Date: Fri, 08 Mar 2002 13:03:20 -0500
From: Louis Proyect <lnp3-AT-panix.com>
Subject: Re: AUT: Communism


Patrick Lea wrote:
>Hi Everyone,
>
>The capitalist cuba debate seems to be getting a little nasty, so I thought
>I might try to shift the focus just a little.
>
>Why question is this: What is communism?
>
>Louis, it seems, believes that although Cuba is a society where commodity
>exchange is the dominating mode of production, it is a communist society.
>This means: people sell their labour-power, value is measured as objectified
>labour crafted in commodities, surplus value is derived.

Do I believe that? Strange, I thought I was saying that communism is a term 
that Marx and Engels would have applied to the culmination of socialist 
development in highly advanced industrial countries, like Germany or 
England. Mostly, Marx and Engels paid little attention to what kind of 
litmus tests should be applied to such societies within the context of a 
worldwide communist system. They were far more concerned with the existing 
examples of working class challenges to capitalist rule. As I pointed out 
here the other day, the Paris Commune factored very heavily in their 
thinking about what was needed in the here and now, rather than in the 
millenarian future. Although the Paris Commune did not really challenge 
private property in any significant fashion, Marx believed that an armed 
and self-organized working class could begin to rule in its own class 
interests. He did not make prior demands that the Paris Commune do away 
with surplus value or commodity production. That was the sort of thing you 
heard from Bakunin, whose idealist approach to communism has been an 
obvious influence on council communists, autonomists and other purists 
posting here.






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