Spanish Revolution and the DOTP

[Kill all the fetuses!]

I wonder couldn't Communes in Spain during the Revolution of 1936, especially in countryside, be considered as the dictatorship of the proletariat? Ignoring rather minuscule role of the State in the agrarian communes, the entire control of the economy and society were in the hands of democratically elected Anarchist communes, even though there were individualists within these communities.

This interpretation of the DOPT should obviously be acceptable to Anarchists. Would it be acceptable to Marcixsts, Communists and what have you? If so, what is then the problem between Anarchists and the others regarding the DOPT?

For me it seems rather obvious that Marx and Engels meant something like this sort of dictatorship in the Manifesto, not the outright dictatorship of the chosen ones, i.e. Vanguard Party. Or I simply don't get something?

[RedMaterialist]

I wonder couldn't Communes in Spain during the Revolution of 1936, especially in countryside, be considered as the dictatorship of the proletariat? Ignoring rather minuscule role of the State in the agrarian communes, the entire control of the economy and society were in the hands of democratically elected Anarchist communes, even though there were individualists within these communities.

This interpretation of the DOPT should obviously be acceptable to Anarchists. Would it be acceptable to Marcixsts, Communists and what have you? If so, what is then the problem between Anarchists and the others regarding the DOPT?

For me it seems rather obvious that Marx and Engels meant something like this sort of dictatorship in the Manifesto, not the outright dictatorship of the chosen ones, i.e. Vanguard Party. Or I simply don't get something?

I would say that the anarchists would be violently opposed to being considered dictators of any kind. IMO that is why they lost the Spanish Civil War: liberals like Orwell refused to submit to the authority of military command. The Republican forces were always splitting into various factions (sound familiar?) and even fighting against each other. It's as though the Left Communist Tendency in Stalingrad had decided that the Red Army was not following the correct socialist theoretical path and stopped fighting the Germans to fight the "revisionists."

[Kill all the fetuses!]

I would say that the anarchists would be violently opposed to being considered dictators of any kind. IMO that is why they lost the Spanish Civil War: liberals like Orwell refused to submit to the authority of military command. The Republican forces were always splitting into various factions (sound familiar?) and even fighting against each other. It's as though the Left Communist Tendency in Stalingrad had decided that the Red Army was not following the correct socialist theoretical path and stopped fighting the Germans to fight the "revisionists."

Ultimately they did submit. I don't think that the reason they lost the war was as simple as this one nor I think this was the reason why they lost. I think the inefficiency of militias is also quite exaggerated, but nevermind that.

My question is not whether Anarchists would consider themselves dictators or not, my point is whether the organization structure of Spanish communes could be considered as DOPT.

[Blake's Baby]

Well, obviously, RedMaterialist is giving his own very distorted Stalinist take on things. 'If only this silly Liberal Anarchists, Zinovievists and Trotskyists had listened to Uncle Joe instead of trying to do things their own way! What they should have done was bow down to their own 'Left Wing' government like Stalin wanted, in order to appease the foreign policy aims of the Soviet Union!' (which is what they did, and why the 'revolution' was drowned in blood).

The Anarchists should never have joined the Republican Government, they should have deposed them and I won't make any bones about it, shot them if necessary. And they should have shot the Stalinists as well. Because sure as eggs is eggs, the Stalinists would have them shot in turn (which is what did happen). But because they rejected 'politics' they didn't see deposing the government as necessary, and allowed it to function - then some members of the CNT even joined it.

Yes, in a sense, the Communes could be considered as a form of the DotP. Not a particularly good form and they were rapidly assimilated back into a war between different factions of the bourgeoisie; but yes, I think there were genuine revolutionary currents (even if confused) in the war in Spain, and I think that self-organisation of the proletariat is the revolution, so the Spanish proletariat organising itself is the revolution in embryonic form.

