Were Lenin and Trotsky wrong about capitalism?

[Blanquist]

They said there was no capitalist way out of poverty for poor, colonial and semi-colonial, countries.

But today many of those old colonial and semi-colonial countries are now first-world, or 'rich' countries or territories, yet they're very much capitalist.

Look at Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, Kuwait, Qatar, etc

There seems be more growth projected with Vietnam and others expected to be a top-10 economy in 40 years.

When will capitalism truly exhaust it's ability to survive?

[StalinFanboy]

Nah. I dont think they were wrong.


They were actually pretty good at it. They did in 50 years what it took the rest of the world like almost 100.

[Grenzer]

You seem to be assuming that the bourgeoisie will just self-liquidate. Capitalism will eventually fade away, but unless the workers actively organize themselves into the class for itself, it may not necessarily be socialism that replaces it.

[Revolution starts with U]

Did they say that? Where? (Not denying they did, that just seems a little off context)

[Ostrinski]

Capitalism is a very elastic system and the bourgeoisie is quite flexible. I do think many of the turn of the century Marxists underestimated that characteristic.

[Bostana]

I am sure Lenin was referring to major imperialist capitalist countries such as the USA, the UK, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, etc., etc.

[Ostrinski]

I am sure Lenin was referring to major imperialist capitalist countries such as the USA, the UK, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, etc., etc.The OP refers to poor countries, though.
They said there was no capitalist way out of poverty for poor, colonial and semi-colonial, countries.

[Revolution starts with U]

I think first, again, we need to establish that they actually said this, and that it is in proper context.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

They said there was no capitalist way out of poverty for poor, colonial and semi-colonial, countries.

But today many of those old colonial and semi-colonial countries are now first-world, or 'rich' countries or territories, yet they're very much capitalist.

Look at Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, Kuwait, Qatar, etc

There seems be more growth projected with Vietnam and others expected to be a top-10 economy in 40 years.

When will capitalism truly exhaust it's ability to survive?
Capitalism has been more resilient than Lenin and Trotsky imagined. However, it's survival has been thoroughly assisted by the misleadership of the proletariat by reformists and Stalinists. But Trotsky's point about the Permanent Revoluiton is not that poor countries cannot become relatively wealthy -- it is that they will not be able to carry out the tasks of the bourgeois revolution -- they will never be like Western European bourgeois democracies -- they will be dominated by foreign capital.

I think, essentially, they were right about this. I mean, South Korea has existed as a client of the US, which still has some 40K troops there. And it is not exactly a bourgeois "democracy"

[Grenzer]

There's kind of a problem with this though. The West no more "dominates' China than China dominates them. Their economies are so interlinked that that disaster would befall all of them in the event of some disruption; so I'd disagree that they will "never be like Western European bourgeois democracies" given that the development of Capital gives them more leeway to do what the fuck they want.

How is South Korea not a bourgeois democracy? It's changed dramatically since the early 1980's.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

There's kind of a problem with this though. The West no more "dominates' China than China dominates them. Their economies are so interlinked that that disaster would befall all of them in the event of some disruption; so I'd disagree that they will "never be like Western European bourgeois democracies" given that the development of Capital gives them more leeway to do what the fuck they want.

How is South Korea not a bourgeois democracy? It's changed dramatically since the early 1980's.
Well, my view is that China is not Capitalist -- it is a deformed workers state. There is a grave danger that the continued pro-capitalist, nationalist poliices of the bureaucracy will lead to capitalist restoration.

As for south Korea, it still has 40K US troops on its soil and really is a client of the US in the far east.

[Blanquist]

Well, my view is that China is not Capitalist -- it is a deformed workers state. There is a grave danger that the continued pro-capitalist, nationalist poliices of the bureaucracy will lead to capitalist restoration.

As for south Korea, it still has 40K US troops on its soil and really is a client of the US in the far east.

Which tendency do you support?

[Brosip Tito]

Which tendency do you support?
He's a Trotskyist, and a rather sad one at that to still hold on to the notion that China is a "deformed workers' state".

Whether you agree that China ever was a DWS, or not, it certainly isn't anymore.

[Blanquist]

He's a Trotskyist, and a rather sad one at that to still hold on to the notion that China is a "deformed workers' state".

Whether you agree that China ever was a DWS, or not, it certainly isn't anymore.

I meant which Trotskyist tendency he supported.

[Ocean Seal]

They said there was no capitalist way out of poverty for poor, colonial and semi-colonial, countries.

But today many of those old colonial and semi-colonial countries are now first-world, or 'rich' countries or territories, yet they're very much capitalist.

Look at Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, Kuwait, Qatar, etc

There seems be more growth projected with Vietnam and others expected to be a top-10 economy in 40 years.

When will capitalism truly exhaust it's ability to survive?
There was no way out of poverty for the people so long as they remained colonial countries.

Singapore, Hong Kong were trade protectorates with strong social democratic policies which made them boom under capitalism. They weren't imperialized, but rather prettied up by the imperialists same goes for Korea.

Kuwait and Qatar have massive natural resources and very limiting immigration policies and large parts of their workforce come from other exploited countries. And I would argue that they aren't "rich" so to speak because although the mean income is high, one would have to see the median income to see how well they are doing.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

Basically, I support the ICL/Spartacists. I don't really think that there is sufficient differences politically between the IG, IBT, ICL and Revolutionary Regroupment to justify separate organizations. Of course, the membership of these groups would object strenuously to this characterization. I have been introduced by comrades on this forum to the CWI -- I have begun to read their stuff with some interest. Thanks for asking.

