Was the Soviet Union socialist?

[Lokomotive293]

I'm interested in the outcome of this poll, as I have a feeling I'm pretty alone with my opinion here on RevLeft.

[Ostrinski]

In short: no. Socialism is a voluntarily associated mode of production of free producers which are not alienated from the product of their labor or isolated from the means of production. It is a globally planned stateless society of no markets, no nations, no money, no classes.

You might be interested in this thread.

http://www.revleft.com/vb/economic-nature-soviet-t177361/index.html

[Lokomotive293]

In short: no. Socialism is a voluntarily associated mode of production of free producers which are not alienated from the product of their labor or isolated from the means of production. It is a globally planned stateless society of no markets, no nations, no money, no classes.

You might be interested in this thread.

http://www.revleft.com/vb/economic-nature-soviet-t177361/index.html

Thanks for the link to the other thread, that's definitely interesting, although it's not like I'm new to this discussion. I made this thread, though, because people's opinions change with the specific time period they are looking at, and the poll in the other thread doesn't take that into account at all.

[Sea]

Are we talking about the conventional definition where socialist = communist or are we talking about DoTP in a more broad sense?

[Ostrinski]

Thanks for the link to the other thread, that's definitely interesting, although it's not like I'm new to this discussion. I made this thread, though, because people's opinions change with the specific time period they are looking at, and the poll in the other thread doesn't take that into account at all.Fair enough, though I think there's pretty much a unanimous consensus among those that think it was socialist at one point in that it was state capitalist at first, then socialist until 50's or 60's or whenever, then state capitalist until the end.

Honestly I think I respect the Brezhnevite position the most, it's the most coherent and consistent, isn't based on the worship of individual leaders, and doesn't fall into the reformist trap of saying that socialism is a matter of policy.

[Le Socialiste]

No, I would not say it was, for reasons outlined above. Nor would I say it was at any time remotely socialist in regards to its economic and political models post-1923. The revolutionary period within Russia from 1917-23 reintroduced and developed what could have easily served as the embryonic modes and functions of such a society, but a variety of factors rendered this impossible. It's been said many times before: civil war, foreign intervention, the destruction of the national economy and the decimation of the urban working-class, all compounded by the failure of revolutionary upheavals abroad and the eventual divorcement of the Bolsheviks from what remained of an already fragile base, minimized any likely chances of success. Russia was incapable of salvaging what remained; likewise, the Party's adoption of the NEP and other similarly-minded policies marked a tactical retreat that was eventually subjected to degeneracy and distortion.

[ind_com]

Thanks for the link to the other thread, that's definitely interesting, although it's not like I'm new to this discussion. I made this thread, though, because people's opinions change with the specific time period they are looking at, and the poll in the other thread doesn't take that into account at all.

I voted for until Khrushchev's reforms, though a counter revolution is not always that sudden. The various factors of degeneration of the Soviet Union developed in the Stalin era itself. Due to the non-involvement of the masses in class-struggle, Stalin was eventually surrounded by a reactionary bureaucracy, who implemented anti-socialist programmes in many cases. They had hatched many plots to restore capitalism since the mid 30s, and their dreams became true when they succeeded in murdering Stalin. After that they took their time till 1991 to slowly undo all the socialist gains made since the revolution.

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

The De Leonist Socialist Labor Party of America argued that the USSR could be viewed as "a class-divided, exploitative society which is neither capitalist nor socialist," and used the term "bureaucratic state despotism" to describe it (quotes from The Nature of Soviet Society, an SLP pamphlet from 1978).

[Brosa Luxemburg]

In short: no. Socialism is a voluntarily associated mode of production of free producers which are not alienated from the product of their labor or isolated from the means of production. It is a globally planned stateless society of no markets, no nations, no money, no classes.

This is pretty much my position as well, although I think that the Bolsheviks did establish a proletariat dictatorship in the early years. Of course, this would later degenerate and lead to successful counterrevolution, characterized in Stalinism.

[Brosa Luxemburg]

The De Leonist Socialist Labor Party of America argued that the USSR could be viewed as "a class-divided, exploitative society which is neither capitalist nor socialist," and used the term "bureaucratic state despotism" to describe it (quotes from The Nature of Soviet Society, an SLP pamphlet from 1978).

Yeah, the SLP had an interesting view of Stalinist Russia, yet I think that they don't back up their theory very well. It's interesting either way though. It seems to be Hillel Ticktin's theory of a "non-mode of production".

[Let's Get Free]

The USSR was not socialist at any point in its history. The 1917 revolution did bring workers to power, but they quickly lost it.

[Zulu]

In short: no. Socialism is a voluntarily associated mode of production of free producers which are not alienated from the product of their labor or isolated from the means of production. It is a globally planned stateless society of no markets, no nations, no money, no classes.


