DENNISR> if you look who was running Russia, who was controlling the means of production, before and then after the collapse, aren't they exactly the same people? If there is a fundamental shift, Y are the same people still in control?
If you could read things empirically to make sense of the world then you would have a point. That would be a mistake.
It may be more comfortable to be able to explain away the stalinist states as 'just the same and just as bad as the other side of the iron curtain'. It may be more comfortable to find a simple date where the nature of the stalinist regimes changed from being the 'good guys' to the 'bad guys' which conveniently absolves us of any responsibility for or link with the horrific consequences of the deformation of the socialist revolution in russia (as Cliff did - if I remember rightly 'all changed in 1923' in his mind). But that would not begin to help in understanding either the actual nature of those regimes or why the collapse of those regimes had such a huge effect on working class conciousness; on the conciousness of the 'leadership' of the reformist parties and trade unions in the west and on the conciousness of the national liberation and anti-colonial movements in the rest of the world. Surely the final collapse of these regimes (if it was nothing fundamental...) would have been an opportunity for revolutionaries - not the huge step backwards it has been in practice (unless you close your eyes and stick your fingers in your ears, that is, as the SWP did and as the original bit quoted points out...).
How do you explain the collapse of the social democratic project for the last period otherwise? How do you explain the concrete collapse in living standards, job security, even average life spans(!) in the former USSR? So some of the old bureaucrats became the new bosses - what does that - fundamentally - prove about the nature of the regimes?? (as opposed to the nature of certain individuals...)
Ted Grant in his replies to Cliff and the State Capitalist theories covers the questions (holes...) in the theory. He asks (and I feel answers...) questions such as what fundamental change of control of the means of production Cliff could see in 1923? (as opposed to the fundamental change you cannot see in the actual collapse of the stalinist states decades later).
Not accepting that the stalinist states were 'state capitalist' for decades after 1923 is NOT to apologise for those regimes that existed it is simply to retain what we consider an analysis that can assist in countering those regimes.
The collapse of the deformed workers states in russia and eastern europe was a long drawn out process - greatly delayed by the results of WW2 (with a greatly strengthened bureaucracy in the east combined with the mass movements in the post-colonial world and the weakened position of many of the previously dominant capitalist regimes - something trotsky, understandably, could not foresee). The process is still going on in China. We have had long internal discussions about the changing nature of that regime with some sections of the CWI arguing that China is already a completely capitalist outfit and others arguing that elements of the planned economy (even in its present horrifically distorted form) still exist making the nature of the regime still fundamentally different from say the US at the present time. While plenty of folk would argue 'what the point of arguing over how many angels can fit on the head of a pin?' - my point here is that the CWI can contain those differing viewpoints within one organisation - they are not ultimatly 'fundamental' differences to us (unlike our REAL differences with the SWP)
If we (ie the then Militant, now SP...) were mistaken - I would argue that it was in holding on to a view that the anti-colonial movements plus a revolutionary movement in the west would be MUCH MORE LIKELY to occur and to spark a re-newed struggle for democratic control of the means of production (ie the overthrow of the dictatorships in the east - such as the movements in 1968) RATHER THAN the collapse of those deformed planned regimes actually strengthening capitalism for a whole period as has in fact happened.* We were correct though in explaining that a major one (of the many...) crimes of stalinism was to distort the movements in the west and the anti-colonial struggles to such an extent that it derailed revolutionary waves outside of the stalinist states. TGs writing on the colonial revolution expand on this as does our analysis of regimes from Burma and Syria to Venezuela now. its an understanding that means the CWI can intervene in these struggles directly
The continuing wrong analysis of the SWP results in a fundamental - on your part - understanding of what is going on around you at the present time. You saw the collapse of stalinism as a triumph for democracy - it was not a triumph - try explaining the collapse of the social democratic parties in the advanced capitalist parties; the worldwide 'triumph' of neo-liberalism for over a decade; the Iraq wars in the middle east (ie how the new imperial dominance of the US could have got away with the horrors it has if the stalinist states had not collapsed). Better still, try explaining that 'triumph' to the working people of eastern europe and the former soviet states
(OK, thats all you are getting beyond short comments - I have tried to sum up most of the key points in one post on a bulletin board. I am busy with work and I cannot be arsed wasting too much time on this given that I know how little you are interested in genuine dialogue plus it is pretty irrelevant to most folk - understandably. You are not as clever as you thought you were being, were you?
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added: * - Ah, apparently we came late to a recognition, part of the disagreement with the old leadership of the Militant - see the into to this pamphlet online: "Russia: How the Bureaucracy Seized Power" - George Collins
http://www.marxist.net/stalinism/how/ (this will also cover those questions of 'when' and 'how' the bureaucracy came to power)
) ) collapsed and the SP has emerged a far less sectarian fair more open party than the SWP is now .. SP are far more willing to get stuck into the day to day basics while SWP are running around like head less chickens looking for 'the next big thing'
