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version of Section H.
H.3 What are the myths of state socialism?
Ask most people what socialism means and they will point to the
Soviet Union, China, Cuba and a host of other authoritarian,
centralised, exploitative and oppressive party dictatorships.
These regimes have in common two things. Firstly, the claim
that their rulers are Marxists or socialists. Secondly, that
they have successfully alienated millions of working class
people from the very idea of socialism. Indeed, the supporters
of capitalism simply had to describe the "socialist paradises"
as they really are in order to put people off socialism.
The Stalinist regimes and their various apologists (and
even "opponents", like the Trotskyists, who defended them
as "degenerated workers' states") let the bourgeoisie have an
easy time in dismissing all working-class demands and struggles
as so many attempts to set up similar party dictatorships.
The association of "socialism" or "communism" with these
dictatorships has often made anarchists wary of calling
themselves socialists or communists in case our ideas are
associated with them. As Errico Malatesta argued in 1924:
"I foresee the possibility that the communist anarchists
will gradually abandon the term 'communist': it is growing
in ambivalence and falling into disrepute as a result of
Russian 'communist' despotism. If the term is eventually
abandoned this will be a repetition of what happened with
the word 'socialist.' We who, in Italy at least, were the
first champions of socialism and maintained and still maintain
that we are the true socialists in the broad and human sense
of the word, ended by abandoning the term to avoid confusion
with the many and various authoritarian and bourgeois
deviations of socialism. Thus too we may have to abandon
the term 'communist' for fear that our ideal of free human
solidarity will be confused with the avaricious despotism
which has for some time triumphed in Russia and which one
party, inspired by the Russian example, seeks to impose
world-wide." [The Anarchist Revolution, p. 20]
That, to a large degree happened with anarchists simply
calling themselves by that name (without adjectives) or
libertarians to avoid confusion. This, sadly, resulted in
two problems. Firstly, it gave Marxists even more potential
to portray anarchism as being primarily against the state
and not being as equally opposed to capitalism, hierarchy and
inequality (as we argue in section H.2.4,
anarchists have opposed the state as just one aspect of class
and hierarchical society). Secondly, extreme right-wingers tried
to appropriate the names "libertarian" and "anarchist"
to describe their vision of extreme capitalism as "anarchism,"
they claimed, was simply "anti-government" (see
section F for discussion on why
"anarcho"-capitalism is not anarchist). To counter these distortions
of anarchist ideas, many anarchists have re-appropriated the use of
the words "socialist" and "communist," although always
in combination with the words "anarchist" and "libertarian."
Such combination of words is essential as the problem Malatesta
predicted still remains. If one thing can be claimed for the 20th
century, it is that it has seen the word "socialism" become
narrowed and restricted into what anarchists call "state socialism"
- socialism created and run from above, by the state (i.e. by the state
bureaucracy and better described as state capitalism). This restriction
of "socialism" has been supported by both Stalinist and Capitalist ruling
elites, for their own reasons (the former to secure their own power and
gain support by associating themselves with socialist ideals, the latter
by discrediting those ideas by associating them with the horror of
Stalinism). The Stalinist "leadership thus portrays itself as
socialist to protect its right to wield the club, and Western ideologists
adopt the same pretence in order to forestall the threat of a more free
and just society." The latter use it as "a powerful ideological
weapon to enforce conformity and obedience," to "ensure that
the necessity to rent oneself to the owners and managers of these
[capitalist] institutions will be regarded as virtually a natural law,
the only alternative to the 'socialist' dungeon." In reality, "if
there is a relation" between Bolshevism and socialism, "it is the
relation of contradiction." ["The Soviet Union versus Socialism",
pp. 47-52, The Radical Papers, Dimitrios I. Roussopoulos (ed.),
pp. 47-8]
This means that anarchists and other libertarian socialists have a major
task on their hands - to reclaim the promise of socialism from the
distortions inflicted upon it by both its enemies (Stalinists and
capitalists) and its erstwhile and self-proclaimed supporters (Social
Democracy and its offspring Bolshevism). A key aspect of this process
is a critique of both the practice and ideology of Marxism and its
various offshoots. Only by doing this can anarchists prove, to quote
Rocker, that "Socialism will be free, or it will not be at
all." [Anarcho-Syndicalism, p. 14]
Such a critique raises the problem of which forms of "Marxism"
to discuss. There is an extremely diverse range of Marxist viewpoints
and groups in existence. Indeed, the different groups spend a lot of
time indicating why all the others are not "real" Marxists (or
Marxist-Leninists, or Trotskyists, and so on) and are just "sects"
without "real" Marxist theory or ideas. This "diversity" is,
of course, a major problem (and somewhat ironic, given that some
Marxists like to insult anarchists by stating there are as many forms
of anarchism as anarchists!). Equally, many Marxists go further than
dismissing specific groups. Some even totally reject other branches
of their movement as being non-Marxist (for example, some Marxists
dismiss Leninism as having little, or nothing, to do with what they
consider the "real" Marxist tradition to be). This means that
discussing Marxism can be difficult as Marxists can argue that our FAQ
does not address the arguments of this or that Marxist thinker, group
or tendency.
