What's the point of minimum programs?

[Tim Cornelis]

I do not grasp the need for a minimum programme as advocated, generally, by Leninists of all stripes. Looking at the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia, the Portuguese Communist Party, French Communist Party, Communist Party of Canada, ANTARSYA, Algerian Workers' Party, we see highly reformist programmes

We have the more reformist programme (usually by 'revisionist' Marxist-Leninist parties):

Nationalisation of Key Industries and Strategic Businesses
Free Education and Health Care
Progressive Taxation

And we have the less reformist programme (e.g. ANTARSYA):

Nationalisation of Key Industries and Introducing Workers' Control
Free Education and Health Care
Raising minimum wage 1,400 euro
Lowering Work Day to 35 Hours


However, I do not understand the need for such programmes. Is the realisation of these programmes a necessity, in your view, for the advancement of socialism, and if so how? Why not simply have as your programme the conquest of political power by and for the working class through the formation of organs of workers' power?

[Per Levy]

all the partys you listed are partys who want votes in election times, and you need to give the voters something they can belive in, abolishing capitalism after winning the election is something no one belives in. that would be my guess, but it probally is just tradition because lenin or trostky or stalin said so once when they lived.

[Q]

The original meaning of the minimum (or immediate) programme was to achieve working class political power. All demands were designed to either weaken the existing state, create the space for our class to be formed as a class-collective and win the battle for democracy.

Without studying them the programmes you mention seem to be of a fundamental different character though.

I'll post some video's where this programmatic approach is being explained:

28979492

14856012

15022827

[Mytan Fadeseasy]

If a democratically elected socialist party can gain the necessary amount of control of the state that it would require to implement a minimum programme, then why not go straight to socialism?

[Yet_Another_Boring_Marxist]

If a democratically elected socialist party can gain the necessary amount of control of the state that it would require to implement a minimum programme, then why not go straight to socialism?

A democratically elected socialist party will never happen.

"But YABM, surely a party that has a Marxist ideology could theoretically win a majority in Parliament".

Correct. This is theoretically true. But ideology counts for very little. A Revolutionary party is not one that adheres to a Marxist line, but one that applies it to it's praxis. So in this sense, a revolutionary party is one that takes a leading role in class struggle and is able to prepare for the seizure of power.

However, when a Marxist party engages the working class through the ballot box as the primary method of engagement, the party takes on a different character.

First of all, the most obvious problem with this engagement is that the act of voting is inherently de-classed. It is not an action which pitches the working class against the ruling class. It is a legal act where the working class plays the game of the bourgeois by the rules of the bourgeois.Not only that, but the very engagement has little to do with class politics. Class politics is the sort of politics that can only function on the level of class, when boss kidnapping happens, we see the working class pitched against his boss, there is no rational way the boss could somehow kidnap himself for the benefit of the working class! However any class can vote for any party, A bourgeois can vote for a "socialist party", and a worker can vote for a "capitalist party". This happens all the time, only the wealthiest section of the labor aristocracy forms the bulk of Labour Party buercracy and many of their politicians are former businessmen, while on the otherhand the Tories can appeal to a white lower middle class base on the level of consumer identity and nativism. So the very act of putting a party on the ballot is an act of surrendering class Independence, as this act has nothing to do with class.

Likewise, no matter what ideology a party takes, it will have to engage politics on it's own level. Now I'd like you to turn on the TV, what are your politicians debating? Nothing really, there isn't much of a discussion about ideas . Instead politics is based on scandals, political spin, and the use of these events to create "popularity" for a politician to make a majority come the day of election. So if you want to engage the working class on the level of electoral politics, then you will need to engage them on this level.

Now I know what you are going to say before you say it. "But a socialist party will be about ideas! It will be about people, people will trust us because we aren't corrupt like bourgeois politcans"! Really? Do you think bourgeois politicians are dumb? If honesty and new ideas were really the way to win elections, then we'd see alot more of it. The reason why politics is the way it is, is because the bourgeois have money and they invest that in marketing teams to find the best ways to manipulate human psychology in order to get votes. Lying and appealing to emotions is simply a better way to win elections.

Let me demonstrate this with a real life example so you understand what I'm saying in concrete terms. J.C Penny decided one day that instead of raising prices and announcing "sales" that were actually more expensive, they'd stop manipulating their consumers and be honest with their pricing and marketing. Do you know what happened? They lost millions of dollars. Here's a link so you know what I mean, It's not that long, only a few minutes of your time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmCn-csZStA

Likewise, there is no other possible way to win an election. Either a socialist party becomes better at double talk, lies, deciete, and popularity contests, or it loses. It will never, ever, ever win an election otherwise.

