Kwisatz Haderach
6th September 2007, 05:51
Ironically, revleftists have disagreements about the precise definition and features of socialism, but one of the things that we all agree on is that there were a number of states in the 20th century which claimed to be socialist but were not, in fact, socialist.
In simplified terms, one could observe the following:
Maoists argue that revisionist states were not socialist.
Trotskyists argue that all "socialist states" after the 1920s were not socialist.
Left- and Council communists argue that the Leninist model of development is inherently detrimental to, or incompatible with, socialism.
And, of course, anarchists believe that the whole notion of a "socialist state" is nonsense.
So, yes, we can all agree that there were some "fake" socialist states at some point or other. Now, the part I find problematic is that we have so many different names for them. "Stalinism," "degenerated workers' states," "deformed workers' states," "coordinatorism," "bureaucratic collectivism," "revisionism," "state capitalism," and so on and so forth. Of course, these different names represent different theories about what went wrong with the states in question, but still, we really should have a more generic term that means "a kind of society where the means of production are owned by the state but which cannot be called socialist for one reason or other."
I propose that we all come together and try to agree on such a term - preferably an "-ism" - for the sake of making it easier to explain things to new comrades. I hate it when someone new to Marxism asks me about the nature of the Soviet Union and I have to list a dozen different names for what the Soviet system might have been.
In simplified terms, one could observe the following:
Maoists argue that revisionist states were not socialist.
Trotskyists argue that all "socialist states" after the 1920s were not socialist.
Left- and Council communists argue that the Leninist model of development is inherently detrimental to, or incompatible with, socialism.
And, of course, anarchists believe that the whole notion of a "socialist state" is nonsense.
So, yes, we can all agree that there were some "fake" socialist states at some point or other. Now, the part I find problematic is that we have so many different names for them. "Stalinism," "degenerated workers' states," "deformed workers' states," "coordinatorism," "bureaucratic collectivism," "revisionism," "state capitalism," and so on and so forth. Of course, these different names represent different theories about what went wrong with the states in question, but still, we really should have a more generic term that means "a kind of society where the means of production are owned by the state but which cannot be called socialist for one reason or other."
I propose that we all come together and try to agree on such a term - preferably an "-ism" - for the sake of making it easier to explain things to new comrades. I hate it when someone new to Marxism asks me about the nature of the Soviet Union and I have to list a dozen different names for what the Soviet system might have been.