Proposal: A Democratic, Three-Stage Path From Here to Socialism

[Monkey Riding Dragon]

I've been thinking of a sort of three-stage theory concerning a transition into a socialist economy of late.

My main case and point examples would be America (and France and Canada) for stage one, Greece for stage two, and Venezuela for stage three.

In the first stage of such a process, the central task of the left is to isolate and defeat the main right wing party. France we can see is in the latter part of this stage. We (Americans) are in the middle. Canada is at the beginning (worst point).

In the second stage (e.g. Greece), the regular party system has started giving way because the main parties are seen as exhausted. The direct election of a real socialist party is possible in this stage. Notice that the surge in support for the Radical Left Coalition in Greece of late has mainly come from youth defections from the centrist so-called Socialist Party, on the grounds that the party is not standing by left wing principles anymore. In other words, said social-democratic/unionist party had to win election and, as a result, become seen as an exhausted option first.

In the third stage (e.g. Venezuela) a socialist party has won election and is reorganizing the economy along socialist lines by means of attaining popular consensus for such changes systematically.

I think that's the way to go about such a transition here in the post-Cold-War era. I wondered what your thoughts might be, now that I've sort of consolidated and clarified my thinking on this matter?

SIDE NOTES: You will notice that the examples I focused on from stage one of this process are First World countries, while the examples I used of stages two and three are much poorer countries. That concentrates an important reality that major economic deterioration is required to get from here to a socialist future. Right now it continues to be the case that 44% of the U.S. population still resides in middle class neighborhoods and 48% considers itself middle class proper. That's a major drop-off from the 65% living in middle class neighborhoods back in 1970, but the fact is that middle class (proper) and wealthy Americans combined still compose most of the U.S. population. So long as that remains the case, socialism remains unattainable here in this country. The proletariat must compose at least roughly a majority of the population for a socialist transformation to be in the realm of possibility. And it most certainly will. I don't really subscribe to the standard Leninist argument that most wealth in the First World stems from the exploitation of Third World working people. If that were true, then Americans today would be much wealthier than they were at the end of the Cold War, given that it has been precisely since the Cold War's end that capitalist globalization has taken off in earnest. Instead, the median income has gone down, the poverty rate has gone up, and so too have debt levels increased. (To be clear, SOME American wealth IS rooted in the exploitation of other countries, but not most.) Nevertheless, re-proletarianization remains ultimately inevitable for two basic reasons: one objective and one subject. The objective reason is ecology. The subjective reason is debt, i.e. the fact that we're losing the game of imperial conquest in this era of capitalist globalization. This system has no answer to either of those problems and both imply that Americans overall WILL have to accept qualitatively lower living standards eventually.

By "the proletariat", I mean the poor. Here I realize I'm breaking with the conventional Marxist definition of the proletariat. I'm also breaking with the conventional Marxist definition of class. I define class by wealth and by access to it rather than by one's relationship to the production and distribution of goods and services (the latter being the conventional Marxist definition). In other words, the most accurate way of defining the class breakdown of society is "the poor, the middle class (and its two varieties of mobility: the upwardly mobile and the downwardly mobile, as well as its three categorizations: upper income, middle class proper, and lower income), and the rich". This understanding is much less muddled and subjective than defining it in terms of say "the workers versus the capitalists". In today's America, "worker" is indeed a class status, but only as much as "black" and "Latino" and "woman" are. These are all expressions of class in that they all tend to adversely affect your social mobility; your access to wealth. But there are certainly a number of people within all of those demographic groups who are wealthy. That includes among workers. There are professional athletes and Hollywood actors and so forth. And there are low-income capitalists and, in many Third World countries, even starving capitalists (small-time street vendors and so forth). The world is complex. Access to capital is the best definition of class IMO because it consistently works in terms of defining one's social status. Why is that important? Because it helps you distinguish your base from your allies. Communists should have the poor as their base rather than unreliable middle class people (e.g. ye standard middle class union workers). The poor are almost always leftists. They are reliable.

