Lenin and centralization over factories in 1918

[Stain]

Does anybody has a retrospective article/lecture about why Lenin centralized the control over factories during 1918? I forgot where I read/heard about how it was because of the world war, imperialist attack and the civil war that lead to famines, lack of expertise for the wokers factories, lack of resource and their justifiable distribution, among other things. Having arguments with anarchists. Here is their attack.

"In January 1918, a scant two months after "decreeing" workers' control, Lenin began to advocate that the administration of the factories be placed under trade union control. The story that the Bolsheviks "patiently" experimented with workers' control, only to find it "inefficient" and "chaotic," is a myth. Their "patience" did not last more than a few weeks. Not only did Lenin oppose direct workers' control within a matter of weeks after the decree of November 14, even union control came to an end shortly after it had been established. By the summer of 1918, almost all of Russian industry had been placed under bourgeois forms of management. As Lenin put it, the "revolution demands ... precisely in the interests of socialism that the masses unquestionably obey the single will of the leaders of the labor process."[17*] Thereafter, workers' control was denounced not only as "inefficient," "chaotic" and "impractical," but also as "petty bourgeois"!"

Cannot post links yet. That is Bookchin article called Listen Marxists! Google it.

[Die Neue Zeit]

"Workers control" became a bankrupt concept, as factory workers became in it only for themselves (literally producing only for their immediate consumption and little else, according to Christopher Read's bio on Lenin).

[Stain]

"Workers control" became a bankrupt concept, as factory workers became in it only for themselves (literally producing only for their immediate consumption and little else, according to Christopher Read's bio on Lenin).

Yes that's what I remember reading that their was no coordination between different factories or peasants to feed the masses or produce enough goods for everybody. But "I'm just making excuses for authortiarianism." So any links on that which I can pass along?

[Questionable]

Yes that's what I remember reading that their was no coordination between different factories or peasants to feed the masses or produce enough goods for everybody. But "I'm just making excuses for authortiarianism." So any links on that which I can pass along?

Yeah, pointing out the fact that it didn't work is one hell of an excuse.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Yes that's what I remember reading that their was no coordination between different factories or peasants to feed the masses or produce enough goods for everybody. But "I'm just making excuses for authortiarianism." So any links on that which I can pass along?

There has to be an external disciplinary force to minimize or get rid of this production parochialism. I commented on this in some Learning thread months ago on the "discipline of the [consumer goods and services] market" (check out past Learning posts on markets), but the thing is that "the market" isn't efficient enough with this discipline or generally with emphasizing stakeholders.

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

Alan Bullock writes in 'Hitler and Stalin' that industrial production was one seventh of what it was before the war and that only with the bringing in of bourgeois "specialists" did it stop falling. Don't read the book, biases liberal anticommunism stretches over one thousand pages.

[Paulappaul]

"Workers control" became a bankrupt concept, as factory workers became in it only for themselves (literally producing only for their immediate consumption and little else, according to Christopher Read's bio on Lenin).

A few things read like bullshit with this:

A) Most factories were extremely low on the essentials of production, namely Oil and other resources akin to actually get the means of production working.

B) Ehh, so what from Russian factories could the workers squander en mass? It wasn't like they were making fucking Ipods. Say there was a factory canning food, would you be surprised when there is mass starvation if people were looking out for themselves?

The thing to remember is this, Russia 1918 was not a walk through times square. It was a poverty stricken, famine ridden shit hole in a tense political and social situation. It wasn't exactly the bustling post - revolutionary, post scarcity situation we imagine following a revolution. It doesn't prove Workers' Control doesn't work, infact nothing worked. The Bolshevik destiny lead to another tyranny under which hundreds of thousands died of starvation still. What is proven by Russian 1918 is that International Capital can create and watch as a country is torn apart by its own contradictions, as it starves to death.

[fug]

Cannot post links yet. That is Bookchin article called Listen Marxists! Google it.
The biggest, most condescending, poorly-written, self righteous pile of shit I've ever seen.

Also 1918 was such a chaotic year that centralized management of the whole country was really the only option, and that barely saved the revolution at a tremendous cost.

[fug]

"Listen Marxist!" is the biggest, most condescending, poorly-written, self righteous pile of shit I've ever seen.
Reading that shit made by feel embarassed for him.
You really have to be "special" to start a "theoretical article" like this:
All the old crap of the thirties is coming back again--the shit about the "class line," the "role of the working class," the "trained cadres," the "vanguard party," and the "proletarian dictatorship."

Anyway 1918 was such a chaotic year that centralized management of the whole country was really the only option, and that barely saved the revolution at a tremendous cost.
Also what DNZ and others said.

[Die Neue Zeit]

A few things read like bullshit with this:

A) Most factories were extremely low on the essentials of production, namely Oil and other resources akin to actually get the means of production working.

B) Ehh, so what from Russian factories could the workers squander en mass? It wasn't like they were making fucking Ipods. Say there was a factory canning food, would you be surprised when there is mass starvation if people were looking out for themselves?

The thing to remember is this, Russia 1918 was not a walk through times square. It was a poverty stricken, famine ridden shit hole in a tense political and social situation. It wasn't exactly the bustling post - revolutionary, post scarcity situation we imagine following a revolution. It doesn't prove Workers' Control doesn't work, infact nothing worked. The Bolshevik destiny lead to another tyranny under which hundreds of thousands died of starvation still. What is proven by Russian 1918 is that International Capital can create and watch as a country is torn apart by its own contradictions, as it starves to death.

My broader, contemporary point is that Workers Control is parochial compared to something like Stakeholder Co-Management (http://www.revleft.com/vb/stakeholder-co-management-t145117/index.html). Workers-as-consumers and supply chain management are things that require priority.

[Paulappaul]

My broader, contemporary point is that Workers Control is parochial compared to something like Stakeholder Co-Management (http://www.revleft.com/vb/stakeholder-co-management-t145117/index.html). Workers-as-consumers and supply chain management are things that require priority.

What's common between a Stakeholder Co-Management and Workers' Control is that production is still treated as property under the ownership and control of this or that individual worker (in a small sense as a stakeholder) or as a collective of workers. The dictatorship of the proletariat is the process of eliminating property relations, those who work as a class, work as toil/servitude and "control" all together. There is nothing marxian about state socialism, workers' control or a stakeholder co-Management.

[Die Neue Zeit]

What's common between a Stakeholder Co-Management and Workers' Control is that production is still treated as property under the ownership and control of this or that individual worker (in a small sense as a stakeholder) or as a collective of workers. The dictatorship of the proletariat is the process of eliminating property relations, those who work as a class, work as toil/servitude and "control" all together. There is nothing marxian about state socialism, workers' control or a stakeholder co-Management.

I disagree about your assessment of Stakeholder Co-Management, which is really just a step below systemic collective worker management, but why then, did you come to the defense of Workers Control?