diffrent kinds of left

[che]

i know that there are diffrent kinds of left...comunist/leninist/anarcist...
can someone explain or give me a link to learn about each one?

[More Fire for the People]

In the left there are two primary groups: Marxist and non-Marxists.
Marxists are anarcho-communist, left communist, Leninist, Stalininst, Maoist, and Trotskyist while non-Marxists tend to be libertarian socialist, revolutionary anarchist, post-left anarchist, and utopian socialist.

[LSD]

Alright, let's start with Anarchism and classical communism.

The difference between classical communism and anarchism is method not ideology. Both aim to create a state-less classless society, the disagreement is in how to attain it.

Classical communists (Marxists, Marxist-Leninists, Trotskyists, Maoists) believe that in order to achieve a communist society, a transitional "socialist" state is required first. This state will serve as an intermediate period durring which the society can transition to a more communal way of working, thinking, and operating.

Theoretically, this state is supposed to operate on the principle of the "Dictatorship of the Proletariat", meaning that, ideally, all workers, and eventually all people will participate in decision making in the transitional state. Unfortunately, every time this has been attempted this transitional state has been run by authoritarian party establishments that largely ignore the wishes of the general population.

Within classical communism are subsets such as Trotskyists, Maoists, and traditional Marxists.

Leninists/Trotskyists generally believe that the Soviet Union was initially on the right path, but became corrupted after Lenin's death and Stalin's ascension. They hold that a transitional state can and must be created and that the Leninist model is a good example to follow. They often claim that had Lenin lived or had Trotksy come to power the USSR would have become truly democratic, but that Stalin prevented this from happening.

Stalinists/Maoists hold that Stalin did not corrupt the Soviet Union and that under his leadership the USSR was a genuine workers state which was only corrupted after his death. They further hold that Maoist China before 1976 was also a genuine socialist state which was on the roard towards communism. They believe that both are realistic models for furture revolutions.

More traditional Marxists claim that the USSR was not a true socialist state and that Lenin's example should not be followed, but that a socialist transitional state is required, just not like the ones that Russia and China had.


Anarchism, by contrast, contends that a classless, stateless society can be created immediately following the revolution without the need for a transitional state. Anarchists do not claim that this change will be instantaneous but that while some adjustment time will no doubt be needed, our intention from the begining must the elimination of all coercive state and class institutions, not, as classical communists would propose, to use them for our purpose.

Anarchists believe that the institution of the state, ultimately, is reactionary in and of itself and cannot be used to further progressive means. It must, rather, be destroyed alltogether at the earliest possible time.

Within Anarchism are subsets such as Anarcho-Syndicalism and Anarcho-Collectivism which generally agree on the final goal but disagree as to the best method of achieving it.

Che-Lives Dictionary (http://www.revolutionaryleft.com/index.php?showtopic=25786)

[slim]

Is leftism an existing ideology that could unite the left under one banner or just a word coined by the cappies to have a go at freedom?

[LSD]

Is leftism an existing ideology that could unite the left under one banner or just a word coined by the cappies to have a go at freedom?

A bit of both, I suppose.

"leftism", basically, describes everything that is to the left of the traditional political left-right spectrum. Unfortunately, that left-right spectrum is a deeply flawed model and many of the "left" ideologies, while sharing similarities, are fundamentally opposed to one another (e.g., Anarchism and Stalinism).

[TC]

The difference between classical communism and anarchism is method not ideology. Both aim to create a state-less classless society, the disagreement is in how to attain it.



I really disagree. The 'aim' of Communists isn't to create a classless, state-less society, the aim is to overthrow exploitive forms of government and replace them with more democratic, egalitarian proletarian forms of government that prevent exploitation...a classless state-less society is simply the theoretical consequence of unopposed proletarian government. Thats to say, since worker's states, like all states, are instruments to protect the economic dominance of their ruling class, in their case the working class, from other classes, such as capitalists, workers states are simply expected to disolve themselves as a natural result of eliminating all other classes (with no other classes to try to horde capital, anything beyond community level governence would serve no purpose, like if there were no poor people to steal rich people's money, they wouldn't need so many cops). That doesn't make a state-less, classless society, a goal or aim, its more like a possible side effect.

But i think the biggest ideological difference is that Communists use Marixst analysis (or at least they claim to, a lot simply regurgitate what they understand to be Marx or Trotsky or Mao's analysis as if the world hasn't changed at all since then) to evaluate societies and social relations between classes and individuals based on the real power dynamics created by the production, possession, and control of capital.