[Geiseric]

I would say that the anarchists would be violently opposed to being considered dictators of any kind. IMO that is why they lost the Spanish Civil War: liberals like Orwell refused to submit to the authority of military command. The Republican forces were always splitting into various factions (sound familiar?) and even fighting against each other. It's as though the Left Communist Tendency in Stalingrad had decided that the Red Army was not following the correct socialist theoretical path and stopped fighting the Germans to fight the "revisionists."

That's a terrible example, Orwell wasn't an anarchist, and you need to read history books not written by stalinoids.

[Kill all the fetuses!]

Yes, in a sense, the Communes could be considered as a form of the DotP. Not a particularly good form and they were rapidly assimilated back into a war between different factions of the bourgeoisie; but yes, I think there were genuine revolutionary currents (even if confused) in the war in Spain, and I think that self-organisation of the proletariat is the revolution, so the Spanish proletariat organising itself is the revolution in embryonic form.

Could you please clarify on the bolded parts? As far as I'm concerned the agrarian communes were functioning perfectly well, considering the circumstances and even if one would ignore the circumstances, the organizational efficiency was incredible, as far as my knowledge goes. It worked like that until Stalinist attacks and even beyond that. I am not sure what you are referring to when you say "Not a particularly good form and they were rapidly assimilated back into a war between different factions of the bourgeoisie".

Also, would love if you clarified the part about revolutionary currents being confused. Thanks.

[Blake's Baby]

It is 'the circumstances' that provide the meat of the problem.

Let's say the revolution occurs in ideal conditions. The working rapidly takes over several advanced industrial countries and then very rapidly spreads the revolution everywhere with little actual bloodshed and destruction. That's scenario A.

Then let's say the revolution breaks out in fits and starts, goes a way in one place and is beaten back, then another place and is beaten back, each time establishing - something, even if only lessons for what can go wrong - and each time the proletariat perhaps learns (or perhaps doesn't) but each time the bourgeoisie learns too. The unsuccessful revolutions are drowned in blood. That's scenario B.

Which of these scenarios most closely corresponds with the situation in Spain in the 1930s? I'd say scenario B is much closer than scenario A.

Beyond that, the question of the form and content of the communes, the confusion of the revolutionary currents and the bourgeois nature of the war are linked.

The communes, indeed the Anarchist movement in Spain and the working class as a whole were revolutionary only when they opposed both the fascists and the Republican government (and its Stalinist allies).

The USSR was a capitalist and imperialist state and its auxilliaries in Spain were carrying out the foreign policy of that state, that objective being the establishment of a 'left-liberal' government in Spain, not a revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat (which would have, by its example, exposed the Soviet Union for what it was, and also terrified and possibly de-stabilised France, the Soviet Union's most useful ally).

The Spanish Republican state was a murderous and anti-worker state (as all states are of course, see the Soviet Union as an example) which had, only a few short years before Franco's revolt, been happily machine-gunning striking miners. This is the state that the 'revolutionary' currents wanted to support, on the grounds that the people who were shooting us yesterday are not as bad as the people who might shoot us tomorrow.

This is why I say the revolutionary currents were confused. They mostly ditched opposition to the Republican government in order to join the 'anti-fascist alliance'. As this anti-fascist front included the Stalinists and liberals, it was a bourgeois formation. True, Durutti did advocate going and shooting them all, but he never did and after his death the Durutti Column was integrated into the new Republican Army - itself pretty much a creature of the Stalinists.

The communes themselves may have increased production but they did it at the expense of workers' self-organisation. They were also very efficiently producing for a war which I've already explained I see as being bourgeois. So they were integrated into capitalist production and not 'socialist' even though they might in some ways point towards the organisation of a social society.

[Thirsty Crow]

But because they rejected 'politics' they didn't see deposing the government as necessary, and allowed it to function - then some members of the CNT even joined it.

Not some, but the impressive majority of the CNT-FAI, with the notable exception of the Friends of Durrutti group.

[Blake's Baby]

Not some, but the impressive majority of the CNT-FAI, with the notable exception of the Friends of Durrutti group.

