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Gravediggers said:
No. And that's a fact and for the record and you can hold any opinion you like, its immaterial, irrelevant and has bugger all bearing on what is being discussed at this moment in time.
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Calm down. I was just curious if the letter Ibn refered to was from an SPGB member. Thank you for informing me.
 
He was for many years. Robin used to take part in the Discussion Bulletin that Frank Girad used to put out - it was full of impossibilists who had manged to keep their feet on terra firma -actual real struggles and issues being discussed.
 
DB was a forum for impossiblists to discuss stuff before the internet - which basically meant canadians, yanks, aussies and brits. The non-brits were a great example of w/c auto-dicatctism and were always trying to get things onto real ground because of their own life conditions not as some mental exercise. The SPGB were frequently out of their depth as a result. Frank's dead now and the the internet took over anyway.
 
Knotted said:
Both Lenin & the Bolsheviks and the SPGB had their origins in the Second International. They both took their conceptions from the same source. What's particularly interesting and exciting about State and Revolution is that it brings to fore all those little neglected revolutionary themes that Marx and Engels explored. Lenin doesn't distort anything, he just puts back the bits that were taken out by Kautsky, Plekhanov, Liebknecht (snr) & co.
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Untrue. The SPGB did not originate from the Second International.
 
Knotted said:
Do you think all state bureaucrats are capitalists? Are you saying that the British civil service is a capitalist class and a distinct capitalist class from the ordinary capitalist class?



Are you saying feudalist class relations are the same as capitalist class relations?
ResistanceMP3 said:
I think for a Marxist, a mode of production, is defined by the class relationships to the means of production. Whether that property/means of production is held privately by individuals acting as a warring band of brothers, a class, or collectively by a bureaucracy acting as a warring band of brothers, a class, does not negate the nature of the mode of production. Marx said as much, I have been told.

So what I am asking is, did the church's collective ownership of property, negate the nature of it's fudal mode of production? If no, why does the same change under capitalism negate the capitalist mode of production?
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Knotted said:
Edit: I can't take this theory seriously. I'm not particularly interested in it anymore. I've looked at four or five different versions, and I've spotted flaws in all of them. They're all the product of extemely tortured reasoning. Just try thinking it through for yourself. Who are the capitalists? Where is the capital? Is there any market competition? If not what drives the economy? If so how so? Just ask yourself these questions.
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you are making a big mistake IMPO IF you think that this issue about property, is just about state capitalism. For me the whole question about inanimate objects such as property [and not yet mentioned money] determining social relations and so the mode of production, is none Marxist. However, the answers to all your questions about state-capitalism, have been answered.
 
ResistanceMP3 said:
you are making a big mistake IMPO IF you think that this issue about property, is just about state capitalism. For me the whole question about inanimate objects such as property [and not yet mentioned money] determining social relations and so the mode of production, is none Marxist. However, the answers to all your questions about state-capitalism, have been answered.
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Explain your view of what constitutes state-capitalism, rmp3
 
two sheds said:
Sorry i don't understand any of this stuff. Can i pose a more theoretical question - what happens when there is a shortage of something like water or fuel in an SPGB-approved socialist society?
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The establishment of socialism does not need the approval of the SPGB, but I get your drift. In the likely hood of shortages occurring either alternatives will have to be used or created. The supply of water will not be a problem with the earths surface consisting of 70% of it. Shortages of fuel on the other hand depends on what particular fuel you are talking about and where those particular shortages are occurring.

The present problems with possible fuel shortages i.e. peak oil, and other fossil fuels do not necessarily equate into a fuel shortage for socialism. Socialism will be using wherever possible clean and natural energy.
 
ResistanceMP3 said:
you are making a big mistake IMPO IF you think that this issue about property, is just about state capitalism. For me the whole question about inanimate objects such as property [and not yet mentioned money] determining social relations and so the mode of production, is none Marxist. However, the answers to all your questions about state-capitalism, have been answered.
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I don't really want to get into all this now.
 
Especially not on this thread with you. I'll only end up pointing out what I think is wrong with the SWP's version of state capitalism. This thread is about the SPGB.
 
Gravediggers said:
In the likely hood of shortages occurring either alternatives will have to be used or created.
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Suggesting some form of control - we'll need to set up factories to do this. Won't the SPBG have disbanded by then, so who decides what to set up and where?

