To be, or not to be state capitalism, By The Socialist Party

[dennisr]

I haven't studied either theories in depth.

Its useful, understanding the nature of the state - actually quite key, in 'knowing your enemy' (I mean the ruling class or caste not the SP!)

 

[TremulousTetra]

yep avert your eyes you toerag 9of corse its for you too...)




'deformed w s', 'degenerated w s', 'state capitalist' etc etc - it all sounds a bit bananas, understandably, to folk - like arguing over the number of angels on a pinhead but behind the hot air and terminology is an attempt to analyse how that state comes into being, what and who's interests it represents, what the basis of its 'power' is etc etc - and, from that, you can draw lessons on how it is to be defeated/changed/improved upon.

Your right of course about us talking in shorthand, but as butch boy wonder points out, for ALL that meat, things are still unclear on the straight forward question. Russia dengenrated or deformed workers state? And for the masses, distinguish.

 

[TremulousTetra]

Why not?

who the fuck are you Napolean. do you dress like that awfull pink/gay/nazi Al Murray character.

 

[butchersapron]

What awfull pink/gay/nazi Al Murray character?

 

[TremulousTetra]

what is is you want to know? - the OP quote is saying that the decline of the SWP is directly linked to its mistaken understanding of what the collapse of the stalinist states effect is on the nature of class struggle at this moment in time - its significent in my book.

but that just another way of saying the same damn thing



or do you want me to give examples - say, the approach of the SWP (as a result of their misdiagnosis) towards the ex-workers parties - combined with it mistaken idea of what 'united front' work actually means? Or the collapse of attempts to build organisations of class struggle by the SWPs international grouping in the ex-stalinist states?

So basically the S P's analysis is that Russia was a deformed workers' state, yes?

butch boy napolean demmands you answer, AND DISTINGUISH between deformed and degenerated, for the sake of the masses.

 

[TremulousTetra]

What awfull pink/gay/nazi Al Murray character?

wait while you see it, it will be like looking in a mirror.

 

[butchersapron]

OK. I look forward to that.

 

[dennisr]

Russia dengenrated or deformed workers state? And for the masses, distinguish.

Thats it - thats all I am 'allowed' to reply to!

The russian state was a degenerated workers state - it bureaucratically degenerated from its beginnings as a workers revolution.

The eastern european states on the other hand were deformed workers states - deformed from their very foundation with an externally and bureaucratically imposed planned economy that did not come out of the mass struggle of of the population themselves.

In the ex-colonial world we see all sorts of oddball deformed workers states, the key example being the Chinese state - coming as it did out of the peasant war in the wake of the incapacity of the bourgeeoise to carry out the tasks of the bourgois-democratic revolution (ending landlordism, national unification, the expulsion of imperialism) and carried through by the Chinese stalinists.

Supported by the workers and peasants but without their active control (or involvement in some cases) - again the same elsewhere - carried out by the prolitarian bonapartists in Ethiopia, Burma even officer castes, under the shadow of the soviet union and what it then represented - the aim of these bonapartist dictators? - power for their elite rather than the workers and peasants regardless of the language they used or slogans espoused.

anyway, night, night napoleon

 

[dennisr]

In Hungary 1956 when the workers rose up against the regime they created workers councils and other organs of popular democracy, ie. they couldn't just lay hold of the existing state machinery, they had to smash it and replace it with workers democracy constructed from below.

So the process of revolution against stalinist regimes in the East and capitalist regimes in the West seems identical and follows the same pattern & it is quite possible in the West to have elements of nationalisation and planning within the context of capitalism.

Crudely - i would argue that the worker's councils were replacing the bureaucratic organs of the state with political control over the planning of the economy. hence a political revolution was required - the planned economy, even in its distorted form was already in place for the workers to take control of.

In the west the organs of economic as well as social control have to be built from scratch - the old edifice smashed - a political and social revolution.

thats where the hairspliting terminology ends

 

[articul8]

the planned economy, even in its distorted form was already in place for the workers to take control of

take control in the same distorted form? Isn't this "market" versus "planning" dichotomy incredibly crude in the absence of class content?

 

[dennisr]

take control in the same distorted form? Isn't this "market" versus "planning" dichotomy incredibly crude in the absence of class content?

of course not and you can see i was not saying that - unless you consider self-organised and controlled worker's councils -potential instruments of control over the state machine - as 'distorted' of course (I don't imagine you do).

isn't the class content in weather the means of production is in private hands - run for private profit - rather than nationalised? (even if in the hands of a bureaucracy as in the case of the various distortions of a workers state)

Ultimately - the state cap view cannot see a state as a body that can have a certain independant existance from the society around it.

