Quote by Engels

[Proletar]

I found this interesting quote on wikiquote by Engels.
What do you anarchist think about this?

"The anarchists put the thing upside down. They declare that the proletarian revolution must begin by doing away with the political organization of the state....But to destroy it at such a moment would be to destroy the only organism by means of which the victorious proletariat can assert its newly-conquered power, hold down its capitalist adversaries, and carry out that economic revolution of society without which the whole victory must end in a new defeat and a mass slaughter of the workers similar to those after the Paris commune. "

[redstar2000]

Engels on anarchism was "just awful"...remember that during the same period (1880-1895), he was emotionally involved with German social democracy and its parliamentary "road to socialism" and the anarchists of that period were the only intransigent critics of that strategy.

So whenever he wrote about anarchism then, it was usually written with the purpose of simply making the anarchists "look bad".

Like this quote. The Paris Commune did have a state-apparatus (though a much reduced one) and yet were still defeated by a superior military force.

Having a "state" does not "guarantee victory"...that's just silly.

And not having one at all is no "guarantee of defeat".

It all depends on what you're really up against at the time of the revolution itself.

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[Floyce White]

I won't repeat here what I already said in my last two Antiproperty articles. Please see the link at the bottom of my posts.

[Proletar]

ok i dindt know that.

Floyce White what links?

[ComradeOm]

Originally posted by [email protected] 2 2006, 01:57 PM
Engels on anarchism was "just awful"...remember that during the same period (1880-1895), he was emotionally involved with German social democracy and its parliamentary "road to socialism" and the anarchists of that period were the only intransigent critics of that strategy.

So whenever he wrote about anarchism then, it was usually written with the purpose of simply making the anarchists "look bad".
So you only pay attention to Marx or Engels when it suits you? How about this Redstar – when did either of the two speak out in favour of anarchism?

[violencia.Proletariat]

Originally posted by ComradeOm+Feb 3 2006, 09:02 AM--> (ComradeOm @ Feb 3 2006, 09:02 AM)
[email protected] 2 2006, 01:57 PM
Engels on anarchism was "just awful"...remember that during the same period (1880-1895), he was emotionally involved with German social democracy and its parliamentary "road to socialism" and the anarchists of that period were the only intransigent critics of that strategy.

So whenever he wrote about anarchism then, it was usually written with the purpose of simply making the anarchists "look bad".
So you only pay attention to Marx or Engels when it suits you? How about this Redstar – when did either of the two speak out in favour of anarchism? [/b]
Since when are Marx and Engels gods that were right about everything? This is not a fucking religion, you can ahere or not to what you want (although you might not want to stick with a certain title if your mixing and matching ideas).

[rebelworker]

Marx and engles are not jesus and mohammed,

Just because they say something dosnt make it true.

Marx hated the anarchsits because they won a majority position in the first international which "forced him" to take the central comittee of on a little vacation to America, this fact I think is an interesting reflection of the function of marxs politics, when the majority gets out of line, seize the reigns of power and sidetrack the common project, even if it destroys it.

Now im not saying this in defence of the politics of many of the anarchists at the time, but if the first international cant be allowed to run its own course, then it dosnt boed well for what is in store for the working class at the hands of a well meaning minority.

Engles makes the mistake, that I think the majority of marxists after him repeated, of thinking that a state is a neutral body that the workers can "controll". The only controlling that will be done is by the actual functionaries of the state, the workers may have varying degrees of influence on a state, but a state is never under the controll of the working class as a whole. Engles and Marx(and Lenin, Trotsky, Mao and Castro) all came from well of backgrounds in what chomsky, I think correctly, identifies as the political class, The top 20% or so of the population who are activly involved in the running of a society. They manage the workplaces, set the curiculum for education, have controll over the mass production of culture and populate the descision making bodies of all levels of govt and the major political parties vying for their controll.

Ths class has an outlook of the nature of the state that is out of step with the reality of mass, in this case working class, politics. It tainted their political analysis, which was often very good, but it has caused a viscious cycle that has lead to vanguardism and stateism within the communist movement.

