Social Democracy ?

[punisa]

Hi commrades,

I noticed that many different currents and theories are brought up here.
After the collapse of the communist goverment in my country, the only left option on the political scene is the socialist-democratic party.
Party was formed from ex-communist party members, but today the party is run more and more by younger people.
It almost won the majority in last years elections, but failed short of a few votes. Country is run by right wing semi-nationalists now : (

What is your view on Social-democracy as a theory? I found just bits:
wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_democracy

As a leftist and marxist, do I belong in such a mind scope? Or is the social-democracy (as many state) just another form of capitalist ideology masked under the red banner?

Can it be a political option worthy to be endorsed by still following Marxist guidelines? Maybe it is not the best, but current right wing government is very church oriented and I'm troubled by the path where this country is headed now.

I'm also making an article on the subject and your views will be very appreciated, thanks. I'll keep an eye on the topic : )

[Herman]

Or is the social-democracy (as many state) just another form of capitalist ideology masked under the red banner?

Social-democracy doesn't even bother to mask itself as "red" anymore. Just look at the British Labour Party.

[3A CCCP]

Hi commrades,

I noticed that many different currents and theories are brought up here.
After the collapse of the communist goverment in my country, the only left option on the political scene is the socialist-democratic party.
Party was formed from ex-communist party members, but today the party is run more and more by younger people.
It almost won the majority in last years elections, but failed short of a few votes. Country is run by right wing semi-nationalists now : (

What is your view on Social-democracy as a theory? I found just bits:
wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_democracy

As a leftist and marxist, do I belong in such a mind scope? Or is the social-democracy (as many state) just another form of capitalist ideology masked under the red banner?

Can it be a political option worthy to be endorsed by still following Marxist guidelines? Maybe it is not the best, but current right wing government is very church oriented and I'm troubled by the path where this country is headed now.

I'm also making an article on the subject and your views will be very appreciated, thanks. I'll keep an eye on the topic : )

Comrade:

In my opinion, social-democrats are worse enemies of Communism than outright capitalists/imperialists or even fascists!

There is no mistaking that a capitalist or fascist is an enemy of the human race. The present day neo-con capitalists like George Bush are pretty much an open book. There is no problem identifying where the neo-fascists, neo-Nazis, and skinheads stand - on the same principles as their idols Hitler, Mussolini, etc.

The problem with social-democrats is that they appear to the public as a force for the betterment of humankind, but in fact social democrats and capitalists are just opposite sides of the same coin.

Social democracy works within the capitalist system for change. That in itself is an exercise in futility. They may win superficial changes, and some even relatively significant changes. However, when the dust settles the big picture remains the same. The capitalist remains on top continuing to exploit the working class; the social democrats pat themselves on the back for doing a wonderful job; and the capitalist system keeps on rolling along.

One of the biggest favors the social democrats do for the capitalist masters is letting steam out of the capitalist pressure cooker so it doesn't explode. This is not only a disservice to the working class, it is betrayal!

The Communist Parties in Eastern Europe have degenerated into social democratic parties as far as I know and are Communist in name only. This would have to include the CPRF in the Russian Federation. The Communist Party China runs one of the most brutal capitalist, sweat shop economies in the the world. The CPUSA is a joke and is about as revolutionary as a cub scout pack.

However, there are still a huge number of Marxist-Leninists in these countries (with the exception of the U.S.) and there are leaders who could organize them (Anpilov in Russia, for example).

Very many people on this list are social democrats and seem to have the same opinons as the NY Times and Washington Post regarding Communism. I wouldn't expect many helpful opinions from most on this list. Feel free to contact me off-list.

3A CCCP!
Mikhail

[spartan]

ever since Blair rebranded it as New Labour, its position on the economy has been a third way, neo-Liberal/free market one but with more of a traditional old Labour commitment to public services.How have they had a traditional old labour commitment to public services? Labour traditionally persued nationalisation - true when Blair came to power one of Labour's '97 policies was the renationalisation of the railways, but we never saw that come in to fruition. Other than that PFI and creeping privatisation seem to be at odds with Labour's traditional policies on pubic services.

EDIT: SHIT sorry Spartan - I edited your post instead of quoting it! Sorry... I'll try and fix it?