With this in mind, this section of the FAQ will concentrate on
the works of Marx and Engels (and so the movement they generated,
namely Social Democracy) as well as the Bolshevik tradition
started by Lenin and continued (by and large) by Trotsky. These
are the core thinkers (and the recognised authorities) of most
Marxists and so latter derivations of these tendencies can be
ignored (for example Maoism, Castroism and so on). It should
also be noted that even this grouping will produce dissent
as some Marxists argue that the Bolshevik tradition is
not part of Marxism. This perspective can be seen in the
"impossiblist" tradition of Marxism (e.g. the Socialist Party
of Great Britain and its sister parties) as well as in the
left/council communist tradition (e.g. in the work of such
Marxists as Anton Pannekoek and Paul Mattick). The arguments
for their positions are strong and well worth reading (indeed,
any honest analysis of Marxism and Leninism cannot help but
show important differences between the two). However, as
the vast majority of Marxists today are also Leninists, we
have to reflect this in our FAQ (and, in general, we do so
by referring to "mainstream Marxists" as opposed to the
small minority of libertarian Marxists).
Another problem arises when we consider the differences not
only between Marxist tendencies, but also within a specific
tendency before and after its representatives seize power.
For example, as Chomsky pointed out, "there are . . . very
different strains of Leninism . . . there's the Lenin of 1917,
the Lenin of the 'April Theses' and State and Revolution.
That's one Lenin. And then there's the Lenin who took power and
acted in ways that are unrecognisable . . . compared with, say,
the doctrines of 'State and Revolution.' . . . this [is] not
very hard to explain. There's a big difference between the
libertarian doctrines of a person who is trying to associate
himself with a mass popular movement to acquire power and the
authoritarian power of somebody who's taken power and is
trying to consolidate it. . . that is true of Marx also.
There are competing strains in Marx." As such, this
section of our FAQ will try and draw out the contradictions
within Marxism and indicate what aspects of the doctrine aided
the development of the "second" Lenin for the seeds from which
authoritarianism grew post-October 1917 existed from the start.
Anarchists agree with Chomsky, namely that he considered
it "characteristic and unfortunate that the lesson that
was drawn from Marx and Lenin for the later period was
the authoritarian lesson. That is, it's the authoritarian
power of the vanguard party and destruction of all popular
forums in the interests of the masses. That's the Lenin who
became know to later generations. Again, not very surprisingly,
because that's what Leninism really was in practice."
[Language and Politics, p. 152]
Ironically, given Marx's own comments on the subject, a key
hindrance to such an evaluation is the whole idea and history
of Marxism itself. While, as Murray Bookchin noted "to his
lasting credit," Marx tried (to some degree) "to create a
movement that looks to the future instead of to the past,"
his followers have not done so. "Once again," Bookchin
argued, "the dead are walking in our midst - ironically,
draped in the name of Marx, the man who tried to bury the
dead of the nineteenth century. So the revolution of our own
day can do nothing better than parody, in turn, the October
Revolution of 1918 and the civil war of 1918-1920 . . . The
complete, all-sided revolution of our own day . . . follows
the partial, the incomplete, the one-sided revolutions of
the past, which merely changed the form of the 'social question,'
replacing one system of domination and hierarchy by another."
[Post-Scarcity Anarchism, p. 108 and p. 109] In Marx's
words, the "tradition of all the dead generations weighs
down like a nightmare on the brain of the living." Yet his
own work, and the movements it inspired, now add to this
dead-weight. In order to ensure, as Marx put it, the social
revolution draws is poetry from the future rather than the past,
Marxism itself must be transcended.
Which, of course, means evaluating both the theory and
practice of Marxism. For anarchists, it seems strange that
for a body of work whose followers stress is revolutionary
and liberating, its results have been so bad. If Marxism is
so obviously revolutionary and democratic, then why have so
few of the people who read it drawn those conclusions? How
could it be transmuted so easily into Stalinism? Why are
there so few libertarian Marxists, if it were Lenin (or,
following Lenin, Social Democracy) which "misinterpreted"
Marx and Engels? So when Marxists argue that the problem is in
the interpretation of the message not in the message itself,
anarchists reply that the reason these numerous, allegedly
false, interpretations exist at all simply suggests that there
are limitations within Marxism as such rather than
the readings it has been subjected to. When something
repeatedly fails and produces such terrible results in the
progress then there has to be a fundamental flaw somewhere.