We must break this cycle which has wrongly equated acheiving communism with seizing state power and bring it back to full controll by the working classes.

[gilhyle]

The anarchists had already been defeated when the First International HQ went to the states. THe real problem with the FIrst International was that the trade unionists abandoned it for liberalism.

Basic error of first order logic: the fact that having a State does not guarantee victory is not a statement of the same logical order as the claim that victory can be achieved without a state. Engels was saying that a State was a necessary but not sufficient condition of using the seizure political power to defeat counterrevolution.

The claim is entirely coherent and surely the basic argument of communists against anarchists at all times - and one anarchists have occasionally grappled with in the full heat of revolution; unfortunately they refuse to grapple with it before then.

However, given the endless debates with anarchists on this site, it hardly seems worth revisiting just because Engels says it.

[violencia.Proletariat]

The claim is entirely coherent and surely the basic argument of communists against anarchists at all times - and one anarchists have occasionally grappled with in the full heat of revolution; unfortunately they refuse to grapple with it before then.

What the hell is this supposed to mean? How many times have marxists or anarchists been in the "full heat of revolution"? The real revolutionary situations that stand out in my mind were the Paris Commune and Syndicalist Catalonia. As an anarchist I am fine with saying that if a paris commune style government (which Engels cited as being dictatorship of the proletarait) is NECESSARY then I'm ok with that. However, as Spain has shown it might not be necessary. We will have to wait and see.

I dont think either side can really say you will fail, because these situations havent happened enough in the advanced capitalist countries to really make a clear judgement.

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by ComradeOm+--> (ComradeOm)So you only pay attention to Marx or Engels when it suits you?[/b]

Absolutely!

I only pay attention to anyone when I think they have something useful to say on a subject.

As it happens, Marx and Engels had many useful things to say about social reality and how it changes.

Very much worth paying attention to! :D

But, alas, they were mortal men...and not "demigods" or "holy prophets".

They made mistakes. :(

Some of them glaring! :o

Would you care to argue that Galileo, Newton, Darwin, etc. were "infallible"?

Then why should we adopt such a ridiculous attitude towards Marx and Engels?

Or anybody else???

To be revolutionary is to think critically about all things!


gilhyle
Engels was saying that a State was a necessary but not sufficient condition of using the seizure political power to defeat counterrevolution.

Well, is that true? Are there "no other ways" to "defeat counterrevolution" other than a state apparatus?

Are we "historically obligated" to establish a political "center of gravity"? Especially in light of our knowledge of what sorts of people are most attracted to such a "center"? :unsure:

And what they do when they get there! :o

One can read into Marx both "pro-state" and "anti-state" perspectives; I think he was "of two minds" on the subject.

But as I noted above, we are free to appropriate what we find useful from Marx without having to "fall in line" with everything the guy ever said on any subject.

The ways in which a post-capitalist society would carry out what we now think of as "state functions" are, at this time, matters of speculation.

We probably won't have a really clear idea of "what to do" until proletarian revolution is imminent.

And the working class has been innovative in revolutionary periods; they might well think up some things that we can't even imagine now!

Our imaginations, remember, are perforce limited by the material conditions in which we live or can imagine as hypothetical possibilities.

Look at what people thought the future "would be like" in 1900 or 1950.

What will the working class be capable of in 2050 or 2100? And what material resources will they have at their disposal?

No one knows!

But a safe bet is: more than we think. :D

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[ComradeOm]

Redstar, I’ll be the first to criticise Marx and Engels when I feel they are in the wrong but in this case I can’t help but agree with them wholeheartedly.

When you say that this Engels quote is intended solely to make anarchism "look bad", you’re perfectly correct. Both Marx and Engels maintained a solid anti-anarchist stance throughout their lives. For damned good reasons I might add.

Marx did not write to pander to "pro" or "anti" camps. The state is not "good" or "bad", it simply exists as an offshoot from class conflict. To argue that the state will not exist is to argue that class divisions will have disappeared immediately following the revolution… I think we all know how ridiculous that notion is.

[rebelworker]

I love how you didnt use actual arguments,
Because its clear anarchists are all crazy and stateists have a flawless record...

