I don't think the council communists made much of a point against democratic centralism, initially they were for a vanguard party, later they ended up rejecting it.

Bordiga, a left communist, criticized democratic centralism on the grounds that democracy can't be a principle for communists, and suggested the term organic centralism instead, while agreeing with the basic freedom of discussion, unity of action principle.



A side point, the formulation of a workers' state was rejected by the council communists.



Council communists never respected Antonio Gramsci, who was nothing but Stalin's man in the Italian party as well as a reformist at heart.



No left communists ever put forward such a position, or ever will. One of the things that characterizes the left communist current is the original support given to the Russian revolution. Certain thinkers who evolved into council communism from left communism did come up with such positions, but the left communist current itself regarded such as positions as semi-Menshevik positions at best.

1. Yes, Soviet does mean council in Russian. The council communists felt that the soviets were instruments of workers control for a time in Russia but then felt with the rise of more authoritarian tendencies that the soviets had become tools of the Bolsheviks rather than genuine institutions of worker's control. When council communist Otto Ruhle toured the SU in 1920 he noted that the soviets were mere tools of the ruling Bolshevik party and were "not councils in a revolutionary sense" (from Non-Leninist Marxism: Writings on the Worker's Councils (http://www.amazon.com/Non-Leninist-Marxism-Writings-Workers-Councils/dp/0979181364/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1334082394&sr=8-1))

2. Bordiga does not represent a view shared by all left-communists, especially council communists. Council Communists rejected both democratic centralism and the concept of a vanguard party. It is true, not all council communists were against democratic centralism but most were. The council communists that were not against it generally didn't support the Bolshevik version of democratic centralism. Luxembourg, despite what many may think, supported democratic centralism, just not the Bolshevik version of it.

3. The formation of a "worker's state" was not rejected by the council communists. (I assume you meant worker's state as the DOTP. If not, then please explain what you meant by worker's state). Sylvia Pankhurst, a council communist, had a whole section in her writing Communism and It's Tactics (http://www.marxists.org/archive/pankhurst-sylvia/communism-tactics/index.htm)about the DOTP and state "The dictatorship, so far as it is genuine and defensible, is the suppression by Workers’ Soviets of capitalism and the attempt to re-establish it. This should be a temporary state of war. Such a period will inevitably occur, we believe, because we do not believe that the possessors of wealth will submit to the overthrow of capitalism without resistance. On the contrary, [we] believe the owners will fight to preserve capitalism by every means in their power." (http://www.marxists.org/archive/pankhurst-sylvia/communism-tactics/ch03.htm)

4. As for the thing on Antonio Gramsci, in 1919-1920 Gramsci encouraged workers in industrial plants to set up workers councils capable of taking over the factories to be democratically run by the workers themselves and council communists have given him credit for this. As far as being "Stalin's man" I cannot comment on this because I do not know the information about this point to make an informed comment.

The last thing you wrote was to a different user and I don't know what it was about so I will not comment.

Sorry it took me forever to answer your claims, I just noticed this thread was active a few moments ago :D

[Bostana]

Well, be that as it may, you will work or we will shoot you. :)

Sounds like Trotskyism

[Brosa Luxemburg]

Sounds like Trotskyism

Sounds like Maoism

[Bostana]

Sounds like Maoism

Sounds Like Roosterism

[Brosa Luxemburg]

Sounds Like Roosterism

Well, you got me there.:cool:

[Bostana]

Well, you got me there.:cool:

But in the end,

We are all comrades in arms
:hammersickle::hammersickle::hammersickle:

[No_Leaders]

But in the end,

We are all comrades in arms
:hammersickle::hammersickle::hammersickle:

Hey waitt!! can us anarchists get involved in this magic moment too? :lol:
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-r9w_gKbyLdc/TyKHEvSXGbI/AAAAAAAALBk/y4aJ86vmMNs/s640/grouphugeveryone.jpg

[Brosa Luxemburg]

Yes, you may as well.

[daft punk]

or you could give an actual reply?
fishing in the morning is communism not the dotp. I'm talking about the 50 years in the transition period and the early stages of socialism. I think it would be equal liability of all to work.

[bricolage]

fishing in the morning is communism not the dotp. I'm talking about the 50 years in the transition period and the early stages of socialism. I think it would be equal liability of all to work.
socialism and communism are the same thing.
50 years (which is a really arbitrary number, why does political change run on a decimal system?) of transition sounds horrific, I'd like to think we could do better than that.

[daft punk]

socialism and communism are the same thing.

I know. Well, they are and they arent. But they are more then they arent.




50 years (which is a really arbitrary number, why does political change run on a decimal system?) of transition sounds horrific, I'd like to think we could do better than that.
50 years and not a day less. Any dissent and you will get a bullet to the head! Sorry, I was getting carried away. Er, yeah could be less, when you get to my age 50 years doesn't seem so long though.

I think we could make fast progress, but it would take time to get to fishing in the morning, as this presupposes huge slack in the economy and a big change in culture.