Date: Tue, 20 May 1997 00:13:40 -0700
From: Ben Seattle <icd-AT-communism.org>
Subject: M-I: (POF-2) The Alpha and Omega of Communist Theory


       _Critical Mass_ Productions presents:


       __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/

                         How to Build 
                    the Party of the Future
        
       __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/


       by Ben Seattle (cyberRed)

       By continuing our political development
       and harnessing the the power
       of the coming revolution in communications --
       we can help to lay the foundation
       for a communist "trend of trends"
       with the ability to eradicate sectarianism from our ranks,
       puncture the influence of reformism over a vast audience,
       capture the imagination of workers in their millions
       and mobilize our class to ignite a fire
       that cannot be extinguished.



       __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/ __/

                           Chapter 2

                      The Alpha and Omega
                      of Communist Theory
        
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Comrades and friends,


Before any group of people (forming a discussion group such as this
one)--can act effectively as a whole--there must be a minimum degree of
consensus on certain basic theoretical questions.  Such a consensus
certainly does not exist at present nor does it appear to be right over the
horizon.  Nonetheless I believe that such a consensus is "on its way" and I
will speculate a bit about the shape it will take.

To begin with--the most important questions of theory concern organization.

The Omega
---------

To start with our end point--we have the question of how humanity will
organize itself, its resources and the creation of various forms of wealth.
 At present, pretty much all (or most) human economic, cultural and
political organization is based on capitalism (ie: commodity production,
money, capital, wages and exchange).  A majority of the participants of
this list consider themselves to be one or another shade of "Marxist".  And
there is already a "consensus" (unfortunately so vague as to be useless)
that we need to somehow advance beyond capitalism to some kind of higher
stage of human social organization, often called "socialism" (a word so
hopelessly vague that I refuse to use it at all).

Debate on this question includes discussion of the relative merits of
"central planning" vs. "market socialism" and discussion of such questions
as whether Cuba, the former Soviet Union, North Korea and Iraq are (or ever
were) "socialist".

And the Alpha
-------------

Even more contentious is the question of how should we (or, for that
matter, the working class) organize our political efforts in order to
(ultimately) get rid of the capitalist system and replace it with something
better.

This question is related to whether we should try to build a "broad" or
"narrow" party and also whether, to what degree and under what conditions
different views should exist and compete against one another inside a
common organization.

One valuable insight we must deal with is a highly interesting comment made
by Chris Buford on December 27 that:

	"a more appropriate marxist organisation for today
	is a network, but [one] that does not preclude
	more disciplined parties or pressure groups
	working within that network."

Strongly related to this is the question of how "communists" (another word
with no clearly defined meaning) should relate to the various strata under
the influence of (or which actively promote) bourgeois ideology.  Under
this category there are a wide range of strata and associated political
trends that sometimes go under the name "labor aristocracy", "liberalism",
"social-democracy" and so forth.

All consideration of the forms by which (as workers or as revolutionary
activists) we organize our activity--must be focused on the real nature of
our tasks.  Our tasks involve (a) mobilizing a particular class, the
proletariat, and various other strata, to (b) achive unity in action to (c)
defend their common interests and (d) shit-can the capitalist system and
replace it with something better.  These tasks require forms of
organization (and an ideological life) that can (e) maintain ideological
clarity and *independence* from bourgeois, reformist and opportunist
conceptions and (f) avoid the tendencies toward degeneration into sectarian
religious cults.

Everything else is just details
-------------------------------

There are a good many other theoretical, political and economic questions
on which we have strong disagreements amongst ourselves.  My view however,
is that, at least with respect to theory--it is the two questions above
(the "alpha" and "omega") which are fundamental.  When a critical mass of
activists reach agreement on these two theoretical issues--all other issues
relating to theory will begin to fall into place.

And I believe that this will happen.

Revolutionary practice is the engine
------------------------------------

I do not wish here to negate the role of revolutionary practice, which is
more fundamental than theory.  Nor do I wish to imply that agreement in
theory will be unrelated to lessons learned in practice.  Many of the
participants on this list already have a great many years of practical
experience (both good and bad) in the class struggle.  This list functions,
partly, as a forum for activists to compare their experiences, sum things
up and draw conclusions.  The theory which is developed here is refined
from practice and in turn guides practice.  Hence, when I discuss here our
collection motion towards theoretical consensus--I hope I am not seen as
talking about a process which takes place in isolation from popular actions
with deep roots in the class struggle.  It is revolutionary practice which
functions as the great engine driving this process forward.