[violencia.Proletariat]

I agree with RebelWorker, ComradeOm please back up your assertions with an arguement. We are willing to discuss it so dont pull the "its been done too many times" line.

[red_che]

Originally posted by [email protected] 2 2006, 01:28 PM
I found this interesting quote on wikiquote by Engels.
What do you anarchist think about this?

"The anarchists put the thing upside down. They declare that the proletarian revolution must begin by doing away with the political organization of the state....But to destroy it at such a moment would be to destroy the only organism by means of which the victorious proletariat can assert its newly-conquered power, hold down its capitalist adversaries, and carry out that economic revolution of society without which the whole victory must end in a new defeat and a mass slaughter of the workers similar to those after the Paris commune. "
I believe Engels drew here the demarcation line between Marxism and Anarchism. While Marx, in all intent and purposes wanted a stateless and classless society, he never have said that the state would be immediately dismantled right on the day of the victory of proletarian revolution. In fact, he adhered the establishment of the proletarian state, that is, the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat first during the transition from capitalism to communism.

Engels, I would say, was more Marxist here when he wrote this.

It is nothing but pure ignorance to say that classes shall have evaporated out of society right after the revolution, like bubbles.


To be revolutionary is to think critically about all things!

But goodness! You're not critical :( ...much less a revolutionary! :o

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by red_che
It is nothing but pure ignorance to say that classes shall have evaporated out of society right after the revolution, like bubbles.

No one claims that classes will "instantly" cease to exist. The question is one of the relative strength of the proletariat vs. the bourgeoisie.

In backward countries like Russia and China, the proletariat was weak and the petty-bourgeoisie was strong. That's why those countries inevitably evolved into modern capitalist countries...inspite of the fact that both countries had a mammoth state apparatus.

In the "old" capitalist countries, proletarian revolution will take place when the bourgeoisie has exhausted its "capacity to rule" -- it will have become irrational, demoralized, and disorganized.

Nor can we anticipate anything in the way of serious resistance from whatever remains of the petty-bourgeoisie...and there won't be much.

The much-beloved "Leninist state" has become historically obsolete. It no longer corresponds to objective material conditions.

Class struggle after the revolution will mostly be ideological...and the working class should, by and large, win easily.

In fact, our biggest job will probably be demolishing all the symbols of the old regime.

We don't need a state apparatus to do that. :D

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[Amusing Scrotum]

Originally posted by rebelworker+Feb 3 2006, 08:57 PM--> (rebelworker @ Feb 3 2006, 08:57 PM)Marx hated the anarchsits because they won a majority position in the first international which "forced him" to take the central comittee of on a little vacation to America, this fact I think is an interesting reflection of the function of marxs politics, when the majority gets out of line, seize the reigns of power and sidetrack the common project, even if it destroys it.[/b]

Well that would be a fair statement if the Anarchists hadn't voted with Marx.

Most the Anarchists thought it would be a good idea to move to America (mainly because Marx would no longer be on the Central Committee) and a lot of the Marxists voted against Marx. Mainly because they thought it would be disastrous if Marx was no longer on the Central Committee.

As to why Marx wanted to move the First International to America. Well I think a fair case can be made that he was "fed up" with the squabbling, the English Unionists and his health was deteriorating rapidly.


rebelworker
Engles and Marx(and Lenin, Trotsky, Mao and Castro) all came from well of backgrounds in what chomsky, I think correctly, identifies as the political class....

A class of course, that Professor Chomsky himself comes from. :lol:

[ComradeOm]

Originally posted by [email protected] 4 2006, 01:06 AM
I agree with RebelWorker, ComradeOm please back up your assertions with an arguement. We are willing to discuss it so dont pull the "its been done too many times" line.
I’m not aware that I made any assertions that require backing up.

Marx’s battles with Proudhon and Bakunin are of course well known; indeed he was amongst anarchism’s most vocal and persistent of critics. I again challenge anyone, and this includes Redstar, to find a work in which either Marx or Engels writes in favour of anarchism.

