Marx to Weydemeyer

[red_che]

I found this quote from a letter of Marx to Weydemeyer.


". . . no credit is due to me for discovering either the existence of classes in modern society or the struggle between them. . . . What I did that was new was to demonstrate:

1) that the existence of classes is
only bound up with particular
historical phases in the
development of production,

2) that the class struggle necessarily
leads to the dictatorship of the
proletariat,

3) that this dictatorship itself only
constitutes the transition to the
abolition of all classes and to a
classless society."

Any thoughts?

[red_che]

And adding up to what I posted, I would post again this quote by Lenin from Marx,

"Between capitalist and communist society lies the period of the revolutionary transformation of the one into the other. There corresponds to this also a political transition period in which the state can be nothing but the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat."

[redstar2000]

I am unsure as to what you are trying to demonstrate here.

That Marx used the phrase on several occasions?

We are all aware of that. :lol:

The disputes on this board concern what he actually meant by that phrase.

Most people here seem to agree that a Leninist despotism does not "meet Marx's requirements".

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[anomaly]

That is the question, isn't it? Everyone agrees that some type of transition is neccesary. However, what is the DoP, if we even use that phrase to describe the transition? (I usually avoid it)

I like with RAAN's 'definition' of the DoP. But I absolutely wish to avoid that which is described by most so-called 'Marxists' and 'Leninists'.

In my opinion, anymore it is completely meaningless to say 'I want the DoP'. Immediately one must answer 'what is the DoP'? What does that transition entail?

[Morpheus]

According to Marx, the Dictatorship of the Proletariat is a kind of state.

[More Fire for the People]

In my opinion, anymore it is completely meaningless to say 'I want the DoP'. Immediately one must answer 'what is the DoP'? What does that transition entail?
Marx —The proletariat will use its political supremacy to wrest, by degree, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralise all instruments of production in the hands of the State, i.e., of the proletariat organised as the ruling class; and to increase the total productive forces as rapidly as possible.

Of course, in the beginning, this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property, and on the conditions of bourgeois production; by means of measures, therefore, which appear economically insufficient and untenable, but which, in the course of the movement, outstrip themselves, necessitate further inroads upon the old social order, and are unavoidable as a means of entirely revolutionising the mode of production.
Lenin —The dictatorship of the proletariat alone can emancipate humanity from the oppression of capital, from the lies, falsehood and hypocrisy of bourgeois democracy — democracy for the rich — and establish democracy for the poor, that is, make the blessings of democracy really accessible to the workers and poor peasants, whereas now (even in the most democratic — bourgeois — republic) the blessings of democracy are, in fact, inaccessible to the vast majority of working people.
[...]
The dictatorship of the proletariat will take from the capitalists and hand over to the working people the landowners' mansions, the best buildings, printing presses and the stocks of newsprint.

[anomaly]

Yes, that is the DoP with which I disagree.

That's why I normally say I'm against it. :)

[More Fire for the People]

Originally posted by [email protected] 7 2006, 04:08 PM
That's why I normally say I'm against it. :)
Yes, as most non-working class leftist tend to be against the dictatorship of the proletariat.

[anomaly]

I'm actually in the working class--by default (my uncle is certainly proletarian).

However, I do not accept this 'Marxist' fantasy that classes will still exist once the material basis of class disappears.

To believe that is sheer idealism.

[More Fire for the People]

The smashing up of the power of capital is one thing, the next task of the proletarian revolution is to 'centralize the means of production' in order to smash up localism and anarchy in production.

[barista.marxista]

Originally posted by Hopscotch Anthill+May 7 2006, 06:11 PM--> (Hopscotch Anthill @ May 7 2006, 06:11 PM)
[email protected] 7 2006, 04:08 PM
That's why I normally say I'm against it. :)
Yes, as most non-working class leftist tend to be against the dictatorship of the proletariat. [/b]
Hopscotch, you so silly. Whenever you don't like someone, you accuse them of being (petty-)bourgeois. Hopefully someday soon your balls will drop, and you can act like an adult.

[anomaly]

Wouldn't we want to decentralize production? And thus get nearer to communism?

[More Fire for the People]

Originally posted by [email protected] 7 2006, 07:43 PM
Wouldn't we want to decentralize production? And thus get nearer to communism?
Whoever said communism = decentralized production?

[anomaly]

Well, I certainly don't think centralizing production into the hands of the state is getting nearer to communism.

Rather we should begin setting up communes right away. Avoid the state in its entirety.

Without a state, the issue of 'centralizing production' becomes rather unclear. I'm really unsure about it.

[More Fire for the People]

Originally posted by [email protected] 7 2006, 07:51 PM
Well, I certainly don't think centralizing production into the hands of the state is getting nearer to communism.
Sounds like an advance to me, placing the means of the production under the power of the soviets [workers’ committees] and working towards a technocratic society were mandatory labor can be abolished.

[Nachie]

Originally posted by [email protected] 8 2006, 01:51 AM
Well, I certainly don't think centralizing production into the hands of the state is getting nearer to communism.
Uhhh yeah that's great but you have to remember that disagreeing with Lenin is not allowed

:rolleyes: ;)

[anomaly]

Hopscotch, I'm rather unclear about what you mean by centralized production... :huh:

Ok, I talked with a comrade, and it seems that 'centralized production' is simply production by the state. It probably involves a bureacratic construction of some sort.

I'd argue for something more decentralized, with communication between centers of production used for coordination rather than some central committee or other centralizing force.

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by Morpheus+--> (Morpheus)According to Marx, the Dictatorship of the Proletariat is a kind of state.[/b]

As I recall, he used the phrase "no longer a state in the proper sense of the word"...by which I think he meant a state already in the process of "withering away".


Originally posted by Communist Manifesto [email protected]
Of course, in the beginning, this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property, and on the conditions of bourgeois production.

When Hopscotch Anthill quotes from this early celebrated document by Marx and Engels, he neglects to inform the reader of its date...nor does he bother to remind people that Marx and Engels regarded it as in need of serious revision but declined to alter it because of its historical significance.

