Brief Essay on Socialism Today

[DarkTravesty]

Here is a brief essay I wrote containing some of my thoughts as far as the future of socialism/communism. I know this is going to get endless criticism, posting it anyway. Some parts considered too inflammatory have been edited, as per the advice of a friend, so the flow may be odd in spots. Keep in mind that I do not advocate violence.

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A Brief Commentary on the Merits of a Modern Vanguard Party

Since the beginning of my several year fight for socialism (if I can even call it a fight) I have been met with considerable resistance everywhere I have taken it. The notable thing about the resistance I have been met with is that it is not active resistance; people aren’t attacking me or the ideas of socialism, they are simply refusing to listen and when they do listen, they fail to give it more than a passing thought.

The list of things that may be to blame for this is impressive, but I am not writing this to detail each one and offer individual solutions. If we were to try individual solutions for every problem that we face, progress would never be made. Instead we need to rethink our overall approach to spreading socialism and educating the people.

In my search for the solution I have reexamined the writings of both Marx and Lenin, the two great socialist thinkers I hold in high regard, as well as great socialist revolutionaries such as Che Guevara. During this reexamination I discovered a solution relevant to our problem that each of these writers and revolutionaries offered: seizure of power by the proletariat. While there are many socialist thinkers who believe in entirely democratic means of takeover, Lenin asserts that it is impractical to strive for this. The capitalist system has resulted in the degeneration of our government such that it is no longer possible to make sufficient progress towards socialism. Furthermore, true socialism cannot be implemented slowly over time; for a socialist system to be successfully implemented it must be done all at once.

<Considerable content edited here> Simply protesting, posting fliers, and holding forums are no longer adequate methods on there own, a strong organization with a sophisticated structure is necessary to direct these actions in order to maximize their impact. We need the vanguard party of Lenin again; the united, organized, and driven organization that will lead the revolution forward.

While I have no concrete outline of what this vanguard party would look like, I do have a basic idea of what elements would ideally be present. A leadership apparatus of some sort would be necessary, ideally in the form of a council. Various committees would also be necessary, each addressing specific needs of the organization. And, of course, various geographical subdivisions should exist. The specifics of the structure of this organization are subject to debate, but I will emphasize that it must be democratic in nature. I do not intend to create a totalitarian organization driven only by a select few; democracy is crucial to socialism, and so democracy must be present in a vanguard party.

Another area of debate is what the exact stances of this organization would be on various issues. Of course, above all, the vanguard party’s purpose is to advance to cause of socialism in the United States. Within the broad boundaries of this goal there are many issues that need to be addressed which have many different solutions, all socialist in nature. It has been a trend within the socialist movement since the very beginning for fragmentation to occur over such minor details, which has greatly weakened the cause. The official vanguard party stance on these points of contention will be decided democratically from within, and may be subject to democratic change. Internal fragmentation must not be allowed to occur, it is the greatest enemy of our cause and we must always be wary of it.

My purpose in writing this is as follows: I want to hear the opinions of others on this, whether it is criticism or praise. I would further like to see the support for such an organization if it were to be created, assuming people aren’t entirely objected to the idea in the first place. This is my call for the creation of a vanguard party in the United States, an organization with the strength to address the problems we face today. Something more than we are currently doing needs to be done, and this is the solution I offer.

[mikelepore]

The word "vanguard" may invoke different pictures in different people. Let&#39;s be more specific about it. Is it expected that the average working class person will eventually be educated to the point of joining the vanguard organization and being part of the decision-making process, so that the embryonic vanguard movement is just chronologically the first working class segment to be awakened to the need? If so, I&#39;m in favor of having a vanguard. Or is the preliminary vanguard movement headed toward becoming the decision-makers, who will ostensibly act "for" the people, "in the name of" the people? If so, I&#39;m against having a vanguard.

[Hit The North]

There are numerous political parties in the USA, and elsewhere, who pose (at least potentially) as the vanguard. How would your organisation be different?

Also I think that posing the solution as "we need a vanguard party" misses the point of the real weakness of the working class in the USA, which is that it lacks organisation at the grassroots.

The American proletariat is potentially the strongest working class in the world, sitting as it does, at the heart of the global superpower. Nevertheless, in many ways it is the weakest working class in the developed world. There are many obvious and not so obvious economic, political and ideological reasons for this weakness and I don&#39;t think adding yet another vanguard party to the list would help much.