The supply of water will not be a problem with the earths surface consisting of 70% of it. Shortages of fuel on the other hand depends on what particular fuel you are talking about and where those particular shortages are occurring.

The present problems with possible fuel shortages i.e. peak oil, and other fossil fuels do not necessarily equate into a fuel shortage for socialism. Socialism will be using wherever possible clean and natural energy.
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Yes but we need the infrastructure to do that - isn't there going to have to be a transition period when reforms will need to be made and the CSP plants constructed before we can all start working whenever we feel like it? That would seem a bit 'reformist', though.
 
Knotted said:
Especially not on this thread with you. I'll only end up pointing out what I think is wrong with the SWP's version of state capitalism. This thread is about the SPGB.
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gd WILL agree IME you are making a big mistake IF you think that this issue about property, is just about state capitalism. The whole question about inanimate objects such as property [and not yet mentioned money] determining social relations and so the mode of production, is none Marxist.
 
ResistanceMP3 said:
gd WILL agree IME you are making a big mistake IF you think that this issue about property, is just about state capitalism. The whole question about inanimate objects such as property [and not yet mentioned money] determining social relations and so the mode of production, is none Marxist.
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Is this in relation to something I've said?
 
Knotted said:
Trying work out what you're getting at is going to be hard work, and I have feeling the rewards won't be worth it.
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If you look at concepts and understanding in isolation of the bigger picture of the social relationships they most certainly wont be rewarding. Wage labour and a market confirms there is a social relationship between buyer and seller of labour power and the creation of surplus value. This relationship exists under state capitalism.
 
Knotted said:
SPGB's object:


What Lenin said was commonly called socialism:


There are no differences here, except the more complete SPGB definition which includes a phrase about democratic control. But even there are no differences.

Lenin:




There is simply no difference between what the SPGB call "socialism" and what Lenin called the "first phase of socialism". When I say there is no difference, there is not even differences in the terms used. I don't have to make any inferences. They are literally and exactly the same.

Of course you might regard Lenin cynically and say he didn't really mean what he said. But you cannot deny what he said. It is simply a matter of undeniable fact that what Lenin called the "first phase of socialism" is exactly what the SPGB call "socialism".

It shouldn't be too surprising either. It is not some sort of coincidence. Both Lenin & the Bolsheviks and the SPGB had their origins in the Second International. They both took their conceptions from the same source. What's particularly interesting and exciting about State and Revolution is that it brings to fore all those little neglected revolutionary themes that Marx and Engels explored. Lenin doesn't distort anything, he just puts back the bits that were taken out by Kautsky, Plekhanov, Liebknecht (snr) & co.
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Lenin, Selected works , Vol 2, Page 11 *"given a really
revolutionary-democratic state, state-monopoly capitalism inevitably and
unavoidably implies a step, and more than one step, towards socialism!"*
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If this is not a distortion by Lenin what is? And how is this 'first phase of socialism', exactly what the SPGB call socialism?
 
butchersapron said:
Are you really going to argue the SPGB is unconnected to the second international in any way at all? Please, be my guest...
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Small change in words from 'originate' to 'unconnected'. And no butchers I'm not going to argue over an assertion you made which is blatantly untrue. And if you want to call me a liar its up to you to prove it.
 
Gravediggers said:
If this is not a distortion by Lenin what is? And how is this 'first phase of socialism', exactly what the SPGB call socialism?
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This is a distortion of what exactly?

What is this to do with what the SPGB call "socialism"? Well I'll show you.

Here's Marx:
The monopoly of capital becomes a fetter upon the mode of production, which has sprung up and flourished along with, and under it. Centralization of the means of production and socialization of labour at last reach a point where they become incompatible with their capitalist integument. This integument is burst asunder. The knell of capitalist private property sounds. The expropriators are expropriated.
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http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch32.htm

Centralisation of the means of production and socialisation of labour reaches a point where it is incompatible with their capitalist integument. If the state has already introduced the fullest democracy then it is a very small step to the democratic common ownership of the means of production.

The only thing original here is Lenin's idea of a revolutionary-democratic state. This is an idea that he later dropped anyway.

By the way I thought you were arguing that Lenin said that state capitalism was identical to socialism. By your own quote, you've proved yourself wrong.
 
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