To be sure, with regard to the old ruling class, the "dictatorship of the proletariat" is "despotic"...it takes the accumulated wealth of the bourgeoisie and redistributes it to the working class. It oppresses the old ruling class, denying them any access to the decision-making processes of the new society.

Nonetheless, there is no suggestion in the Manifesto that these acts will be the privilege of a "revolutionary elite". Moreover, the emphasis that Marx and Engels placed on "by degrees" of the transformation reflects the objective material conditions of the mid-19th century.

By our contemporary standards, even the "most advanced" capitalist countries of that time would be regarded as incredibly backward shitholes.

A highly centralized and well-planned effort to "develop production" would have made sense in that era.

Indeed, that's what the bourgeoisie did!...or at least attempted to do.


Hopscotch Anthill
The smashing up of the power of capital is one thing, the next task of the proletarian revolution is to 'centralize the means of production' in order to smash up localism and anarchy in production.

Something that modern capitalism is already doing..."smashing up localism and anarchy in production", that is.

It might even be argued that with regard to certain commodities, "centralization" might be less productive than "localization".

The reification of centralization as a "cardinal virtue" was a common error of 19th century European intellectuals. What we really need to do "after the revolution" is take a hard look at what we need and then decide which is more productive...centralized or local production.

Invoking "centrality" or "locality" as abstractions without regard to objective material conditions is not Marxist, it's idealist.

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[More Fire for the People]

Originally posted by [email protected] 7 2006, 07:57 PM
Hopscotch, I'm rather unclear about what you mean by centralized production... :huh:

Ok, I talked with a comrade, and it seems that 'centralized production' is simply production by the state. It probably involves a bureacratic construction of some sort.

I'd argue for something more decentralized, with communication between centers of production used for coordination rather than some central committee or other centralizing force.

Ok, I talked with a comrade, and it seems that 'centralized production' is simply production by the state. It probably involves a bureacratic construction of some sort
Tell your comrade he's quote confused. Centralization of production means create a national congress of workers’ committees that organize and plan production under scientific and democratic adminstration.

[KC]

Originally posted by Redstar+--> (Redstar)As I recall, he used the phrase "no longer a state in the proper sense of the word"...by which I think he meant a state already in the process of "withering away".[/b]

Yes; the dictatorship of the proletariat is the creation of a proletarian state that starts withering away at its inception. The withering away of the proletarian state coincides with the withering away of bourgeois society.


Originally posted by Redstar+--> (Redstar)Marx and Engels regarded it as in need of serious revision but declined to alter it because of its historical significance.[/b]

Actually, they didn't "regard it as in need of serious revision" (emphasis mine) but rather minor alterations. Let's look at what was actually said:


Originally posted by Preface to 1872 German Edition
However much that state of things may have altered during the last twenty-five years, the general principles laid down in the Manifesto are, on the whole, as correct today as ever. Here and there, some detail might be improved. The practical application of the principles will depend, as the Manifesto itself states, everywhere and at all times, on the historical conditions for the time being existing, and, for that reason, no special stress is laid on the revolutionary measures proposed at the end of Section II. That passage would, in many respects, be very differently worded today. In view of the gigantic strides of Modern Industry since 1848, and of the accompanying improved and extended organization of the working class, in view of the practical experience gained, first in the February Revolution, and then, still more, in the Paris Commune, where the proletariat for the first time held political power for two whole months, this programme has in some details been antiquated. One thing especially was proved by the Commune, viz., that “the working class cannot simply lay hold of ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes.” (See The Civil War in France: Address of the General Council of the International Working Men’ s Assocation, 1871, where this point is further developed.) Further, it is self-evident that the criticism of socialist literature is deficient in relation to the present time, because it comes down only to 1847; also that the remarks on the relation of the Communists to the various opposition parties (Section IV), although, in principle still correct, yet in practice are antiquated, because the political situation has been entirely changed, and the progress of history has swept from off the earth the greater portion of the political parties there enumerated.

But then, the Manifesto has become a historical document which we have no longer any right to alter. A subsequent edition may perhaps appear with an introduction bridging the gap from 1847 to the present day; but this reprint was too unexpected to leave us time for that.

Karl Marx & Frederick Engels
June 24, 1872, London

So what have they said needs improvement? The "measures at the end of Section II" which are those various points upon which Marx used at the time to define socialism. This section has nothing to do with the quotes Hopscotch used.

Another point that was made was that "the working class cannot simply lay hold of ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes." What does this mean? Let's go to the piece where it was stated and look at what was said:


The Paris [email protected]
But the working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes.

The centralized state power, with its ubiquitous organs of standing army, police, bureaucracy, clergy, and judicature — organs wrought after the plan of a systematic and hierarchic division of labor — originates from the days of absolute monarchy, serving nascent middle class society as a mighty weapon in its struggle against feudalism.

So what this really means is that the proletariat can't merely lay hold of ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own puproses; i.e. the proletariat can't rule using the bourgeois model of a state. The proletariat must destroy the bourgeois state and construct a proletarian state in its place.

So is there anything here at suggests Marx and Engels wanted "serious revisions" of the Manifesto? Of course not. I'm just going to let Marx and Engels refute redstar on this one:


The general principles laid down in the Manifesto are, on the whole, as correct today as ever. Here and there, some detail might be improved.


Hopscotch Anthill

Tell your comrade he's quote confused. Centralization of production means create a national congress of workers’ committees that organize and plan production under scientific and democratic adminstration.

Centralization = Evil :lol:

[bezdomni]

Tell your comrade he's quote confused. Centralization of production means create a national congress of workers’ committees that organize and plan production under scientific and democratic adminstration.

Haha, that's what I said. I was pretty vague though, since I haven't ever used the phrase "centralization of production" before.

I imagined it had something to do with a worker's congress of some sort in which economic planning occured.

I was the "comrade", to clarify.