Mike:
Let&#39;s be more specific about it. Is it expected that the average working class person will eventually be educated to the point of joining the vanguard organization and being part of the decision-making process, so that the embryonic vanguard movement is just chronologically the first working class segment to be awakened to the need?

Isn&#39;t it more the case that the American worker has to educate herself (through struggle) and, in doing so, form the vanguard through collective action?

[DarkTravesty]

Is it expected that the average working class person will eventually be educated to the point of joining the vanguard organization and being part of the decision-making process, so that the embryonic vanguard movement is just chronologically the first working class segment to be awakened to the need?
Yes, this is exactly what I mean. I am not advocating a vanguard party that makes decisions for the working class, this is completely against what socialism is about and would defeat the purpose entirely.

The other parties posing as a "vanguard party" differ greatly form what I have in mind. Calling what I have in mind a party probably doesn&#39;t get the point across as well as I would like, so I&#39;ll try to give a brief explanation. I am talking about an organization with a political agenda, something more than a mere political party. A proper vanguard "party" in my opinion, needs a very sopisicated structure, one more like a government than a party.

As I explained a bit of in the article, this organization would have many different parts, and be entirely democratic in nature. The positions of the party would be decided democratically, and democracy would be inherent in the organization from the regional divisions all of the way up the the highest level council (or whatever it would be) I&#39;m still having some difficulty explaining this it would seem =&#092;

[mikelepore]

Originally posted by Citizen [email protected] 22, 2007 10:21 pm
Isn&#39;t it more the case that the American worker has to educate herself (through struggle) and, in doing so, form the vanguard through collective action?
I think a vanguard must educate the working class in this limited sense: people who have put some time into considering such matters must recommend to the working class a list of specific features for a new socialist system. For example, one feature that I have seen recommended and agree with is to have direct democratic election by the workers of middle industrial management instead of having appointment of middle management by the general management. Such anti-bureaucratic features have to be conceived and expressed explicitly, and written into the bylaws of the new system explicitly, otherwise revolution is likely to lead to bureaucracy by default.

[DarkTravesty]

The problem is that in general the working class here in the US does not educate itself or spend time thinking about these things, even when provoked. I feel strongly that a vanguard organization is necessary to take a more active role in educating people. By all means, they are encouraged to think about things and consider the matters themselves, but i don&#39;t think we can assume everyone will.

The proof for this that I see is the current state of the working class in the US; they are very apathetic, generally speaking, and spend little time "educating" themselves, in favor of entertainment after a day of work. And I can&#39;t blame them for that, I do the same many times. A vanguard party would concentrate on more aggressive methods of getting the method out, taking a more active role (as I have said earlier) in attempting to educate people.

[obsolete discourse]

mike says:
...the notable thing about the resistance I have been met with is that it is not active resistance; people aren’t attacking me or the ideas of socialism, they are simply refusing to listen and when they do listen, they fail to give it more than a passing thought.

Perhaps, history is done with what you are proposing? Perhaps the conditions are no longer there and those who work are bored and suspicious of all politics?


Here&#39;s some words from Frere Dupont. Perhaps they may help you in relation to your misguided vangaurdist thinking. In this scene The Mother Cat is commenting to Dearest Kitten on the need for vigilance of the pro-revolutionary against the political movement of the leftwing of the state. He takes a healthy jab at Zizek as well...

Dearest kitten, do not become prematurely despondent. We should not resign ourselves to coming face to face with this devil only at the moment of another Supreme Soviet’s triumph of centralisation, on the contrary. The signs of the left wing’s complicity, of the determination of its ideas by its class position, occur almost at every point in its interventions, which it calls ‘politics’. It is simply a matter of knowing how to look.

Oh mama, then please give me the clue for even now there is an encroachment from the shadows.

Dearest kitten, then study hard these words, they are a common enough formulation; tell me what you find in them:


&#39;But the thematics of the crowd are only a manifestation of what Lenin called spontaneism: an uprising will achieve nothing without organisation. Zizek has recently reminded us of this; recalling the Events of May 1968, Derrida will also voice a similar concern: he disliked ‘vibrating in unison’, he says, and even then, the Events are not yet a politics. Communism remains etiolated unless it joins the call to go outside with a determinate political programme.&#39; (from http://spurious.typepad.com/ (10/03/05))

Oh mama, this is less the philosophy of the firing squad (in which, after all, one might find some merit) than it is a philosophy for the firing squad. This one makes arguments for the Committee of Public Safety like it was 1792.