On still another note, I think the matter of how we define equality in terms of property ownership important. Communists are not Adam Smiths or Thomas Jeffersons. We are not proposing a vision of equality wherein everyone becomes a small-time business owner. Communism specifically means common ownership of property, not more or less equal individual ownership. Communism is collectivism, not individualism.

So anyhow, I wanted to get opinions on the three-stage theory described above. What's your take on this? Does that sound about right to you?

[Positivist]

Aside from some analytical errors, the biggest problem in your proposal is your assessment of the struggles for socialism in terms of electoral politics. In many of the countires you've listed, especially the US, if socialist reorganization was attempted it would likely be deemed unconstitutional. This renders electoral activity in countries where this is the case irrelevant. More important is the strength of the mass socialist movement to use its own strength to engineer the social revolution. Furthermore, the main right wing parties are in no position to be defeated in any of these countries. While France has elected a socialist, he appears so far to be more of a social democrat, and the US doesn't even have a prominent left wing. The democratic party can hardly even be called centrist as it remains uncompromisingly to be a proponent of capitalism. As for Greece, I am not familiar enough with the state to determine to what extent socialist reorganization could be accomplished through controlling it. Though if it were to go the ally of Venezuela, it would not exactly bring it to socialism. It seems unclear if Venezuela is ever going to completely socialize its economy, or if the government even still has the will to achieve this.

[Anarcho-Brocialist]

Reform (use of politicians to bring about a Socialist economy) doesn't bestow upon the populace Socialism, at least for the United States. For many reasons -- socially, Socialism/Communism has been used of out context so much not many Americans truly knows what it means. Furthermore common ownership of land goes against the 'values' of the typical American 'dream'. Private property is one of the most loved 'gifts' of Capitalism. Even though we do not seek to abolish land of the artisan or the peasant, [paraphrasing from The Communist Manifesto]. Politically we do not have the abundance of wealth to throw millions of dollars into one representative seat for even a semi-urban congressional district; let alone the resources to fund a presidential election.

Not to discredit your work, but insurrection, class-consciousness etc., are the only hope. Political campaigns have been monopolized. To even have the slightest chance you need big dollars on your side. What financial institution would fund a campaign who seeks to abolish their wealth? Even with some funding, how many Americans intend to vote Socialist? With the effort of mass propaganda, a majority of the vote, and class consciousness it would only be rational to just overthrow the former, not slowly phase it out via democratically, because in two - four years you have another election for the senate, congress, and presidency. If we fail, the house and senate of Capitalists will veto any bill the Socialist will put forth, if not already the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court, unlike political office hopefuls, stay until they retire, and their interests are vested with the Capitalist. Overthrowing Capital and their bourgeois government can only bring Socialism.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Wealth is an horrendously inaccurate indicator of class, and if you want to ascribe a word to it, don't use 'proletariat', for that has a very specific meaning within the realm of political philosophy and economic history. It has a strong academic (and real life!) connotation: the working class.

I mean, how would you describe some rich banker who has not a penny to his/her name, because he/she is paid through a company, and draws a tax-free allowance of like, 10 grand per year, and rents a property and has a company car...technically they would have no wealth, so are they the proletariat?

Also, first world is an horrendously outdated term, too. It implies that there are a second and third world, and implies isolation along 'world' lines. Rather, we need to focus on the world being divided by 'class' lines. I have more in common with a poor man in Bolivia, than I do with a rich man in New York. That is the real existence of class solidarity.

I'm not sure there is much to gain from this analysis, nor from its electoral-remedial solutions. I don't have enough time to recount how many times the 'Socialism will come via further leftwards electoral shifts' argument has proven not only false but very dangerous to the working class.

[Monkey Riding Dragon]

The Boss wrote:
Wealth is an horrendously inaccurate indicator of class, and if you want to ascribe a word to it, don't use 'proletariat', for that has a very specific meaning within the realm of political philosophy and economic history. It has a strong academic (and real life!) connotation: the working class.

The root term for "proletarian" goes back to ancient Rome, where the root word means property-less. In modern terms, that would probably translate into what they call a "net worth"of zero.