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by Khayembii Communique
The withering away of the proletarian state coincides with the withering away of bourgeois society.

The "withering away" of "bourgeois society"?

Now there's a "new idea". :blink:

Did "bourgeois society wither away" under the Paris Commune?

This seems to suggest that "bourgeois society" is something we should "tolerate" for some indefinite period after proletarian revolution.

Why would we want to do that? :o

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[KC]

The "withering away" of "bourgeois society"?

Now there's a "new idea".

I worded that weird. That should be "bourgeois ideals" or "bourgeois sentiments" or something of the sort. I'm sure you know what I meant, though. You're just looking for something to pick at in my post, as the majority of it is right.



This seems to suggest that "bourgeois society" is something we should "tolerate" for some indefinite period after proletarian revolution.

No. It seems to suggest that it will take a long time for bourgeois ideals to die out. Hell, it will take years to destroy the bourgeois class itself.

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by Khayembii Communique
I worded that weird. That should be "bourgeois ideals" or "bourgeois sentiments" or something of the sort.

It seems to suggest that it will take a long time for bourgeois ideals to die out. Hell, it will take years to destroy the bourgeois class itself.

Keeping that state apparatus around "as long as possible", eh?

I sort of figured that's what you really had in mind. :lol:

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[KC]

Keeping that state apparatus around "as long as possible", eh?

I sort of figured that's what you really had in mind.

If you go back and read what I wrote, I was actually agreeing with you and clarifying upon the comment you made. So by arguing against me you are arguing against yourself and therefore contradicting yourself! :lol:

As for how long "the state apparatus" should remain; the state apparatus will remain as long as there are class antagonisms that are irreconcilable. The state will naturally wither away with the withering away of both the bourgeois class and bourgeois ideals.

Your attempt to slander me horribly failed; you ended up both contradicting yourself and just being wrong. I am trying to contribute to the debate and you are making completely unfounded accusations. I'm afraid this happens every time you "participate" in debates. :(

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by Khayembii Communique
The state will naturally wither away with the withering away of both the bourgeois class and bourgeois ideals.

Yes, that's what both Marx and Engels thought would happen.

According to their remaining supporters, both Stalin and Mao did a pretty good wrecking job on the bourgeoisie as a class -- if not so good against "bourgeois ideals"...nevertheless, there was no sign of any "withering away of the state".

It looks to me like Marx and Engels may have gotten this one wrong. :(

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[JKP]

To quote Engels:

"Of late, the Social-Democratic philistine has once again been filled with wholesale terror at the words 'Dictatorship of the Proletariat'. Well, good gentlemen, do you want to know what this dictatorship will look like? Look at the Paris Commune. That was the Dictatorship of the Proletariat"

[LoneRed]

damn redstar your an anarchist through and through, why do you even try to call what you believe as marxist, You take nearly every point he made, and Try(keyword here) to dismantle it. Once again you are NOT taking into consideration the context of Russian society, when the Workers run society, when the entire working class is in charge and the capital-labor relationships, as well as private property are gone, there is no base for a state to exist, as a state only exists the hold together existing oppressive relationships. Stalin or Mao werent the working class. you cant say the dynamic relationships marx thought of were in place in those societies, your arguments are more and more sounding like the classic capitalist ones.

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by LoneRed
Stalin or Mao weren't the working class.

But their supporters claimed at the time and still claim to this day that those regimes were "dictatorships of the proletariat"...sometimes adding in the peasantry as a subordinate class.


When the Workers run society, when the entire working class is in charge and the capital-labor relationships, as well as private property are gone, there is no base for a state to exist, as a state only exists the hold together existing oppressive relationships.

Once you establish a state apparatus, the people who are part of it have an interest in keeping it around.

It's easier work and pays better than a regular job...and confers status as well.

A state apparatus also attracts the ambitious...the people who imagine that they are "natural leaders of men".

NOT the kind of people you want "in charge"...especially if they have a professional army or professional police force at their disposal.


Damn redstar you're an anarchist through and through...

Because I "dare" to suggest the possibility that Marx and Engels made mistakes?

Sort of like farting in church? :lol:

Well, try this...

What Did Marx "Get Wrong"? (http://www.redstar2000papers.com/theory.php?subaction=showfull&id=1095081406&archive=&cnshow=headlines&start_from=&ucat=&)

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[anomaly]

Originally posted by Hopscotch+--> (Hopscotch)Centralization of production means create a national congress of workers’ committees that organize and plan production under scientific and democratic adminstration.[/b]
This is just a sugar-coated version of what I said. See Hopscotch's using of the word 'national'. It implies a state.

Again, I argue for decentralization based on high levels of communication in order to plan production efficiently. But we'll see what works best when the time comes. My money is on this one.


KC
It seems to suggest that it will take a long time for bourgeois ideals to die out. Hell, it will take years to destroy the bourgeois class itself.
This goes back to your idea that communism is 'impossible' so long as any bourgeois state remains in existence. This assumes, of course, a completely militant attitude toward the communes (or collectives, depending on development). My position, as usual, is that no state is needed.

What really gets me is your idealistic treatment of class itself. After all, a state can only functionally exist when one class is suppressing another. And class is based entirely on one's relation to the means of production. This means that in your post-revolutionary state, a functionally class society will exist in which the relations to the means of production will still be different.

Thus, the ex-bourgeoisie will become a new proletariat, a new oppressed class. And when this happens, it makes little sense for the ruling class to allow their underclass to 'wither away' as you assume.

Once the relation to the means of production that gives rise to the bourgeoisie disappears, so too the bourgeoisie will disappear. Will we have counterrevolutionaries? Yes. But will we have class? No.

In order to destroy private property right away, in order to make everyone's relation to the means of production equal, the state must be destroyed right away.

