Most firefighters think the SWP/ruc (Wespec') is a load of ole bollocks

[bolshiebhoy]

Hoe recent was your last reading of State and Revolution? Compared with clasical Council Communism it is still markedly authoritarian and party centred.

Sometimes you have a point but then you ruin it by being deliberately wrong. No it's not. And the point is that if Lenin hadn't written S&R and actually participated in the making of a revolution the council coms/anarchists wouldn't have had anything to talk about. Poor show even by your standards.

 

[LLETSA]

Any takers?



Has it ever entered the heads of any of the 'Leninists' on here to ask themselves why attempts to 'build a Leninist party' in this country or any other western country (and arguably any country outside of Russia) have ended in abject failure?

 

[bolshiebhoy]

Any takers?



Has it ever entered the heads of any of the 'Leninists' on here to ask themselves why attempts to 'build a Leninist party' in this country or any other western country (and arguably any country outside of Russia) have ended in abject failure?

Proof? Other than prejudice. Western country, don't make me laugh.

 

[mk12]

I think you also misunderstood my arguments.

Evidence of the boilsheviks high votes in the elections to the soviets backs up the success of this tactic
The Bolsheviks were a party that wanted to influence the masses so that the workers and peasants would seize power through their proletarian organs, the Soviets. The April Thesis did just this. So I suppose I agree with you that workers were won round to the Bolshevik's programme. But that is the purpose of revolutionaries isn't it?

Wouldn't anarchists in Russia argue amongst the workers that all power should go to the Soviets? Therefore, weren't their tactics the same as the Bolsheviks?

This can in no way be seen as evidence that S&R and the turn suggsted in it was not an opportunist or tactical document
On State & Revolution - You seem to think that this book was written as propaganda so that people would support the Bolsheviks. In fact, he had to stop before finishing it because the revolution took place! It wasn't released in Russia until 1918, how can this be a propaganda tool?

there is ample evidence that the working class did actually support the sort of argument put forward in the April Theses
Yes, but it took the Bolsheviks correct programme to actually prove to the workers and the peasants that ALL power should rest with the Soviets, and that the P.G. was unnecessary.

Unfortunately, there is more evidence to suggest that the workers had not agreed with the April Thesis. As the All-Russian Congress of Soviets in June, there were -
285 Socialist-Revolutionary
248 Menshevik
105 Bolshevik
111 Various other small parties

This congress also supported the Provisional Government.

working class taking power in those same July days
The July days were evidence that the Bolsheviks tactics were correct. You would probably agree. But this was only in Petrograd. The Bolsheviks realised that you shouldn't seize power without the majority of workers wanting it...the workers could have taken power in Petrograd in June or July. But the rest of the country would not have followed suit. Remember the Paris Commune! Thanks to the revolutionary party, these mistakes were not made again.

 

[LLETSA]

Proof? Other than prejudice. Western country, don't make me laugh.

Are you serious?

 

[bolshiebhoy]

Are you serious?

No, just not prepared to parenthesize your 'anarchism'. Oh hell I have.

 

[LLETSA]

No, just not prepared to parenthesize your 'anarchism'. Oh hell I have.

Ask some of the other anarchists on here if they think I'm an anarchist.

Are you really so blinded by your own dogma as to believe that the only reason to question Leninism is to score points on a forum for 'anarchism'?

The question still stands: why has a Leninist party on the model of the Russian one never been successfully built in any country outside Russia?

Take your time- I'm off out now.

