Discussion on SPD, views of history, etc.

[Brosa Luxemburg]

So I was reading this article (http://home.earthlink.net/~lrgoldner/bordiga.html) when I came across this.


If the German revolution had saved Russia from isolation, the 20th century would have taken a completely different course. That view of history was a very useful "heuristic device" to avoid all the pitfalls of Social Democracy, Stalinism, Maoism, and Third Worldism. To live within that tradition, whether as a Trotskyist, a Third Camper, or an ultra-leftist, is to measure history from the vantage point of the German and Russian soviets of 1917-1921. It is not at all a bad benchmark for historical judgment; it is certainly superior to the Keynesian welfare state, the Stalinist successes in the first Five Year Plan, or labor-intensive agrarian communes in China as a notion of socialist society. But it leads to an impasse. It leads one to viewing history as a strategist for the Comintern in 1920, of taking up where the Central and Eastern European revolutions against the Hohenzollems, Hapsburgs and Romanovs left off. Yet an historical chasm separates those revolutions, and their dual character, from the present. (34) The dual nature of the October revolution was that of a revolution in which historical tasks of the bourgeois revolution were realized under the leadership of the working class, after which the proletarian political content was completely snuffed out by Stalinist counter-revolution. To draw the line of "continuity" uncritically through Lenin and Trotsky, as the exact extensions of Marx in the early twentieth century, to make the Russian Revolution the touchstone of the 20th century ("the turning point of history where history failed to turn", as someone put it) is to "buy into" a whole view of history, before and, since 1917. It is above all to accept a mythology about German Social Democracy as a revolutionary Marxist formation prior to some date, whether 1890, or 1898, or 1914, when the SPD was taken over by "revisionism". If there is one single myth at the bottom of the outlook informed by "the best of German Social Democracy and Russian Bolshevism" which has now become problematic, it is that rose tinted view of the early SPD. It is through that view that the international left was colonized by the lenses of Aufklaerungwhich originated in the civil service of the enlightened despotic states.

What are your thoughts on this?

[Die Neue Zeit]

Goldner wrote his article from an anti-party viewpoint, and years before Lars Lih's book.

Even I have stated that the original Socialist International organization was more mature than Marx's views. It took the imperative of worker-class organization to an "institutional" level, a level that surpassed Marx's more primordial views on party-movements. That's not "continuity uncritically" through the two eras.

[Brosa Luxemburg]

Bump

[Blake's Baby]

I wish I knew what 'aufklaerung' meant.

Looks like a version of the old Second-International-bashing that's fairly common among certain well-read Anarchists and Council Communists. If it's from Goldner many years ago as DNZ says, I suppose that's not so surprising.

The question for me is, does 'part 1' fit together with 'part 2'? One may not accept the 'myths' of German social democracy, while at the same, one can be convinced that the revolution in Russia was doomed without an international extension. I'm not sure that believing that the Marxist current in the SPD was a minority, is incompatible with believing that an extension of the revolution to Germany was essential.

The idea that all the Bolsheviks (or the working class) were doing in Russia was fulfilling the bourgeois revolution is pure councilism. Some of us regard this as a degeneration of theory under the influence primarily of Stalinism and the failures of the mid-C20th. It's a capitulation to the old stagist conceptions (Russia needs a capitalist revolution before a proletarian revolution) and a rejection of the internationalism of the revolutionary process (the fate of the revolution will be decided in Russia, contra Luxemburg, Lenin, Trotsky etc).

[Die Neue Zeit]

Looks like a version of the old Second-International-bashing that's fairly common among certain well-read Anarchists and Council Communists. If it's from Goldner many years ago as DNZ says, I suppose that's not so surprising.

And will doubtless increase amongst the rest of the left-com milieu as works like those of Lars Lih and comradely strategic discussions like those of Mike Macnair get popularized. :)


One may not accept the 'myths' of German social democracy

We're not the ones propagating "myths" of German social democracy. It's the left-com milieu (your milieu) and the anarchist, Trot, and M-L milieus that have had this stranglehold.

[Zanthorus]

I wish I knew what 'aufklaerung' meant.

It is the German for 'enlightenment'. Loren's thesis (Which I don't claim to be able to do full justice to) is that most of the socialist movement for the past century has been labouring under the false impression that Marxism is some kind of straightforward extension of the doctrines of the enlightenment, rather than a supercession of them. What turns this from a seemingly purely theoretical matter to one which concerns the history of the 20th century workers' movement is the percieved similarities betweened the enlightened absolutist state popular among figures like Kant, and 'actually-existing socialism'. Here the view that Marxism provides an unproblematic extension of the enlightenment, that the proletariat will start by completing the unfinished tasks of the 'bourgeois revolution', ceases to be merely a mistake and becomes the manifestation in thought of the practical fact that the 20th century workers' movement existed not to negate capitalism as such but to finish it's construction in the absence of a revolutionary bourgeoisie.