============================2a. My own views on the Omega
============================
We need a relatively clear vision of where we are going if we want to
capture the imaginations and loyalties of the hundreds of millions of
people who represent the only force that can bring us there.

I have written extensively on my own views of what communist society will
look like.  The bulk of this is posted on my web site and I will not at
this point repeat it here. [2.1]  As I have noted, I refuse to use the word
"socialism".  I am holding this word hostage.  I use the term "transition
period" to emphasize that such a period can only be understood as a period
in which the working class has established political hegemony and is in the
process of making a conscious and successful step-by-step transition to a
communist economy, culture and political system (something that has never
been done).

A communist economy, culture and political system is defined as being
guided by the principle: "From each according to his ability, to each
according to his need".  Such an economy, culture and political system
would operate entirely without money, capital, wages, commodity production
or any kind of exchange other than the exchange of consumption for
production (ie: the growers of a peach give the peach to workers, who, in
exchange, eat the peach).

I emphasize the goal of communism because otherwise there is a strong
tendency to fall into the trap of forgetting (on the level of theory) that
this is our goal.  This is why we have had discussion (from learned
economists no less) that Iraq is "socialist" (ie: by this or that bullshit
definition).  Some have argued that we should focus on "socialism" because
it is closer to being an achievable goal and easier to understand than
communism.  This is bullshit.  Picture yourself walking across a tightrope.
Now ask yourself--do you or do you not want the other end of the tightrope
to be firmly secured at the correct location ?

"Begin with the end in mind"
----------------------------

Stephan Covey (a Morman, one of the more reactionary religions) knows more
about this than many of us.  The second of his seven famous principles is
"Begin with the end in mind".  The reason is fundamental.  It is a lot
easier to get somewhere if you have a clear conception of where you are
going.  Otherwise, you are likely to be making great progress in going
nowhere--or just be drifting along in some random and unhelpful direction.
And this has certainly been taking place on the level of theory.

I will say that I emphatically reject both "market socialism" and "central
planning" as being "communism".

Markets
-------

Markets will certain exist during the transition period, if only because a
functioning economy will be necessary and non-market methods of effectively
running an economy can only be learned over a period of time. Markets will
exist so that the workers will have a functioning economy while they
experiment with and learn how to run an economy without markets.

>From time to time we also see various schemes that someone has devised that
use markets and exchange (combined with special rules, cooperatives or
what-not) in an economy--not as a *temporary expedient* during a period of
transition--but as a *cure* for capitalism's ills.

I think we are in the same situation here as the U.S. patent office--which
kept getting patent applications for "perpetual-motion machines".  Everyone
who understands the first two laws of thermodynamics (roughly speaking:
"you can't win" and "you can't break even") knows that you cannot draw
unlimited energy out of a closed system.

Yet the patent office kept getting all these applications because would-be
geniuses continued to believe that they had outsmarted nature.

Similarly, we may never run into a shortage of "sharp" people who have
devised a perfect plan to escape the laws of commodity production and
exchange--while proposing--an economy based on commodity production and
exchange.

The patent office, getting fed-up with this (and grasping that some people
have greater respect for laws made by man than the laws of nature) finally
instituted a new regulation: perpetual-motion machines, on the authority
vested by the U.S. Congress, are, by law, no longer patentable.

Central Planning
----------------

There is a great deal of mythology about central planning and its
relationship to communism or the transition period.  Some small part of
this mythology may be based on a remark by Engels in "Anti-Duhring" that is
frequently misunderstood (I will get into this in just a bit).  But I
believe that the bulk of this mythology came up in the 1930's.  At that
time, history witnessed the stagnation of free-market capitalism (in the
midst of the Depression) side by side with the rapid development and
industrialization of the "workers' state", under Stalin, which utilized
"central planning".

>From the ideological war between capitalism and "communism" of this
period--was born the absurd notion that the *alternative* to an economy
guided by the "invisible hand" of the marketplace--must necessarily be an
economy guided by a group of all-powerful central planners.

I will not try to define here what is or is not "genuine" central planning.
I regard this as somewhat akin to the search for the "genuine" pot of gold
at the end of the rainbow.  The problem with all forms of planning that
involve a supreme central arbitrator--comes down to an information
bottleneck.  The center cannot possibly get and analyse all the information
required to compare the outcomes of all the different possible decisions
which must be made.  As such, it is inevitable that all such forms break
down in practice into something more closely resembling feudalism than
free-market capitalism.  The center inevitably must partition
responsibility for various sectors to different departments--which from
that point on are engaged in fierce turf wars (ie: competition and rivalry
to cheat and take advantage of one another and outscore each other by
manipulating whatever artificial system is inevitably used to measure their
performance).