Both recognised that the state was merely an instrument of class rule. As long as you have classes you will have a state. This is a basic part of the Marxist interpretation of society and history.

The only other point I made that is in any way contentious is that class divisions will not disappear immediately following the revolution. No knowledge of Marxism is required here, just plain common sense. Short of killing off every last capitalist – desirable but logistically impossible – class divisions will endure. I don’t know of anyone but the most delusional of anarchists that would disagree with this conclusion.

[rebelworker]

When you say that this Engels quote is intended solely to make anarchism "look bad", you’re perfectly correct. Both Marx and Engels maintained a solid anti-anarchist stance throughout their lives. For damned good reasons I might add.

You keep quoting Marx or Engles and their assertians like they are biblical truth...

And making baseless statements about the imposibility of anachists revolutionary strategy ;)

[violencia.Proletariat]

I again challenge anyone, and this includes Redstar, to find a work in which either Marx or Engels writes in favour of anarchism.

Why should we do this? Is anarchism only ok if Marx said so? Do you visit his grave sight every sunday and pray too? :lol:


Both recognised that the state was merely an instrument of class rule. As long as you have classes you will have a state. This is a basic part of the Marxist interpretation of society and history.

Fair enough except for the fact that you dont need a "state" in class supression. Nor would I consider a Paris Commune style government a "state" according to what we know as a state today.


The only other point I made that is in any way contentious is that class divisions will not disappear immediately following the revolution.

Of course not, but they will be enough so we dont need some kind of leninist superstructure to break them up. If that were the case maybe the proletariat isnt really ready. As Redstar said, you dont need a state to abolish bourgeois rule and destroy the remnents of their old empire.


Short of killing off every last capitalist – desirable but logistically impossible – class divisions will endure.

I wouldnt really say so. Sure there will still be a division between the proles and whats left of the capitalist that is being counter revolutionary. But divisions between the proletariat class and petty bourgeois should dissolve quickly.

[Hiero]

I don't know why people are claiming that some people take Marx's word like religous people take God's word, this statement is completely off. The difference between Marx and Engel's writing and religious text, is that Marx and Engels were anaylsing society with a scientific method. Marx and Engels showed the nature of classs strugle and what the state is in relation to class struggle. So Marx and Engels weren't just saying things abou the state to upset the Anarchists. Marx and Engels wrote about the state as being neccassary because the found it neccassary in their anaylsis which has provern to be a correct anaylsis. The above quote does not stand on it's own, it is a summary of years of work,

On the other hand with the Anarchist, i am yet to see a good justification for not having the state, something based on correct anaylsis.



Class struggle after the revolution will mostly be ideological...and the working class should, by and large, win easily.

You falsely assume that all things will become social property in one go. You also falsely asume that people will not become bureaucrats and use their influence to create a position where they become the new bourgeoisie. Aslo the class struggle continues in culture, though which stems from ideology, but the struggle will come out in culture as well.

[Vanguard1917]

ComradeOm:

Short of killing off every last capitalist – desirable but logistically impossible – class divisions will endure.

It goes a lot deeper than that. A workers' revolution can kill every single capitalist in society; but that will not in itself solve the historical problems that gave way to class division in the first place.

Socialist society - the dictatorship of the working class - needs to essentially eliminate the material causes of class society. If it cannot socialise the forces of production and increase the productivity of labour to necessary extents then, as Marx says, all the old crap will come back again.

That is why this is also an ahistorical reply to ComradeOm's ahistorical statement:

nate:

I wouldnt really say so. Sure there will still be a division between the proles and whats left of the capitalist that is being counter revolutionary. But divisions between the proletariat class and petty bourgeois should dissolve quickly.

The working class needs to defeat not only the capitalist class but also the conditions that give way to capitalist society. A handful of bourgeois people did not create these conditions. We eliminate the capitalist class in the process of eliminating the material conditions of class society. The material conditions that gave way to class society are historical.

That is probably the key 'mistake' of the anarchist logic - from which all their other 'mistakes' stem: their ahistorical logic.

The workers' state is needed to uphold the historical revolutionary interests of the working class - to eliminate the capitalists and to eliminate capitalist society. It is historically necessary.