"The state by its very nature is composed of bureaucracy, officers, generals, heads of police ect. But they do not consitute a class they are an instrument of a class even if they may be in antagonism to that class. They cannot themselves be a class"

The bit above is from Ted Grant. He means all states - he means that bureaucrats exist in the transitional socialist state and have to be controlled by organs of workers power. Its points like this - in Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotskys writing which is why I don't see any major breakthrough in the folk you lists. First of all we have to understand the basics (not made any easier by the distorted co-option of the language of marxism by the dictators in the deformed - and, yes, to be politically correct, degenerated - workers states)

The state cap view seems to want every thing to fit into 'good' and 'bad' boxes whereby - the workers state can only be 'good' or it can no longer be a workers state. It ends up being that crude in Cliffs arguements once you strip away to the various theoretical leaps. At least Shautemen draw the ultimate conclusions of a rejection of marxist class analysis. Cliff was obviously an erudite fella - but has missed the essence of what folk from Marx and Engels to Lenin and Trotsky were pointing to (in relation to the state apparatus) in discussing the Paris Commune and the Russian Revolution in trying to mistakenly fit the facts to his theories. Remember, the socialist control of the state apparatus is a transitional society going towards a classless society where a state, and class, no longer exists.

 

[butchersapron]

of course not and you can see i was not saying that - unless you consider self-organised and controlled worker's councils -potential instruments of control over the state machine - as 'distorted' of course (I don't imagine you do).

isn't the class content in weather the means of production is in private hands - run for private profit - rather than nationalised? (even if in the hands of a bureaucracy as in the case of the various distortions of a workers state)

Ultimately - the state cap view cannot see a state as a body that can have a certain independant existance from the society around it.

There's nothing in any state capitlaist view that i've ever come across that denies the potentiial (relative) autonomy of the political - in fact, a good chunk of of them are based on the idea - of the state acting as collective capitalist against the particluar capitalist interests.

 

[dennisr]

There's nothing in any state capitlaist view that i've ever come across that denies the potentiial (relative) autonomy of the political - in fact, a good chunk of of them are based on the idea - of the state acting as collective capitalist against the particluar capitalist interests.

You are right - I should have said "Cliff's version of state cap in the USSR" rather than any old "state cap" theory.

then my comment would make sense


And the other thing I was wrong on was the date Cliff uses as the point where capitalist returns in the USSR - I said earlier 1923 - apparently its 1928 - makes no difference otherwise to what i said though

 

[dennisr]

There's nothing in any state capitlaist view that i've ever come across that denies the potentiial (relative) autonomy of the political - in fact, a good chunk of of them are based on the idea - of the state acting as collective capitalist against the particluar capitalist interests.

The obvious examples of what you say is Nazi germany or Fascist italy. I would agree with that view. Engels and Marx analysed the phenominum of Bonapartism - where, sometimes for long periods the state was in conflict with the class that same state represented! Napolean at root defended the the bourgious relations ushered in by the French Revolution even while re-introducing the trappings of feudal forms and crowning himself 'emporer'.

Again crude and quick (this is all quite a refesher for me...) but taking up your summary as an example

The idea of the degenerated workers state viewpoint (the one that says this continued after 1928... unlike Cliff) is that the soviet state bureaucracy was acting in its particular collective interests - defending a nationalised means of production, planning and monopoly of foreign trade - BUT - against the longer-term, general interests of the soviet working class.

The working class needed a political revolution to re-assert control over the bureaucracy.

They (We...) would argue that the degeneration of the workers states to the point of capitalist restoration - took a lot longer to be achieved than Cliff's simple date of 1928 assumes (and we have to assume the bureaucrats and state went from defending 'socialist relations to defending 'capitalist relations if the theory is correct).

Now the working class needs both a political revolution and a social revolution to assert its control over the means of production.

(Ok that crude - but a starting point to work from)

 

[dennisr]

One question as an aside for everybody - if the stalinist bureaucracy had managed to hold on for say one more decade before collapsing and the options open to the soviet and east european working class was the economic crisis we have now in the west, do you think capitalsm could have been so resoundingly restored?

 

[TremulousTetra]

The obvious examples of what you say is Nazi germany or Fascist italy. I would agree with that view. Engels and Marx analysed the phenominum of Bonapartism - where, sometimes for long periods the state was in conflict with the class that same state represented! Napolean at root defended the the bourgious relations ushered in by the French Revolution even while re-introducing the trappings of feudal forms and crowning himself 'emporer'.