And if a socialist party does all that, if it surrender's it's class politics to the ballot, if it engages in mainstream politics like it must to win elections. Then even if it wins a majority of parliament, it will cease to be a socialist party and nothing will come out of it.

So no, a socialist party can never win democratically win the state. Because to do so would be to surrender it's socialist nature.

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

Tim

Why not simply have as your programme the conquest of political power by and for the working class through the formation of organs of workers' power?

Every honest Marxist Minimum Program has its proclaimed goal the establishment of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat. This while the "maximum program" is Communism (the lower stage of). As Communists we should take it for granted that the other populist parts (lowering work day, increasing taxes on wealthy etc.; all aimed at making the party more concrete and popular) of the proclaimed Minimum program, absolutely must be on the basis of our "state within a state"(kautsky) having taken power and destroyed the bourgeois state: the dictatorship of the proletariat.

[Mytan Fadeseasy]

I disagree. Unless a socialist society is wanted and understood by the majority, it cannot happen. Anything else would result in oppression.

Socialists would not need to coerce and manipulate the proletariat if they understood and wanted socialism. Once socialists gained control democratically, the state would cease to exist.

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

I live in the U.S. I don't necessarily support such things like universal healthcare because I think it furthers the cause of socialism (though I think it might do that).

I support universal healthcare because I don't want anymore Americans to have to choose between food and medical bills. People literally become homeless in this country because they can't afford the insurance!

In cases like this, socialism is the furthest thing from my mind. Such a situation is just morally despicable and the American government should be ashamed of itself for not implementing at LEAST a program of basic medical healthcare for all Americans.

[Die Neue Zeit]

First of all, the most obvious problem with this engagement is that the act of voting is inherently de-classed. It is not an action which pitches the working class against the ruling class. It is a legal act where the working class plays the game of the bourgeois by the rules of the bourgeois. Not only that, but the very engagement has little to do with class politics. Class politics is the sort of politics that can only function on the level of class, when boss kidnapping happens, we see the working class pitched against his boss, there is no rational way the boss could somehow kidnap himself for the benefit of the working class!

Your argument was reasonable until later on. The act of voting (as opposed to spoiling) is a two-edged sword: it can be political, or it can tempt voters to not really be politicized via the branch meeting. Bossnappings are nowhere near political, though. Class is at the political level, not at the sectional level.


And if a socialist party does all that, if it surrender's it's class politics to the ballot, if it engages in mainstream politics like it must to win elections. Then even if it wins a majority of parliament, it will cease to be a socialist party and nothing will come out of it.

So no, a socialist party can never win democratically win the state. Because to do so would be to surrender it's socialist nature.

You've got the wrong argument there, actually. You're implying that it's pointless to win over majority political support.

The real argument to be put forward is that majority political support by a radicalized working class cannot legally "win" the state because to do so would involve a whole raft of constitutional amendments, if not a new constitution altogether. This support butts heads with rule-of-law constitutionalism's army, police, civil service apparatus, and so on.


I disagree. Unless a socialist society is wanted and understood by the majority, it cannot happen. Anything else would result in oppression.

Socialists would not need to coerce and manipulate the proletariat if they understood and wanted socialism. Once socialists gained control democratically, the state would cease to exist.

Your Impossibilism's very own parliamentary cretinism and rule-of-law constitutionalism are a case in point. Majority political support from the working class /= electoral majority.

[Mytan Fadeseasy]

Your Impossibilism's very own parliamentary cretinism and rule-of-law constitutionalism are a case in point. Majority political support from the working class /= electoral majority.

I take your point that the elected parliament does not at the moment represent the majority view of the population. However, as the proletariat achieves a greater class awareness, constitutional changes will occur, as the mainstream capitalist parties do their best to appeal to the sentiment of the majority and hang on to political power. That is why it is so important that the proletariat understands what socialism is, and how capitalism works. If the proletariat does not, then the reforms of the capitalist parties will appease the proletariat and prevent the full implementation of socialism.