[chebol]

Hiero, and others (Engels, for example), have it right, although I will disagree with Hiero briefly. Some people (perhaps not here) DO take Marx and Engels (and Lenin, and Trotsky, and whoever else) as gospel, a problem that leads to all kinds of mistakes. The root cause is that they don't actually analyse FOR THEMSELVES the reality of the class struggle; or their analysis is entirely wishful thinking.

The latter is part of the problem here. I openly admit that I'm part of the camp that WISHES that a state is an unnecessary tool in the victory of the proletarian revolution. It would be SO much EASIER (for my head, anyway) not to have to deal with such a contradictory phenomenon as a "workers' state" as a transitional step towards communism.

Unfortunately, I have never seen a convincing alternative that is grounded in historical reality. How, for example, are we to defeat the forces of reaction if (and WHEN) they fight back, attacking the revolution as it unfolds. The masses or workers, whether or not they have been convinced in their millions (or even billions) of the revolutionary project, will need to be prepared to fight back. How? They will need to organise armed militias.

In any realistic scenario, the revolution does not unfold on a global scale in an instant. Therefore, the revolutionary workers are likely to be fighting against organised soldiers in an army with highly complex technology. True, they are fighting against people who are their own proletarian comrades, or ought to be, but they are fighting for Reaction. Short of convincing the entire global proletariat AT ONCE, this is a likely scenario. Side by side with a military force, naturally there must be a propaganda campaign launched to convince workers and soldiers not to fight the revolution.

History, however, has shown (and will continue to show) the need for an organised and armed revolutionary proletariat. Whatever name you call this temporary organisation, necessary only for the defeat of reaction, it resembles a revolutionary workers' and peasants' army.

Who coordinates this force? Revolutionary councils? Sure. And how is the entire front coordinated? By reps from those councils.

Who coordinates supplies in this period, to facilitate the most rapid and bloodless victory over the counter-revolution? Presumably those same councils and their reps. Who provides political direction to the revolutionary forces, military or otherwise, during this period? Those same representatives, taking their lead from the population, but also providing leadership to that same population.

Similarly to the unfolding of the global revolution, the entire proletariat can not be viewed as a perfectly revolutionary mass. There will be (as there are now) more class conscious members of that class, and those who are less so. If the revolution is not to be lost from an ideological perspective (particularly as people tend to die in wartime, or get disillusioned), any leadership (those providing necessary coordiantion and direction) will also have to carry out the task of maintaining and building political consciousness.

Obviously the degree of popular workers' democracy in this organisational form will be (and will need to be) greater than what it currently is, but it will also be less than that of "pure" communism. As you begin to apply marxist analysis and method to specific circumstances, however, even more specific forms of organisation become clearly necessary. This is what lead Lenin to argue for the "vanguard" party as an organisation that facilitated the carrying-out of those tasks in Russia. Clearly problems both avoidable and unavaoidable beset that organisation, and the lessons from that experience cannot be transposed directly to the present day in every circumstance, but the basic principle, plus specific lessons, still apply.

We are still in the period of the violent struggle of the masses against imperialism, and the period in which education and organisation are paramount. This period is likely to drag on for some time. To imagine that the proletariat can triumph, without going through prolonged phases of class-conscious organising and education, in the current and future periods of direct conflict with imperialist forces, is just ludicrous.

That's what Engels is getting at (more or less)......

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by Hiero+--> (Hiero)You falsely assume that all things will become social property in one go.[/b]

All the important things, yes. The trivia can be left to "wither away"...I'm not worried about "pet psychologists" as a nucleus of counter-revolution.


You also falsely assume that people will not become bureaucrats and use their influence to create a position where they become the new bourgeoisie.

That will not be permitted! Indeed, the whole idea that we "need" a permanent bureaucracy will be in disrepute.

This is a curious objection coming from someone who seems to defend the idea of a Leninist hyper-state...because it is in precisely such states that bureaucrats have both the opportunity and the material incentive to "run wild" and turn themselves into a new bourgeoisie.


Also the class struggle continues in culture, though which stems from ideology, but the struggle will come out in culture as well.