I meant the 'Anarchist Ministers' of which there were I believe 6. The majority of the CNT-FAI may have joined the 'anti-fascist committees' or whatever they were called, and so participated in a cross-class movement but that's not exactly 'joining the government'. It is however certainly assimilating the Anarchist organisations into support for the bourgeois state (and by extension the USSR's foreign policy).

[Kill all the fetuses!]

The Spanish Republican state was a murderous and anti-worker state (as all states are of course, see the Soviet Union as an example) which had, only a few short years before Franco's revolt, been happily machine-gunning striking miners. This is the state that the 'revolutionary' currents wanted to support, on the grounds that the people who were shooting us yesterday are not as bad as the people who might shoot us tomorrow.

Oh, now I see where you're coming from. I more or less agree with your sentiment.



The communes themselves may have increased production but they did it at the expense of workers' self-organisation. They were also very efficiently producing for a war which I've already explained I see as being bourgeois. So they were integrated into capitalist production and not 'socialist' even though they might in some ways point towards the organisation of a social society.

Now again, I'm not sure what exactly you are talking about. It is true that production increased in industrial collectives, however, they weren't as self-organized as agrarian ones due to their proximity to the State apparatus and necessary production for the front, I suppose.

But I'm not sure how your argument ties with the agrarian communes, because as far as I have read about it, these communes were a true manifestation of self-organization of peasants. Libertarian democracy, semi-autonomous units on a small scale which made such democracy possible etc etc. It's true that production increased, but I don't see how did it come "at the expense of workers' self-organization". It wasn't merely about the production, the whole society and social relations were changed. They did produce for war, which, of course, was a necessity considering the circumstances, they did produce for exports, but - and I might be asking due to my ignorance - but where a better example of a communist society was produced?

[Blake's Baby]

...

Now again, I'm not sure what exactly you are talking about. It is true that production increased in industrial collectives, however, they weren't as self-organized as agrarian ones due to their proximity to the State apparatus and necessary production for the front, I suppose...

Only necessary production because they had sacrificed themselves to the bourgeois state and its Stalinist henchmen, that's the point. They were no longer producing for themselves, they were producing for their own executioners.


...
But I'm not sure how your argument ties with the agrarian communes, because as far as I have read about it, these communes were a true manifestation of self-organization of peasants. Libertarian democracy, semi-autonomous units on a small scale which made such democracy possible etc etc. It's true that production increased, but I don't see how did it come "at the expense of workers' self-organization". It wasn't merely about the production, the whole society and social relations were changed. They did produce for war, which, of course, was a necessity considering the circumstances, they did produce for exports, but - and I might be asking due to my ignorance - but where a better example of a communist society was produced?

No it wasn't 'a necessity in the circumstances', it was a bourgeois and imperialist war. When the communes agreed to be part of the republican government's war effort they signed their own death warrants as autonomous actors in the revolution. They were subsumed into the bourgeois state, no matter how comparatively pleasant (or not) production was.

Where was a better communist society produced, in modern times? Well, I think it's fair to say that only the revolutionary wave of 1917-27 has gone further than Spain, but that too was very rapidly defeated. But Russia and Spain are really all we have as examples.

[Kill all the fetuses!]

Only necessary production because they had sacrificed themselves to the bourgeois state and its Stalinist henchmen, that's the point. They were no longer producing for themselves, they were producing for their own executioners.

Yes, that was true for industrial communes, not for agrarian ones though.



No it wasn't 'a necessity in the circumstances', it was a bourgeois and imperialist war. When the communes agreed to be part of the republican government's war effort they signed their own death warrants as autonomous actors in the revolution. They were subsumed into the bourgeois state, no matter how comparatively pleasant (or not) production was.


Okay... The war itself wasn't necessary, but the fact is that it occurred and the communes were threatened by the fascists - you have to defend yourself, right? Sending some food and whatnot to your comrades and defending yourself from fascists is a necessity under these circumstances, I don't understand how can you say that it wasn't necessary without invoking some weird Ghandian ultimate pacifist thing.