Now as to how one determines who is poor, who is middle class, and who is rich, just simply asking people is a pretty good way of doing that, IMO. And you'll find that the way they answer concerning their own status is remarkably similar to what U.S. government statistics suggest is the case. For example, a recent survey found that 14% of the U.S. population describes itself as "poor". That roughly mirrors the U.S. government's estimate that 16% of the U.S. population falls below the poverty line (meaning that they're unable to survive independently of government assistance and/or charity and/or the informal economy, etc.). When you consider "the working class" to be intrinsically and exclusively proletarian, by contrast, that type of simplistic "analysis" runs up against real problems. For instance, while both the U.S. government and the general U.S. population estimates the American poverty rate somewhere in the neighborhood of 15%, the U.S. government records that more than 60% of the population belongs to the waged workforce. This means that a large majority of American workers are NOT purely proletarian, but propertied, and perhaps considerably propertied. When you deny that contradiction, the absence of a revolutionary situation is hard to explain. After all, if the vast majority of Americans are, in fact, in a proletarian condition right now (as identified by their status as workers), then why aren't they rebelling in the streets? Can't they figure out their own interests? But once you accept the reality of this contradiction, the present situation suddenly makes a lot more sense.

Indeed, measuring proletarian status by poverty also explains the 20th century pretty well. It explains why, for example, it was mainly impoverished Third World peasants who waged the revolutionary struggles leading to socialism during that era. The urban worker = proletarian equation, by contrast, does not. See what I mean? And the same idea can be applied even to pre-Marxian times. Like you can see the peasants generally adopting radical, collectivist views in England during the 17th century rebellions (see the Diggers and Levellers), as well as in the United States shortly after the American Revolution (see Shay's Rebellion). These developments in no small part corresponded to the world-historic decline of agriculture as it emerged in each country as a trend. So whereas the 20th century saw a demographic shift in the world population from majority-rural to majority-urban, we can see that this same shift was taking place on the world stage over a more protracted period of time. The peasants resisted their increasing impoverishment by turning to collectivist principles, and often on a spontaneous basis, though sometimes with the theoretical aid of Marxists (particularly beginning with Mao). In the modern era, slum dwellers in general largely define poverty. These are often unemployed people or people working in the informal economy. So what it all means in the practical is that either Marx was wrong about the modern era featuring a UNIQUE opportunity for communist transformation...or that, if such a unique opportunity does, in fact, exist (and I think it does), then it can be better explained by factors other than the emergence of a new class. (Perhaps by the advancement of communications technology, for example.)

This all matters when you seek to identify the fundamental class orientation of a political party. For example, there are American Marxist parties that describe themselves as "labor-led", meaning essentially led by union workers. As you can see by the analysis that I've just highlighted, largely that is a middle class orientation, not a proletarian one. Those that base themselves most essentially in the poor, by contrast, are basically proletarian parties to the extent that they do so. It's worth adding here that I doubt there's any such thing as a PURELY proletarian party in this sense in the world today, and that that's probably for the best. Why is it for the best? Because, to a certain degree, the proletariat needs the comparative broad-mindedness that comes with being politically connected to more middle class people in order to succeed. Parties that are almost entirely proletarian often wind up adopting a lot of anti-political/anti-social outlook that so often unfortunately comes with the alienation of the authentic proletariat from mainstream politics, which in turn leads into the realm of cultish sectarianism; separation from the masses. So what I'm saying is that a communist party SHOULD be populist in a general sense, but in a nuanced way that LEANS in a specifically proletarian direction (again, defining proletarian status by poverty), IMO. I hope that makes sense.


Also, first world is an horrendously outdated term, too. It implies that there are a second and third world, and implies isolation along 'world' lines. Rather, we need to focus on the world being divided by 'class' lines. I have more in common with a poor man in Bolivia, than I do with a rich man in New York. That is the real existence of class solidarity.

85% of the world's wealth differences are attributable to location. Therefore I consider location (First World, Second World, and Third World status) to be one of the various ways in which class finds expression.