 

[fanciful]

i was refering to Rebel in particular as an example of a sort of semi-disillusioned "leninist" i.e. the sort who have to put llibertarian in front of the label, cause they've accepted to one degree or another, the anarchist critique of leninism.
butchers is right about S & R upto a point, i think its acknowledged by Lenin himself, i.e. the old second international critique of anarchism vis the importance of smashing the state was a reformist and wrong argument.
lenin rediscovered the genuine marxist position on the state, i.e. it needs to be smashed a workers state established to crush the power of the bourgeoisie, hence from above and below. its true in that sense the experience of revolution informed the bolshevik position. What's wrong with that? Changing your position in the light of struggle seems to be a pretty good idea to me.
But I don't accept Butchers is right that Lenin was always an authoritarian in desguise who just presented an insincere position in S & R effectively as a manouevre, i don't think there's any evidence for that at all. Not least in WITBD, which I still think is an excellent pamphlet which correctly describes the relationship between the working class party and the working class. basically the swp are authoritarian not because they're Leninists (they're not), but because they disavow leninism in both theory and in practice.

 

[butchersapron]

<snip>
But I don't accept Butchers is right that Lenin was always an authoritarian in desguise who just presented an insincere position in S & R effectively as a manouevre, i don't think there's any evidence for that at all. Not least in WITBD, which I still think is an excellent pamphlet which correctly describes the relationship between the working class party and the working class. basically the swp are authoritarian not because they're Leninists (they're not), but because they disavow leninism in both theory and in practice.

I'm not arguing that Lenin was adopting an 'an insincere position in S & R' - i fully suspect that in Paul Mattick's words he was "subjectively honest" - my argument concerning S&R can be summed up:

"Everything Lenin wrote prior to State and Revolution, and every step taken after the seizure of power, turns the apparent radicalism displayed in this pamphlet into a mere opportunistic move to support the immediate aim of gaining power for the Bolshevik Party. It is quite possible that Lenin's identification with the proletariat was subjectively honest, in that he actually believed that the latter must come to see in his conception of the revolutionary process their own true interests and their real convictions.

On the other hand, the ambiguities within his revolutionary proposals indicate that, while trusting his own revolutionary principles, Lenin did not trust those of the working class, which would first have to be educated to continue to do for themselves what, meanwhile, would be done for them by the Bolshevik state. What he allows the workers with his left hand, he takes away again with his right. It was then not a momentary emotional aberration on the part of Lenin that induced him to grant so much revolutionary self-determination to the workers, but a pragmatic move in the manipulation of the revolution in accordance with his own party concept of the socialist state."

My italics, in case anyone thinks that i'm simply making a case about Lenin himself rather than the approach that he and latter day bolsheviks adopt and actively defend as their own.

Paul Mattick - The Idea of the Commune from 'Marxism: Last Refuge of the Bourgeoisie'.


(I know, i'm not doing avery good job of extricating myself from the thrread despite my intentions).

 

[fanciful]

fair enough. however, while he says that Lenin was honest, he then says he doesn't trust the working class. I don't agree. The whole thrust of the position presented in WITBD is that the purpose of the revolutionary party is to fight to raise the working class to a consciousness of its own interests, in itself - for itself, so its the working class who achieve socialism the working class who make the revolution, the working class who rule through their party and their state.
for me the most telling confirmation of lenin's understanding of the party is the situation today. Lenin asserts that socialism needs to be brought to the working class from outside of the economic relationship by the revolutionary party. today there are no parties fighting for socialism (small groups but not parties) and not surprisingly socialism is marginal inside the working class.
confirmation of leninism but in the negative sense.
if you take the evolution of the SWP, they always tailed the most left wing section of bourgeois society. they were never leninists publishing whole books against Leninism, with a critique roughly along the lines of most anarchist critiques, In the past they tailed the left reformists or even right centrists in the labour party and trade unions. Today there aren't any. so instead they tail "radical" muslims and so on, the groups they percieve as anti-imperialist.

 

[mk12]

State and Revolution was published after the Russian revolution. How could it be used as a tool to gain support for Bolshevik tactics?

 

[Louis MacNeice]

State and Revolution was published after the Russian revolution. How could it be used as a tool to gain support for Bolshevik tactics?

