File spoon-archives/marxism-general.archive/marxism-general_1998/marxism-general.9801, message 37


Date: Thu, 08 Jan 1998 23:50:49 -0800
From: Juan Fajardo <fajardos-AT-ix.netcom.com>
Subject: M-G: Re: Walters' "Communism vs. Socialism"


In Marxism-General-Digest of Friday, January 9 1998(Volume 01 :
Number 581), Sheila Walters wrote:

>[...] I'm still perplexed that there's only one organization
> I could find (the Progressive Labor Party) believes in "fighting
> directly for  communism"!   Why are all the other revolutionary
> movements promoting socialism? ...I know that many
> socialists believe that moving directly to communism would be
> too drastic, and I can understand that some peope would feel
> that way.  However, we're talking about people and organizations
> that believe that the world is otherwise capable of adapting to
> enormous fundamental changes that a successful revolution would
> implement   - why do such people and organizations see real
> communism as too revolutionary?  Wouldn't the difficulties of
> instituting Marxist socialism be every bit as daunting as creating
> a communist government?  
[Sheila Walters" <swalters-AT-odu.edu>, "Communism vs. Socialism", 
 Wed, 7 Jan 1998 15:43:26 EST]

    Ms. Walters, you bring up a very important question and one that has
caused much confusion over the years.  In part this confusion has
stemmed from changes in usage of terminology.  
    Marx and Engels originally spoke of communism suplanting capitalism,
but recognized that there would need to be a transitional stage in which
vestiges of the old society would remain while the new society was being
created.  This was because, as was pointed out by another list member,
the structure of a given society are based on the material conditions in
which that society exists.  Thus while we might be able to do away with
capitalists as a class by expropriating their productive property and
establishing state monopolies over trade and production, we could not
immediately do away with the capitalist way of organizing labor and
distribution.  For example, labor would still have to be paid for, goods
would still need to be sold, etc until we could have sufficient
productive capacity to give to people all that they needed free and a
population concientious enough only to take what they needed.  Moreover,
classes would still exist, and with them the need for a state (Read
Engels's *The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State*
which you can find in the Marx/Engles Internet Archive, at
<http://csf.Colorado.EDU/psn/marx/>).  Marx and Engles referred to this
initial transitional stage as the "lowest stage of Communism" and to the
classless, stateless society that would emerge from it as the "highest
stage of Communism."
    Over time revolutionists in order to clarify matters began to refer
to them by the labels "socialism" and "communism."  But in time the Old
Socialists of the Second International began to propose that revolution
was undesirable and unnecessary, that socialism could be implanted
peacefully through elections and that capitalism could be reformed away.
They began to try to test this theory after WW I, unsuccessfully it
turns out (as they were told it would be at the ouset) in Scandinavia,
it was later tested again with disastruous results in Chile in 1973.
These parties called themselves Socialist and refered to their system of
capitalism with heavy social welfare programs as "socialism." Their
detractors, those consistent Marxists who ended up grouping around the
Bolsheviks, in order to differentiate themselves from these degenerated
parties and to point out that "reformed" capitalism was not their goal
but eventual communism, began to call themselves Communist and to speak
of struggling for communism.  This did not mean that they had decided
that no transitional state would be necessary, reality of course would
not allow such an illusion for long even if they had had it.
    More recently, communists have come into the realization that
socialism (Marx's "lowest stage of communism") is itself something that
cannot be created overnight by an act of will but is itself the product
of a vast social transformation, which can only be realized when
capitalism has been overthrown on a world scale.  The struggle under
socialism will be the creation of a communist society, but until
capitalism is done away with as a system everywhere, the struggle cannot
move to that level but must of necessity be a struggle between the
nascent socialist society and the dying capitalist one.  It will be, in
fact is, a period of violent and internecine conflict which requires
that the energies and resources of socities in which capitalism has been
ovethrown be dedicated to surviving the capitalist counterattack -
witness the devastation engendered by the Russian Civil War, the Korean
War, the invasion of Vietnam, the 30+ year campaign against Cuba, etc. 
Does this mean that the struggle for socialism, the dictatorship of the
proletariat, is to be put off? Not at all, but it does require the
realization that such a dictatorship and the revolutionary politics
which must guide it are themselves a product of a social process. 
*Socialism doesn't change societies, societies create socialism by
changing.*  
    Until socialism is created however, we now realize more clearly,
there exists yet another transitional form, a form in which
revolutionists after overthrowing *capitalists* in government, must
educate people and explain to them the need to overthrow *capitalism* in
other areas of society and mobilize them to work toward making the
changes that will move society forward along this road.  We call these
transitional regimes "workers' states," and in countries in which state
power passes into the hands of alliances of the toiling classes we refer
to them as "workers and peasants states", or "workers and farmers'
governments" (to use the term favored by the Socialist Workers Party of
the USA) or "New Democratic States" (the Chinese Communist Party's
term).
     Thus the transformation of sosciety from capitalism to communism
will proceed thusly:
1) Capitalism is overthrown and workers' and farmers' governments are
put in place which will educate and mobilize the people for the
conscious transformation of society, render assistance to other
revolutions and other workers and farmers governments, begin to change
society away from capitalist norms etc.
2) Once capitalism has been overthrown everywhere, we focus on the
transition to socialism in which the economy is transformed along
socialist lines on a world scale, and the conditions are created by
which classes disappear and with them so does the state, and society as
a whole can realize the goal of "taking from each according to his
abilities, giving to each according to his needs."
3) Once this is achieved we will have transitioned to communism.

   So, why not move to communism right away? The answer is that one
cannot. It may sound good as a slogan, but it is unrealizable as a
program.  Do Marxists consider such a move too drastic, too
revolutionary? Well...yes.  More than that, we know that drastic moves
in that direction as disatruously costly and destructive, as we found
out when Stalin ordered the forced collectivization of Soviet
agriculture, when China attempted the "Great Leap Forward" in the 1950s,
or when the Khmer Rouge forced everyone on to vast collective farms and
worksites in order to fulfill their own twisted vision of a mixed
"communist" (BIG TIME quotation marks on that one!) and agrarian utopia.
   As for your question regarding the implantation of a "communist
government", I assume that you mean by this a the implantation of
communism and not merely the implantation of a government by communists,
which are two very different thins.  Assuming that it is the former
which you meant, I feel I must disagree with  Rolf Martens' criticism of
you on that point ("Your mentioning a "communist government" shows that
you don't
know what Marxists mean by "communism", for instance.")  On the one hand
it is unfairly harsh toward someone who is admittedly still becoming
familiar with Marxism, but it is at root incorrect.  In this instance
Mr. Martens seems to be equating "government" with "state."  Under
communism the state will have disappeared of course, but not so
government.  There must be some way of organizing the collective life of
a society to resolve common problems, organize production and
distribution, etc.  However, we cannot yet know what specifically such a
government will look like as we have no experience of government that is
not class government, but we may surmise that it will not include any of
the hallmarks of state systems such as permanent executive bodies,
"special detachments of armed men" (i.e. police, army, etc), and of
course it will not issue currency nor stamps, levy taxes, nor collect
fines, etc.  We may also assume (I hope we can!) that it will be a
system of government in which rules are followed and decisions are stuck
with not due to fear of reprisal as now, but though respect for others.
    I hope that in some way I have helped to answer your questions. 
Keep asking them, please.  I too am new to the list, and it is nice to
know I'm not the only one.

- Juan


     --- from list marxism-general-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---

   

Driftline Main Page

 

Display software: ArchTracker © Malgosia Askanas, 2000-2005