[Joe Hill's Ghost]

Social democracy is basically just capitalism with extra safety switches. I would definitely prefer to live in a social democratic state over the brutal neoliberal regime I live in now. However, we need to realize that social democracy is a byproduct of class struggle. In any nation where class struggle is low, the social democrats will become more and more right wing. This is because social democracy isn't a real ideology, but an accommodation to working people fighting back. They try to coopt and buy workers off with a more comfortable capitalism. Once folks start to take such programs for granted capital moves in claiming everything is too "expensive" and starts slashing services. As working class militants, we need to be there to fight these cuts, and to fight them with mass social movements that will build people power rather than leftist politician power.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Comrade:

In my opinion, social-democrats are worse enemies of Communism than outright capitalists/imperialists or even fascists!

There is no mistaking that a capitalist or fascist is an enemy of the human race. The present day neo-con capitalists like George Bush are pretty much an open book. There is no problem identifying where the neo-fascists, neo-Nazis, and skinheads stand - on the same principles as their idols Hitler, Mussolini, etc.

The problem with social-democrats is that they appear to the public as a force for the betterment of humankind, but in fact social democrats and capitalists are just opposite sides of the same coin.

Social democracy works within the capitalist system for change. That in itself is an exercise in futility. They may win superficial changes, and some even relatively significant changes. However, when the dust settles the big picture remains the same. The capitalist remains on top continuing to exploit the working class; the social democrats pat themselves on the back for doing a wonderful job; and the capitalist system keeps on rolling along.

One of the biggest favors the social democrats do for the capitalist masters is letting steam out of the capitalist pressure cooker so it doesn't explode. This is not only a disservice to the working class, it is betrayal!

The Communist Parties in Eastern Europe have degenerated into social democratic parties as far as I know and are Communist in name only. This would have to include the CPRF in the Russian Federation. The Communist Party China runs one of the most brutal capitalist, sweat shop economies in the the world. The CPUSA is a joke and is about as revolutionary as a cub scout pack.

However, there are still a huge number of Marxist-Leninists in these countries (with the exception of the U.S.) and there are leaders who could organize them (Anpilov in Russia, for example).

Very many people on this list are social democrats and seem to have the same opinons as the NY Times and Washington Post regarding Communism. I wouldn't expect many helpful opinions from most on this list. Feel free to contact me off-list.

3A CCCP!
Mikhail

Comrade, even as a hardline "Marxist-Leninist," I think you would be welcome to join Social-Labour Democracy. You are correct in regards to today's social-fascists, who are to be kept out!



Now, for a historical guide to the problems of social democracy:



Problems with “Social Democracy”

When Russian Marxism emerged, it came in the form of “social democracy,” modeled after the German experience. Although this classical “social democracy” was a far cry from the liberal and economistic “social democracy” of today, the theoretical underpinnings of the former were rife with serious problems from the outset, which will be explained in the following deconstruction of key parts of Chapter 5 of Kautsky’s The Class Struggle.

The interest of the working-class is not limited to the laws which directly affect it; the great majority of laws touch its interests to some extent. Like every other class, the working-class must strive to influence the state authorities, to bend them to its purposes.

Great capitalists can influence rulers and legislators directly, but the workers can do so only through parliamentary activity. It matters little whether a government be republican in name. In all parliamentary countries it rests with the legislative body to grant tax levies. By electing representatives to parliament, therefore, the working-class can exercise an influence over the governmental powers.

[…]

The proletariat is, however, more favorably situated in regard to parliamentary activity.

[…]

The proletariat is, therefore, in a position to form an independent party. It knows how to control its representatives. Moreover, it finds in its own ranks an increasing number of persons well fitted to represent it in legislative halls.

Whenever the proletariat engages in parliamentary activity as a self-conscious class, parliamentarism begins to change its character. It ceases to be a mere tool in the hands of the bourgeoisie. This very participation of the proletariat proves to be the most effective means of shaking up the hitherto indifferent divisions of the proletariat and giving them hope and confidence. It is the most powerful lever that can be utilized to raise the proletariat out of its economic, social and moral degradation.