Goldner wrote his article from an anti-party viewpoint, and years before Lars Lih's book.

Even I have stated that the original Socialist International organization was more mature than Marx's views. It took the imperative of worker-class organization to an "institutional" level, a level that surpassed Marx's more primordial views on party-movements. That's not "continuity uncritically" through the two eras.

All of this is completely irrelevant to the point being made. Engaging with the text rather than sounding off your pre-concieved ideas would be a smart course of action here.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

On a personal level I can't really assent to Loren's assessment. In the first place because it just seems too easy and seems to rely to a certain extent more on high flown phrases than actual theoretical engagement. This may be due to a deficiency in attempting to get the point across in the form of a short article which is ostensibly about what someone else thought (To be frank, I would prefer it if he'd stuck to his original purpose and talked about what Bordiga actually thought, not about how what Bordiga thought vaguely suggests some vague ideas about the 20th century workers movement which the author was wrestling with). But also because some of the historical details of the picture which he paints bother me, especially the idea that the problem begins with Engels and everything he wrote after Marx's death somehow became magically became tainted with the 'lenses of aufklaerung'. I don't know, in spite of his intentions I think that the text does more to muddy the waters than to clarify them particularly.

[Brosa Luxemburg]

(To be frank, I would prefer it if he'd stuck to his original purpose and talked about what Bordiga actually thought, not about how what Bordiga thought vaguely suggests some vague ideas about the 20th century workers movement which the author was wrestling with)


My original purpose wasn't to talk about what Bordiga actually thought but rather to discuss a part of an article I read that happened to be about Bordiga.


But also because some of the historical details of the picture which he paints bother me, especially the idea that the problem begins with Engels and everything he wrote after Marx's death somehow became magically became tainted with the 'lenses of aufklaerung'

Yes, this part really bothered me as well.

[Zanthorus]

My original purpose wasn't to talk about what Bordiga actually thought but rather to discuss a part of an article I read that happened to be about Bordiga.

I was talking about the text itself, not your intentions in starting this thread.

[Blake's Baby]

...
We're not the ones propagating "myths" of German social democracy. It's the left-com milieu (your milieu) and the anarchist, Trot, and M-L milieus that have had this stranglehold.

You're not a councilist or an anarchist. What the fuck are you talking about?

I reject the notion that the 'myths' that the 'ultralefts' pedal are real. Not aware that there's any Left Com group that claims that the SPD was perfect before 1890 or 1914 or any other date. Goldner's 'myth' is a strawman.

And the Anarchist 'myths' are pretty much the opposite of the 'myths' that Goldner (and you, it seems) charge the Left Comms with spreading. So how come you can conflate the two?

[Rowan Duffy]

The concept that we should find either an original sin, or a time in which a was committed in the SPD is not a very materialist analysis. I think there is a fair bit of mysticism and voluntarism tied up with the need to find the turning point (or its invariant degeneracy) in the SPD. Mysticism because the analysis is looking for moral failings rather than the material pressures which contributed to them, and voluntarism because of the belief that by pure force of will they should have been overcome to create a revolution.

There were real social and material pressures on the SPD and the German left in general that manifested in very different ways than the rather unusual unfolding situation in Russia.

The tsar fell not because of the surprisingly brilliant orientation of the Leninists, but because he was both grossly incompetent and fighting a protracted war that was mass murdering the Russian military - a military then who largely defected. Further the course of the revolution had strong compulsions placed on it because of the level of development.

The German government did not experience the same total collapse of support from the troops. Further, the SPDs reformist and chauvinist wing found broad support in the public - it's not simply that the leadership was traitorous since it in fact reflected the base. Given a choice in 1918 the class still went with the SPD.

It is true that the SPD was not really a Marxist party in the sense that everyone was a Marxist theorist (I'm dubious that this would even be a good thing), and it's unlikey that any mass party ever will be. However it was surprisingly close, and it has a more impressive history than possibly any other mass party in the west.

I'm opposed to myths, but I think Goldner is the one promulgating them.

[Die Neue Zeit]

It is true that the SPD was not really a Marxist party in the sense that everyone was a Marxist theorist (I'm dubious that this would even be a good thing), and it's unlikey that any mass party ever will be. However it was surprisingly close, and it has a more impressive history than possibly any other mass party in the west.

I'm opposed to myths, but I think Goldner is the one promulgating them.