Considering the circumstances and using hindsight, the death warrant was written before the Social Revolution, it didn't really matter whether they support the war effort or not. I mean, if the communes had refused to participate in the war (whatever that means), how could they had survived the fascist onslaught after the civil war? What would had changed by such a decision?

[Blake's Baby]

Yes, that was true for industrial communes, not for agrarian ones though...

The agricultural communes were unaffected by the war?


Okay... The war itself wasn't necessary, but the fact is that it occurred and the communes were threatened by the fascists - you have to defend yourself, right? Sending some food and whatnot to your comrades and defending yourself from fascists is a necessity under these circumstances, I don't understand how can you say that it wasn't necessary without invoking some weird Ghandian ultimate pacifist thing...

The Stalinists and the Republican government weren't 'comrades', that's my point. The anti-fascist committees were the Spanish state and the Soviet Union's auxilliaries co-opting the communes and pretty much the entire Anarchist movement over towards the bourgeoisie.

You don't 'defend' yourself by giving food to your killers, whether they're Franco's forces or Stalin's.



...Considering the circumstances and using hindsight, the death warrant was written before the Social Revolution, it didn't really matter whether they support the war effort or not. I mean, if the communes had refused to participate in the war (whatever that means), how could they had survived the fascist onslaught after the civil war? What would had changed by such a decision?

They couldn't. Who said they could? But because they couldn't survive anyway, it was right to surrender to the Stalinists, is that what you're saying? If that's the case, then why not join Franco's forces instead?

"When the worker is being beaten it does not comfort him that the stick is called 'the people's stick'."

My contention is that the situation in Spain was only revolutionary when the working class was fighting for itself, not for the Republic or the Soviet Union., Yes, it needed to resist the military advances of the Fascists; what it should also have done is fought the Stalinist and liberal murderers who were 'on its own side'. The fact that it couldn't survive doesn't change the fact that joining one gang of murderers to fight another gang of murderers leaves you at the mercy of a gang of murderers - whoever wins.

Can you show me where I said at any point that the communes should have 'refused to participate in the war'? I said in the first post I made that they didn't take the war far enough, they should have fought the Fascists and the Republic. I referred to the communes being part of 'the republic's war effort'. I'm not sure why you're taking my meaning as being the opposite of what it is.

[Geiseric]

The Spanish revolutionaries didn't support morroccos independence, and didn't nationalize the financial system, due to the influence of imperialism. This was never realized until too late. Moroccos independence movement would of cut off Francos base of support, and the financial bourgeois would more or less support Franco as soon as the territories they were located in were conquered.

[Blake's Baby]

I think you are over-generous with your use of the term 'revolutionaries' Geiseric. The Spanish government didn't proclaim Morocco's independence. Against what was the Spanish government 'revolting'?

[Kill all the fetuses!]

The agricultural communes were unaffected by the war?

They were, my point was the production was carried out solely for the purposes of war only in industrial cities, in the countryside the communes produced primarily for themselves, sending some part to the front.


The Stalinists and the Republican government weren't 'comrades', that's my point. The anti-fascist committees were the Spanish state and the Soviet Union's auxilliaries co-opting the communes and pretty much the entire Anarchist movement over towards the bourgeoisie.

You don't 'defend' yourself by giving food to your killers, whether they're Franco's forces or Stalin's.

Ah, now I think I get it. That's true, but you also must recognize that Stalinists didn't come into play before 1937, if I am not wrong, and also the fact that communes in the country side did fight Stalinists whenever they attacked them post-May Days and they in large part refused to be controlled by the government.

When I said "comrades", I was referring specifically to Anarchists and others fighting in the front, oftentimes from the same villages, but I guess I see your point now.


My contention is that the situation in Spain was only revolutionary when the working class was fighting for itself, not for the Republic or the Soviet Union., Yes, it needed to resist the military advances of the Fascists; what it should also have done is fought the Stalinist and liberal murderers who were 'on its own side'. The fact that it couldn't survive doesn't change the fact that joining one gang of murderers to fight another gang of murderers leaves you at the mercy of a gang of murderers - whoever wins.