[Fionnagáin]

I do not grasp the need for a minimum programme as advocated, generally, by Leninists of all stripes. Looking at the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia, the Portuguese Communist Party, French Communist Party, Communist Party of Canada, ANTARSYA, Algerian Workers' Party, we see highly reformist programmes




We have the more reformist programme (usually by 'revisionist' Marxist-Leninist parties):

Nationalisation of Key Industries and Strategic Businesses
Free Education and Health Care
Progressive Taxation
And we have the less reformist programme (e.g. ANTARSYA):

Nationalisation of Key Industries and Introducing Workers' Control
Free Education and Health Care
Raising minimum wage 1,400 euro
Lowering Work Day to 35 Hours
In what sense are either set of demands "more reformist" or "less reformist"? They're more or less strong, yes, but they are all demands for reform. If we're going to argue that stronger reforms are somehow less reformist, we'd find ourselves concluding the most reformist position of all would be to oppose all reforms, which is just plain silly.

Reforms are reforms, and all programmes for reforms are reformist by definition. The distinction between "reform" and "revolution" is just that, between reform and revolution, not between "bad things" and "good things". That's just a lot of posturing that serves no purpose but to excuse the essentially reformist orientation of most "revolutionary" sects.

[Die Neue Zeit]

I take your point that the elected parliament does not at the moment represent the majority view of the population.

That wasn't the point I was trying to convey. Majority political support from the working class itself isn't the same as that from the broader "electorate." Have you forgotten that the broader" electorate" includes non-working-class elements?

[blake 3:17]

@DNZ -- can we skip the class essentialism? Under your rules who does qualify as "working class"? I get really sick of workerism because it is based on fairly arbitrary distinctions, and its advocates are either people who know better in practice or are full of shit.

One pretty no brainer, which the Liberal Party has finally endorsed, is legalizing marijuana. When I was close to the NDP, and it happened to be the top, I just thought it crazy that they didn't push for it. They wouldn't touch it even if they inhaled. It'd cause a shitstorm in US-Canada relations, but what's the point of being opposition if you don't offer any opposition?

[Mytan Fadeseasy]

That wasn't the point I was trying to convey. Majority political support from the working class itself isn't the same as that from the broader "electorate." Have you forgotten that the broader" electorate" includes non-working-class elements?

A very small minority of the electorate will not be working class. What's your point? Are you trying to say that the proletariat cannot achieve a majority because they will be outnumbered by the capitalist class? That would be pure bunkum.

[Mytan Fadeseasy]

In what sense are either set of demands "more reformist" or "less reformist"? They're more or less strong, yes, but they are all demands for reform. If we're going to argue that stronger reforms are somehow less reformist, we'd find ourselves concluding the most reformist position of all would be to oppose all reforms, which is just plain silly.

Reforms are reforms, and all programmes for reforms are reformist by definition. The distinction between "reform" and "revolution" is just that, between reform and revolution, not between "bad things" and "good things". That's just a lot of posturing that serves no purpose but to excuse the essentially reformist orientation of most "revolutionary" sects.

I don't think a political group with a reformist agenda can call itself revolutionary. The fight for reforms should be left to trade unions. Socialist political groups should stand for revolution alone.

[Die Neue Zeit]

@DNZ -- can we skip the class essentialism? Under your rules who does qualify as "working class"?

Blake, it's much broader than the "manual working class," but there are obvious limits. Cops are no-go, for example. A starting point can be that "The ‘working class’ here means the whole social class dependent on the wage fund, including employed and unemployed, unwaged women ‘homemakers’, youth and pensioners. It does not just mean the employed workers, still less the ‘productive’ workers or the workers in industry." (http://www.revleft.com/vb/workforce-and-pensionersi-t154871/index.html?p=2161985)


The fight for reforms should be left to trade unions.

Before deciding on the political question of "reform or revolution," are those same trade unions capable of being political in the first place? One can't be even a reformist without being political first.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

However, when a Marxist party engages the working class through the ballot box as the primary method of engagement, the party takes on a different character.

First of all, the most obvious problem with this engagement is that the act of voting is inherently de-classed. It is not an action which pitches the working class against the ruling class. It is a legal act where the working class plays the game of the bourgeois by the rules of the bourgeois.Not only that, but the very engagement has little to do with class politics. Class politics is the sort of politics that can only function on the level of class, when boss kidnapping happens, we see the working class pitched against his boss, there is no rational way the boss could somehow kidnap himself for the benefit of the working class! However any class can vote for any party, A bourgeois can vote for a "socialist party", and a worker can vote for a "capitalist party". This happens all the time, only the wealthiest section of the labor aristocracy forms the bulk of Labour Party buercracy and many of their politicians are former businessmen, while on the otherhand the Tories can appeal to a white lower middle class base on the level of consumer identity and nativism. So the very act of putting a party on the ballot is an act of surrendering class Independence, as this act has nothing to do with class.