Thus Cornelius Castoriadis:
"Marx was, in fact, the first to stress that the significance
of a theory cannot be grasped independently of the historical
and social practice it inspires and initiates, to which it
gives rise, in which it prolongs itself and under cover of
which a given practice seeks to justify itself.
"Who, today, would dare proclaim that the only significance
of Christianity for history is to be found in reading
unaltered versions of the Gospels or that the historical
practice of various Churches over a period of some 2,000
years can teach us nothing fundamental about the significance
of this religious movement? A 'faithfulness to Marx' which
would see the historical fate of Marxism as something
unimportant would be just as laughable. It would in fact
be quite ridiculous. Whereas for the Christian the revelations
of the Gospels have a transcendental kernel and an intemporal
validity, no theory could ever have such qualities in the
eyes of a Marxist. To seek to discover the meaning of
Marxism only in what Marx wrote (while keeping quiet about
what the doctrine has become in history) is to pretend -
in flagrant contradiction with the central ideas of that
doctrine - that real history doesn't count and that the
truth of a theory is always and exclusively to be found
'further on.' It finally comes to replacing revolution
by revelation and the understanding of events by the
exegesis of texts." ["The Fate of Marxism," pp. 75-84
The Anarchist Papers, Dimitrios Roussopoulos (ed.),
p. 77]
This does not mean forsaking the work of Marx and Engels. It
means rejecting once and for all the idea that two people,
writing over a period of decades over a hundred years ago
have all the answers. As should be obvious! Ultimately,
anarchists think we have to build upon the legacy of the
past, not squeeze current events into it. We should stand
on the shoulders of giants, not at their feet.
Thus this section of our FAQ will attempt to explain the various
myths of Marxism and provide an anarchist critique of it and
its offshoots. Of course, the ultimate myth of Marxism is what
Alexander Berkman called "The Bolshevik Myth," namely the
idea that the Russian Revolution was a success. However, given the
scope of this revolution, we will not discuss it fully here except
when it provides useful empirical evidence for our critique (see
section H.6 for more on the Russian
Revolution). Our discussion here will concentrate for the most
part on Marxist theory, showing its inadequacies, its problems,
where it appropriated anarchist ideas and how anarchism and
Marxism differ. This is a big task and this section of the FAQ can
only be a small contribution to it.
As noted above, there are minority trends in Marxism which are
libertarian in nature (i.e. close to anarchism). As such, it
would be simplistic to say that anarchists are "anti-Marxist"
and we generally do differentiate between the (minority)
libertarian element and the authoritarian mainstream of Marxism
(i.e. Social-Democracy and Leninism in its many forms). Without
doubt, Marx contributed immensely to the enrichment of socialist
ideas and analysis (as acknowledged by Bakunin, for example).
His influence, as to be expected, was both positive and negative.
For this reason he must be read and discussed critically. This
FAQ is a contribution to this task of transcending the work of
Marx. As with anarchist thinkers, we must take what is useful
from Marx and reject the rubbish. But never forget that
anarchists are anarchists precisely because we think that
anarchist thinkers have got more right than wrong and we reject
the idea of tying our politics to the name of a long dead thinker.
Ultimately, the greatest myth of Marxism is the idea that
anarchists and most Marxists want the same thing. Indeed,
it could be argued that it is anarchist criticism of Marxism
which has made them stress the similarity of long term goals
with anarchism. "Our polemics against [the Marxists],"
Bakunin argued, "have forced them to recognise that freedom,
or anarchy - that is, the voluntary organisation of the
workers from below upward - is the ultimate goal of social
development." He stressed that the means to this
apparently similar end were different. The Marxists
"say that [a] state yoke, [a] dictatorship, is a
necessary transitional device for achieving the total
liberation of the people: anarchy, or freedom, is the goal,
and the state, or dictatorship, is the means . . . We reply
that no dictatorship can have any other objective than to
perpetuate itself, and that it can engender and nurture
only slavery in the people who endure it. Liberty can be
created only by liberty, by an insurrection of all the
people and the voluntary organisation of the workers from
below upwards." [Statism and Anarchy, p. 179]
As such, it is commonly taken for granted that the ends of
both Marxists and Anarchists are the same, we just disagree
over the means. However, within this general agreement over
the ultimate end (a classless and stateless society), the
details of such a society are somewhat different. This,
perhaps, is to be expected given the differences in means.