Indeed, comrade, and Goldner's in the same company as that unholy "Hegelian" trio of Gramsci, Korsch, and Lukacs on myths about orthodox Marxism.


Further, the SPDs reformist and chauvinist wing found broad support in the public - it's not simply that the leadership was traitorous since it in fact reflected the base. Given a choice in 1918 the class still went with the SPD.

The "outstanding role model for left politics today" that was the USPD was formed quite a bit late, I should say.


All of this is completely irrelevant to the point being made. Engaging with the text rather than sounding off your pre-concieved ideas would be a smart course of action here.

The only ones with the pre-conceived ideas here are those subscribing to the author's line or those sympathetic to it.

[blake 3:17]

Indeed, comrade, and Goldner's in the same company as that unholy "Hegelian" trio of Gramsci, Korsch, and Lukacs on myths about orthodox Marxism.

Hmmmmmm.... On a very personal level, I've been feeling at war with Lukacs. Engaging with non-marxist philosophers has been such a pleasant break from the need for totality all the time. I remember loving Korsch's Marxism and Philosphy. Never really thought of Gramsci as particularly Hegelian. It may be that when you talk about a party-movement, I'm thinking of some combination of Lenin's fighting on all fronts and Gramsci's counter hegemony.

PLease excuse the thread drift.

[Die Neue Zeit]

^^^ When it comes to comradely threads like these, there's never such a thing as a "thread drift."

Gramsci turned the ortho-Marxist premise of hegemony on its head, from one based on confidence into one based on skepticism. The proletariat doesn't need counter-hegemony or what not. It needs to establish its own!

[Rowan Duffy]

Indeed, comrade, and Goldner's in the same company as that unholy "Hegelian" trio of Gramsci, Korsch, and Lukacs on myths about orthodox Marxism.

I'd like to extricate Gramsci from the other two, at least partly because I like Gramsci, and I don't like the other two. :)

I'm no fan of sophisticated uses of Hegalianism, but I think Gramsci's work in the Prison Notebooks does not make overly complicated use of it.

Further, his attention to organisational questions is excellent. Specifically, I was very impressed with his use of the catholic church as a very sophisticated Aesopian language. It's actually a rather beautiful symmetry because he can use the benefits of experience that that church has had in remaining coherent with a large number of different internal tendencies over a very long period of time, while simultaneously studying how the Italian communists might need to deal with the church - and at the same time, the Catholic church stands in for the Communist party, about which it would have been hard to write while in prison. I think it's an altogether brilliant piece of work.

Further the battle over cultural hegemony is quite as relevant now as it was when he wrote it. We've been losing pretty badly at this battle, despite a massive economic crisis. We need to evaluate carefully why we can't seem to win on this battlefield.

[Die Neue Zeit]

I'd like to extricate Gramsci from the other two, at least partly because I like Gramsci, and I don't like the other two. :)

Look, comrade, I too like what some of Gramsci had to write, such as Caesarism vs. Bonapartism (http://www.revleft.com/vb/managed-democracy-ancient-t158688/index.html), but he shared what the other two wrote about somehow Lenin being the real "orthodox Marxist," about Lenin's thought not being continuous with ortho-Marxism, etc.


Further, his attention to organisational questions is excellent. Specifically, I was very impressed with his use of the catholic church as a very sophisticated Aesopian language. It's actually a rather beautiful symmetry because he can use the benefits of experience that that church has had in remaining coherent with a large number of different internal tendencies over a very long period of time, while simultaneously studying how the Italian communists might need to deal with the church - and at the same time, the Catholic church stands in for the Communist party, about which it would have been hard to write while in prison. I think it's an altogether brilliant piece of work.

That's not novel, though. Liberals of the time thought that Second International organization was akin to a secular church.


Further the battle over cultural hegemony is quite as relevant now as it was when he wrote it. We've been losing pretty badly at this battle, despite a massive economic crisis. We need to evaluate carefully why we can't seem to win on this battlefield.

Yes, but there are two issues here on this specific subject:

1) Marx and the ortho-Marxists wrote of the proletariat establishing its own hegemony (including things like Alternative Culture), even over other "popular" classes, before a revolutionary period. Lars Lih documented this final component of the Erfurtist strategy in Chapter 1 of his WITBD book, about the Volkspartei ("people's party") premise. Counter-hegemony looks too defensive.

2) The way he wrote it may, unfortunately, suggest Popular Front crap. That the Euro-coms took inspiration from Gramsci's stuff on positioning and so on isn't surprising.

[More politically, of course, it's because most of the established left has the wrong priorities on the question of strategy.]