I'm not sure there is much to gain from this analysis, nor from its electoral-remedial solutions. I don't have enough time to recount how many times the 'Socialism will come via further leftwards electoral shifts' argument has proven not only false but very dangerous to the working class.

Well please try to enumerate one.

In all seriousness, you seem to be of a mind to divorce short-term solutions (reforms) from long-term solutions (revolutionary change), as if the mass line can be retained in spite of such a divorce. It cannot. Being a serious revolutionary is more than just standing off to the side and demanding that everyone come to you and adopt your politics. It means going to the masses and relating to where they are in life and politics, listening to their needs and demands, and trying to fulfill those needs and demands, and not just in the long-term and abstract, but in the short-term and concrete, even while yes seeking to help them get beyond, as Marx put such things, "the narrow horizon of bourgeois right" both in their thinking and in practice. It's not an either-or proposition. Both things are needed.


Anarcho-Brocialist wrote:
Reform (use of politicians to bring about a Socialist economy) doesn't bestow upon the populace Socialism, at least for the United States. For many reasons -- socially, Socialism/Communism has been used of out context so much not many Americans truly knows what it means. Furthermore common ownership of land goes against the 'values' of the typical American 'dream'. Private property is one of the most loved 'gifts' of Capitalism. Even though we do not seek to abolish land of the artisan or the peasant, [paraphrasing from The Communist Manifesto]. Politically we do not have the abundance of wealth to throw millions of dollars into one representative seat for even a semi-urban congressional district; let alone the resources to fund a presidential election.

Not to discredit your work, but insurrection, class-consciousness etc., are the only hope. Political campaigns have been monopolized. ....

Thank you for your input! I appreciate it. :)

However, I have to say that your analysis comes across to me as...well something like this, to sum it up: "The proletariat has no idea what its own class interests are and just automatically buys into semi-official propaganda. Therefore, insurrection is required, yet I elaborate no path from here to there." I hate to sound mean about this, but that just isn't a convincing case to me. 1) You present no alternative, and 2) you seem to be convinced that people are basically just stupid and take up the views they do for no material reason, but simply based on the persuasiveness of rhetoric.


Positivist wrote:
Aside from some analytical errors, the biggest problem in your proposal is your assessment of the struggles for socialism in terms of electoral politics. In many of the countires you've listed, especially the US, if socialist reorganization was attempted it would likely be deemed unconstitutional. This renders electoral activity in countries where this is the case irrelevant.

How do you figure? Are we not capable of, for example, amending the constitution or getting into a situation wherein authoring a new one becomes a possibility?


More important is the strength of the mass socialist movement to use its own strength to engineer the social revolution.

Why do we need to pick and choose between these things?


Furthermore, the main right wing parties are in no position to be defeated in any of these countries. While France has elected a socialist, he appears so far to be more of a social democrat, and the US doesn't even have a prominent left wing. The democratic party can hardly even be called centrist as it remains uncompromisingly to be a proponent of capitalism. As for Greece, I am not familiar enough with the state to determine to what extent socialist reorganization could be accomplished through controlling it. Though if it were to go the ally of Venezuela, it would not exactly bring it to socialism. It seems unclear if Venezuela is ever going to completely socialize its economy, or if the government even still has the will to achieve this.

Okay, I'm starting to get the impression here that you're basically just downright anti-political/anti-social to the point of refusing to acknowledge anything as good or as having potential.

[cynicles]

France we can see is in the latter part of this stage. We (Americans) are in the middle. Canada is at the beginning (worst point).
lolwtf? Based on what criteria? America is the centre of global capitalism and imperialism, it's the toughest nut to crack and the most hostile country in the west to socialism.

[Lenina Rosenweg]

There is some truth to the OP.RDR has certainly put a lot of thought and effort into this.



In the first stage of such a process, the central task of the left is to isolate and defeat the main right wing party.