Such methods may work fine in simple or primitive economies in which
technology can be imported from abroad--but reveal their weaknesses as the
economy grows more complex.

This does not mean that various kinds and degrees of planning, or even
various shades of central planning, will not play a useful (or even
necessary) role in one or another aspect of the functioning of the economy
during the transition period.  This should be no great suprise.  Even "free
market" capitalism uses a degree of central planning (ie: central banks
such as the "fed" in the U.S.) to regulate and influence credit markets.

What must, however, be most emphatically rejected--is the idea that
all-powerful central planners are somehow necessary to run an advanced
economy without markets.

Communist society will certainly utilize planning--but not in the sense of
there being a single all-powerful center.  Rather--there would be many
centers.  These centers would both coordinate their activity and,
simultaneously, compete against one another for the support of alternate
views on how best to serve the needs of the masses.  Such forms of
planning, in which the planning authority is distributed to many centers
(without a single center necessarily having overall authority), are not
usually refered to as "central planning".

==========================================================2b. Engels on the merger of the "Between" with the "Within"
==========================================================
In a very interesting passage in Anti-Duhring (about a third of the way
thru Section II "Theoretical" of Part III "Socialism"), Engels discusses
the inevitable merger between the forms of organization *within* a factory
and the forms of organzation *between* factories.  Just as the planets,
left to themselves, will inevitably spiral into the sun, Engels notes, so
also will these two forms of organization merge.  Eventually, notes Engels,
the entire economy would function as efficiently as a single factory--and
this would allow the creation of sufficient wealth--that no one would ever
again have to struggle merely to survive.

This is the passage by Engels which is often distorted by the advocates of
central planning.

Engels noted that the form of organization *inside* a factory was far more
rational and less wasteful than the form of organization *between*
factories (which relied on the *market* and the principle that resources
could only be transfered between the fundamental units of wealth-creation
*after first being transformed* into commodities).  In more modern terms,
we can conceive of this as a "bandwidth limitation" restricting the flow of
wealth from one wealth-producing center to another.  [2.2]

Our modern day advocates of central planning reason that since most
factories in Engels' day were highly centralized top-down systems of
command and control--that Engels therefore must have envisioned the *entire
economy* consisting of a *highly centralized system* of top-down control.
I call this the "single point of control" theory.  Usually, our advocates
of such central planning add room at various places for the population to
input suggestions and "intelligence" into the system to keep the central
planners aware of the relative priorities of this and that--and to help
prevent them from making too many stupid decisions.

But from a theoretical perspective this is utter nonsense.

Engels' argument was more simple, basic and fundamental than such silly
arguments in favor of a single point of control.  Engels was pointing out
the utter inadequacy of *market mechanisms* to regulate production and
coordinate the economic activity of a complex society.  In fact, an
examination of how large capitalist enterprises are organized today--shows
that the highly hierarchical methods of the past are considered weak,
inefficient and too slow, awkward and clumsy for many or most forms of
wealth production.  As the process of wealth creation has become more
complex, what is more valued today are things such as flexibility,
initiative from below, and the ability to put together self-moving teams
which can be assembled, reassembled and rapidly adapted to meet changing
needs.

Engels' point on the *eventual coalescence* of the organizational forms of
wealth creation *within* units and *between* units--remains quite profound
and valuable.  We will run into this fundamental concept again when we
examine the organization forms by which *communists* will organize themselves.

==========================================================2c. The dictatorship of the proletariat in the modern world
==========================================================
Finally we come to the central theoretical question which stands as the
necessary and decisive link between the Alpha and the Omega: the nature of
the "dictatorship of the proletariat" in the modern world.  I have not seen
much discussion of this topic on the Spoon's list.  One could get the
impression that this is not a popular topic or that it raises too many
controversial issues or that it is too complex to deal with.  But we are
going to have to deal with it.  This question cannot be avoided forever.

It is this question that is driving the (so-far) unresolvable debate on
"Stalinism".  The discussion on "Stalinism" has tended to present itself as
a disagreement about the past.  But the energy behind the discussion has
its source--in different conceptions of the future.

Stalin is well-known for not permitting criticism by his political
opponents.  The system of rule he perfected suppressed the former
bourgeoisie--but it also suppressed the working class as well.  And because
of this--it inevitably led to the rule of a new class of privileged
functionaries.