Again crude and quick (this is all quite a refesher for me...) but taking up your summary as an example

The idea of the degenerated workers state viewpoint (the one that says this continued after 1928... unlike Cliff) is that the soviet state bureaucracy was acting in its particular collective interests - defending a nationalised means of production, planning and monopoly of foreign trade - BUT - against the longer-term, general interests of the soviet working class.

The working class needed a political revolution to re-assert control over the bureaucracy.

They (We...) would argue that the degeneration of the workers states to the point of capitalist restoration - took a lot longer to be achieved than Cliff's simple date of 1928 assumes.

Now the working class needs both a political revolution and a social revolution to assert its control over the means of production.

(Ok that crude - but a starting point to work from)

strawman

when did the post war boom end = 1971 with the breakdown of bretton woods.
when did russia become state capitalist = 1928 1st ten year plan.

both are arbitrary dates plucked out of a PROCESS. There ISN'T a real disagreement here.

 

[TremulousTetra]

so for the SP stalin was a progressive when he was doing to he russian wc what hitler was doing to the gwc?

if the nazis were automous, why did hitler have to kill off the national 'socialist' in 35?

 

[dennisr]

strawman

when did the post war boom end = 1971 with the breakdown of bretton woods.
when did russia become state capitalist = 1928 1st ten year plan.

both a arbitrary dates plucked out of a PROCESS. There ISN'T a real disagreement here.

The difference being that both Cliff and Marxists would agree that before 1928 capitalist relations in the USSR had been overthrow (not so with the general date put forward for the end of the post war capitalist boom in the west). The capitalist state had been overthrown.

Do you see the point I am making now?

Where was the significent counter-revolution and overthrow of the workers state plus re-introduction of private property relations (even in it distorted form) in 1928?

(I'll give you a clue as to Cliffs theory if you like - the bureaucracy and its consumption of surplus value - apparently they did not consume this before 1928 and they did after)

 

[dennisr]

so for the SP stalin was a progressive when he was doing to he russian wc what hitler was doing to the gwc?

These stupid questions (or the stupid assumptions behind them...) are why I rarely bother to engage you "resistance"

yes, that's right we think stalin was 'progressive'

(as did the left and other working class oppostionists dying in siberian camps in thier tens of thousands, and trotters before the icepick stifled his cheers for the 'progressive' stalin)

actually, we did not want a political revolution (as raised a number of times in previous posts...) - what I meant was that we wanted a 'let praise the progressive stalin' party/fiesta. we felt that if we all held hands these little misunderstandings between us would be resolved. luckily the SWP there to raise the red flag of "resistance" *takes tongue out of cheek*

if the nazis were automous, why did hitler have to kill off the national 'socialist' in 35?

because hitler was defending capitalist interests at root? (and no I did not say they were 'autonomus' - the state mashine they controlled was a product of capitalist relations - at root defending capitalist interests) (its not that hard to work out the answer to that question is it?) - I would point out that Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky all gave detailed and well explained examples of the role of the state. The French Revolution, Bonapartism, The Paris Commune, The Russian Revolution, the rise of Fascism - all good examples - the SWP have ven print some of these works

 

[TremulousTetra]

The difference being that both Cliff and Marxists would agree that before 1928 capitalist relations in the USSR had been overthrow (not so with the general date put forward for the end of the post war capitalist boom in the west). The capitalist state had been overthrown.

Do you see the point I am making now?

Where was the significent counter-revolution and overthrow of the workers state plus re-introduction of private property relations (even in it distorted form) in 1928?

(I'll give you a clue as to Cliffs theory if you like - the bureaucracy and its consumption of surplus value - apparently they did not consume this before 1928 and they did after)

you misunderstand my point, and cliffs on the bureaucracy and its consumption of surplus value.

These stupid questions (or the stupid assumptions behind them...) are why I rarely bother to engage you "resistance"

yes, that's right we think stalin was 'progressive'

(as did the left and other working class oppostionists dying in siberian camps in thier tens of thousands, and trotters before the icepick stifled his cheers for the 'progressive' stalin)

its what you've said, deg,ws & def,ws are more progressive cos they 'only' require a 'political revolution', no?

because hitler was defending capitalist interests at root? (and no I did not say they were 'autonomus') (its not that hard to work out the answer to that question is it?) - I would point out that Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky all gave detailed and well explained examples of the role of the state. The French Revolution, The Paris Commune, The Russian Revolution, the rise of Fascism - all good examples - the SWP have ven print some of these works

oh good, glad U cleared that up for me and butch.

