Date: Wed, 31 Jul 1996 18:42:21 -0400
Subject: Some basic questions of Marxism (was Meat and Potatoes, I think.)


List,

     I couldn't help but to evesdrop on the discussions between Mark Adkins
and several other list members.  The questions and critisisms brought up by
Mark lie at the core of Marxism.  It is therefore necessary that we discuss
these issues and build a base of understanding to be expanded.
 
   I also feel something in common with Mark.  Almost a year ago I entered
the Marxism list with the same questions and skeptical attitude.  Now, a year
later, I still have questions and, thankfully, a skeptical attitude.  The
thing is, however, that my questions are now of a higher level.  I have built
an understanding of the basics, and now seek to understand the more diverse
and intense aspects of Marxism.  And my skeptical is something that I hope I
never lose.  

     Marxism is a science.  It demands critical analyzation.  I am sure that
Mark has heard many Marxists proclaim that one needs faith in Marxism.  He
probably can hear them sigh and say "why doesn't he just beleive".  Of coarse
they don't say it in these words, but you can tell thats what they beleive.
 Marxism is not something to be beleived, it is something to be developed.
 We can leave faith to the church go-ers. Marx, fortunatly, laid down a
strong foundatoin for future generations to work with.  That is a purpose of
this list, to discuss and develop Marxism.

    Hegel writes:   
        "I could not of course imagine that the method which in this system 
         of Logic I have followed -- or rather which this system follows of 
         itself -- is not capable of much improvement, of much elaboration in

         detail, but at the same time I know that it is the only true
method."
     
   Though Hegel here talks of the dialectic, I think it aplies to much more.
 While I feel that Marxism offers the key to understanding the past, present,
and (to an extent) the future, I also recognize that it is only an idea.
 And, like all ideas, it is a product of it's time.  Though I would argue
that times have not changed all that drastically from when Marx lived, they
have changed nonetheless.  So, Marxism may be "the only true method", but
it's still "capable of much improvement."

    I hope that Mark stays with this list and continues to ask questions, and
maybe answer some for himself.  It would be interesting to compare my
developement with his, seeing as we both share in common a critical attitude
towards anything resembling a doctrine.  

    I haven't read all the correspondance between Mark and the others, so if
I repeat what has been said, I apalogize.   I'm going to talk about some
general points and questions that Mark raises.  Hopefully Mark will get back
to me and tell me what needs to be expanded on and what was left out.

                             DEMOCRACY AND MARXISM

     Mark seems to feel democracy is an important issue.  And it should be.
 Today we live in a society that has not only acheived more democracy then
any other, but that has also warped the idea more then anyother.  
     To say that the US, Britain, France etc. are not democratic is nonsense.
 Everyone in these nations has the right to go to the polls every 2-4 years
and vote for whoever they think would best represent them.  But is this
really a complete democracy?  I'm not talking about representative vs. direct
democracy.  I'm talking abour bourgeois vs. worker's democracy (or some would
say socialist democracy).
    One has to look at what we vote for in the "free world" and where we get
our information.  In parliamentary democracy (bourgeois democracy) our
elected representatives vote for a variety of things.  Welfare reform, crime
bills, balancing the budget, military spending etc.  Do you see something
common to all the above?  They are all effects of the economy.  Welfare is
how we provide for people that cannot find jobs, or as Kurt Vonnegut calls
them "the economic waste".  Although there is much work to be done, and many
needing work, our economy keeps a reserve army of the unemployed onhand to
keep profits high.  All crime bills are a direct reaction to the economy.  If
one agrees that crime rates rise in relation to the rise in poverty and the
decline of living standards, then one agrees that crime is of economic
origins (or at least the majority of it).  We have seen our society become
more and more a police state through the legislation of elected officials.
 Of coarse, this police state emerges through the will of the people, I mean,
what choice do we have?  That question is the point I would most like to
make.  What choice do we have?  We cannot do anything about the economy,
those decisions are left to unelected presidents and CEOs.  As long as our
democracy takes second place to their profits, we must allow a degeneration
of our life through our democratic process.  That is what's meant by
bourgeois democracy.  Our parlaments and congress' are all reactions to what
happens in the economy.  
    Worker's democracy, or socialist democracy, is far more complete.  This
is because the mode of production (the economy) lies in the hands of the
citizens as opposed to the hands of an unelected layer of moneyed
"aristocrats".   Production becomes planned according to the needs of the
people.  In capitalism products are throwen out to a anarchistic market.  It
is there that the crisis of overproduction and unemployment find their
origins.  The formerly uncontrolled market is taken over by workers formed
into councils.  This worker's councils decide what is to be produced and what
the products are to be used for.  Instead of building bombs and bayonets to
be used against fellow workers in other lands, they build butter knives and
bread to feed their families.  ALL POWER FLOWS FROM THE BOTTOM UP.  The
workers themselves decide what they need, no capitalist class, and no
bureaucracy decided for them.   Marx says: "Government becomes the
administration of things, not the governing of persons."  Or something like
that. 