I agree with you about this. But one does not need a state apparatus to struggle on the "cultural front"...just comrades who are seriously interested in doing that kind of stuff. I don't see why there should be any "shortage" of such comrades.


Originally posted by [email protected]
Socialist society - the dictatorship of the working class - needs to essentially eliminate the material causes of class society.

It is my hypothesis that a successful proletarian revolution cannot take place until capitalism itself has already done that...that is, has already developed the material foundations of communism.

A revolution that takes place under conditions of material scarcity must inevitably degenerate into a despotism...and then restore capitalism.

Calling that despotism "socialism" does not change anything. It's still a class society with wage-slavery...and a new ruling class in formation.


chebol
Unfortunately, I have never seen a convincing alternative that is grounded in historical reality.

Why assume that the future will be "just like the past"? That is, why assume that proletarian revolutions in the "old" capitalist countries (western Europe and North America) will face circumstances that resemble those of Lenin's Russia or Mao's China to any significant extent?

Sure, both Russian and Chinese Leninists can make a very plausible argument that they "had to do what they did" because of both internal and external threats to their very existence.

What makes you think it will be anything like that for us?

What resources will be available to a revolutionary proletariat in the "old" capitalist countries in 2050 or 2100? And what difficulties will face even the "new" and most vigorous capitalist economies in that era?

No one knows!

If we were to proceed on the assumption that we "have to have" a Leninist hyper-state apparatus, then we'd build one...even if it were totally unnecessary.

It would be "part of our project" and no one would really question it.

If things turned out badly for us and we "needed an army" and generals and weapons of mass destruction, etc., then we'd probably go ahead and do that (or try to).

But understand: if that happens, then we lose even if we "win".

Once you start building up an elaborate state apparatus, it will attract the very kinds of people who will be most inclined to form a new ruling class.

And we're fucked! :o

The Maoists imagine that we can rely on "really revolutionary personalities" who can "really be trusted" to keep that from happening.

That's not Marxism; it's "great man" idealism.

Indeed, the perspective of a Leninist hyper-state leads to the "great leader"...inevitably! It may not happen "all at once" and some of the Eastern European regimes didn't last long enough for it to really "kick in". But even they tried to elevate their colorless mediocrities to "great leader" status...as much as they could in the shadow of the USSR.

The "lessons of history" are pretty clear about this...so why risk it?

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[ComradeOm]

Originally posted by nate
Why should we do this? Is anarchism only ok if Marx said so? Do you visit his grave sight every sunday and pray too?
Where did this come from? Redstar asserted that this Engels quote can be explained away by his politics at the time. I merely pointed out that this was an established position that the man had held for most, if not all, of his life.


Nor would I consider a Paris Commune style government a "state" according to what we know as a state today.
The state does not necessarily have to be a massive Leninist edifice. Its form depends entirely on the materialist conditions of the time. What is not in doubt is that the state will exist, at least according to the Marxist analysis of history.

[violencia.Proletariat]

Where did this come from? Redstar asserted that this Engels quote can be explained away by his politics at the time. I merely pointed out that this was an established position that the man had held for most, if not all, of his life.

Your past posts have seem to rely on things because marx said so. Now if I'm not mistaken the marxist thing to do is to look at EVERYTHING critically, including his own works.


The state does not necessarily have to be a massive Leninist edifice.

If it does have to be, then we will never reach communism. And if we need such a super-state in order to bring us to communism, maybe the proletariat isnt ready.


Its form depends entirely on the materialist conditions of the time. What is not in doubt is that the state will exist, at least according to the Marxist analysis of history.

I dont see how you can say there is no doubt a state will have to exist. Does syndicalist Catalonia ring a bell? We cant really say whats going to happen, or what technology will be around to make a "state" obsolete.

[rebelworker]

Unfortunately, I have never seen a convincing alternative that is grounded in historical reality. How, for example, are we to defeat the forces of reaction if (and WHEN) they fight back, attacking the revolution as it unfolds. The masses or workers, whether or not they have been convinced in their millions (or even billions) of the revolutionary project, will need to be prepared to fight back. How? They will need to organise armed militias.