It's called communism.

Socialism is a transitory period during which a communist economy is being constructed but the vestiges of capitalism remain operational. That was precisely the situation of the Soviet Union during the first 3 five-year plans at least.

I voted "until Khrushchov's reforms" but matter of fact is they were controversial and may be regarded as attempts to actually find a way to continue socialist construction. It was not until Khrushchov had been removed from power that the USSR returned to the state capitalism completely (see: Kosygin's reform of 1965).

[Let's Get Free]

It's called communism.

Socialism is a transitory period during which a communist economy is being constructed but the vestiges of capitalism remain operational. That was precisely the situation of the Soviet Union during the first 3 five-year plans at least.

Marx and Engels never once made that distinction, they used the terms 'communism' and 'socialism' more or less interchangeably. You cannot have something "in between" a class society and a money based economy and a non class society and a non money based economy, it's one or the other.


I voted "until Khrushchov's reforms" but matter of fact is they were controversial and may be regarded as attempts to actually find a way to continue socialist construction. It was not until Khrushchov had been removed from power that the USSR returned to the state capitalism completely (see: Kosygin's reform of 1965).
I've never understood this explanation, as i do not judge a regime by who happens to be in office. A capitalist state does not become less capitalist just because a social democrat happens to be prime minister or president. Similarly, a regime does not become state capitalist just because Kruschev is in power rather than Stalin. This is a Great Man analysis that concentrates on the transfer of state power from one regime to another. However, the Marxist one focuses on the transfer of power from the state and bosses to working class people. What makes a society socialist is the social relationships it has, not the personal opinions or reforms of those in power. Thus if the social relationships under Kruschev are similar to those under Stalin, then the nature of the regime is similar.

[Zulu]

Marx and Engels never once made that distinction, they used the terms 'communism' and 'socialism' more or less interchangeably.

What does "socialism" mean? An ML likbez. (http://marxistleninist.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=learning&action=display&thread=688)






You cannot have something "in between" a class society and a money based economy and a non class society and a non money based economy, it's one or the other.


Well, then I've got a very bad news for you: you're stuck with the money-based economy forever, because there is another thing you most certainly cannot have, and that is an overnight transition from the class society to a classless one.

[Let's Get Free]

What does "socialism" mean? An ML likbez. (http://marxistleninist.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=learning&action=display&thread=688)

Find me an example where Marx or Engels made a distinction between the terms 'socialism' and 'communism'




Well, then I've got a very bad news for you: you're stuck with the money-based economy forever, because there is another thing you most certainly cannot have, and that is an overnight transition from the class society to a classless one.

Actually, logically speaking, thats the only way you can introduce it when you think about it - which is why the Communist Manifesto itself talks of communism being the most radical rupture with traditional property relations. You cant have something in between communism and a capitalism. Its one or the other. Its like being pregnant or not. You cant "kind of pregnant."
There is a way round this problem and I urge people to think of it in these terms. Instead of advocating a transitional period AFTER the capture the political power - which is a complete dead end - think of the transition as something that happens BEFORE this event.

[Zulu]

Find me an example where Marx or Engels made a distinction between the terms 'socialism' and 'communism'

http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch03.htm





Its one or the other. Its like being pregnant or not. You cant "kind of pregnant."


No, it isn't like being pregnant at all. Communism is like being a handsome person - you have to continuously work on it.

The funniest thing is that a pregnancy-related analogy used by none other than Marx himself was what got the Marxist-Leninist concept of the "two phases" going:

"What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect, economically, morally, and intellectually, still stamped with the birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it emerges." (http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1875/gotha/ch01.htm)




Instead of advocating a transitional period AFTER the capture the political power - which is a complete dead end - think of the transition as something that happens BEFORE this event

Ain't it just ludicrous how you guys insist on reinventing bicycles with square wheels. All out of fear of a little dictatorship...

So how's your bright idea any different from that of Kautsky or any other social-democratic opportunist out there wishfully thinking that society can somehow "creep in" to "socialism"? Guess what, it doesn't. The productive forces are long overdue for real socialism, yet nothing points that the financial oligarchy ruling the world is going to release control any time soon or that the petty bourgeois "workers" in the First world bought up by it with the imperialist rent will be willing to do anything remotely transitional until "austerity" and crises return them to real proletarian conditions.

[Let's Get Free]

http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch03.htm
Didn't find anything in there that made a distinction between 'socialism' and 'communism.'





No, it isn't like being pregnant at all. Communism is like being a handsome person - you have to continuously work on it.
This sounds like some Fabian, gradualist nonsense.




