Reverse Reformism

[Peoples' War]

I was thinking about the USSR recently, and about reformists.

As a Marxist-Leninist, I acknowledge that reforms cannot make socialism, only a revolution led by a vanguard of the proletariat.

However, we see the USSR transform from a socialist society to a capitalist one, without a revolution (or counter-revolution -- although comrades argue it was...but how so?). Something you could call Counter-reformism, perhaps.

How can a socialist state, one as advanced and well off as the USSR, which had made so many gains and advances for the Soviet proletariat and world wide communism, fall back into capitalism this way?

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Your M-L comrades would call it Revisionism where the leaders of the Russian CP were actually capitalists wearing socialists skin. But I would say it was simply counter revolution aided by foreign bourgeois agents.

[wunks]

Your M-L comrades would call it Revisionism where the leaders of the Russian CP were actually capitalists wearing socialists skin. But I would say it was simply counter revolution aided by foreign bourgeois agents.what foreign bourgeois agents? you really can't attribute the fall of the USSR to "foreign agents", because that's not how it happened.

[Peoples' War]

Your M-L comrades would call it Revisionism where the leaders of the Russian CP were actually capitalists wearing socialists skin. But I would say it was simply counter revolution aided by foreign bourgeois agents.
Yes, they were revisionist, but my point is that they didn't "revise" capitalism back into the USSR, but the reformed it.

Where was the "counter-revolution". Were there bourgeois fighters in the streets? Bourgeois strikes?

It's very confusing.

[Imposter Marxist]

Well there -was- a counter-revolution. A full out attack on the working class by a section of the party, headed by Gorby, and others.

There are plenty of things that led to this counter-revolution, such as the liquidation of soviet and workers power, the defeat of the communists attempting to overthrow the 'capitalist roaders' (lol), and various things. I'll message you with some readings on it and some more details.

uhh, i mean, it was always STATE CAPITALISM and fascism and the people were freed in 1991.

[Tim Cornelis]

However, we see the USSR transform from a socialist society to a capitalist one, without a revolution (or counter-revolution -- although comrades argue it was...but how so?).

Quite a significant part of history (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutions_of_1989) I'd say.

[The Douche]

Because the USSR never fundamentally broke with capitalism. The USSR was not socialist, so no restoration of capitalism occurred.

[Rafiq]

what foreign bourgeois agents? you really can't attribute the fall of the USSR to "foreign agents", because that's not how it happened.

Your counterrevolution had already fully commensed as early as the twenties. It's what happens when revolution doesn't spread

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[Rafiq]

"uhh, i mean, it was always STATE CAPITALISM and fascism and the people were freed in 1991."

/facepalm

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[wunks]

Your counterrevolution had already fully commensed as early as the twenties. It's what happens when revolution doesn't spread

Sent from my SPH-D710 using Tapatalk 2I thought that what TheGodlessUtopian meant was that foreign agents caused its collapse in 1991 despite being a healthy socialist state previously. I was going by the assumption that that was what he meant when I responded to his post. because the fall of the USSR as a state in 1991 was not because of foreign agents.

[Peoples' War]

Because the USSR never fundamentally broke with capitalism. The USSR was not socialist, so no restoration of capitalism occurred.
It was socialist, regardless of whatever ultra-left position you maintain.

[Peoples' War]

Glastnost and perestroika were reforms, not counter-revolution.

[The Douche]

It was socialist, regardless of whatever ultra-left position you maintain.

Define socialism?

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

It always had classes. It always had a state. It always had money.

Where was the Socialism?

Perhaps, for a short period in the 1930s it moved towards destroying classes (though sub-classes - the bureaucrats, the artists/writers/engineers/scientists, always maintained their hegemony at the top!), but it never even slightly moved towards destroying the state or money.

The USSR lasted 74 years. For at least 50 of those years, it was unashamedly State Capitalist. For 35+ of those years, it was unashamedly Imperial. Of these two FACTS, there is no question.

Again, what Socialism?

[jookyle]

Reform in to capitalism sounds pretty counter-revolutionary to me