Even the most periferal readings(not written by stalinists)on the CNT in the Spainsh revolution will show that spontaneous militias, while not the most well organised, were very efficient fighting units beacuse of the revolutionary zeil they held. They only failed for lack of arms and the so called "workers state" organised by the communist party was stabbing them in the back nd sabotaging the revolution at every step.


History, however, has shown (and will continue to show) the need for an organised and armed revolutionary proletariat. Whatever name you call this temporary organisation, necessary only for the defeat of reaction, it resembles a revolutionary workers' and peasants' army.

Who coordinates this force? Revolutionary councils? Sure. And how is the entire front coordinated? By reps from those councils.

Exactly, none of this requires a state.
revolutionary unions, community organisations and even revolutionary ORGANISATIONS(not parties) can take a lead in organising both armed resistance and the ongoing propaghanda campaign needed to counter the global capitalist onslaught.


Why assume that the future will be "just like the past"? That is, why assume that proletarian revolutions in the "old" capitalist countries (western Europe and North America) will face circumstances that resemble those of Lenin's Russia or Mao's China to any significant extent?

Sure, both Russian and Chinese Leninists can make a very plausible argument that they "had to do what they did" because of both internal and external threats to their very existence.

What makes you think it will be anything like that for us?

I think its dangerous to not call a spade a spade. We must not repeat the mistakes of the past. Material conditions aside nothing can justify the actions of Vanguardist groups.

Relying on hopping for "different conditions" still leaves the door wide open for people to interpret "the nessesity" for a "workers state" lead by "the vanguard" all over again.

Lets put the last nails in the coffin and put an end to possibly the most destructive force against communist revolution the workers movement has ever faced, the enemy "within".

[ComradeOm]

Originally posted by nate
Your past posts have seem to rely on things because marx said so. Now if I'm not mistaken the marxist thing to do is to look at EVERYTHING critically, including his own works.
And should I carry out a series of physics experiments to prove that Newton’s laws are indeed correct? I agree with the bulk of Marx’s theories and conclusions. Does that mean that I follow them blindly? Of course not.


I dont see how you can say there is no doubt a state will have to exist. Does syndicalist Catalonia ring a bell? We cant really say whats going to happen, or what technology will be around to make a "state" obsolete.
What is the Marxist interpretation of the state? It’s a body used by the ruling class during class struggle to aid and ensure their dominance. That’s all. It’s the anarchists who gave the term all its negative connotations by imparting more importance to it than necessary.

[rebelworker]

We were just more astute in analysing(along with most of humanity) the ACTUAL PRACTICE of a state. Your description might look great on paper but there are REAL political phonomenons at work in a state that you are missing, either by choice, oversight or by class aspirations.

I hope its the second.

[red_che]

Fair enough except for the fact that you dont need a "state" in class supression. Nor would I consider a Paris Commune style government a "state" according to what we know as a state today.

This statement seems to contradict even the very basic principle in class analysis.

Class rule cannot materialize without state apparatus. The Paris Commune itself is a state. It is exactly the dictatorship of the proletariat.


I wouldnt really say so. Sure there will still be a division between the proles and whats left of the capitalist that is being counter revolutionary. But divisions between the proletariat class and petty bourgeois should dissolve quickly.

Well, history have shown that it does not dissolve quickly. Paris Commune shows that. :)

[ComradeOm]

Originally posted by [email protected] 6 2006, 05:43 PM
We were just more astute in analysing(along with most of humanity) the ACTUAL PRACTICE of a state. Your description might look great on paper but there are REAL political phonomenons at work in a state that you are missing, either by choice, oversight or by class aspirations.
The "actual practice" of the state? In which case you've been studying the bourgeois state. This is a state that functions exactly as intended - managing the interests of the ruling class while suppressing the proletariat. Its gotten to the point where its actually quite efficient.

The problem with anarchists is that they are unable to look beyond this bourgeois state and so assume that all states are equally oppressive and detrimental to the proletariat. You do not see the forest for the trees.

And tell me, what "real" political phenomena am I missing?