In Lenin's own words from the preface to the first edition:

Lastly, we sum up the main results of the experience of the Russian revolutions of 1905 and particularly of 1917. Apparently, the latter is now (early August 1917) completing the first stage of its development; but this revolution as a whole can only be understood as a link in a chain of socialist proletarian revolutions being caused by the imperialist war. The question of the relation of the socialist proletarian revolution to the state, therefore, is acquiring not only practical political importance, but also the significance of a most urgent problem of the day, the problem of explaining to the masses what they will have to do before long to free themselves from capitalist tyranny.
​

That would seem to be a pretty clear statement that revolution is a process - or more accuartely processes froming stages - and that State and Revolution is intended to promote Bolshevik understanding and action to move these processes forwards.

Cheers - Louis Mac

 

[butchersapron]

Absolutely Louis - it's an utter absurdity to suggest that the Bolsheviks suddenly stopped acting tactically in October 1917 and gave up trying to retain influence and support amongst the Russian working class - it's also equally absurd to imagine that during the writing of the Pamphlet (in the months between the July days and the lead up the Revolution) the ideas being expressed therein by Lenin had no bearing on the political or tactical orientation of the Bolsheviks.

 

[mk12]

I hate this "no-tactics" approach. Are you saying that revolutionaries shouldn't have a coherent plan in trying to convince workers that their plan is best? I thought anarchists produce books, leaflets etc...isn't this what the Bolsheviks were doing?

 

[butchersapron]

No ones saying that you shouldn't employ tactics - just that you seem unable to recognise them being used by the Bolsheviks in certain situations and that those tactics were the result of a damaging perspective.

 

[mk12]

The state & revolution was a brilliant book...a vision of the future society. But obviously, like all visions put forward by thinkers, they fail to recognise possible external factors.

Questions are raised in the revolutionary period which could not be assessed before hand.

 

[Louis MacNeice]

mk's post 11.19 am: The state & revolution was a brilliant book...a vision of the future society. But obviously, like all visions put forward by thinkers, they fail to recognise possible external factors.

Questions are raised in the revolutionary period which could not be assessed before hand.

mk's post 9.58 am: State and Revolution was published after the Russian revolution. How could it be used as a tool to gain support for Bolshevik tactics?

Some of us have attention spans longer than an hour and twenty one minutes...so lets get this straight you think that State and Revolution was written after the revolution (so it has no bearing on the Bolshevik's tactics) but before the revolutionary period (so it has no bearing on the Bolshevik's tactics).

Well done mk you're up there with rw in the talking nonsense stakes - Louis Mac

 

[Nigel Irritable]

Has it ever entered the heads of any of the 'Leninists' on here to ask themselves why attempts to 'build a Leninist party' in this country or any other western country (and arguably any country outside of Russia) have ended in abject failure?

Actually the question of why it is that no mass revolutionary organisation has been built anywhere since the early years of the Comintern is one that has exercised plenty of Marxists over the years. The issue is fundamentally about the twin disasters of the working class movement, social democracy and stalinism.

The existence of mass social democratic and stalinist parties claiming the adherence of the great mass of the working class in pretty much every country, with revolutionaries isolated in small groups, was an objective rather than merely subjective factor which even the most thick-skulled "sell the paper and recruit" sectarian has had to address from time to time.

In countries where revolutionaries found themselves with more political space to work with quite substantial organisations, which were revolutionary at least in the intentions of their activists, were sometimes built - think of Sri Lanka and Bolivia as Trotskyist examples and Spain as an anarcho-syndicalist one.

 

[mk12]

Lenin was writing the book through the revolution...he had to finish it early. But it was published after the revolution.

I believe you are a bit 'memory challenged'.

 

[Louis MacNeice]

Lenin was writing the book through the revolution...he had to finish it early. But it was published after the revolution.

I believe you are a bit 'memory challenged'.

None of which addresses the two contradictory claims you made re. the books relevance to the question of Bolshevik tactics; go back and read what Lenin had to say about the book's purpose. But I do apologise mk, I was wrong, the problem isn't with your memory but with your ability to think coherently.