Does it matter that the bourgeois can vote for socialists while the proletariat can vote for capitalists? There have always been a handful of upper class folks who supported socialism and Marxism, for moral reasons, because they didn't want to be on the losing side of history, or because they were Karl Marx's best friend.

It seems that the bigger problem (which you mention) is of political strategy and tactics, as it is true that the bourgeois parties are more flexible in the electoral situation. However that doesn't make it somehow impossible to win electorally - it's just an obvious difficulty. It does seem though that at the very least you need more than just an electoral movement to win - you'd also need a strong labor and street movement.

Perhaps the biggest potential problem with Leftists winning electorally, at least in countries with a politicized military, is the issue of armed coups as shown by Allende's overthrow.

[Tim Cornelis]

In what sense are either set of demands "more reformist" or "less reformist"? They're more or less strong, yes, but they are all demands for reform. If we're going to argue that stronger reforms are somehow less reformist, we'd find ourselves concluding the most reformist position of all would be to oppose all reforms, which is just plain silly.

Reforms are reforms, and all programmes for reforms are reformist by definition. The distinction between "reform" and "revolution" is just that, between reform and revolution, not between "bad things" and "good things". That's just a lot of posturing that serves no purpose but to excuse the essentially reformist orientation of most "revolutionary" sects.

If we use a scale of reformist-radical-revolutionary then it makes sense, it's less reformist and more radical, but not revolutionary.

[Mytan Fadeseasy]

A democratically elected socialist party will never happen.

"But YABM, surely a party that has a Marxist ideology could theoretically win a majority in Parliament".

Correct. This is theoretically true. But ideology counts for very little. A Revolutionary party is not one that adheres to a Marxist line, but one that applies it to it's praxis. So in this sense, a revolutionary party is one that takes a leading role in class struggle and is able to prepare for the seizure of power.

It should be the proletariat that seize power, not a leading party.


However, when a Marxist party engages the working class through the ballot box as the primary method of engagement, the party takes on a different character.

If the party's aim is to establish socialism by helping to generate a socialist majority in the population, then how can it's character change? The party has one role, to aid the overthrow of the capitalist state by the proletariat. The party does not have any other motives, unlike other so called socialist parties that aim to establish themselves as a vanguard, which will then take control of the state 'on behalf of' the proletariat.


First of all, the most obvious problem with this engagement is that the act of voting is inherently de-classed. It is not an action which pitches the working class against the ruling class. It is a legal act where the working class plays the game of the bourgeois by the rules of the bourgeois.Not only that, but the very engagement has little to do with class politics. However any class can vote for any party, A bourgeois can vote for a "socialist party", and a worker can vote for a "capitalist party". This happens all the time, only the wealthiest section of the labor aristocracy forms the bulk of Labour Party buercracy and many of their politicians are former businessmen, while on the otherhand the Tories can appeal to a white lower middle class base on the level of consumer identity and nativism. So the very act of putting a party on the ballot is an act of surrendering class Independence, as this act has nothing to do with class.

At the time of revolution, with a class conscious proletariat, most will understand that there are ultimately just two classes, the working class, and the capitalist class. The choice will be between socialism and capitalism. Do you want to continue being a wage slave, raising wage slaves, spending your whole life as part of the mechanism of the capitalist process, or do you want to be free? As the proletariat understands and wants socialism, many capitalists may also come to understand and want socialism. We are, after all, all capitalists at the moment. Our pensions, houses, savings etc. are all making money from money. A true socialist party on the ballot is not trying to appeal to classes, but to socialists, who may come from many walks of life.


Likewise, no matter what ideology a party takes, it will have to engage politics on it's own level. Now I'd like you to turn on the TV, what are your politicians debating? Nothing really, there isn't much of a discussion about ideas . Instead politics is based on scandals, political spin, and the use of these events to create "popularity" for a politician to make a majority come the day of election. So if you want to engage the working class on the level of electoral politics, then you will need to engage them on this level.