[Morpheus]

Originally posted by [email protected] 8 2006, 11:53 PM
To quote Engels:

"Of late, the Social-Democratic philistine has once again been filled with wholesale terror at the words 'Dictatorship of the Proletariat'. Well, good gentlemen, do you want to know what this dictatorship will look like? Look at the Paris Commune. That was the Dictatorship of the Proletariat"
Paris Commune: Myth vs. Reality
by Morpheus
http://question-everything.mahost.org/Hist...risCommune.html (http://question-everything.mahost.org/History/ParisCommune.html)

In 1871 the government of Paris made peace with Prussia on harsh terms, having just lost the Franco-Prussian war. During the war the Prussians laid seige to Paris and the French government fled the city. The new French Republic, headed by Louis Theirs, sent troops into the city to take the military arms inside the city to insure they could not be used by the Parisian workers to resist the Germans. This provoked a rebellion by Paris against the national government. They refused to allow the troops to take the weapons and on March 26th elected a municipal council, thus inagurating the Paris Commune. The Commune called for a national rebellion to overthrow the government and reshape France into a Federation of Communes modelled on the Paris Commune. The national government laid seige to Paris and on May 30th suceeded in crushing it. Thousands of inhabitants were massacred, the city remained under martial law for years, anarchism was outlawed and a major crackdown of radicalism ensued. Among revolutionaries around the world a mythology about the Paris Commune was created. It was seen as a source of inspiration, a great socialist rebellion which started to implement a radically egalitarian society. Although it had a radical fringe, overall the Paris Commune was merely a left-Republican rebellion and was no where near as radical as it is portrayed.

Marxists are among the chief purveyors of this myth. Most Marxists claim that the Paris Commune was an example of the "Dictatorship of the Proletariat," the first time a "workers' state" was implemented. Marx supported the Prussians in the Franco-Prussian war. On July 20th, 1870, Marx said in a letter to Engels:

"The French need a thrashing. If the Prussians are victorious the centralization of state power will be helpful for the centralization of the German working class; furthermore, German predominance will shift the center of gravity of West European labor movements from France to Germany. And one has but to compare the movement from 1866 to today to see that the German working class is in theory and organization superior to the French. Its domination over the French on the world stage would mean likewise the dominance of our theory over that of Proudhon, etc."

Marx originally opposed the rising of the Commune, but once it was underway he changed his position and supported it. In 1881 the Dutch socialist Ferdinand Domela Nieuwenhuis wrote to Marx asking him what measures a workers' state should take if it came to power unexpectedly. Part of Marx's response said:

"Perhaps you will point to the Paris Commune; but apart from the fact that this was merely the rising of a town under exceptional conditions, the majority of the Commune was in no sense socialist, nor could it be. With a small amount of sound common sense, however, they could have reached a compromise with Versailles useful to the whole mass of the people -- the only thing that could be reached at the time. The appropriation of the Bank of France alone would have been enough to dissolve all the pretensions of the Versailles people in terror, etc., etc. ... The doctrinaire and necessarily fantastic anticipations of the programme of action for a revolution of the future only divert us from the struggle of the present."

This view sharply contrasts from his earlier views expressed in The Civil War in France, published shortly after the defeat of the Commune, where he greatly praised the Commune and emphasized it's radical and revolutionary character. In that work Marx said of the Paris Commune:

"It was essentially a working class government, the product of the struggle of the producing against the appropriating class, the political form at last discovered under which to work out the economical emancipation of labor. Except on this last condition, the Communal Constitution would have been an impossibility and a delusion. The political rule of the producer cannot co-exist with the perpetuation of his social slavery. The Commune was therefore to serve as a lever for uprooting the economical foundation upon which rests the existence of classes, and therefore of class rule. With labor emancipated, every man becomes a working man, and productive labor ceases to be a class attribute."

It also differs from Engels' and Lenin's claim that the commune was a "dictatorship of the proletariat." Marx's second position of 1881, that the Commune 'was in no sense socialist,' is not entirely correct, but its' closer to the truth than the standard radical left myths about the Paris Commune. The Paris Commune was no where near as radical as most leftists, including many anarchists, make it out to be. Engels later admitted this, telling Bernstein in 1884 that, "The fact that in the Civil War the unconscious tendencies of the Commune are represented as being more or less deliberate plans, was quite justified in the circumstances, perhaps even inevitable." [quoted on Blumenburg, p. 140] These "unconscious tendencies" were just what Marx and Engels wanted to see in the Commune, it was no where near as radical as they portrayed it as.

The idea that the Paris Commune constituted a "dictatorship of the proletariat" can be easily refuted by examining its' class content. Most of the French working class in 1871 were not proletarians in the traditional Marxist sense (factory workers) but were artisans or semi-artisans - what Marx called petit bourgeoise and most of his followers call petty bourgeoise. Only five of the people on the Commune's council were proletarian in the orthodox Marxist sense; 35 were artisans. Thus, if the Paris Commune was the dictatorship of anyone it was the dictatorship of the petit bourgeoisie.

The Paris Commune was really a radical Republican rebellion, not a socialist one. "Commune" in France at the time just meant an administrative area, like "county" in the United States. Most of the people elected to the council were Jacobins. The socialists, mostly anarcho-mutualists and Blanquists, were a minority. The government implemented many reforms but did not seek to completely overthrow capitalism. It remitted all payments of rent for dwelling houses from October 1870 until April but did not abolish rent. It allowed workers to take over factories which had been closed down by their employers, to get the economy restarted, but only ones closed down by their employers. It made many other reforms but was ultimately just a reformist Republican government. They did not abolish capitalism, nor did the majority have any intention of doing so.

Althoug Marx's 1881 position is much closer to the truth than most far left interpretations he wasn't entirely correct. Even though it was mainly a reformist government, there were a few radical tendencies in the Paris Commune. These tendencies were of a mostly anarchist nature. Marxists were a tiny minority in Paris at the time and did not play a significant role in the Commune. The taking over of factories by workers was something that anarchists had been advocating for a long time and contradicted the idea of centralizing the economy in state hands which Marx had been advocating for a long time. The national program called for the formation of a national confederation using mandated & recallable delegates, something anarchists had been advocating for decades. This would effectively have abolished the national government and created a confederation of republican city-states. Obviously anarchists would take this a step further and abolish the state within the commune as well, but anarchist influences were clearly present. Unfortunetly these radical tendencies were ultimately secondary compared to the reformist nature of the commune.

