Date: 12 Jun 97 21:21:55 EDT
From: neil <74742.1651-AT-CompuServe.COM>
Subject: M-I: state capitalism


dear Freinds,

reply to Andrew A.

Andy, you give your defense of state caps game away !
You say; 

"If the means of production have been nationalized
then this means the people as a whole , if organized
nationally , own the means of production. Whether 
the people as a whole own the means of production
is an empirical question . It is likely a matter of degree..........

Andy. Mere nationalization is not socialism! If it was ,
British Petrolium , The Post office, The US   Amtrak Rail system ,
Franco Spain, Peronist Argentina, The LA Coluseum, 
the County Health Dept and the School Board  could just as well fit into
your social democratic Kautskian concept of "socialism'
or  your so called state socialism, as well as the state cap
stalinist regimes you go to bat for.

Nationalization, social democrat capitalist or stalino 
state capitalist and  Tory run capitalist  nationalized property is
still capitalist to the core as the political state bureaucracy
is still reliant on the profit system , 'planned 'or  unplanned.

This is why the Social relations in all these regimes are
not QUALITATIVELY different ,only quantitatively , the workers are impelled
to toil  for peanuts, the ruling class usurps their product
buys labour power to produce commodities and continues
and strengthens  money and exchange relatons to hid the
exploitation , the production of surplus value and the 
accumulation of capital , all alienated from workers control!
 Of course the state authorities  are standing by ready to 
pummel workers who try to defend their class interests--
priv cap and state cap.
Question. What is the difference between the actions of the USA 
and exUSSR political state  toward a large militant movement of 
striking workers?
Answer. In the USA, the workers might get warning shots.

If you say the workers are in power  in the  state capitalist 
regimes, then where are the rank and file workers soviets, councils,
assemblies and other organizations which would have to
be dominant and massive  in a worker society , either in transition to
 or having reached socialism?
 Partial Answer; they were smashed in the USSR by imperialist onslaughts 
and the disasterous Russian CP tactics of going back on their own 
revolutionary program in the early  20s  and eventually  building up 
state capitalism , with a new ruling class on top.. 

Mere Party rule is not sufficient, any   Party can call itself 
communist (and many a faker one has/does) ,  but it is the  
action of masses and programme for control of society and 
the REVOLUTIONIZING of social  relations,
in the first place, the economy, which determines if  the
society in going forward to socialism or setting up a Party
monopoly (East) or even shared Party hegemony (West)
to run capitalism.,

If the economy is still bulit on dominance of the commodity
production including and especially  human beings, the 
wages system, money -exchange and hence alienated labor,
you can sugar coat it all you want  Andy , you are still building 
capitalism  and the rancid odor cannnot be hidden indefinitely,

And the is why in your state cap bloc-- looking at the growth -
acumulation rates (See Nove, etc.)  and the need for capital to produce
 average surplus value,. the weaker  ex-USSR 
capital in relation to the western imperialist  camp, collapsed sooner.

It also explains why workers could be taken in by 'market'
and democratic  propaganda in the the ex-USSR and ex- empire
and why none even tried to mobilize, strike, occupy or take
up arms to defend the rotten state cap systems that collapsed
from 1989-91, in any  revolutionary way. 
It is also shown by the #s of state caps that have easily 
made the 'transition" to being quite excelled priv cap exploiters!

Neil


 
 








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