A political party standing for socialism does not engage in populism to gain votes. It stands for socialism. If the public do not want socialism, they will not vote for it. The public needs to understand and want socialism, and not be coerced into something that calls itself socialism, but which follows a reformist agenda.


Now I know what you are going to say before you say it. "But a socialist party will be about ideas! It will be about people, people will trust us because we aren't corrupt like bourgeois politcans"! Really? Do you think bourgeois politicians are dumb? If honesty and new ideas were really the way to win elections, then we'd see alot more of it. The reason why politics is the way it is, is because the bourgeois have money and they invest that in marketing teams to find the best ways to manipulate human psychology in order to get votes. Lying and appealing to emotions is simply a better way to win elections.

A socialist revolution will come from the people, with representatives of the people standing for parliament in order to win control of state mechanisms, prior to disbanding the state. A class conscious public will know what socialism is, and want it. If their representative did not stand for socialism, they would be replaced. The main political parties in the UK stand for capitalism, a system that owes its survival to lying to the public. Therefore, it's no surprise that capitalist politicians lie. Why would a socialist politician need to lie if the public understood and wanted socialism?


Let me demonstrate this with a real life example so you understand what I'm saying in concrete terms. J.C Penny decided one day that instead of raising prices and announcing "sales" that were actually more expensive, they'd stop manipulating their consumers and be honest with their pricing and marketing. Do you know what happened? They lost millions of dollars. Here's a link so you know what I mean, It's not that long, only a few minutes of your time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmCn-csZStA

That's capitalism for you.


Likewise, there is no other possible way to win an election. Either a socialist party becomes better at double talk, lies, deciete, and popularity contests, or it loses. It will never, ever, ever win an election otherwise.

Again, a socialist party does not need to lie.


And if a socialist party does all that, if it surrender's it's class politics to the ballot, if it engages in mainstream politics like it must to win elections. Then even if it wins a majority of parliament, it will cease to be a socialist party and nothing will come out of it.

I agree. The party would not be a socialist party.


So no, a socialist party can never win democratically win the state. Because to do so would be to surrender it's socialist nature.

No socialist party would surrender its socialist nature. That would mean it was not a socialist party. However, if the majority of the public understood and wanted socialism, then a democratically elected socialist party would take control of the state, enabling the dismantling of the state, and the establishment of a socialist society.

[Mytan Fadeseasy]

Before deciding on the political question of "reform or revolution," are those same trade unions capable of being political in the first place? One can't be even a reformist without being political first.

I would suggest that there are many in the workplace who are members of unions who want reforms, but would not necessarily consider themselves as political.

As for the unions themselves, I guess they are political entities. In the UK, the unions support the Labour Party, who Lord Sainsbury considers too neoliberal, so what does that tell you about their politics? :D

[Fionnagáin]

If we use a scale of reformist-radical-revolutionary then it makes sense, it's less reformist and more radical, but not revolutionary.
The distinction between reform and revolution is qualitative, not just quantitative. You don't become more revolutionary by heaping more reforms onto the program, by demanding greater reforms, or making those demands stronger.

[Tower of Bebel]

A schematic explanation of the programme:


The minimum programme does the groundwork for the political takeover by the working class:

It intends to create a workers' movement
It weakens the bourgeois state
It acts as a counterweight to the degrading tendencies of capitalism


The minimum programme finishes what the radical bourgeois has left unfinished

The destruction of feudalism and other old remnants
The creation of a democratic republic


The minimum programme is the minimum we need in order to start working towards our real goal: communism

That is, however, the old (classic) vision of the minimum programme (pre-1914/1917/1919).

[Die Neue Zeit]

A schematic explanation of the programme:


The minimum programme does the groundwork for the political takeover by the working class:

It intends to creat a workers' movement
It weakens the bourgeois state
It acts as a counterweight to the degrading tendencies of capitalism

The minimum programme finishes what the radical bourgeois has left unfinished

The destruction of feudalism and other old remnants
The creation of a democratic republic

The minimum programme is the minimum we need to start working towards our real goal: communism

That is, however, the old (classic) vision of the minimum programme (pre-1914/1917/1919).

Comrade, the second part is a bit contentious after what you read, no? Unless by "radical bourgeois" you are referring to radical bourgeois ideas that didn't catch on at the public policymaking level (Ricardian-inspired radicals, US left-Republicans, etc.), then in that case the tasks weren't "unfinished" because they weren't really started in the first place.