So how's your bright idea any different from that of Kautsky or any other social-democratic opportunist out there wishfully thinking that society can somehow "creep in" to "socialism"?
What the hell are you talking about? I'm not arguing that society can "creep" into socialism, actually that is precisely your argument. I am arguing quite the opposite. What you are pretty much saying it is "idealistic" to get rid of capitalism at a stroke and insisting that we have to be "realistic" in phasing in a communist society over an extended "transition period" commencing with the capture of political power by the workers. Which makes about as much sense as someone being progressively impregnated over an extended period of time.

[Zulu]

I'm not arguing that society can "creep" into socialism

Yes, you're arguing exactly that, as you've just said the transition should take place without a political takeover by a force that supports it.

[Let's Get Free]

Yes, you're arguing exactly that, as you've just said the transition should take place without a political takeover by a force that supports it.

You are misrepresenting my position. Socialism requires the transformation of consciousness on a mass scale. This is what happens incrementally over time, not the transition from capitalism to communism. So therefore, if there is a transition, it will happen BEFORE the capture of power by a revolutionary proletariat. The capture of political power just indicates the end of this transition period and the point at which communism is implemented in a coordinated fashion which, in fact, is the only way logically that it can be implemented – instantaneously. You cannot have a gradual transition from a class society to a classless society it is simply not possible.

[Zulu]

Socialism requires the transformation of consciousness on a mass scale.

Yeah, and it cannot occur so long as the old relations of production, namely, the capitalist ones, remain operational. Logically ;).

[Let's Get Free]

The changeover of the means of production from private to common ownership will also take place before the seizure of power.

[Zulu]

The changeover of the means of production from private to common ownership will also take place before the seizure of power.

Like I said, "creeping into socialism", er?

Not fucking likely!

Anyway, why do you insist on the "seizure of power"? The way you imagine it, it's a totally meaningless notion.

[Let's Get Free]

Like I said, "creeping into socialism", er?

NO! The changeover from private ownership to public ownership will happen during the revolutionary situation, when workers seize the means of production, establish its own organizations to run the workplaces and industries, and create congresses or delegate bodies controlled by it through which coordination can take place, and through which the workers can control their own workers militia.


Anyway, why do you insist on the "seizure of power"? The way you imagine it, it's a totally meaningless notion.
It is when socialist majority have captured political power and they AT ONCE eliminate capitalism and the class relations of capitalism. They do not phase them out gradually (which is implausible for all sorts of reasons), as you are suggesting, but they do this instantaneously.

[Zulu]

NO! The changeover from private ownership to public ownership will happen during the revolutionary situation, when workers seize the means of production, establish its own organizations to run the workplaces and industries, and create congresses or delegate bodies controlled by it through which coordination can take place, and through which the workers can control their own workers militia.

In other words, they seize political power before they seize political power. OK, I guess, this makes just as much sense as eliminating capitalism instantaneously...

[Le Socialiste]

It is when socialist majority have captured political power and they AT ONCE eliminate capitalism and the class relations of capitalism. They do not phase them out gradually (which is implausible for all sorts of reasons), as you are suggesting, but they do this instantaneously.

What's implausible here is your expectation that capitalism can be 'abolished' so swiftly. It's not an overnight process (though I often wish it could be). Capitalism is a global phenomenon; as such, we mustn't divorce ourselves from reality and get lost in such an idealistic and immaterial conception of revolution and the immense groundwork it entails. It is, for all intents and purposes, a work in progress, a process for which there is no shortcut. A society in the throes of revolutionary activity will still have to confront any remaining vestiges of the capitalist system it seeks to eliminate. It would be foolish to try and estimate just how long it would take, seeing as everything remains conditional upon shifts in the material landscape, which in turn depends on a variety of other vital factors.

[Let's Get Free]

What's implausible here is your expectation that capitalism can be 'abolished' so swiftly. It's not an overnight process (though I often wish it could be). Capitalism is a global phenomenon; as such, we mustn't divorce ourselves from reality and get lost in such an idealistic and immaterial conception of revolution and the immense groundwork it entails. It is, for all intents and purposes, a work in progress, a process for which there is no shortcut. A society in the throes of revolutionary activity will still have to confront any remaining vestiges of the capitalist system it seeks to eliminate. It would be foolish to try and estimate just how long it would take, seeing as everything remains conditional upon shifts in the material landscape, which in turn depends on a variety of other vital factors.

You are absolutely right that it is a work in process. It is absolutely true that the process of arriving at communism is a long and hard struggle and there is nothing sudden about it. It involves as Marx pointed out the alteration of consciousness on a mass scale. It is THIS that takes a long time, not the changeover from capitalism to communism itself. All societies are in a process of transition. By postponing this mythical notion of a "transition" to some distant, far off period in time, we subconsciously dis-empower ourselves in the here and now and disengage from trying to change society in the present. We are already in the transition period and we need to wake up and do something about it.