Cheers - Louis Mac

 

[LLETSA]

Actually the question of why it is that no mass revolutionary organisation has been built anywhere since the early years of the Comintern is one that has exercised plenty of Marxists over the years. The issue is fundamentally about the twin disasters of the working class movement, social democracy and stalinism.

The existence of mass social democratic and stalinist parties claiming the adherence of the great mass of the working class in pretty much every country, with revolutionaries isolated in small groups, was an objective rather than merely subjective factor which even the most thick-skulled "sell the paper and recruit" sectarian has had to address from time to time.

In countries where revolutionaries found themselves with more political space to work with quite substantial organisations, which were revolutionary at least in the intentions of their activists, were sometimes built - think of Sri Lanka and Bolivia as Trotskyist examples and Spain as an anarcho-syndicalist one.

With respect, that post sidesteps the question rather than answers it.

Don't you think the secret lies in your second paragraph? The question of WHY the 'twin disasters' of social democracy and Stalinism were dominant in the workers movement is something you do not address at all.

 

[cockneyrebel]

But that question could be posed to anyone on the left, not just trotskyists. Indeed where are the anarchist equivalents of Sri Lanka or Bolivia, in terms of influence on a revolutionary movement. Where is the equivalent of IWCA/Red Action type politics?

 

[LLETSA]

But that question could be posed to anyone on the left, not just trotskyists. Indeed where are the anarchist equivalents of Sri Lanka or Bolivia, in terms of influence on a revolutionary movement. Where is the equivalent of IWCA/Red Action type politics?

Don't you think you could be missing the point?

The fact that a majority of the radical elements of the left set out after 1917 to emulate the Bolsheviks marginalised every other radical socialist current. In the euphoria over the fact that a socialist revolution had actually been accomplished somewhere it probably couldn't have happened any other way, but the essentially Russian character of Bolshevism was, sometimes deliberately, overlooked. Western revolutionary socialists felt inadequate to their Russian conterparts because they had actually made a revolution. Therefore even the doubters failed to stand up to them. Those that did were swept aside. Stalinism had, under these conditions in the new Communist parties, a relatively easy time in later imposing its will - while claiming continuity with Leninism. That Leninism arose out of Russian conditions, at a particular time in history where it seemed to fit the bill, and had little relevance to, especially, western European conditions, was proven by the subsequent seven decades in which the different strands that claimed continuity with Bolshevism either failed to build anything substantial on that model or else abandoned it (while pretending that they hadn't.) This was because the Leninist party model was entirely unsuited to territory outside the Tsarist empire. The proof? That it was rejected by radical elements of the working class everywhere - or at least that it didn't attract enough of those radical elements to make an impact. The majority of 'Leninists' inevitably chose Stalinism, which pretended to be Leninism even as it adopted reformism or, in the Third World, other forms of class collaboaration, while Trotskyism (possibly excepting the two places Nigel Irritable mentions) never managed to become more than a gaggle of squabbling sects. In 1989 this model, in all its guises, shuffled off the stage of history in ignominious defeat. Nothing has come along to replace it. That is the reality and there's little use pretending otherwise.

The most disturbing thing? That the 'Leninists' (as well as some of their harshest critics) carry on as if nothing much has happened.

 

[cockneyrebel]

You seem to be missing the point. What has the rest of the left done since 1989 exactly?

Where have anarchist or IWCA style politics taken off? The USSR ended 14 years ago.

Going by your logic you might as well write off the entire left. Because are you saying that anyone else has "managed to become more than a gaggle of squabbling sects."

 

[butchersapron]

And why shouldn't anyone with half a brain write off the entire left?

 

[cockneyrebel]

I include anarchism when I talk about the left....

 

[butchersapron]

So do i. I'm more than prepared to admit it though.

 

[cockneyrebel]

I'm prepared to admit the left in the UK is fucked (although it is still very strong in some countries in the world), but things can change. I wouldn't "write the left off".....

 

[butchersapron]

I would. Am doing so right now.

 

[cockneyrebel]

What you think there is no future for the left? Has capitalism won?