For anarchists on the other hand, the cheif aim is percisely to eliminate all authority of any sort...it essentially rejects the possibility of 'democratic government' or, feels it has to in order to justify its rejection of any type of government. At the same time Anarchists seem to allow psudo-state type organizations that most political scientists, sociologists, anthropologists, ect. would consider states, like the Paris Commune, but since they have no systematic approach to evaluating societies the way Communists do they can't make comparative politics type distinctions.



Theoretically, this state is supposed to operate on the principle of the "Dictatorship of the Proletariat", meaning that, ideally, all workers, and eventually all people will participate in decision making in the transitional state.

Thats really not true either. One doesn't have to participate in decision making in order to ensure that decisions are made to benefit them. I don't think the government's of capitalist state's consult with every board member, ceo and corporate president before passing laws or making executive decisions yet they seem to do a pretty good job of influencing the process to ensure that it benefits them. The same is true in a socialist state. Of course workers vote for their government, but they vote in capitalist states too (though workers states like Cuba have much more direct accountability to the electorate then capitalist states like the United States), their power relies on their control of the means of production, the factories and the farms, so that they control the wealth of the country and therefore the government that relies on their economy to run itself, just as capitalist and feudal governments do. This is a more marxist perspective then thinking that power depends on direct participation.


Unfortunately, every time this has been attempted this transitional state has been run by authoritarian party establishments that largely ignore the wishes of the general population.

That's a completely propagandistic claim. How do you determine that such parties 'ignore the wishes of the general population.' I don't think western anarchists saying that governments they barely know anything about are 'authoritarian' counts. You can try to repeat it under the notion that an unsubstantiated claim repeated enough times will seem like general knowlege that must have some evidence, it worked for 'Saddam has weapons of mass destruction' and i guess it must have worked for you on this issue, but its not a real argument.


Leninists/Trotskyists generally believe that the Soviet Union was initially on the right path, but became corrupted after Lenin's death and Stalin's ascension.

No thats what Trotskyists believe. Marxism-Leninism includes all major branchs of Marxism other then so called 'left communism' and 'anarcho-communism', the trotskyists don't define 'leninism' any more then Maoists or Eurocommunists or 'Soviet-Revisionists'.


They hold that a transitional state can and must be created and that the Leninist model is a good example to follow.

Only orthodox Trotskyist's think that the october revolution's model is the only model, most mainstream Communists (and by 'mainstream' i mean the type that have been in power or are in power somewhere, not kids selling newspapers in SanFransisco) accept that there are many different methods of revolution depending on the conditions of the particular state in question and that the class and social character of the revolutionary state is much more significant in reality then whether or not it came from a "marxist-leninist vanguard party."


Stalinists/Maoists...

I'm sure i've made this point before, but "Stalinism" is not an ideological position because Stalin made no theoretical contributions and i think it would be impossible to find a self described 'Stalinist' beyond a Marxist-Leninist with a positive assessment of Stalin's role in history. Maoists have a positive assessment of Stalin's policies, but its irrelevant to their contemporary position because they don't use any of Stalin's theories (as he didn't come up with anything new beyond marxism-leninism), they use Mao's theories on things like revisionism, class struggle within the party, people's war, cultural revolution, ect. Thats why they're called "maoists" :-p.


More traditional Marxists claim that the USSR was not a true socialist state and that Lenin's example should not be followed, but that a socialist transitional state is required, just not like the ones that Russia and China had.


"traditional Marxists", what are you talking about? Marxim-Leninism is the only influencial political strain of Marxim, it is 'traditional marxism.'

I also think its interesting that people talk about trotskyists and maoists but totally ignore more recent influencial versions of Marxism-Leninism, such as the so called 'revisionist' Marxism-Leninism of the Soviet Union between 1953 and 1986, "Socialism with Chinese Characteristics" which is numerically speaking the version of Marxism-Leninism with the greatest number of contemporary adherents, Eurocommunism and New Leftism which were recent marxist-leninist movements of the West that were much more significant at their heights (and the former arguably still is) then trotskyism and maoism.

[LSD]

I really disagree. The 'aim' of Communists isn't to create a classless, state-less society, the aim is to overthrow exploitive forms of government and replace them with more democratic, egalitarian proletarian forms of government that prevent exploitation...a classless state-less society is simply the theoretical consequence of unopposed proletarian government.