Many of the things Marx praised in the Commune differed greatly with the centralized policies he advocated both before and after the Commune. It's destruction of bureaucracy, worker takeover of factories, advocacy of decentralization and mandated delegates in a national confederation had many things in common with anarchist theory, but little in common with the program in the Communist Manifesto or his other writings. Some have put forth the theory that Marx was intentionally being deceptive, latching onto the Commune in order to promote his own ideology. Another possibility is that he was simply caught up in the excitement of the moment. Engels was most likely being deceptive, since in 1884 he admitted that Marx represented the "unconscious tendencies" of the Commune as being deliberate plans, yet in his 1891 preface to Marx's Civil War in France he perpetuates the mythology of the Commune by again representing these "unconscious tendencies" as if they were what the Commune was actually planning to do. Bakunin appeared to lean towards the theory that Marx and company were being deceptive, claiming that:

"The picture of a Commune in armed insurrection was so imposing that even the marxists, whose ideas the Paris revolution had utterly upset, had to bow before the actions of the Commune. They went further than that; in defiance of all logic and their known convictions they had to associate themselves with the Commune and identify with its principles and aspirations. It was a comic carnival game, but a necessary one. For such was the enthusiasm awakened by the Revolution that they would have been rejected and repudiated everywhere had they tried to retreat into the ivory tower of their dogma."

The Paris Commune provides evidence in favor of the anarchist theory of the state. "The council of the Commune become more and more isolated from the people who elected it, and thus more and more irrelevant. And as its irrelevance grew, so did its authoritarian tendencies" [anarcho]. Members of the first international began to complain that the commune was turning into a dictatorship and minority rule. In the later part of its existence the Commune voted to create a "committee of public safety" to "defend" (by terror) the "revolution." If you recall the original French Revolution it was the committee of public safety that went around chopping off the heads of its' opponets - both on the left and on the right. The Commune was crushed before the committee could chop any heads off and these authoritarian tendencies allowed to fully unfold as they did in later "socialist" revolutions.

Looking at the main anarchist analyses of the Paris Commune one finds a better analysis, but one that still tends to overexaggerate the radical aspects of the Commune. Bakunin called the Commune a "blow for Revolutionary Socialism" but acknowledged that the Commune "organized in a Jacobin [Republican] manner," that most of those elected were not socialists and that they did not fully implement a socialist program. But he made up excuses for this and overexaggerated the similarities between his own philosophy and what was implemented in the Paris Commune. There were a few similarities but it was hardly "a bold, clearly formulated negation of the State." Turning to Kropotkin we find a better analysis than Bakunin, although still a flawed one. Kropotkin correctly criticized the Commune's impelementation of representative government, but still tended to overestimate how radical the Paris Commune was. The Paris Commune was just a petty bourgeoie left-Republican uprising. It was no where near as radical as it is made out the be. The ideologies which were furthered by the myth of the radical socialist Paris Commune were themselves far more radical and revolutionary then the Commune itself ever was.

[KC]

Ah, another one of these, Anomaly. I was expecting another one sometime soon; it's been, what, a week or so since we talked about this last?


My position, as usual, is that no state is needed.

You don't know what a state is.



What really gets me is your idealistic treatment of class itself. After all, a state can only functionally exist when one class is suppressing another.

Ugh. I'll quote Lenin again. Maybe you'll actually read it this time...


Originally posted by Lenin
“The state is a product and a manifestation of the irreconcilability of class antagonisms. The state arises where, when and insofar as class antagonism objectively cannot be reconciled. And, conversely, the existence of the state proves that the class antagonisms are irreconcilable.”
(emphasis mine)

Notice how he says class antagonisms and not classes.

Now, can class antagonisms exist within a nation without "functional classes"? Of course! This is because of the influence of foreign classes on that nation. We live in a global society. No place is so isolated as to not be influenced by foreign society.



Thus, the ex-bourgeoisie will become a new proletariat, a new oppressed class. And when this happens, it makes little sense for the ruling class to allow their underclass to 'wither away' as you assume.


Actually it makes perfect sense. You are just an idiot and can't seem to grasp it.



Once the relation to the means of production that gives rise to the bourgeoisie disappears, so too the bourgeoisie will disappear.

The former-bourgeoisie will still have a bourgeois class consciousness. You are using one definition of class and discarding the other, hence making your analysis incomplete. I will expand on this topic later tonight or maybe tomorrow.



In order to destroy private property right away, in order to make everyone's relation to the means of production equal, the state must be destroyed right away.

You don't even know what a state is.

[anomaly]

Originally posted by KC
You don't even know what a state is.
I think it's been about 3 days or so. :lol:

But nothing new. These have become rather boring. :(

Unfortunately, you completely discard Engels definition of a state, which a tool for one class to suppress another.

From this we see that you advocate a post-revolutionary class society.

Even when the material basis for that class has disappeared. :o

Thus, we may have individuals who resent their new 'place' in society, but they cannot be labeled a separate class. And it is here that your argument breaks down. Without class, there is no state. We would simply have, to be blunt, criminals. And we certainly don't need a state to take care of criminals.

It's all rather simple. Why have official, rigid hierarchy (for what else is the state?) when the material basis for such is gone?