The minimum program should once again be divided into political and not-so-political components. It seems the debate in this thread is on the not-so-political components, where historically economic reforms have been said components' bread and butter.


The distinction between reform and revolution is qualitative, not just quantitative. You don't become more revolutionary by heaping more reforms onto the program, by demanding greater reforms, or making those demands stronger.

That's exactly what Tim was getting at. Compare living wage job guarantees and anti-inflationary wage indexing vs. more statutory holidays. Compare educational training income vs. tuition relief or even zero-tuition policies.

[Tower of Bebel]

Comrade, the second part is a bit contentious after what you read, no? Unless by "radical bourgeois" you are referring to radical bourgeois ideas that didn't catch on at the public policymaking level (Ricardian-inspired radicals, US left-Republicans, etc.), then in that case the tasks weren't "unfinished" because they weren't really started in the first place.
I merely took the phrase from one of Lenin's replies to Martynov during the programme debat on the second congress of the Russian social democrats in 1903.

Comrade Martynov, for example, failed even to take account of earlier writings about our agrarian programme, when he spoke repeatedly about redressing an historical injustice, about an unfounded reversion to forty years ago, about destroying not the feudalism of today but that which existed in the sixties, and so on. In replying to these arguments I shall be obliged to repeat myself. If we had indeed based ourselves only on the principle of ‘redressing an historical injustice’, we should have been guided by democratic phrasemongering alone. But we refer to the survivals of the serf-owning system which exist around us, to present-day reality, to what is today hampering and holding back the proletariat’s struggle for liberation. We are accused of reverting to the hoary past. This charge merely reveals ignorance regarding the most generally known facts about the activity of the Social-Democrats in all countries. Everywhere they set themselves the aim, and work for it, to finish what the bourgeoisie has left unfinished. That is just what we are doing. And in order to do it we are obliged to revert to the past and that is what the Social-Democrats do in every country, where they are always reverting to their 1789, to their 1848. Similarly, the Russin Social-Democrats cannot but revert to their 1861, and they do this all the more vigorously and frequently because our so-called peasant ‘reform’ has brought about so little in the way of democratic changes.
http://www.marxists.org/history/international/social-democracy/rsdlp/1903/ch19.htm

[vizzek]

Before deciding on the political question of "reform or revolution," are those same trade unions capable of being political in the first place? One can't be even a reformist without being political first.

what's with all the obsession over being "political?" the world proletariat has become almost completely desensitized to politics, so what makes you think they're going to suddenly start involving themselves in the electoral process?

[Mytan Fadeseasy]

what's with all the obsession over being "political?" the world proletariat has become almost completely desensitized to politics, so what makes you think they're going to suddenly start involving themselves in the electoral process?

The proletariat need to be political to achieve socialism. The proletariat need to understand and want socialism for a socialist revolution to be successful. I would agree that many people are desensitised to politics though. We somehow need to get it out there that there is an alternative to capitalism, as I'm sure it is the continual banging of the head against the capitalist brick wall that has brought about this lack of political interest. The proletariat have given up on mainstream politics as they have realised that it changes nothing for them. Capitalism changes nothing for them, and all mainstream parties are capitalist.

[vizzek]

The proletariat need to be political to achieve socialism. The proletariat need to understand and want socialism for a socialist revolution to be successful.

not to sound rude, but this really just sounds like rhetoric to me. can you back any of this up with more convincing examples?

[Die Neue Zeit]

I merely took the phrase from one of Lenin's replies to Martynov during the programme debate on the second congress of the Russian social democrats in 1903.

http://www.marxists.org/history/international/social-democracy/rsdlp/1903/ch19.htm

Which was inspired by some comments in the then-newly-published Social Revolution, don't you think?

Anyway, the issue here is the divide between Macnair's assertions on rule-of-law constitutionalism and Kautsky's "unfinished tasks of the bourgeois revolution" (article) (http://www.cpgb.org.uk/home/weekly-worker/686/for-a-minimum-programme).


what's with all the obsession over being "political?" the world proletariat has become almost completely desensitized to politics, so what makes you think they're going to suddenly start involving themselves in the electoral process?

Politics is much broader than the electoral process, yet much narrower than anarchist assertions of "the economic is political."

Every genuine class struggle is political, not economic (Marx and Engels).

[Tower of Bebel]

Which was inspired by some comments in the then-newly-published Social Revolution, don't you think?
http://www.revleft.com/vb/picture.php?albumid=1286&pictureid=10484