What is to be Done about the Bourgieous?

[OneBrickOneVoice]

One of the biggest problems past socialist states have faced is dealing with the bourgieous and a counter-revolution. The road that these socialists states took were often brutal and ineffective. I say they are brutal because of the reputation they earned the movement. I say ineffective because the bourgieous still took over. This question has been bothering me for a while, what are your thoughts?

[vyborg]

We must distinguish two stages.
a) in the transition period the capitalist class is still very powerful, especially due to its links on a world scale, so a mixture of revolutionary surveillance and an effective controls on them will be inevitable, even if this doesnt in any way mean an excuse to the stalinist repression against the working class or any other class.
b) when the workers' state will be consolidated at least on a continental scale, the capitalist class will have no power whatsoever and they will be citizens as any other, they will have their part of duties and will enjoy what socialism will bring to humankind as any of us

[Janus]

Previous thread on this (http://www.revolutionaryleft.com/index.php?showtopic=57417&hl=bourgeois)


This question has been bothering me for a while, what are your thoughts?
The bourgeois are defined by their relation to the means of production. After the revolution, there are no longer bourgeois as the means of production have been socialized. Furthermore, I would think that their theories would have been throughly debunked by then that few would listen to them and their children would also have no way to follow in their footsteps.

[propertyistheft]

the bourgeois, and the supposed counter revolution should be crushed completely, They must either give up all the means of production and become supporters of the revolution, leave the country or region, or be killed. It is the revolutionary's duty to destroy capitalism and all that perpetuates it and All that comes from a capitalist view point. They must not be allowed to create a large counter force, like the contras.

But this should not be a reaon to crush out all opposing thought. There needs to be a line drawn between capitalist reaction, and Revolutionary debate. I do not support a vanguard party approach to any revolution. While it might succeed in gaining control of the country, the overall aims of the revolution will not be met. Or will be met with the degradation of peoples rights.

[OneBrickOneVoice]

Originally posted by [email protected] 19, 2006 06:32 pm
Previous thread on this (http://www.revolutionaryleft.com/index.php?showtopic=57417&hl=bourgeois)


This question has been bothering me for a while, what are your thoughts?
The bourgeois are defined by their relation to the means of production. After the revolution, there are no longer bourgeois as the means of production have been socialized. Furthermore, I would think that their theories would have been throughly debunked by then that few would listen to them and their children would also have no way to follow in their footsteps.
There is still class war post revolution. There are reactionaries, and there are people who attempt to overthrow the socialist government. What about them?

[bcbm]

There are reactionaries, and there are people who attempt to overthrow the socialist government. What about them?

http://writingcompany.blogs.com/this_isnt_writing_its_typ/images/guillotine.jpg

[Janus]

There are reactionaries, and there are people who attempt to overthrow the socialist government. What about them?
Obviously, they need to be dealt with. However, the power of the ex-bourgeois shouldn't be exaggerated in order to justify a police state. The only threat that they pose is through their ideas and whether or not they will survive depends on the existing material conditions.

[vyborg]

Janus is right and I add that the less the revolutionary State will be forced to deal with burgeoisie the better because it will be from the start a weak and healty State as Lenin put it, a half-State ready to fade away as the planning of the economy comes forward. You cant eliminate the State with prisons and camps full of former capitalists

[ItalianCommie]

The bourgeois are defined by their relation to the means of production. After the revolution, there are no longer bourgeois as the means of production have been socialized.

...the bourgeois, and the supposed counter revolution should be crushed completely, They must either give up all the means of production and become supporters of the revolution, leave the country or region, or be killed.

I agree. If the capitalist violently resists the seizure of the means of production, of course, then will there be violence.


Obviously, they need to be dealt with. However, the power of the ex-bourgeois shouldn't be exaggerated in order to justify a police state.

Even better. Stalin did that and look where we are now with the movement as a whole.

[LSD]

Although "brutal" is a generally fair description of Leninism in practice, the problem with "socialist" states of the past is not that they were too "brutal" with their local bourgeoisie, it's that they failed to disenfranchise them.

Because the "revolutionary vanguard" was so eager to centralize power and set up a massive state apparatus, they needed managers and bureaucrats with experience in running industry. That meant hiring all the bourgeoisie that they'd ostensibly just overthrown!

In addition, of course, they added a whole new crew of elite bureaucrats to the mix, only further strengthening the emerging class paradigm.

Postrevolutionary society needs to start dispensing with class immediately. That means no bosses, "red" or otherwise.

If the former bourgeseoisie are integrated into the population and work just like everyone else, in less than a generation, the capitalist class will be extinct. That doesn't mean that their ideas will vanish, but without an economic powerbase, they'll be effectively powerless.

The reason that the bourgeoisie were able to so easily transition back into power in Russia and China and Algeria and Yugoslavia is that they never left. When the grand experiments collapsed, all the old managers and bosses just took off their spiffy red jackets and went right back to being overt capitalists.

The only way to stop that from happening is to make sure that once we kick the bourgeoisie out of power, we keep them out, and we don't bring anyone in to take their place.

The proleariat is perfectly capable of "managing" itself.

[chimx]

Imma quote a passage by Marx that I have quoted before:


Bourgeois revolutions, like those of the eighteenth century, storm more swiftly from success to success, their dramatic effects outdo each other, men and things seem set in sparkling diamonds, ecstasy is the order of the day – but they are short-lived, soon they have reached their zenith, and a long Katzenjammer [crapulence] takes hold of society before it learns to assimilate the results of its storm-and-stress period soberly. On the other hand, proletarian revolutions, like those of the nineteenth century, constantly criticize themselves, constantly interrupt themselves in their own course, return to the apparently accomplished, in order to begin anew; they deride with cruel thoroughness the half-measures, weaknesses, and paltriness of their first attempts, seem to throw down their opponents only so the latter may draw new strength from the earth and rise before them again more gigantic than ever, recoil constantly from the indefinite colossalness of their own goals – until a situation is created which makes all turning back impossible, and the conditions themselves call out:

Hic Rhodus, hic salta!
[Here is the rose, here dance!]

Yet for revolutionary vanguards, they are often too eager to allow for a natural, organic revolutionary consciousness. They allow for abominations such as "war communism", the destruction of Krondstat, and the empowerment of capitalist experts so as to storm through revolutionary periods. The ends justify their means, but in doing so, they alienate the class they are trying to defend. They fear criticism, interruptions, recoil--the very nature of real proletarian revolution.



There are reactionaries, and there are people who attempt to overthrow the socialist government. What about them?

http://writingcompany.blogs.com/this_isnt_writing_its_typ/images/guillotine.jpg

isn't that a picture of the beheading of robespierre, signifying the downfall of the period of jacobin rule? oh the irony!