The October Revolution & The Soviet Union: What went wrong?

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

Guess I'm just shameless. "Caste," is a bit clumsy, but elevating the bureaucracy to "class" status is incorrect. Marx held that classes were historical necessities -- the Soviet Bureaucracy (and Chinese, Cuban, Vietnamese, etc.), were anything but.

The bureaucracy's relationship to the means of production was qualitatively different than the bourgeoisie. And I agree that the idea of capitalism without private property was an idea that would have been impossible for Marx to come up with -- because it involves a misunderstanding of his theories.

A ruling class that does not own the means of production is fanciful. And whatever your take on the Soviet Bureaucracy, they did not own the means of production. Unless you stretch the meaning of "own" past the breaking point. "Appropriator and commander," is that a new relationship to the means of production? Very creative, comrade. The same could be said about the "labor lieutenants of capital," the union bureaucracy. They too are a conduit of class alien attitudes and ideas into the proletariat. They too, try to force the workers to act against their own interests. They too gain material benefit from this. They are still members of the working class -- they are not capitalists and they are not some new class.

You seem to think that these things are moral categories. Since you hate the bureaucracy (and I'm with you on that, comrade), poof, they become the bourgeoisie. It is all about the relationship to the means of production.

[Captain Ahab]

Was not the control of the means of the productions handed to the state? Was not the state controlled by the bureaucracy?

[Thirsty Crow]

Guess I'm just shameless. "Caste," is a bit clumsy, but elevating the bureaucracy to "class" status is incorrect. Marx held that classes were historical necessities -- the Soviet (and Chinese, Cuban, Vietnamese, etc.), were anything but.

You're evading the question. Not only is the use of the notion of caste clumsy, but is directly connected to the impossibility of some currents to engage with the reality of the Soviet Union through the lens of the Marxist notion of class, which I briefly sketched in my prior post.

So, let's not dance around this issue anymore. First, is my understanding of the notion of class (appropriating surplus product and appropriating labour through a concrete way it is alienated from the worker - slavery, feudal relations of servitude, wage labour; in short, relationship to the means of production and conditions of labour) correct, and if yes, then what about the acknowledged difference between workers' and bureaucrats' relationship to the means of production in USSR.

The bureaucracy's relationship to the means of production was qualitatively different than the bourgeoisie. And I agree that the idea of capitalism without private property was an idea that would have been impossible for Marx to come up with -- because it involves a misunderstanding of his theories.

Marx talked about just what I wrote, "the abolition of private property on the basis of capital itself". Are you aware of this?

A ruling class that does not own the means of production is fanciful. And whatever your take on the Soviet Bureaucracy, they did not own the means of production.

This is an old trick of arguing from the standpoint of legal relations and legally recognized (constitution, laws) forms of property ownerhsip. Marxist class analysis nowhere in sight.

Unless you stretch the meaning of "own" past the breaking point.

Interesting. I thought that Marxists should be examinging the relations of production, and not just the legal relations.

"Appropriator and commander," is that a new relationship to the means of production? Very creative, comrade.

This is absurd.

It's clear as day that what I did is abstract from the concrete differences of the historical class societies and thus put forward a notion of class which accounts for their common characteristics.

The same could be said about the "labor lieutenants of capital," the union bureaucracy.

The union bureaucrats usually do not employ wage labour for the sake of production of capital. And they do not bond the worker as serf to a piece of land. They do not enslave the worker.

They too are a conduit of class alien attitudes and ideas into the proletariat

I'm not talking about a "conduit of class alien attitudes and ideas". There you go again with this exclusive attention to ideological and legal relations.

You seem to think that these things are moral categories.

Is crap like this really necessary? I mean, only a fool could conclude that, or a person desperately trying to evade the question.

[Luís Henrique]

Was not the control of the means of the productions handed to the state? Was not the state controlled by the bureaucracy?

If so, where did the competition that is absolutely necessary to the existence of capital go?

Luís Henrique

[Captain Ahab]

If so, where did the competition that is absolutely necessary to the existence of capital go?

Luís Henrique

Why is competition absolutely necessary for the existence of capital? Is it not wage-labour that is as said by Marx?

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

So what? Capitalists are not some rock solid homogeneous group who meet in some secret boardroom to conspire to squash any flicker of rebellion. Believe it or not, capitalists are in bitter competition with each other. Capitalist nations are constantly hostile to one another. Or what, do capitalist nations not go to war with each other?