Can you show me where I said at any point that the communes should have 'refused to participate in the war'? I said in the first post I made that they didn't take the war far enough, they should have fought the Fascists and the Republic. I referred to the communes being part of 'the republic's war effort'. I'm not sure why you're taking my meaning as being the opposite of what it is.

Sorry, I didn't understand you correctly then. Now I do agree with you. But then again, like I said before, rank-and-file Anarchists did fight back Stalinists and Republicans, they even defied their own leadership in the government, I think that's what May Days and post-May Days events were all about. Was it too late and did they do so only after being attacked to begin with? Absolutely.

So I think that ultimately I agree with you, I simply didn't understand you at first. Thanks.

[Geiseric]

I think you are over-generous with your use of the term 'revolutionaries' Geiseric. The Spanish government didn't proclaim Morocco's independence. Against what was the Spanish government 'revolting'?

The independence was but another issue along with nationalizing the financial system that the anarchists, socialists, and communists ignored when they had control over the republican territory. This was due to many reasons, none of them valid in terms of revolutionary strategy.

[fear of a red planet]

The interesting question here is not Spain per se, but anarchists and the DOTP.

My view is that anarchists rightly will oppose the concept of DOTP because it is entirely bound up with the dictatorship of the revolutionary party and that people who believe in DOTP tend to believe that their party is the only legitimate leading organ of the proletariat.

However that is not to say that anarchist influenced communities or federations of communities would not be "allowed" to act in a tightly coordinated and forceful way to project their power including over others if required.

It is concievable I suppose that such a situation could be described as a dictatorship especially by those opposed to it. And indeed it might feel like one to those on the other side.

So to sum up - yes to workers uniting and using their combined power to excercise their will, no to single party rule.

[Blake's Baby]

The interesting question here is not Spain per se, but anarchists and the DOTP.

My view is that anarchists rightly will oppose the concept of DOTP because it is entirely bound up with the dictatorship of the revolutionary party and that people who believe in DOTP tend to believe that their party is the only legitimate leading organ of the proletariat...

Except it isn't, and though some might, some of us don't. By definition 'the dictatorship of the revolutionary party' cannot be the dictatorship of the proletariat, and if such a thing emerges it is quite obviously the counter-revolution.

The working class must exercise its dictatorship, it's the only class that can while still liberating humanity - I'm with Rudolf Rocker on this one, 'everything for the councils! Nothing above them!'


...However that is not to say that anarchist influenced communities or federations of communities would not be "allowed" to act in a tightly coordinated and forceful way to project their power including over others if required.

It is concievable I suppose that such a situation could be described as a dictatorship especially by those opposed to it. And indeed it might feel like one to those on the other side...

Because it is one.


...So to sum up - yes to workers uniting and using their combined power to excercise their will, no to single party rule.

Well exactly. Or any-party rule.

[human strike]

Interestingly more than a few anarchists at the time conceived of libertarian communism as a transition period leading to "free communism". When viewed this way, in what sense is libertarian communism* not the DOTP?

*Not that that is necessarily what was established in Spain, though it was certainly an expressed aim and it has been claimed many times that is what was established.

[Die Neue Zeit]

The Anarchists should never have joined the Republican Government, they should have deposed them and I won't make any bones about it, shot them if necessary. And they should have shot the Stalinists as well. Because sure as eggs is eggs, the Stalinists would have them shot in turn (which is what did happen). But because they rejected 'politics' they didn't see deposing the government as necessary, and allowed it to function - then some members of the CNT even joined it.

Yes, in a sense, the Communes could be considered as a form of the DotP. Not a particularly good form and they were rapidly assimilated back into a war between different factions of the bourgeoisie; but yes, I think there were genuine revolutionary currents (even if confused) in the war in Spain, and I think that self-organisation of the proletariat is the revolution, so the Spanish proletariat organising itself is the revolution in embryonic form.