The proletariat has, therefore, no reason to distrust parliamentary action; on the other hand, it has every reason to exert all its energy to increase the power of parliaments in their relation to other departments of government and to swell to the utmost its own parliamentary representation.

All of the above is an expression of parliamentary reductionism on the part of Kautsky, in part because of his “apocalyptic predestinationist” belief that capitalism would soon collapse because of a crisis either in the here and now or on the horizon, which would “explain away” his revisionist conclusions that no real revolutionary theory was needed and that only a Rabocheye Dyelo-style “economism” (albeit only in the polemical sense) was necessary. For him, the “union of the labor movement and socialism” – the central theme of this thesis – culminated in a mere parliamentarian “Socialist Party”: the social-democratic party. It is unfortunate that his most well-known disciple, when he scrambled to “find” the earliest traces of Kautsky’s transformation from the real founder of “Marxism” to an anti-proletarian “renegade” – and then committed his “findings” to The State and Revolution – did not find the answers right under his proverbial nose.

On another note, even the word “democracy” in “social democracy” raises serious concerns. First, Kautsky entertained fetishes of “pure” (bourgeois) democracy, hence the aforementioned parliamentary reductionism. Therefore, the question to ask is: “social democracy” for whom? That is, was this “social democracy” for the working class, for the petit-bourgeoisie, or for the bourgeoisie? History has irrevocably answered that question. Second, it would appear that Kautsky, in spite of what he said about educated proletarians, was the intellectual forerunner of modern sectoral chauvinism (the application of the word “proletarian” to only those who work strictly to produce commodities, thus separating them from the rest of the working class) – hence the need for the confused “social democracy” and not the “dictatorship of the proletariat” (which will be revisited upon as a term later in the thesis):

The Socialist movement has, in the nature of things, been from the beginning international in its character. But in each country it has at the same time the tendency to become a national party. That is, it tends to become the representative, not only of the industrial wage-earners, but of all laboring and exploited classes, or, in other words, of the great majority of the population. We have already seen that the industrial proletariat tends to become the only working-class. We have pointed out, also, that the other working-classes are coming more and more to resemble the proletariat in the conditions of labor and way of living. And we have discovered that the proletariat is the only one among the working-classes that grows steadily in energy, in intelligence, and in clear consciousness of its purpose. It is becoming the center about which the disappearing survivals of the other working-classes group themselves. Its ways of feeling and thinking are becoming standard for the whole mass of non-capitalists, no matter what their status may be.

As rapidly as the wage-earners become the leaders of the people, the labor party becomes a people’s party. When an independent craftsman feels like a proletarian, when he recognizes that he, or at any rate his children, will sooner or later be thrust into the proletariat, that there is no salvation for him except through the liberation of the proletariat – from that moment on he will see in the Socialist Party the natural representative of his interests.

We have already explained that he has nothing to fear from a socialist victory. In fact such a victory would be distinctly to his advantage, for it would usher in a society that would free all workers from exploitation and oppression and give them security and prosperity.

But the Socialist Party represents the interests of all non-capitalist classes, not only in the future, but in the present. The proletariat, as the lowest of the exploited strata, cannot free itself from exploitation and oppression without putting an end to all exploitation and oppression. It is, therefore, their sworn enemy, no matter in what form they may appear; it is the champion of all the exploited and oppressed.

Third, this is rather surprisingly the forerunner to Lenin’s historically validated theory of the revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry. The key problem with Kautsky’s formulation here is that it is best applied only during the beginning of the capitalist mode of production in any particular nation-state, and not during towards the end, when a proper socialist revolution occurs.

One can only wonder about the petit-bourgeois and lumpen elements – non-bourgeois classes – who flocked to the fascist causes, as well as wonder about modern “social democracy” (that is, “social democracy” for the bourgeoisie) being the direct result of not orienting the classical “social democracy” in the most advanced capitalist countries to the working class only. Lenin wrote a rather lengthy work attacking populism, titled What the “Friends of the People” Are and How They Fight the Social-Democrats. Today, it is more apt to comment on what the populist “social-democrats” are – and how they fight the working class!

[punisa]

Hi again,

all of your comments are really great, thank you very much. You've put into a great concept which gave me a couple of epiphonies, which is always a good thing.
The way you've put it " letting steam out of the capitalist pressure cooker so it doesn't explode" is so right that it's actually scare.