    But now lets take a look at what democracy is, and why it comes about.
 Democracy is not something that society introduces because it would "be nice
to have" or because "it is the American way" etc.  Democracy arises out of
necessity.  The bourgeois revolutions (esp. the French revolution) brought
about the first bourgeois democracy.  This democracy was reserved for the
ruling class, however.  Democracy, under capitalism, is a way that the
capitalists can arrange their affairs with eachother without resorting to war
(which they often to anyways).  Thus, democracy finds it's necessety as the
discussion circle among the bourgeoisie.  The only way the the "common man"
has been able to achieve any say is through illegal and often revolutionary
struggle.  Take the democracy of the US.  Originally only the big landowners
got the vote.  Then the farmers struggled to get a voice.  After that the
workers fought bitter, and often bloody, battles to get labor rights and a
say in political affairs, however narrow.  It was not untill 1867 that Black
Americans got the right to vote.  Actually, it was not untill 1965 that the
first meaningful legislation was passed that actually made voting a safe
thing to do for Black Americans.  And women didn't get the vote untill the
thirties.   So, you can see how democracy was won by the bourgoeis ruling
class in the revolutions of the 18th, and 19th centuries.  It was then up to
the people to fight the bourgeoisie and force it to give up some power.  But
we must remember that whatever one giveth, one can taketh back again.  The
process of struggle is how our democracy has become as complete as it is, and
even now it is still far from acceptable (see above).
     The proletarian, or workers', revolutions bring democracy to the people.
  This is the time in which power is taken away from the minority and won by
the majority.  It is a logical outcome of the Fuedal, Capitalism, Socialism
scenerio.  Democracy now becomes a necessary fact of life.  Before, under
capitalism, democracy and rights were something to be taken in times of
crises (for "security" during wars and depressions).  They could be taken
because they weren't a necessary factor for the system to function.  Under
socialism democracy becomes necessary.  The fall of the Soviet Union show's
what happens when the people have no say in their system.  Democracy, under
capitalism, is how the bourgoeisie sorts out it's affairs.  Democracy, under
socialism, is how the proletariat (the workers) sort out their affairs.  If
there is not democracy under socialism then the system falls apart.
 Democracy through workers councils is necessary if supply is to meet demand,
if the products are to meet the actuall needs and desires of the consumers.
 In the USSR you saw a burueacracy guessing what the people wanted.  We all
know to well what happened then.  So, the basic formula stands:  Capitalism can function just as well with no interference from the people.  Socialism cannot function without the say of the people.

   All the above is the Marxist analysis of democracy and it's role in
society.

                             MARXISM AND THE STATE

      This will be fairly short.  If Mark wants me to expand on any of this
please ask.  
       Lenin writes:  
              "...it's [the state's] aim is the creation of "order" which
              legalises and perpetuates this oppression by moderating
               the collisions between the classes."  (_State and Revolution_
 pg. 9)
       The state acts as a muffler of class struggle.  It preserves the power
of the present class structure.  As long as one class dominates another the
state is necessary.  It is a tool to retain power.  Socialism does not come
about as a handout from gods or goblins.  It is a social system won through
the hard struggle of the masses.  Once the people take state power away from
the capitalists (weather this is through a social, or political revolution is
another topic!) they will have to preserve it.  The bourgeois class will
still exist for a while.  They will try to take back power by any means
necessary.  The workers will have to use the state the same way that the
capitalists had to use it before them.  Only this time it will be a
repression of the reactionary minority for the benifit of the majority,
whereas before it had been the repression of the progressive majority for the
benifit of the minority.
    But, if the capitalists do not have capital, they sooner or later die out
as a class.  And, because the state is a tool used by one class to dominate
another, the state ceases to be necessary.  The state "withers away" along
with the capitalist class. 


   I seem to remembr Mark asking if the future played out as Marxism said it
would.  Here is a qoute from Frederick Engel's _Socialism, Scientific and
Utopian_:

        "Taking over of the great institutions for production and
communication, 
         first by joint-stock companies, late on by trusts, then by the
state."

   I apologize that I give such a short and incomplete example of the Marxist
analyzation of capitalism, but I have written to much already.  I think that
even this small quote shows the basic layout for what has happened to
capitalism in the 19th, and 20th centuries.  Capitalism first went into a
period of boom.  This was when the capitaist system fulfilled it's role as
the revolutionizer in the means of production.  Capitalism enjoyed a quick
developement at this period.  Soon, joint stock companies took control.
 Imperialism hit the scene big time (and is still as strong as ever).
 Monopolies and near monopolies took controll.  This was evident in the early
20th century (ie. Railroads, newspapers, electricity, communications etc.
etc.).  All this caused capitalism to come to a crash.  World War 1, the
great depression (world-wide), World War 2...  These major catastrophies
showed eveyone that capitalism could not sustain itself alone.  The state
soon got involved bigtime.  Keynesianism became the game of the day.  The
capitalists became superflous.  They were still paid, but the government
subsidised them and made sure that a market existed.  We now live in a time
where capitalism is living off he taxes of the people.  The government
regulates and subsidises everything.  The capitalists are still paid profits,
even more at the expense of workers now then ever.  But, government
regulation has lead to inflation and hard times for entreprenuers (sp!).  The
system is truley damned if it does, damned if it don't.   This is the major
contradiction that will play out in the coming decades.  All this Marx and
Engels "predicted" over a hundred years ago.  

   The USSR:

       The USSR was a degenerated example of a workers' state.  It had the
shell of socialism, but nothing to fill it.  Socialism was attempted in a
thirdworld country amidst a world wide-imperialism war.  To add to these
conditions socialism had to be raised amidst of a civil war and a
pre-existing famine.   The proletarian revolution was carried out in a nation
that was 90% peasants, not urban proletarians.  This complicated matters all
the more.  Capitalism could very well have failed if it were first attempted
under such conditions.

   I don't know if this long letter has cleared matters up at all.  Hopefully
it will stir up discussion if nothing else.  
   Mark, if you have any comments or questions, please get back to me.

   Anyway, I have to go to work.

       ---Mike Dean
          Labor Militant
          Seattle, Wa.


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