How about you.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

He's a Trotskyist, and a rather sad one at that to still hold on to the notion that China is a "deformed workers' state".

Whether you agree that China ever was a DWS, or not, it certainly isn't anymore.

Thanks for your empathy comrade. This is a discussion for another thread. I base my views on the material conditions and the property relations as they exist in China -- not idealistic impressions. Blanqui -- if you want to discuss further send me a message.

[Brosip Tito]

Thanks for your empathy comrade. This is a discussion for another thread. I base my views on the material conditions and the property relations as they exist in China -- not idealistic impressions. Blanqui -- if you want to discuss further send me a message.
I'm in.

[Misanthrope]

"first world" is not a measure of capitalism's success. Worker's are still exploited and the wealth gap tends to be higher in these so called "first world" nations. Those nations have a capitalist class and their(the capitalists') success does not equate to the system's success.

[bolshie]

They said there was no capitalist way out of poverty for poor, colonial and semi-colonial, countries.

But today many of those old colonial and semi-colonial countries are now first-world, or 'rich' countries or territories, yet they're very much capitalist.

Look at Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, Kuwait, Qatar, etc

There seems be more growth projected with Vietnam and others expected to be a top-10 economy in 40 years.

When will capitalism truly exhaust it's ability to survive?

This is a good question. I think there are a few reasons. Some of those countries actually had quite centralised economies for a long time. Also, some got a lot of aid from the USA etc.

[A Marxist Historian]

They said there was no capitalist way out of poverty for poor, colonial and semi-colonial, countries.

But today many of those old colonial and semi-colonial countries are now first-world, or 'rich' countries or territories, yet they're very much capitalist.

Look at Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, Kuwait, Qatar, etc

There seems be more growth projected with Vietnam and others expected to be a top-10 economy in 40 years.

When will capitalism truly exhaust it's ability to survive?

Most of these are enclaves, not countries, so that's not too meaningful.

Korea? The US was pouring huge quantities of foreign aid into Korea for decades, and also, until fairly recently, letting the South Koreans export to the USA without tariff barriers. Same for Taiwan by the way.

Why? Because of the Chinese Revolution, taking a third of the population of the planet outside the grip of capitalism. Otherwise, never would have happened, and both Korea and Taiwan would be dirt poor. Hong Kong and to some degree Singapore too, as they got rich as the only economic interfaces between China and the rest of the world for decades.

Also, because in both South Korea and Taiwan the old landlords had been tied to Japanese not US imperialism, so the CIA could oversee fairly radical land reforms without hurting US imperial economic interests.

In fact, in South Korea the bulk of the land reforms, which are the basis for South Korea's economic success, were actually carried out by Kim Il Sung during the brief North Korean occupation of most of South Korea.

If anything, this is all evidence for Trotsky's theory of permanent revolution, according to which social progress in colonial countries in the imperialist era is only really possible when the proletariat comes to power. In these particular cases, it was proletarian rule (in a deformed Stalinist fashion) in China and North Korea that made this social and economic progress possible.

Meanwhile in the rest of the Third World things keep getting worse, with peasants more and more thrown off their lands, extreme urban squalor and now even cholera coming back.

In the so called Indian "success story," half of all Indian children continue to suffer malnutrition and hunger. Feh.

There have been a few economic gains in just the last few years in Third World countries, but they only reflect the extreme economic collapse in the last few years in Europe and Japan and America. You hafta produce stuff somewhere. If the economies in the imperial centers actually do come back a bit, then Brazil and India and so forth will be right back into social crisis. In fact, that's starting to happen already.

-M.H.-

[A Marxist Historian]

They said there was no capitalist way out of poverty for poor, colonial and semi-colonial, countries.

But today many of those old colonial and semi-colonial countries are now first-world, or 'rich' countries or territories, yet they're very much capitalist.

Look at Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, Kuwait, Qatar, etc

There seems be more growth projected with Vietnam and others expected to be a top-10 economy in 40 years.

When will capitalism truly exhaust it's ability to survive?

And as for Vietnam, it's climbing economically for the same reason China is.

Because it's not really a capitalist country, at least the banks are state owned, and has been at least partially immune to the world capitalist economic decline triggered by the world capitalist bank collapse.

-M.H.-

[campesino]

They said there was no capitalist way out of poverty for poor, colonial and semi-colonial, countries.

But today many of those old colonial and semi-colonial countries are now first-world, or 'rich' countries or territories, yet they're very much capitalist.

Look at Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, Kuwait, Qatar, etc

There seems be more growth projected with Vietnam and others expected to be a top-10 economy in 40 years.

When will capitalism truly exhaust it's ability to survive?
Kuwait and Qatar were constructed on the backs of Bengali and Pakistani workers.
about Singapore google "poverty in singapore" and click the first link which should have "yourspd" in the URL it stands for Singapore Democratic party

The ruling classes of the country are still rich, and the working class of those countries are still poor, capitalism has not changed anything for any body. I heard a right-wing man on c-span talk about the Indian "success story" about how India in the 70's and 80's received food aid and now exports grain, though %22 percent of Indians are malnourished according to the UN 2009 report

[Koba Junior]

They said there was no capitalist way out of poverty for poor, colonial and semi-colonial, countries.

But today many of those old colonial and semi-colonial countries are now first-world, or 'rich' countries or territories, yet they're very much capitalist.

Look at Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, Kuwait, Qatar, etc

There seems be more growth projected with Vietnam and others expected to be a top-10 economy in 40 years.

When will capitalism truly exhaust it's ability to survive?

Those places are all doing okay, depending on how you look at things, but I really don't think any of them are considered "first world" or "rich" by any stretch.