Your definition of what constitutes capitalism contains all the superficiality of a bourgeois commentator. As I've said many times before the existence of a capitalist class does not depend on the owners having some legally enshrined right to their property. People who call themselves Marxists should not hold such a superficial notion on what capitalism is. They should look at what actually holds on the ground. The relationship of the ruling state capitalist class to the means of production was totally different to that of the ordinary Russian worker. You would have to be absolutely delusional to deny this. This class had absolute control over the disposal of economic surplus unlike the ordinary Russian workers. The overwhelming control that it exerted over the means of production by virtue of its absolute control over the state amounted to de facto ownership of those means by this class. Not as individual capitalists but as a collective capitalist class. This is not a new development. The upper echelons of the catholic church during feudal times owned large swathes of property, not as individuals, but collectively.



The Whites at this point were in no position to take advantage of the rebellion or even support it. You accusations are groundless.

My definition of a capitalist class is that the have a characteristic relationship to the means of production, OWNERSHIP. The SB simply did not have that, ever. And you betray your idealism when you bring in the upper echelons of the Catholic Church during feudal times -- they were capitalist? Really? Another example of capitalists without capitalism. Do you just label any ruling group some kind of capitalist class? Groupings that concentrate political power into their hands are not necessarily capitalists.

The impressionistic, anti-Marxist view of state cappers usually comes down to this formula: The bourgeoisie own the means of production in capitalism. In the SU, the bureaucracy controls the state, which collectively owns the means of production and therefore they are the new bourgeoisie, collectively. When Napoleon became head of state in France, did that mean a return to feudalism? No it did not. Same with the USSR, in the new Thermidor, property and class relations were not overturned. It is a bit complex. So we don't just tar the Stalinists as being the new bourgeoisie because the exert a high degree of control over production.

the existence of a capitalist class does not depend on the owners having some legally enshrined right to their property.

No it depends on them de facto and dejure OWNING the property and having fairly free reign to do with it whatever they desire. Like shut it down, like give it to their children, like sell it and take the profit and move to Tahiti. These things and many others that are the right of the bourgeoisie everywhere (well, almost everywhere) did not exist in the USSR.

As for my "accusations" about the Whites -- it is a judgment that the victory of the rebels would have lead to the downfall of the Bolsheviks and counterrevolution. The Rebels consisted of a heterogenous bunch -- no way they bring about a new and improved version of October.

[Captain Ahab]

I don't think Marx ever implied that there is only one necessary condition for the existence of capital - or for its domination of the productive activity.

Yes, but when did he argue that competition is absolutely needed for the creation of capital?

He is quite clear that capitalism can only exist on the basis of the production of commodities though, and it is hard to see what the necessity of commodities would be if there was no private property - who would sell and who would buy those commodities, if not separate private proprietors?

Commodities are things people want and there will be a demand for them regardless of who creates them. The states sells the commodities and the workers buy them. State-capitalism is bound not to resemble free market capitalism just like a tendency here not being identical to another doesn't mean it isn't socialist.

(But, even if Marx never said that capitalist exploitation cannot exist without competition, LinksRadical does:

I've only skimmed through your spar with LinkRadical and don't particularly care what he says as he is not Marx.

[Luís Henrique]

Yes, but when did he argue that competition is absolutely needed for the creation of capital?

Well, he certainly says this:

Conceptually, competition is nothing other than the inner nature of capital, its essential character, appearing in and realized as the reciprocal interaction of many capitals with one another, the inner tendency as external necessity.) (Capital exists and can only exist as many capitals, and its self-determination therefore appears as their reciprocal interaction with one another.) Capital is just as much the constant positing as the suspension of proportionate production. The existing proportion always has to be suspended by the creation of surplus values and the increase of productive forces. But this demand, that production should be expanded simultaneously and at once in the same proportion, makes external demands upon capital which in no way arise out of it itself; at the same time, the departure from the given proportion in one branch of production drives all of them out of it, and in unequal proportions. So far (for we have not yet reached the aspect of capital in which it is circulating capital, and still have circulation on one side and capital 'on the other, or production as its presupposition, or ground from which it arises), even from the standpoint of production alone, circulation contains the relation to consumption and production -- in other words, surplus labour as counter value [Gegenwert], and differentiation of labour in an ever richer form.

(Grundrisse, Notebook IV; all emphases mine)

I am pretty sure there are other paragraphs by him on the subject, but I haven't been able to find them on a cursory search. Anyway, the drive of his reasoning seems pretty clear to me: capital can only exist through competition.

Commodities are things people want and there will be a demand for them regardless of who creates them.

A lettuce is a commodity, and it is a "thing people want" - but a lathe is a commodity, not a thing people want - it is only a use value for capital.

The states sells the commodities and the workers buy them.

Which then means a very strange form of capitalism that produces means of consumption as commodities, but means of production as... non-commodities?

The historical experience shows otherwise: means of production in the Soviet Union and similar social formations were produced as commodities, and sold by companies to one another, as if they were independent and competing capitalist enterprises.

I've only skimmed through your spar with LinkRadical and don't particularly care what he says as he is not Marx.

Fair enough.