I'm not as generous in my assessment, Blake. To what extent did the Spanish Communes exhibit class independence, a foundational feature of a DOTP? I wouldn't consider their actions in relation to the Republicans and the Popular Front lot to be consistent with class independence.

[Skyhilist]

This is the good thing about scientific socialism - we can use historical mistakes made by the CNT-FAI and learn from those mistakes so that they don't happen in the future. Each attempt at revolution should be more evolved than the last. The CNT-FAI were quite evolved for their time, but like any movement facing what they were, was prone to mistakes. Of course, we have the luxury of hindsight bias.

[Blake's Baby]

I'm not sure that were so evolved. They didn't have as developed a political perspective as the Bolsheviks, and the Bolsheviks made catastrophic mistakes. This is why I said that the gropings towards the DotP that were made in Spain were 'not a particularly good form and rapidly assimilated' - more rapidly than in Russia.

But whatever mistakes were made by the Bolsheviks or the CNT-FAI pale into relative insignificance when stood against the massive fact of the lack of a world revolution.

Could the overthrow of the Republican government have precipitated a similar situation in France as Stalin feared? Possibly, but it doesn't seem very likely to me. I think it has to be admitted as a possibility though. Without a revolution in France, a revolution in Spain is doomed. If Spain = Russia here, France = Germany. What happened in Spain can perhaps be likened to Russia during 1917 - the working class begins the process of revolution, but never pushes beyond (let's say) July 1917. Instead it gets caught up in defence of the Provisional Government (= the Republican government). Too crass to suggest Caballero was the Spanish Kerensky?

That of course would mean Stalin's position was the same as it had been before April 1917.

[CyM]

I think there were elements of dual power, but those elements never fully developed into the dictatorship of the proletariat largely because of the anarchist prejudice against establishing a state. Another important element is the lack of a theoretically grounded revolutionary leadership with a mass base. No one was capable of challenging the traitors in the leadership, because of this. Andres Nin is singlehandedly responsible for this deplorable situation. In the beginning, the Stalinists had no base whatsoever. Even the POUM was bigger than them, with a couple of thousand. The first revolutionary waves were crashing into the Socialist party and rocking it. The youth wing was radicalized rapidly by these big historic events. It came into conflict with the reformist leadership. They came to Nin and invited him to join, begged him to come and teach them. Basically, a youth wing 100,000 strong, arms in hand, came to the leader of an organization of maybe 2000 and begged him to lead them.

He refused. He said they would have to quit their organization and join him.

Trotsky called it a betrayal of the revolution.

Of course, having been rejected, they went and sought out the Communist party. They would become the mass base that the stalinists later used to divert and crush the movement. Nin has this guilt to bear.

[Kill all the fetuses!]

Could the overthrow of the Republican government have precipitated a similar situation in France as Stalin feared?

That of course would mean Stalin's position was the same as it had been before April 1917.

I've read plenty of times some short comments on Stalin fearing a success of Spanish Revolution. Could you please elaborate little bit on these points that I quoted and suggest a more explicit/documented text on the Stalin-Spanish Revolution relationship?


I think there were elements of dual power, but those elements never fully developed into the dictatorship of the proletariat largely because of the anarchist prejudice against establishing a state.

Well, my point is asking this question had exactly this prejudice in mind. Yes, anarchists wouldn't like a DoPT in the form of a state, so could a DoPT be established through self-organized, horizontally controlled communes? If you take a territorial unit in Spain, not the country or Catalonia as a whole, the communes did take power over that region, suppressing any capitalists relations without violence. I created this thread exactly because it seemed to me that such a thing looks like an Anarchist DoPT.


Another important element is the lack of a theoretically grounded revolutionary leadership with a mass base. No one was capable of challenging the traitors in the leadership, because of this.

But the same is true for any leftist current, right? Like nobody was capable of challenging Soviet bureaucracy as well.


