Date: Thu, 1 Aug 1996 04:08:48 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Re: Marxism: meat and potatoes questions


Greg Schofield wrote:

> What a regime chooses to call itself has
> absolutely nothing to do with Marxism I believe Joe Stalin declared the
> USSR communist as a reward and a false sense of achievement after his
> first five year plan (I stand to be corrected on this historical detail).

While I agree with the general point that you are making, here's a little
historical detail.

In 1937 Stalin declared that socialism had been constructed and that they
were on the road to communist society. After Stalin's death, Molotov - a
strong supporter of Stalin - denied that socialism had been achieved and
Khruschev also later repudiated Stalin's assertion.

It was not until the 22th Congress of the CPSU in 10/61, that the final
achievement of socialism was announced. The '61 Party Program stated that
the socialist principle "From each according to his abilities, to each
according to his *work* had been achieved" (emphasis added, JL).[!] At
this time it was said: "In the next decade [61-70] the Soviet Union, in
creating the material and technical basis of communism, will surpass the
strongest and richest capitalist country, the USA, in production per head
of population; the people's standard of living ... will improve
substantially, [and] everyone will live comfortably ...." By 1980, they
were supposed to have achieved communism and the "doctrine" of the
"universal abundance of products" was to be established.

Jerry



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