[KC]

Class Consciousness

Among Marx's less systematic statements on class, two have attracted considerable attention. The controversy turns on whether Marx distinguished "a class in itself" from "a class for itself," sharply differentiating an objective definition of class from its subjective expressions in struggle and consciousness. G.A. Cohen has provided a forceful defense of the structural conception: "A person's class is established by nothing but his objective place in the network of ownership relations....His consciousness, culture, and politics do not enter the definition of his class position." A note adds: "not even his behaviour is an essential part of it." A strict distinction between structure and consciousness is required, first, "to protect the substantive character of the Marxian thesis that class position strongly conditions consciousness, culture, and politics." Second, the distinction is needed to rescue the universal applicability of class analysis for historical study. If class consciousness is the touch-stone of class, it is argued, the concept ceases to have any heuristic validity for periods when no class consciousness can be discerned. "It is precisely because a class need not be conscious of itself," writes Cohen, "that the phrase 'class-in-itself' was introduced."

E.P. Thompson, in contrast, develops the thesis that class is the historical outcome of complex processes of formation in which struggle and consciousness play a determining role. He argues that the structural definition impoverishes historical understanding, and adds that Marx did not countenance its usage, although he declines to establish this last claim. We now argue that Thompson is in fact correct: Marx's notion of class is the one he - not Cohen - recommends.

For Marx, the importance of class is grounded on the premise that the concept has explanatory and not merely descriptive validity for historical analysis. In contrast to positivist social science, which typically treats class as a purely theoretical construct, a creation of the observer, Marx is concerned to make class visible in history as a real phenomenon. For Marx, that is, the concept of class is meaningful only insofar as it permits an interpretation of social formations in terms of class struggle. The structural definition of class, however, undermines its explanatory validity. Anderson, for example, summarizes the structural conception thus: "It is, and must be, the dominant mode of production that confers fundamental unity on a social formation, allocating their objective positions to the classes within it, and distributing the agents within each class. The result is, typically, an objective process of class struggle (emphasis added)." Anderson makes a precipitous leap from individuals' economic position to their class behavior: "The result is...an objective process of class struggle." There are two dangers in this conception. First, it suggests that classes are present in social formations by definition. There appears to be little need for a study demonstrating how individuals in determinate production relations come to engage in collective struggles which shape social reality. Without this study, however, class is reduced to a purely nominal category, imposed upon the evidence. Nothing Marx writes, to be sure, suggests that class is only a cultural phenomenon, independent of its structural moorings. But the identification of objective class locations, however precisely and completely, is only the beginning of historical study. What must then be addressed is the question of class formation, the processes whereby individuals acquire a capacity for collective action. This is the question which raises the most important and problematic issues about class. Indeed, only its answer can vindicate the explanatory power of the concept, by reconstructing the ways in which class struggles impose their pattern on history.

Secondly, the structural definition of class suggests that a class's behavior and consciousness can be deduced from its objective place in the economy by means of a simple equation. TO be sure, Cohen accepts the argument, and surely Anderson agrees, that "the connection between production relations on the one hand and consciousness, politics, and culture on the other is not simple. There is logic in it but not law." The austerity of the structural premise - that a person's class is established by nothing but his objective place in the network of ownership relations - is nevertheless belied by the study of class formation. For this study shows that consciousness, politics and culture constitute the terms in which individuals interpret and respond to their economic situation. These elements can therefore not be understood, however undogmatically, as subjective expressions of their situation, but enter into their coming together as a class. In an important sense, Marx inverts the structural conception, suggesting that class struggle precedes class. For men and women discover their shared predicament and articulate a common language and action, thus coming into existence as a class, only in the process of defending their interests against other men and women who occupy an antagonistic position in the relations of production. Outside the boundaries of this struggle, the combantants tend to lose their cohesion as classes.

Is this interpretation of class invalidated by historical evidence of individuals bound by similar production relations who nevertheless fail to identify their interests as a class? Marx's structural interpreters suggest that he developed the notion of class in itself to retain the usefulness of class analysis in these cases, for example, a study of the peasantry. The problem, however is not so much in the historical evidence as in the poverty of the categories used to understand it. The distinction between class in itself and for itself needlessly restricts the range of possible degrees and types of class formation and consciousness: it implies that individuals are either fully aware of their class ways, even if they remain - structurally - a class. It is the structural definition, then, which robs the concept of its heuristic validity for historical study.

For Marx, on the contrary, classes are historical relationships involving complex processes of formation and disintegration. Indeed, he nowhere uses the term class in itself, or contrasts it with a class for itself. Scholars attributing this distinction to Marx have misread the two passages adduced to support it. In the first, from The Poverty of Philosophy, Marx distinguishes between the proletariat insofar as it constitutes "a class as against capital" and a class "for itself." This distinction denotes two levels of working class struggle: it refers, first, to the workers' attempts to resist capitalist exploitation, specifically to maintain wages, and second, to their endeavor to construct a wholly new society. Marx simply does not refer to the proletariat as a class in itself, independently of struggle and consciousness.

In the second passage, from The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, Marx draws a distinction between peasants insofar as "they do not form a class," and insofar as they do "form a class." The context of this passage shows that Marx is not referring solely to the nineteenth century French peasantry. Rather, he draws a distinction between the conditions of peasant existence prior to and following the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars. The prerevolutionary peasantry formed a cohesive bloc demonstrating a talent for organization and united action well-known to historians. Marx assigns peasant class struggle an essential role in dismantling the ancien regime. Following the Revolution, however, the peasantry rapidly lost its capacity for concerted, sustained struggle, precisely because the seigneur, the traditional antagonist against whom its solidarity had been forged, was defeated. By the mid-nineteenth century, Marx argues, it could no longer enforce its "class interests in [its] own name;" it was clearly "incapable of any revolutionary initiative." But Marx's carefully couched language indicates that he is far from the view that the peasantry disintegrated into a class in itself, losing all residual capacity to struggle or think in class ways. This conception would indeed deny him the possibility of explaining the peasantry's intervention in mid-century French society and politics: an inert structure disallows an account of the history of concrete struggles.