There's nothing in any state capitlaist view that i've ever come across that denies the potentiial (relative) autonomy of the political - in fact, a good chunk of of them are based on the idea - of the state acting as collective capitalist against the particluar capitalist interests.

I'm just making the point, we, SW SP, agree it was a PROCESS. We disagree when the process was completed, thats all.

on that point, stalins position on spanish civil war, is not a group puting their imperialist interests before the interests of the iwc?

 

[dennisr]

I'm just making the point, we, SW SP, agree it was a PROCESS. We disagree when the process was completed, thats all.

That 'disagreement' results in a completely different view of how the working class in the stalinist states was to throw off the yolk of the bureaucracy. It results in a completely different view of the effects of the collapse of the stalinist states on the iwc and it is a result of a completely different view of class relations and revolutionary processes (ie the buraucracy becoming class and the role of the state - and how we respond to it - in both revolutionary and non-revolutionary situations)

apart from that, yep its just a little disagreement over PROCESS

Shall we hold hands now? ))

on that point, stalins position on spanish civil war, is not a group puting their imperialist interests before the interests of the iwc?

Well it can be summed up in 'socialism in one country' becoming 'no revolution in any other country' - trotskyists (in between cheering for the progressive stalin sic I imagine) - pointed this out. Of course the soviet bureaucracy's interests are best served by ultimately stopping democratic workers revolutions in other countries, of course that is not in the interests of the iwc. But the soviet bureaucracies interests were not "imperial" interests - otherwise they would be fighting for control of the markets and trade routes.

 

[dennisr]

its what you've said, deg,ws & def,ws are more progressive cos they 'only' require a 'political revolution', no?

this is at the very best a very trite comment by you - at worst, its an attempt to smear and imply something which simply is not true

firstly - I've never used the term 'progressive' for these states - i have simply pointed out that the tasks of the working class are simplified.

secondly - do you seriously consider 'only a political revolution' to be a walk in the park???

do you think this rather pathetic attempt to sneer is deserved by the countless generations of working people who have fought the bureaucracy in those countries - say the Hungarian people in 56 that your cde mentioned earlier - If so, its no wonder the IS has no serious input in any of those states now if this is the general view (I hope it is just your uninformed view). Let alone the left oppostionists and countless other groups

shall we will forget it as simply an infantile comment?

 

[dennisr]

I'm just making the point, we, SW SP, agree it was a PROCESS. We disagree when the process was completed, thats all.

When one innocently 'just makes a point', they make that point in advance of the reply. Do you think everybody is quite so disingenous?

"resistance" your little forays into 'debate' with me and others always drift off into pointless threads everybody else loses interest in and you just end up making one snide remark after another (usually with a "I am just making this point" proviso at the end of the post...) which I reply to - its kind of pointless. You rarely if ever have anything to say other than the snides, so why bother?

As usual I don't start these one-sided 'debates' so what ids your interest in doing so?

Why did you start this thread? Why did you consider it ti be so important?

After all you keep implying our differences are - apparently - quite minor.

So what have you got to say on the subjects you raise?

 

[dennisr]

you misunderstand my point, and cliffs on the bureaucracy and its consumption of surplus value.

Come one then - prove you are not just an arrogant twat - and 'explain' what it is the rest of us have missed from the guru's points on surplus value?

 

[Udo Erasmus]

Crudely - i would argue that the worker's councils were replacing the bureaucratic organs of the state with political control over the planning of the economy. hence a political revolution was required - the planned economy, even in its distorted form was already in place for the workers to take control of.

In the west the organs of economic as well as social control have to be built from scratch - the old edifice smashed - a political and social revolution.

thats where the hairspliting terminology ends

The point I was making that your differentiation between Eastern and Western Blocs doesn't seem to hold in practise. You say, you only needed a political revolution in the East - in the West you needed a political AND A SOCIAL revolution.

In order to overthrow their ruling classes, in both East & West, the working class has/had to use the same methodology.

Workers in the Eastern Bloc couldn't simply lay hold of the existing state machinery they had to smash it and rebuild a new workers state from below.

The form of workers councils that emerged in struggles against stalinism were identical to those that emerged in revolutions against capitalism (say, for example, Cordones in Chile or Shoras in Iran), and based on the same principles of a political and social revolution taking control of the economy by establishing democracy in the factories and at the grassroots.

 

[dennisr]

The point I was making that your differentiation between Eastern and Western Blocs doesn't seem to hold in practise. You say, you only needed a political revolution in the East - in the West you needed a political AND A SOCIAL revolution.