This can only be done by a separate working class struggle,not subordinate to a bourgeois party. In the US the Republicans can be as horrid as they are because of the Democrats.There are differences between Obama and Romney but they are, quite obviously, different factions of the ruling class.They are essentially debating how to arrange the deck chairs on the Titanic. No one is putting forth a working class perspective.In a crisis situation as we now face, the most "radical" sounding solution wins out.If no one is putting forth a left perspective, then the far right gains.



France we can see is in the latter part of this stage. We (Americans) are in the middle. Canada is at the beginning (worst point).

In the second stage (e.g. Greece), the regular party system has started giving way because the main parties are seen as exhausted. The direct election of a real socialist party is possible in this stage. Notice that the surge in support for the Radical Left Coalition in Greece of late has mainly come from youth defections from the centrist so-called Socialist Party, on the grounds that the party is not standing by left wing principles anymore. In other words, said social-democratic/unionist party had to win election and, as a result, become seen as an exhausted option first.

Sometimes the bourgeois is forced to undertake measures a socialist would do. Argentina re-nationalizing YPF is an example.Its a symbol of the decline of capitalism but doesn't necessarily mean putting the economy under social ownership.Obama nationalizing AIG and "Government Motors" is similar.

Getting from "here to there" is a perennial problem for socialists.I don't know how you feel about this guy, but I think an updated version of Trotsky's Transistional Program can come in very handy.

An example of transitional demands could be along the lines of..(for the US)


1.) Create living-wage union jobs for all the unemployed through a massive public works program to develop mass transit, renewable energy, infrastructure, healthcare, education, and affordable housing.


2.)Free, high quality healthcare for all. Replace the failed for-profit insurance companies with a publicly funded single-payer system as a step towards fully socialized medicine.


3.)No budget cuts to education & social services! Full funding for all community needs. The federal government should bail out states to prevent cuts and layoffs. A massive increase in taxes on the rich and big business, not working people.


4.)Raise the federal minimum wage to $12.50/hour, adjusted annually for cost of living increases and regional differences, as a step towards a living wage for all.


5.)A minimum guaranteed weekly income of $500/week for the unemployed, disabled, stay-at-home parents, the elderly, and others unable to work.


6.)Stop home foreclosures and evictions. For public ownership and democratic control of the major banks.


7.)No more layoffs! Take bankrupt and failing companies into public ownership and retool them for socially necessary green production.


8.)Free, high quality public education for all from pre-school through college. Full funding for schools to dramatically lower teacher-student ratios. Stop the focus on high stakes testing and the drive to privatize public education.


9.)Repeal all anti-union laws like Taft-Hartley. For democratic unions run by the rank-and-file to fight for better pay, working conditions, and social services. Full-time union officials should be regularly elected and receive the average wage of those they represent.


10.)For a guaranteed living wage pension.


11.)Shorten the workweek with no loss in pay and benefits - share out the work with the unemployed and create new jobs.


End the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. Bring all the troops home now!
and...

Slash the military budget.


Repeal the Patriot Act and other attacks on democratic rights.


Equal rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people, including same-sex marriage.

An example from my organisation. You could debate these demands or modify them but the thing is, they can't be fulfilled under the rule of capital.

Also the struggle is not just though electoral politics.Aunt Emma famously said, "if voting could change the system it would be illegal". Us mainstream politics is a stage managed media circus. Trotsky said that elections can provide a "snapshot" of how people are feeling at a particular time. For socialists elections can have an educative role. The important thing is the self organisation of the working class, not electing horrible neo-liberal/ neo-con Democrats to defeat horrible neo-liberal/ neo-con Republicans.

Funny thing is though, I actually think it would be better of Obama wins. Because..
A.) People will be dissillusioned with the Dems even more and we can begin organizing a US Labor Party.
B.) As much as I hate to say this, Obama, the guy who brought us the NDAA, drone attacks, a two tier wahe system for the manufacturing sector, bank bailouts, ad nauseum, is marginally better. Romney will do what Scott Walker has done, only nationwide.Obama would love to destroy the unions, but the Dems still need the fig leaf.