Marx contends that the peasant class was mainly responsible for Louis Bonaparte's rise to power. He vindicates this thesis by investigating how the peasantry came to acquire real historical existence as one of the principal agents shaping the social formation. His study makes it clear that capitalism's transformation of French agriculture cannot be conceived as a blind process reallocating the peasants within new relations of production, assigning blank and passive human beings their objective class positions. Nor can the peasants' support for Napoleon be deduced from their situation. Napoleon's rise to power confronted Marx with a profound puzzle, which the peasantry's class position could not easily resolve. Rather, Marx explains the peasants' collective behavior in terms of their shared experience and the historical and cultural characteristics which shaped it. He shows that capitalist exploitation confronted individuals with living memories of their own. These historical traditions provided the terms in which the peasants made sense of their objective circumstances and articulated their common interests. Specifically, Marx argues that French peasants interpreted their present situation against the background of their revolutionary experience of 1789. The Napoleonic Code had given them ownership rights to their plots, precisely those rights which capitalist exploitation threatened. When the crisis of the mid-nineteenth century again propelled the peasants onto the French political stage, they responded by recalling the name they associated with their golden age.

The distinction between class in itself and class for itself fails to explain peasant class behavior either before or after the Revolution. In both situations the peasantry came to struggle and define itself in (albeit different) class ways, and yet in neither situation did it develop a consciousness of itself as a distinct class. It is more useful, then, to distinguish between class consciousness - expressions of class identity, which can take many forms, for instance, class specific interpretations of dominant ideologies - and consciousness of class, that is, a class's awareness of its precise place and role in the historical process. Class consciousness is an integral part of the definition of class. For Marx, however, consciousness of class is first made possible by capitalist society, and only the proletariat is fully capable of becoming a class for itself. It is in this sense that he argues that the emergence of class is a product of the bourgeoisie.

It is sometimes argued that Marx demonstrated his commitment to the structural reading of class by restricting the role of class struggle and consciousness to the surface relief of society. In this view, the analysis of a specific historical conjuncture does indeed require a focus on class struggle and the superstructural expressions of class. Hence Marx examines conflicts, shifting alliances, the organization and disorganization of classes primarily in his historical case studies, because these struggles provide the immediate explanation of contemporary events - for instance, Louis Napoleon's rise to power. But an explanation of the underlying structure and development of society requires a study of more fundamental economic processes below the direct confrontation between classes.

[red_che]

Anomaly:


However, I do not accept this 'Marxist' fantasy that classes will still exist once the material basis of class disappears.

Classes will exist if the material basis of its existence is still existing. But if its basis is gone, then calsses will also disappear. And that is what DoP, or the transition period, will do.

Classes do not disappear at once!

It has to wither away as its basis of existence withers away also. And so do the state.


Rather we should begin setting up communes right away. Avoid the state in its entirety.

Without a state, the issue of 'centralizing production' becomes rather unclear. I'm really unsure about it.


You are confusing yourself.

How can the workers do the setting up of communes?

How can the workers abolish private property?

How can the workers abolish the bourgeois ideals and culture in one day?

It is actually you who is dreaming. :(

Redstar:


As I recall, he used the phrase "no longer a state in the proper sense of the word"...by which I think he meant a state already in the process of "withering away".

Yeah. And that withering away of the state cannot be done in a day or two, or in amonth or two.

It is a long process.


When Hopscotch Anthill quotes from this early celebrated document by Marx and Engels, he neglects to inform the reader of its date...nor does he bother to remind people that Marx and Engels regarded it as in need of serious revision but declined to alter it because of its historical significance.

The significance of this quote by Marx is irregardless of date. As long as there still is class struggle, and this conforms with the present condition, then it is still valid.

In fact, no country had ever yet achieved complete freedom from capitalism. Not even Russia or China when they have won their revolution.

And their experiences clearly shows, and proves more, that the transition from capitalism to communism is not a festival of one day or sort. It is rather a long and arduous process.


Nonetheless, there is no suggestion in the Manifesto that these acts will be the privilege of a "revolutionary elite". Moreover, the emphasis that Marx and Engels placed on "by degrees" of the transformation reflects the objective material conditions of the mid-19th century.

Nobody, not even Lenin, said that these acts could be done only by a "revolutionary elite." It is the proletariat, as a class, who will do this. The Party's role is to guide, direct and lead the working class.

[KC]

Yes, that's what both Marx and Engels thought would happen.

According to their remaining supporters, both Stalin and Mao did a pretty good wrecking job on the bourgeoisie as a class -- if not so good against "bourgeois ideals"...nevertheless, there was no sign of any "withering away of the state".

It looks to me like Marx and Engels may have gotten this one wrong.

1. This is a war. We can lose.
2. Mao/Stalin were assholes. This wasn't the DoP.

Anomaly, I hope you understand the double meaning of class now.

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by red_che+--> (red_che)Yeah. And that withering away of the state cannot be done in a day or two, or in a month or two.

It is a long process.[/b]

The longer the better, eh?

Wouldn't it be refreshing if our resident Leninists would just come out and say, honestly, "we intend to stay in power as long as we possibly can!"???

Instead of all this empty babble about "how long it takes" to go from capitalism to communism...as if we were talking about geological ages or something. :lol:


The Party's role is to guide, direct and lead the working class.

And the Party leaders positively drool with anticipation. :lol:


Khayembii Communique
Mao/Stalin were assholes. This wasn't the DoP.

Both they and their supporters claimed it was...and still do to this day.

Indeed, just three decades ago, suggesting that Stalin and Mao were "assholes" would have gotten you restricted to Opposing Ideologies as a "brazen anti-communist".


This is a war. We can lose.

If Marx was right, then no, we can't lose.

http://www.websmileys.com/sm/cool/123.gif

[KC]

Both they and their supporters claimed it was...and still do to this day.

Indeed, just three decades ago, suggesting that Stalin and Mao were "assholes" would have gotten you restricted to Opposing Ideologies as a "brazen anti-communist".


So what?


If Marx was right, then no, we can't lose.

If Marx was right, then we will eventually win.

[anomaly]

Originally posted by KC+--> (KC)Anomaly, I hope you understand the double meaning of class now.[/b]
I always have a terrible time understanding idealism in any form.