Andres Nin is singlehandedly responsible for this deplorable situation.

Could you please suggest a reading on the topic, because thus far I haven't head about these actions of Nin. Thanks.

[CyM]

Unfortunately, pathfinder books, the American SWP, are anti-communist bastards who threatened to sue marxists.org for copyright infringement over Trotsky's writings of the 1930's. So the marxist internet archive is missing a huge chunk of what he wrote in the 30's, including much of his stuff on spain.

Pierre Broué is a Marxist historian who quotes from some of those letters in this article (https://www.marxists.org/archive/broue/1983/12/carrillo.html). First two paragraphs, though the article itself is not bad, just a bit long.

I'll try to find something better.

[Devrim]

Unfortunately, pathfinder books, the American SWP, are anti-communist bastards who threatened to sue marxists.org for copyright infringement over Trotsky's writings of the 1930's. So the marxist internet archive is missing a huge chunk of what he wrote in the 30's, including much of his stuff on spain.

Doesn't copyright expire 70 years after the author's death?

Devrim

[MaximMK]

This is the first time i hear about an "Anarchist dictatorship of the proletariat" don't they renounce any dictatorship and authority and don't see the working class as the leaders of the revolution

[CyM]

Doesn't copyright expire 70 years after the author's death?

Devrim

Yeah, bit by bit that period is reaching public domain. But theres a collection of thousands of articles which hasn't hit the internet yet. Or it did, and then had to be taken down. Fucking SWP.

[Blake's Baby]

I've read plenty of times some short comments on Stalin fearing a success of Spanish Revolution. Could you please elaborate little bit on these points that I quoted and suggest a more explicit/documented text on the Stalin-Spanish Revolution relationship?...

I don't know of any documentary sources, but it has been expressed as an explanation for Russia's relationship with the Republican government an the 'left' parties in Spain, and it fits best with the facts I think.

Basically the idea is that Stalin feared de-stabilisation in France, because the only thing that stops Germany attacking Russia is the knowledge that France can attack it. So what Stalin wanted in France was a friendly but stable centre-left government.

Because he wanted a stable France, he couldn't risk a potential revolution in Spain spreading. He was prepare to sacrifice the revolution in Spain for the stability of France and a counterweight to Germany.


This is the first time i hear about an "Anarchist dictatorship of the proletariat" don't they renounce any dictatorship and authority and don't see the working class as the leaders of the revolution

They renounce the language, they renounce the theory, I'm pretty certain that in practice most Anarchists support what Marxists see as the dictatorship of the proletariat. And most anarchists see the proletariat as being the revolutionary class.

[CyM]

I actually think it went further than that. Spain is where the bureaucracy became fully conscious of its interests, understanding that a successful revolution, especially a healthy one, would provoke political revolution in Russia to retake the planned economy from the bureaucratic caste. Up till Spain, the failed revolutions were due to straight up incompetence. In Spain, they actively worked to prevent betray the workers.

Sent from my SGH-I337M using Tapatalk

[Trap Queen Voxxy]

No, apparently "proletarian dictatorship," means representative democracy, state centralization, mass bureaucratization, and other fun stuff that further alienates the worker from political authority.

[Skyhilist]

No, apparently "proletarian dictatorship," means representative democracy, state centralization, mass bureaucratization, and other fun stuff that further alienates the worker from political authority.

It means different things to different Marxists so it's hard to place an objective definition on "proletarian dictatorship." It's very annoying.

[Comrade Chernov]

I would say that the anarchists would be violently opposed to being considered dictators of any kind. IMO that is why they lost the Spanish Civil War: liberals like Orwell refused to submit to the authority of military command. The Republican forces were always splitting into various factions (sound familiar?) and even fighting against each other. It's as though the Left Communist Tendency in Stalingrad had decided that the Red Army was not following the correct socialist theoretical path and stopped fighting the Germans to fight the "revisionists."

It was more like the Soviets mass-murdered the Anarchists because they Weren't Communist Enough©.