"Socialists"

[Redhead]

When people talk of socialists they usually talk of either communists, or social democrats. Left and right. Revolutionary and reformist. Black and white.
But what about the ones in between...?

There are some political parties and people who call themselves socialists. They are revolutionary, and they are anti-capitalists. In other words they kinda want to establish Marx' transition to communism, which is, socialism. But they do not want the higher fase, communism. They dont want to abolish the state, they dont want a wage-less society. But they do however want worker controlled workplaces, and remove the capitalist system.

So the question here is: where to put them? And what do you think of these people?

[helot]

But what about the ones in between...? Is there really anyone inbetween? I doubt the possibility.




There are some political parties and people who call themselves socialists. They are revolutionary, and they are anti-capitalists. In other words they kinda want to establish Marx' transition to communism, which is, socialism. But they do not want the higher fase, communism. They dont want to abolish the state, they dont want a wage-less society. But they do however want worker controlled workplaces, and remove the capitalist system.

First off, Marx's transition to communism would be the "revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat", not socialism. Socialism and communism are interchangeable that is a classless and thus stateless society.

The very notion that you can retain the state in a classless society is a fundamentally flawed and idealistic conception. It has no relation to reality and fails to understand the very function of the state which is, in its most basic sense, an organ of class rule.


Also, the wages system is fundamental to capitalism. I fail to be able to conceive of a society with generalised wage labour that is not capitalist society ofc with just some wage labour it may instead be another class society like a slave society. One thing is certain though, the existence of wages presupposes the worker is alienated from what they need to produce and the product of their labour.

[Blake's Baby]

No, Marx's 'transition to communism' isn't 'socialism', because to Marx, they were the same thing.

Anyone who wants the first phase of communist society, ie a society where capitalism has been abolished but society is not yet capable of producing to satisfy all wants, but not the higher phase where all wants are satisfiable, is 'an idiot'.

Anyone who wants the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat (ie a transitional society based on capitalism in the process of being dismantled) without wanting a socialist society at all, is 'a lunatic'.

[Redhead]

Some also call themselves "democratic socialists" (not social democrats). Its more like the original reformists from the "split" of socialism, than the social democrats of today.

[Tim Cornelis]

I tend to call some of these variants bourgeois-socialist (which, to me, includes Stalinism, market socialism, and such ideologies that want to retain commodity production in socialism). I use it slightly differently than it is used in the Communist Manifesto.

Democratic socialism is generally social-democracy but opposed to neoliberalism, and was a response to neoliberalised social-democracy.

[tuwix]

When people talk of socialists they usually talk of either communists, or social democrats. Left and right. Revolutionary and reformist. Black and white.
But what about the ones in between...?

There are some political parties and people who call themselves socialists. They are revolutionary, and they are anti-capitalists. In other words they kinda want to establish Marx' transition to communism, which is, socialism. But they do not want the higher fase, communism. They dont want to abolish the state, they dont want a wage-less society. But they do however want worker controlled workplaces, and remove the capitalist system.

So the question here is: where to put them? And what do you think of these people?

Many of them are just confused. Other ones have wrong information about Marxism. People usually confuse Marxism with Leninism. There was much propaganda that was both Stalinist or bourgeois to make that confusion. So for many people Marxism is responsible for Stalin's, Mao's, Pol Pot's massive killings, famine, etc. Then it's clear for them that they don't want to support communism.
In fact, their path is path to nowhere. Efforts to humanize a capitalism are futile. It tends always to return to its naked form.

[bropasaran]

They dont want to abolish the state, they dont want a wage-less society. But they do however want worker controlled workplaces, and remove the capitalist system.
I presume you made a mistake by writing "a wage-less society" instead of "a money-less society", but nevertheless, I want to make a remark. When talking about wage, having in mind the socialist terminology as established in the 19th century, there are two things we can mean- we can refer to "wage labor" and to "wage system". Marx famously pointed out the mistake in the wording of the Gotha Program Draft which refered to "abolition of the wage system" instead talking about abolition of wage labor.

Namely, wage labor is a type of wage system- it is a wage system, but not the only one. Wage system simply means existence of explicit remuneration for work, whereas wage labor refers to the type of wage system where the workers' labor is alienated to their boss in exchange for a wage the boss gives them, wage labor being also called wage-slavery.

Meaning, you can have a society where wage labor is abolished, but there is some kind of wage system.

Take these examples of wage systems- 1) a workers' cooperative earning money on the market and it's workers dividing among themselves the earnings, 2) as mutualist would suggest- members inside an agro-industrial federation distributing their produce among themselves by mechanism of labor vauchers, 3) as anarcho-collectivists would suggest- members of the commune (or a federation of communes) distributing their produce among themselves by mechanism of labor vauchers, even 4) as some (historical and "utopian") libertarian communists would suggest- members of the commune (or a federation of communes) distributing their produce among themselves by mechanisms of labor quotas and/or rationing. In all these systems, the remuneration a worker gets could be in the terminology of the classical socialist theory called a wage, and these are all wage systems - but none of them is a system of wage labor.

[xnecron101x]

There are some political parties and people who call themselves socialists. They are revolutionary, and they are anti-capitalists. In other words they kinda want to establish Marx' transition to communism, which is, socialism. But they do not want the higher fase, communism. They dont want to abolish the state, they dont want a wage-less society. But they do however want worker controlled workplaces, and remove the capitalist system.

So the question here is: where to put them? And what do you think of these people?

My father is exactly the kind of "socialist" you are describing there. We argue constantly about this because I believe more in Marx's transition through dicatatorship of the proletariat into a communist society, but he would be content keeping a state and currency while giving the majority of power to the workers. While I don't agree with the point of view, I certainly understand it. To them, it is a compromise between the left wing wanting the abolition of the state and the right wing wanting essentially control over the lives of the workers.

I guess I'm saying it seems more realistic to them to achieve a somewhat bastardized Proletarian Dictatorship, especially through a parliamentary system. My father, for example, is a naturalized American citizen from Canada. As such, he supported the New Democratic party in Canada and somewhat reluctantly supports the Democratic party here in the states simply because there really is no representation for any kind of socialist in this country.