The workers' movement to overthrow capitalism will never gain the support
of millions until it can clearly demonstrate that it understands how the
workers' dictatorship can suppress the bourgeoisie *without* at the same
time suppressing the workers.

In particular, we have to deal with the nature of the proletarian
dictatorship in the modern world--in terms of its relationship to the
coming revolution in communications.

We are standing on the eve of the greatest communications revolution in
history.  This revolution in communications will transform every sphere of
society.  More to the point, it will profoundly transform the terrain on
which is waged the class struggle.

After the rule of capital is overthrown, the communications revolution will
continue to be part of every social movement, every struggle against
everything backward and all motion to mobilize mass energy for development
on the economic, cultural and political fronts.

Progressive activists, today, who wish to see the communications revolution
harnessed to serve the real needs of humanity--will have questions that
they will ask of any "marxist" that they encounter.  Real marxists are
(presumably) for the dictatorship of the proletariat.  What will be the
attitude of the dictatorship of the prolateriat toward the internet ?  In
particular, will a system of workers' rule attempt to CENSOR the internet ?
 No group of people, no organization, no political trend can be regarded
seriously--as prepared to move humanity forward to communism--if it does
not have a clear, concise and well-argued answer to this question.

Within the economically advanced countries--we will *never* be dangerous to
the bourgeoisie--until we wrest from the reformist trends the banner of
democracy.

Today it is the reformist political trends which claim to stand for a
future in which all workers have the right to accuse their government of
incompetence, hypocrisy, corruption or worse--and to openly state that it
deserves to be done away with.  Will such a right exist when workers rule ?

I believe that the answer to this question follows logically from
consideration of the Alpha and Omega.  Once we have sorted out the primary
issues of the Alpha and the Omega--the answer to the question of whether
the workers' dictatorship would attempt to censor the internet--will fall
into place as easily and as naturally as a stone arch is completed when the
central keystone falls into place. [2.3]


(to be continued)


<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>

    Next week: Communist Organization in the Modern World

<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>--<>

------
Notes:
------

----------
[Note 2.1]
----------

   See:
                   "Anti-Joseph

                        and

         the Self-Organizing Moneyless Economy
                (S.O.M.E.) Hypothesis"

   available at: "www.pix.org/cyberLeninism/"

   It is currently available only in polemical (ie: lengthy) form
   (approximately one hundred thousand words).  A popular (and much
   shorter) version will eventually be prepared.

   Readers without web access can obtain my web pages by contacting me
directly by e-mail at: POF-AT-communism.org.  Please include the word
"PRIVATE" in the subject line to help insure that your note does not get
lost in a sea of related e-mail.

----------
[Note 2.2] Bandwidth limitation restricting the flow of wealth:
----------

(Note: because there is often so much confusion between "use-value" and
"exchange-value", I am not using these words.  I will use the word "wealth"
to denote what, in classical Marxism, is often called use-value.)

In a modern economy, the creation of wealth requires the rapid flow of
forms of wealth from one wealth-creation center to another.  At each
center, various forms of wealth (in the form of labor or parts or
processes) are combined to create new wealth (ie: labor, either
current/living or past/frozen, is added).

Under capitalism, wealth can only flow from center "A" to center "B" after
this wealth has first been transformed into a commodity (or money--the
universal commodity).  But this transformation greatly distorts, slows down
and obstructs the transfer of wealth.

Within a factory (and subject to the limitations of the factory authority)
all resources flow to where they are most needed, to where they will do the
most good.  However outside the factory, the flow of wealth is restricted
by the limitations of the system of commodity production.  This is the
contradiction illuminated by the depression era scenes in which food (for
which there was no market--because people had no money) was soaked in
gasoline and burned.  Because conditions did not exist for this food to be
transformed into a commodity--it could not be used--even though the
distribution of this food would have created a type of *social wealth* (in
the form of stronger, healthier people) there was no way to *capture* the
necessary portion of this wealth and return it to the *specific company*
that had the food.

One of the basic contradictions limiting the ability of the capitalist
system to produce wealth--is that this wealth must be able to assume the
form of a commodity.  In this section of Anti-Duhring, Engels points out
how, under capitalism, the ability to create wealth can always grow more
rapidly than (and eventually outstrip) the capacity of the market to absorb
it.

----------
[Note 2.3]
----------

   See:
     "The Digital Fire --
      Will the Dictatorship of the Proletariat Censor the Internet?"
   at my website.  (Approximately ten thousand words)

   Readers without web access--please see Note 2.1 (above)




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