Devrim
19th January 2008, 07:05
From a thread in the Trotskyists section:
The Socialist Workers Party offers a unique analysis of the Soviet Union, and the other countries which comprised the former Soviet Bloc. This theory is known as State-Capitalism.
The idea is not particularly unique. It was first advanced by the communist left in 1918:
We stand for the construction of the proletarian society by the class creativity of the workers themselves, not by the ukases of the captains of industry. . . if the proletariat itself does not know how to create the necessary prerequisites for the socialist organisation of labour no one can do this for it and no one can compel it to do this. The stick, if raised against the workers, will find itself in the hands of a social force which is either under the influence of another social class or is in the hands of the soviet power; but the soviet power will then be forced to seek support against the proletariat from another class (e.g. the peasantry) and by this it will destroy itself as the dictatorship of the proletariat. Socialism and socialist organisation will be set up by the proletariat itself, or they will not be set up at all - something else will be set up - state capitalism
Ante Ciliga developed on the idea in his book the Russian Enigma in (published in 1938, but written earlier. His position was taken up by the ex-Trotskyists of the Revolutionare Kommunisten Deutschlands (RKD) who broke with the idea of the defence of the workers state, and defined the USSR as state capitalist. The Italian fraction of the communist left also broke from the idea of
the great lie of the ‘proletarian nature’ of the Russian state and to show it for what it is, to reveal its counter-revolutionary, capitalist and imperialist nature and function. It is enough to note that the goal of production remains the extraction of surplus value, to affirm the capitalist character of the economy
In the UK the Anti Parliamentary Communist Federation stated in its Principles, and tactics published in 1935:
Lenin's utopian idea of a 'Workers' State' is in essence State Capitalism. The NEP is capitalist economics, through and through. Wage labour is the basis of capitalism. Russian society is no exception -- high or low wages have no bearing on the question. The productivity of labour increases out of all proportion to wages which means a relative decline in the value of labour-power and the abject pauperisation of the working class as a whole. To say that unemployment in Russia is non-existent is to reveal that industrial development has not reached that stage where the agrarian population has been completely absorbed in wage labour.
Wage labour gives rise to commodity production and capitalist relations, therefore, the control of the means of production and exchange in the hands of the state and not the proletariat. State Capitalism presupposes wage slavery, and a slavery that becomes more brutal in character as the productive forces of labour develops. The Russian proletariat is learning why failure followed the initial success of the Bolshevik Party. The CI in exploiting Bolshevik traditions to divert the proletariat from the International character of the revolution cannot always succeed. The impetus once set in motion will raise the Marxian slogan: Abolition of the wages system!
Cliff would have been aware of at least some of these currents particularly the RKD as it came from Trotskyism. To claim that in 1947 when Cliff started to talk about state capitalism that it was a unique idea is distorting the record somewhat.
Devrim
The Socialist Workers Party offers a unique analysis of the Soviet Union, and the other countries which comprised the former Soviet Bloc. This theory is known as State-Capitalism.
The idea is not particularly unique. It was first advanced by the communist left in 1918:
We stand for the construction of the proletarian society by the class creativity of the workers themselves, not by the ukases of the captains of industry. . . if the proletariat itself does not know how to create the necessary prerequisites for the socialist organisation of labour no one can do this for it and no one can compel it to do this. The stick, if raised against the workers, will find itself in the hands of a social force which is either under the influence of another social class or is in the hands of the soviet power; but the soviet power will then be forced to seek support against the proletariat from another class (e.g. the peasantry) and by this it will destroy itself as the dictatorship of the proletariat. Socialism and socialist organisation will be set up by the proletariat itself, or they will not be set up at all - something else will be set up - state capitalism
Ante Ciliga developed on the idea in his book the Russian Enigma in (published in 1938, but written earlier. His position was taken up by the ex-Trotskyists of the Revolutionare Kommunisten Deutschlands (RKD) who broke with the idea of the defence of the workers state, and defined the USSR as state capitalist. The Italian fraction of the communist left also broke from the idea of
the great lie of the ‘proletarian nature’ of the Russian state and to show it for what it is, to reveal its counter-revolutionary, capitalist and imperialist nature and function. It is enough to note that the goal of production remains the extraction of surplus value, to affirm the capitalist character of the economy
In the UK the Anti Parliamentary Communist Federation stated in its Principles, and tactics published in 1935:
Lenin's utopian idea of a 'Workers' State' is in essence State Capitalism. The NEP is capitalist economics, through and through. Wage labour is the basis of capitalism. Russian society is no exception -- high or low wages have no bearing on the question. The productivity of labour increases out of all proportion to wages which means a relative decline in the value of labour-power and the abject pauperisation of the working class as a whole. To say that unemployment in Russia is non-existent is to reveal that industrial development has not reached that stage where the agrarian population has been completely absorbed in wage labour.
Wage labour gives rise to commodity production and capitalist relations, therefore, the control of the means of production and exchange in the hands of the state and not the proletariat. State Capitalism presupposes wage slavery, and a slavery that becomes more brutal in character as the productive forces of labour develops. The Russian proletariat is learning why failure followed the initial success of the Bolshevik Party. The CI in exploiting Bolshevik traditions to divert the proletariat from the International character of the revolution cannot always succeed. The impetus once set in motion will raise the Marxian slogan: Abolition of the wages system!
Cliff would have been aware of at least some of these currents particularly the RKD as it came from Trotskyism. To claim that in 1947 when Cliff started to talk about state capitalism that it was a unique idea is distorting the record somewhat.
Devrim