I can back up this statement of yours with a real life example. After the explotation done by the nationalistic government, shady privatization of formerly state owenership, country was in the economic collapse. Middle class and proud hard working citizens degraded themselves to a searching thru dumbsters for food ! Not long ago these were the same folk that could afford to take their families on vacation and have two cars.

Naturually people realized a huge drop in the life standards and decided to "vote left" in order to stop this process. Unfortunatlly the only other sollution and opposition to the right wingers were the social-democrats.

They won and ruled 2000-2004. Nothing really changed, the explotation by foreign corporations continued ever so strong. Only the masquarade of socialism made some people think that governmental structure actually changed. Ok, maybe the church was not as loud, but who cares if the sermon or a movie is showing on sunday morning TV when people are drowning in debts??

After 2004 the right-center got back to their position, countinuing what they do best - align themselves with foreign "investors" by exploiting working class and selling of land.

I'll guess that some of you by now can pretty much discover which country is the topic here, although I have not mentioned it.
Anyway the political problem today is that only these two parties right-center and left-center (as they call their "ideology" in the political spectrum) are a choice. They hold about 96% of political body.
Other small parties are there just to sell their votes to the big players anyway and they're basicly nothing more then oportunists.

I have the need to politically active, but where the hell can I belong in such a situation? Should one choose the lesser evil and try to find ways to present alternative ideas? Or just stick to public written political commentaries (which is my current position) in order to make at least some poeple use their heads?

We're not a big country and although people are very into politics, their political knowledge is so shallow that it's funny.

I'll drop by later, see ya

[Holden Caulfield]

social democracy is dead, dying or severly wounded in most developed countries which is a shame as these parties are the ones that the workers will run to when crisis set in probably,

as has been said just look at the British Labour Party they are carbon copies of the Torys, the time when they realise there are more voting workers than from the middle classes then they can win elections as a left wing party, tailored specifically to the needs of the majority of the workers,

a real danger to this is the growth of fascism in the country spurred on by the media moguls and such as fascism apart from the obvious danger splits the working classes between left and right and between racial lines,

[Die Neue Zeit]

^^^ At least you're moving away from Trotsky's antiquated class "analysis" of fascism when dealing with neo-fascists like the BNP. :)

[Holden Caulfield]

^^^ At least you're moving away from Trotsky's antiquated class "analysis" of fascism when dealing with neo-fascists like the BNP. :)

i am not your average trotskyist, i am certainly no cliffite, and i don't follow Trotsky to the word i just think my views are closest to his in comparison to most other noteable marxists i have read about

[punisa]

a real danger to this is the growth of fascism in the country spurred on by the media moguls and such as fascism apart from the obvious danger splits the working classes between left and right and between racial lines,

I'm sorry, guess I still didnt inject myself with enough coffe this morning :) But I did not fully understand this statemant you made, although I am intrigued. Could you develop on that?

I'm interested in this theory of yours beacuse we are facing a lot fascist revival here. Wearing fascist symbols in public and attending concerts which glorify certain aspects of fascism is not sanctioned in any way in our county.

On the contrary, it is actually endorsed by national media and the ruling party!

[sonicbluetm]

Social-democracy doesn't even bother to mask itself as "red" anymore. Just look at the British Labour Party.

The Labour party is far afield on the right side of the spectrum and everyone knows it, and in fact that's why the Brits vote for them.

It's a special case and doesn't necessarily represent social-democracy as a whole.

There definitely are some genuinely leftist social-democratic parties in Europe. Die Linke is one and it's rapidly gaining in popularity, effectively replacing the rightist SPD.

[Sugar Hill Kevis]

ever since Blair rebranded it as New Labour, its position on the economy has been a third way, neo-Liberal/free market one but with more of a traditional old Labour commitment to public services.

How have they had a traditional old labour commitment to public services? Labour traditionally persued nationalisation - true when Blair came to power one of Labour's '97 policies was the renationalisation of the railways, but we never saw that come in to fruition. Other than that PFI and creeping privatisation seem to be at odds with Labour's traditional policies on pubic services.