[Yet_Another_Boring_Marxist]

The whole point of the dictatorship of the proletariat is to countuine class struggle under socialism, as long as the law of value operates there will always be capitalist relations in production that will manifest themselves in the buerocracy. But history doesn't ever end. There is no dichotomy of a good revolution and a false revolution. Revolution is a protracted process with small victories, small defeats, and many roads.

So it isn't a matter of having a "correct" revolution where everyone has a complete understanding of what socialism is by reading all three volumes of Das Kapital, it's a matter of getting the ball rolling and pushing it forward with class struggle. Kruschev's capitalist reforms weren't a betray, they were a class struggle that was lost. This means that the method that was used for class struggle was faulty and needs to be reconsidered, it doesn't invalidate the entire Russian Revolution, since at least Lenin got the ball rolling so to speak.

We can't throw away our heritage, we need to seriously look at what these revolutions accomplished, where they failed, and how they ended. It is only with this knowledge that we can start once again. Otherwise we are bound to repeat the same mistakes, walk down the same blind alleys, and make the same failures over again despite our intentions.

[Luís Henrique]

http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch03.htm

This is a distinction, but not the distinction we are discussing about,

But Marx certainly distinguished a "lower phase" and an "upper phase" of communism, which is what we usually mean by "socialism" and "communism", as your quote below clearly shows:


"What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect, economically, morally, and intellectually, still stamped with the birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it emerges."

Luís Henrique

[Paul Cockshott]

In short: no. Socialism is a voluntarily associated mode of production of free producers which are not alienated from the product of their labor or isolated from the means of production. It is a globally planned stateless society of no markets, no nations, no money, no classes.

You might be interested in this thread.

http://www.revleft.com/vb/economic-nature-soviet-t177361/index.html

how on earth could it be voluntary? Nobody choses the country they are born in. Once socialism is established the only voluntary element would be whether you emigrated and the more socialist countries there are the harder that gets.

[Luís Henrique]

You cannot have a gradual transition from a class society to a classless society it is simply not possible.

I suppose this means that we cannot have a gradual transition from a classless society to a classist one? If not, why? And if so, how do we accommodate the data that tell us otherwise?

Luís Henrique

[Paul Cockshott]

http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch03.htm




No, it isn't like being pregnant at all. Communism is like being a handsome person - you have to continuously work on it.



"What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect, economically, morally, and intellectually, still stamped with the birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it emerges." (http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1875/gotha/ch01.htm)



So how's your bright idea any different from that of Kautsky or any other social-democratic opportunist out there wishfully thinking that society can somehow "creep in" to "socialism"? Guess what, it doesn't. The productive forces are long overdue for real socialism, yet nothing points that the financial oligarchy ruling the world is going to release control any time soon or that the petty bourgeois "workers" in the First world bought up by it with the imperialist rent will be willing to do anything remotely transitional until "austerity" and crises return them to real proletarian conditions.

nice one Zulu

[Luís Henrique]

NO! The changeover from private ownership to public ownership will happen during the revolutionary situation, when workers seize the means of production, establish its own organizations to run the workplaces and industries, and create congresses or delegate bodies controlled by it through which coordination can take place, and through which the workers can control their own workers militia.

So the mere seizing of property by the workers puts an end to capitalist relations of production? Does this mean that cooperatives, which are owned by workers, are already socialist? If so, how then this is not a gradual process - with capitalist and socialist relations co-existing?


It is when socialist majority have captured political power and they AT ONCE eliminate capitalism and the class relations of capitalism. They do not phase them out gradually (which is implausible for all sorts of reasons), as you are suggesting, but they do this instantaneously.

What are the capitalist relations of production? Merely the juridical property of the means of production? But in this case, how was the Soviet Union not socialist?

Luís Henrique

[RedMaterialist]

Find me an example where Marx or Engels made a distinction between the terms 'socialism' and 'communism'



In the Critique of the Gotha Programme Marx emphasized that in the transition from capitalism to communism there would still be a need for the use of capitalist forms such as unequal pay:


"What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect, economically, morally, and intellectually, still stamped with the birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it emerges..."

"But one man is superior to another physically, or mentally, and supplies more labor in the same time, or can labor for a longer time; and labor, to serve as a measure, must be defined by its duration or intensity, otherwise it ceases to be a standard of measurement....

But these defects are inevitable in the first phase of communist society as it is when it has just emerged after prolonged birth pangs from capitalist society."

Marx clearly foresees a transition from capitalism to communism in which some features of capitalism initially are retained. He did not use the term socialism to describe this phase of transition. However, the word seems to describe the "first phase of communist society" fairly well.