No it isn't. It's the point of "unopposed proletarian government".

The socialist state was never meant to be a permanent solution, from Marx's own writings it is clear that he envisaged it as a transitional stage only.

Far from being a "theoretical consequence", it is the fundamental purpose of a proletarian revolution!


That doesn't make a state-less, classless society, a goal or aim, its more like a possible side effect.

Do you think that its coincidental that Marx labeled the classless stateless society "Communist"?

Communism is called communism because it aims to achive ...communism.

Calling communism a "side effect" of a communist revolution transcends ludicrousy!


But i think the biggest ideological difference is that Communists use Marixst analysis

I would disagree with that.

As you admitted yourself, many self-proclaimed Communists do not actually use Marxist analysis, furthermore many Anarchists do, especially "Anarcho-Marxists" and "Anarcho-Communists".

Therefore while Marxist analyses are more common among Marxist-Leninists than among Anarchists, it would be untrue to say that it is the most important different.

Again, the most important difference is Anarchism's contention that a communistic society can be created without the need for a transitional state and classical communisn's contention that it cannot.


Thats really not true either. One doesn't have to participate in decision making in order to ensure that decisions are made to benefit them. I don't think the government's of capitalist state's consult with every board member, ceo and corporate president before passing laws or making executive decisions yet they seem to do a pretty good job of influencing the process to ensure that it benefits them.

Don't kid yourself, there's a great deal of corporate participation that occurs.

Those CEOS and board members "vote with their dollars" and politicians are well aware that if they don't satisfy them, the donations will quickly dry up.

And don't think that there isn't a lot of "private sector consulting" going on. Those corporations often consult on draft legislation. Hell, sometimes they even the right the damn things!

But, no, capitalist governments are not "capital democracies", they do not allow full participation and yes, most companies are generally happy ...generally.

But so what?

Communist society is not the "business sector" and is not a capitalist state. Just because a system of limited participation can work reasonably well, doesn't mean that a system of full participation can't work better.

Certainly the more voices that are heard, the better we know what the people want. And certainly that's the ultimate goal of any truly democratic society.


That's a completely propagandistic claim. How do you determine that such parties 'ignore the wishes of the general population.'

By analysing the country in question, its government, its policies, and its relationship with its people.

It is actually relatively easy to identify authoritarian state mechanisms, they don't exactly "hide it" well.


Only orthodox Trotskyist's think that the october revolution's model is the only model

I didn't say that Leninists consider it the "only" model, I said that they consider it a good model.

[violencia.Proletariat]

lsd about anarcho syndicalism and communism, i always though of syndicalism as a way of obtaining anarcho communism, because in anarcho communism there is the idea of the general strike

[riverotter]

I'm new here (hi) and I wanted to say I liked your original post, LSD. It was very clear, succinct and informative.

I'm not sure I understand how an anarchist can be a communist, too (or an anarchist communist, like yourself.) I mean, they both want the same eventual goal, but doesn't the fact that communists believe in the necessity of a state - the "dictatorship of the proletariat" - during a transition to communism conflict with the anarchist position of going immediately to a stateless system?

[violencia.Proletariat]

Originally posted by [email protected] 29 2005, 06:46 PM
I'm new here (hi) and I wanted to say I liked your original post, LSD. It was very clear, succinct and informative.

I'm not sure I understand how an anarchist can be a communist, too (or an anarchist communist, like yourself.) I mean, they both want the same eventual goal, but doesn't the fact that communists believe in the necessity of a state - the "dictatorship of the proletariat" - during a transition to communism conflict with the anarchist position of going immediately to a stateless system?
marxists believe in the necessity of the dicatorships of the proles, a communist just defines the goal, it doesnt mean you have to believe in one way of getting there

[riverotter]

Ahhh... Yes, now I understand.

Thanks nate!

[sanpal]

There is a fable written by poet Krylov under the name " the Swan, a Cancer and a Pike " where it is spoken about how these characters were harnessed to carry one cart three together. The swan pulls a cart to the sky, the cancer pulls it along a coast of the river, and the pike pulls it to water. Naturally, a cart until now there. I think mankind still long will go by " tests and mistakes " ... till someone gives a meaning to marxism scientifically (as a complete conception) according now-a-days period. I hope a series of works as the complete conception is appearing by now:
http://www.kprf.ru/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4820
http://www.kprf.ru/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10346