In order to overthrow their ruling classes, in both East & West, the working class has/had to use the same methodology.

Workers in the Eastern Bloc couldn't simply lay hold of the existing state machinery they had to smash it and rebuild a new workers state from below.

The form of workers councils that emerged in struggles against stalinism were identical to those that emerged in revolutions against capitalism (say, for example, Cordones in Chile or Shoras in Iran), and based on the same principles of a political and social revolution taking control of the economy by establishing democracy in the factories and at the grassroots.

Well, there we disagree. In Chile and Iran the means of production have to be exapproriated. The capitalist class will fight tooth and nail to hold onto their property via their state - their, ultimately, "armed bodies of men" - which has to be smashed. The INTERNATIONAL capitalist class will come to their aid (the US in Chile is a prime example) to defend those private property relations. In the same way they did in 1917 (27 white and foreign armies if I remember correctly?).

Did the international capitalist class come to the aid of the bureaucracies in eastern europe - if we assume they are out and out capitalist (as opposed to the reaction be both agree they represented) - In east germany, hungary, czechslovakia?

I appreciate the points you are making and that's not to say i disagree with every point you are making - certainly the role of the workers councils has key similarities - the elements of workers control in practice are the same things we are both fighting for. In that sense, of course, one could call this a 'social' revolution as well in terms of atittudes towards control of those means - but what I mean by social revolution above is an overthrow of the old property relations - in the soviet states the state control over the economy has to be taken over, the state machine purged, and controlled by the councils as they move towards the final destruction of the state as an entity. I think we use the term 'social' in a difference sense to each other in our posts.

And yes, the capitalists (ie the western ones that I recognise as such) certainly left the workers to their fate during the huganrian uprising etc - they did not want democratic workers revolutions in the east any more than the bureaucrats. But did they mobilise to crush the workers movements that occured as the soviet states collapsed?? if not why not? how have those workers movements ended up in the capitalist class (if we assume there were already a capitalist class) strengthend - workers right further weakened (obviously I would add - private property relations re-introduced wholesale - but, ok, lets agree to disagree on that last point for now...)

The practice, I would say, supports my arguement that the stalinist bureaucracies were transitional states holding back workers democracy - but where the mode of production was no longer in private control. That they could have gone one way or the other - dependant on the role played by the working class

 

[TremulousTetra]

There's nothing in any state capitlaist view that i've ever come across that denies the potentiial (relative) autonomy of the political - in fact, a good chunk of of them are based on the idea - of the state acting as collective capitalist against the particluar capitalist interests.

You are right - I should have said "Cliff's version of state cap in the USSR" rather than any old "state cap" theory.

then my comment would make sense


And the other thing I was wrong on was the date Cliff uses as the point where capitalist returns in the USSR - I said earlier 1923 - apparently its 1928 - makes no difference otherwise to what i said though

So you agree butchters, that in cliffs state capitlaist view cliff denies the potentiial (relative) autonomy of the political - of the state acting as collective capitalist against the particluar capitalist interests? Have you got a link Butcher's? Such a link would surely contradict Tony cliffs own theory of a deflected permanent evolution?

 

[butchersapron]

I said the exact opposite of that.

Dennis, sorry, but it's just not worth it.

 

[TremulousTetra]

dennisr, no point getting upset with me for the debate meandering, if you didn't bothered answering questions that haven't been asked

So if it was not state capitalist, what was the Soviet Union?

with, "degenerated workers' state". That would have been it.

 

[dennisr]

So you agree butchters, that in cliffs state capitlaist view cliff denies the potentiial (relative) autonomy of the political - of the state acting as collective capitalist against the particluar capitalist interests? Have you got a link Butcher's? Such a link would surely contradict Tony cliffs own theory of a deflected permanent evolution?

BA was pointing out that state capitalist theories recognise the potential (relative) autonomy of the state in reply to my mistake generalisation equating all state cap theories to the one - Cliff's

My point could be clarified - Cliff recognised that there had been a workers revolution in Russia in 1917 - that the state machine had, overthrown , smash and replaced and that the means of production had been taken out of the hands of the capitalists.

The growing bureaucracy would have been acting in its interests - controlling a nationalised economy - but against workers input and control of that economy. It was NOT - between 1917 but before 1928 - in Cliff's opinion as much as ours - defending collective capitalist interests.

So there must be some point (in 1928 according to Cliff) where the workers state was overthrown and a capitalist state was re-imposed - enforcing and defending private property. Following the Marxist theories on the state that Cliff would claim to agree with.

This rally is 'angels on head of pin' stuff - so i'll leave you all in peace as well