You suggest that, deprived of their special relation to the means of production, the bourgeoisie will still exist as a functional class in society. And this is due to a lingering class consciousness.

I think class consciousness will disappear really quick when they are presented with the choice of death or assimilation into society (or just leaving).

Why are you so afraid of a functionally classless society? Why must you insist upon a special underclass of 'bourgeoisie' (due to that 'lingering consciousness', right?) which must be exploited by a new ruling class?

That will not lead to communism. That will just lead to new state...and later on that state will have to be destroyed. And that is a real problem.


red che
Classes will exist if the material basis of its existence is still existing. But if its basis is gone, then calsses will also disappear. And that is what DoP, or the transition period, will do.
But you contradict yourself in the next line. You say that, even though it is this material basis which gives rise to class, class can't be elminated at once. Instead, we must create a state after revolution. Gee, that sounds fun.

Class is based on the relation to the means of production. Make that relation equal, and class functionally disappears. There will be no underclass, as KC wishes there to be.

There will, of course, be counterrevolutionary criminals. And they should certainly be dealt with.

About centralization of the means of production: I am highly skeptical of this notion. But if it proves to work better, alright. As I said, my money is on a more decentralized mode of production based heavily on communication between centers of production. But we'll see.

[More Fire for the People]

Wouldn't it be refreshing if our resident Leninists would just come out and say, honestly, "we intend to stay in power as long as we possibly can!"???
But we don't http://www.vpsingles.com/pics/smoking.gif Leninists intend on securing the proletarian dictatorship as long as necessary.


And the Party leaders positively drool with anticipation.
The emphasis of Leninist organization is not the theoreticians of the movement, but the cadre and the masses. The October Revolution was led and organized not by Lenin, Trotsky, et. al. but rather the minor party members with strong organic connections to the proletariat.

[KC]

You suggest that, deprived of their special relation to the means of production, the bourgeoisie will still exist as a functional class in society. And this is due to a lingering class consciousness.

I think class consciousness will disappear really quick when they are presented with the choice of death or assimilation into society (or just leaving).


There are two definitions of the word class; the one used in Marx's theory of historical materialism and one used to describe the class struggle. By not recognizing the second definition of class, your analysis is flawed. Did you read the excerpt I posted?

Also, your assumption that every member of the bourgeoisie will either assimilate into society or leave in such a short time period is oversimplistic. What of clandestine bourgeois organizations? What of bourgeois attempts to undermine socialist society? Is this not class warfare? Moreover, what of class antagonisms? They won't die out until classless society has been fully achieved.


Why must you insist upon a special underclass of 'bourgeoisie' (due to that 'lingering consciousness', right?) which must be exploited by a new ruling class?


I "insist upon" it because I recognize that this is an inevitability. Also, nobody is being exploited (oppressed, sure; but not exploited). How the hell would the bourgeoisie be exploited? You're not making sense.


That will just lead to new state

Yes. A proletarian state that will wither away as class antagonisms disappear.

The proletarian state comes into existence with the proletarian domination of the country in which the revolution took place. Once the proletariat have power, the proletarian state is constructed. This state is used to maintain the rule of the proletariat against the bourgeoisie (both native and foreign) and bourgeois ideals. As society moves towards communism, the bourgeoisie will eventually assimilate into the proletarian class; once the whole world is proletarian, since there is no longer class antagonisms, the proletarian class ceases to be along with the state used to maintain its rule. Why? Because, the state is an apparatus used by one class to rule over another. Once everyone is effectively proletarian, there is no longer a class to rule over and therefore the reason for people to come together as proletarians ceases to be. This is when communism in its highest stage is realized.

[anomaly]

Originally posted by KC
What of bourgeois attempts to undermine socialist society?
I certainly mentioned these. However, given the three clear choices the bourgeoisie will have, I think this will be the least popular one (based simply on the human yearning to live).

Your fear, I feel, is unjustified.


Also, nobody is being exploited (oppressed, sure; but not exploited).
Whenever class exists, exploitation will exist.

And your aim is a functionally class society. Ours is a difference of goals. Your odd fear of the bourgeoisie leads you to believe that the state machinery will need to be 'utilized'. What you fail to recognize is that the state itself is the problem.

Thus the fundamental rift between 'Marxism' and anarchism.

I simply do not see the ruling class allowing the ruled class to 'wither away'. What is more likely is the ruling class artificially maintaining a ruled class, artificially maintaining hierarchy.

That's definitely not what we want. Well, maybe you want it.

[KC]

Your fear, I feel, is unjustified.

Yes, because my "fear" isn't based on historical observations at all. :rolleyes:



And your aim is a functionally class society. Ours is a difference of goals. Your odd fear of the bourgeoisie leads you to believe that the state machinery will need to be 'utilized'. What you fail to recognize is that the state itself is the problem.

Thus the fundamental rift between 'Marxism' and anarchism.

http://www.revolutionaryleft.com/index.php...st&p=1292067106 (http://www.revolutionaryleft.com/index.php?showtopic=49684&view=findpost&p=1292067106)

Read it. You have no idea what class is.



I simply do not see the ruling class allowing the ruled class to 'wither away'. What is more likely is the ruling class artificially maintaining a ruled class, artificially maintaining hierarchy.


That's because you're an idiot.

[anomaly]

This is your main argument:


Originally posted by Essay
For this study shows that consciousness, politics and culture constitute the terms in which individuals interpret and respond to their economic situation. These elements can therefore not be understood, however undogmatically, as subjective expressions of their situation, but enter into their coming together as a class.
Also, 'class consciousness can exist without the material class relations.' Maybe for a little while, yes.

Class consciousness, however, is merely a mindset expressed in actions. And it is dependent upon material conditions.

But you are trying to separate class consciousness from the material basis for class. And that simply isn't correct. When the material basis for class is destroyed, class consciousness will begin to disappear--and this will probably 'wither'.

So we will have a functionally classless society--and thus no need for this precious state of yours.