No political support should be given to Mr Obamanation. I'm voting for Jill Stein.

[Lenina Rosenweg]

State and Revolution by Lenin provides a rough road map of how the working class can come to power.

As far as defing proletarian/working class...

The Roman proletarian was not the same as the working class under capitalism. The Roman proletari were uprooted, declassed peasants or freed slaves, brought into urban areas.They were often unemployed and parasitic. Their situation did not allow them to play a progressive role in the society of the time.

The Marxist definition of the working class is based on relationship to the means of production. Third world peasantry certainly played a revolutionary role, but only to an extent.All the epic Third World revolutions and nationalist movements of the 20th century-from Algeria to Libya to Egypt to China to Vietnam, were eventually rolled back.I would say all of them, without exception.Why is this? I am not dissing them at all, there were and are very real accomplishments, but there were flaws as well, notably lack of a working class base.

There were alternatives to Dengism. If Algeria had more followed the path of Ben Bella, and adopted worker's democracy, they could have avoided the horrific civil war of the 90s.Its the working class and its relationship to the means of production which is key, not relative income levels.

[Tim Finnegan]

So, basically, the third stage is a warmed-over Lassallism, and the first two are a long-winded way of getting to the point where you can have a warmed-over Lassallism?

[ed miliband]

Wealth is an horrendously inaccurate indicator of class, and if you want to ascribe a word to it, don't use 'proletariat', for that has a very specific meaning within the realm of political philosophy and economic history. It has a strong academic (and real life!) connotation: the working class.




i think "working class" is arguably more problematic, especially in the uk, where it is tied up with so many cultural and social assumptions. for example self-employed plumbers, electricians, etc. are, in the eyes of many "working class", but graduates working precarious jobs or employees in "creative industries", for eg often aren't considered so. for many "working class" is signified by accent, the newspaper you read, your choice of summer holiday, etc. above all else. "working class" and "middle class" are also often spoken of as opposites.

"prole" is what it is. i love this dauve quote:



If one identifies proletarian with factory worker (or even worse: with manual labourer), or with the poor, then one cannot see what is subversive in the proletarian condition. The proletariat is the negation of this society. It is not the collection of the poor, but of those who are desperate, those who have no reserves (les sans-réserves in French, or senza riserve in Italian), 5 (http://libcom.org/library/capitalism-communism-gilles-dauve#footnote5_zbyc2h2) who have nothing to lose but their chains; those who are nothing, have nothing, and cannot liberate themselves without destroying the whole social order. The proletariat is the dissolution of present society, because this society deprives it of nearly all its positive aspects. Thus the proletariat is also its own destruction. All theories (either bourgeois, fascist, stalinist, left-wing or "gauchistes") which in any way glorify and praise the proletariat as it is and claim for it the positive role of defending values and regenerating society, are counter-revolutionary. Worship of the proletariat has become one of the most efficient and dangerous weapons of capital. Most proles are low paid, and a lot work in production, yet their emergence as the proletariat derives not from being low paid producers, but from being "cut off", alienated, with no control either over their lives or the meaning of what they have to do to earn a living.

[Rafiq]

I wouldn't take so kindly to developing a so called revolutionary formula which could be diminished in regards to it's correlation with reality in a matter of months. We aren't here for making recipes for future kitchens.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

i think "working class" is arguably more problematic, especially in the uk, where it is tied up with so many cultural and social assumptions. for example self-employed plumbers, electricians, etc. are, in the eyes of many "working class", but graduates working precarious jobs or employees in "creative industries", for eg often aren't considered so. for many "working class" is signified by accent, the newspaper you read, your choice of summer holiday, etc. above all else. "working class" and "middle class" are also often spoken of as opposites.

"prole" is what it is. i love this dauve quote:

I don't think Marxist academic language is particularly relevant in general colloquial usage of the term working class, so i'd agree with you. But also when we talk of the Marxist academic usage of 'working class', we do actually have a very clearly defined group in mind, we are not merely basing 'working class' and 'middle class' on privileges, which is what tends to happen with its colloquial usage.