Dearest kitten, one more step if you wish to become a dialectician.

Oh mamma, then it is to the details that we shall turn; the author advances with his bootlaces tied together, he permits hostile comment on the crowd but is unable to quote the crowd’s critique of its would-be leaders. With this omission he demonstrates his class antagonism towards the crowd itself. The call for organisation belongs to the organising classes, the middle managers, the social professionals, the state’s well-educated functionaries. ‘Organisation’ is always a call for the suppression of the crowd’s key character – so it is that the purpose of the left wing is the reintegration of the crowd as a harnessed use value, the tortoise is turned over. And the dream of the left wing is that the crowd under the stewardship of the party becomes a local expression of the state’s will.

[DarkTravesty]

I have read the above over several times, and sadly I think the significance of it is escaping me (for the most part) Would anyone care to enlighten me further?

[DrFreeman09]

However necessary a vanguard party is, the Left as a whole is currently confused and disoriented because not only is their no vanguard, but the whole idea of a vanguard has become muddled and distorted by the degeneration of the workers&#39; state in the USSR and the flat-out non-existence of the workers&#39; state in other "communist" nations.

The massive amount of misconceptions that came out of the October Revolution of 1917 will be difficult to clear up, but it is possible.

The main reason those misconceptions have NOT been cleared up at this point is because of the countless cult-like organization where Marxism and Leninism have been converted into a sort of religion. These groups denounce the failures of the USSR and other regimes on the surface, yet they turn around and throw phrases at us like "democratic centralism" and "dictatorship of the proletariat" without understanding what those phrases actually mean.

These organizations claim to support democracy and genuine workers&#39; rule, but when asked the tough questions like "will one party hold a monopoly over political power?" they cannot answer&#33; When asked about the need for the entire working class to have CONCRETE democratic rights of free speech and organization, they cannot answer&#33; When asked about whether the workers will have direct control over their vanguard organization, they will not answer&#33;

This is extremely confusing for people on the Left and has led to the complete theoretical bankruptcy of Marxism these days and to the complete paralysis of the Left.

If we want to create a successful vanguard capable of mobilizing the masses and ending bourgeois rule, I believe there are several things that have to be done:

1. This organization must implement the principle of COMPLETE TRANSPARENCY. Workers need to be able to see what goes on behind the curtain and provide input, or else it&#39;s not really their organization is it? This seems like a no-brainer, but you&#39;d be surprised how many "Marxist" organizations object to this idea.

2. We need to dare to talk about our goal. We must make clear that workers&#39; rule WILL NOT look like the degenerated police state of the USSR. Further, we must also drive home that even workers&#39; rule is not our goal. Stateless, classless society is our goal, with the necessary precursor of workers&#39; rule as a short-term goal. Peace and abundance for all is our goal.

3. We must make clear that in a post-revolutionary situation, the vanguard party CANNOT be the ruling party. If there is one party that maintains a monopoly over political power, it must suppress all that oppose it to maintain this position. This includes the suppression of those who expose the possible corruption, hypocrisy, and degeneration that may exist within the party. Thus, a monolothic party-state will lead to degeneration (this is what has happened every time to date) and is contradictory to the concept of workers&#39; rule.

4. Above all, we have to be clear that workers will have concrete democratic rights of free speech under workers&#39; rule, and that if those within the "Marxist" party become corrupt or exhibit hypocrisy, the workers must have the right to say so and, if need be, to organize independently of the "Marxist" party without permission from the state.

A good example of an organization that claims to support genuine workers&#39; rule yet fails on all four of those counts is the CVO (the Communist Voice Organization).

They can be found here: http://CommunistVoice.org

Ben Seattle and I recently had a debate with the founder of this organization on these very principles, and I believe it was quite fruitful.

The entire debate can be found here: http://struggle.net/struggle/mass-democracy

Particular attention should be drawn to this article: http://struggle.net/struggle/ben/2007/909-ben.htm (article is in the "Appendix" section)