As is obvious from Bakunin's argument, anarchists stress
the unity of means and goals, that the means which are
used affect the goal reached. This unity between means
and ends is expressed well by Martin Buber's observation
that "[o]ne cannot in the nature of things expect a little
tree that has been turned into a club to put forth leaves."
[Paths in Utopia, p. 127] In summary, we cannot expect
to reach our end destination if we take a path going
in the opposite direction. As such, the agreement on ends
may not be as close as often imagined.
So when it is stated that anarchists and state socialists
want the same thing, the following should be borne in mind.
Firstly, there are key differences on the question of current
tactics. Secondly, there is the question of the immediate
aims of a revolution. Thirdly, there is the long term goals
of such a revolution. These three aspects form a coherent
whole, with each one logically following on from the last.
As we will show, the anarchist and Marxist vision of each
aspect are distinctly different, so suggesting that the short,
medium and long term goals of each theory are, in fact,
different. We will discuss each aspect in turn.
First, there is the question of the nature of the revolutionary
movement. Here anarchists and most Marxists have distinctly
opposing ideas. The former argue that both the revolutionary
organisation (i.e. an anarchist federation) and the wider
labour movement should be organised in line with the vision
of society which inspires us. This means that it should be
a federation of self-managed groups based on the direct
participation of its membership in the decision making
process. Power, therefore, is decentralised and there is
no division between those who make the decisions and those
who execute them. We reject the idea of others acting on
our behalf or on behalf of the people and so urge the use
of direct action and solidarity, based upon working class
self-organisation, self-management and autonomy. Thus,
anarchists apply their ideas in the struggle against the
current system, arguing what is "efficient" from a
hierarchical or class position is deeply inefficient from
a revolutionary perspective.
Marxists disagree. Most Marxists are also Leninists. They
argue that we must form a "vanguard" party based on the
principles of "democratic centralism" complete with
institutionalised and hierarchical leadership. They argue that
how we organise today is independent of the kind of society we
seek and that the party should aim to become the recognised
leadership of the working class. Every thing they do is
subordinated to this end, meaning that no struggle is seen as
an end in itself but rather as a means to gaining membership
and influence for the party until such time as it gathers enough
support to seize power. As this is a key point of contention
between anarchists and Leninists, we discuss this in some detail
in section H.5 and its related sections
and so not do so here.
Obviously, in the short term anarchists and Leninists
cannot be said to want the same thing. While we seek
a revolutionary movement based on libertarian (i.e.
revolutionary) principles, the Leninists seek a party
based on distinctly bourgeois principles of centralisation,
delegation of power and representative over direct democracy.
Both, of course, argue that only their system of organisation
is effective and efficient (see
section H.5.8
on a discussion
why anarchists argue that the Leninist model is not effective
from a revolutionary perspective). The anarchist perspective
is to see the revolutionary organisation as part of the
working class, encouraging and helping those in struggle to
clarify the ideas they draw from their own experiences and
its role is to provide a lead rather than a new set of leaders
to be followed (see
section J.3.6 for more on this). The
Leninist perspective is to see the revolutionary party as
the leadership of the working class, introducing socialist
consciousness into a class which cannot generate itself
(see section H.5.1).
Given the Leninist preference for centralisation and a leadership
role by hierarchical organisation, it will come as no surprise
that their ideas on the nature of post-revolutionary society are
distinctly different from anarchists. While there is a tendency
for Leninists to deny that anarchists have a clear idea of what
will immediately be created by a revolution (see
section H.1.4),
we do have concrete ideas on the kind of society a revolution
will immediately create. This vision is in almost every way
different from that proposed by most Marxists.
Then there is the question of the state. Anarchists, unsurprisingly
enough, seek to destroy it. Simply put, while anarchists want a
stateless and classless society and advocate the means appropriate
to those ends, most Marxists argue that in order to reach a stateless
society we need a new "workers'" state, a state, moreover, in which
their party will be in charge. Trotsky, writing in 1906, made this
clear: "Every political party deserving of the name aims at seizing
governmental power and thus putting the state at the service of the
class whose interests it represents." [quoted by Israel Getzler,
Marxist Revolutionaries and the Dilemma of Power, p. 105] This
fits in with Marx's and Engels's repeated equation of universal suffrage
with the political power or political supremacy of the working class.
In other words, "political power" simply means the ability to
nominate a government (see section H.3.10).
While Marxists like to portray this new government as "the
dictatorship of the proletariat," anarchist argue that,
in fact, it will be the dictatorship over the proletariat.
This is because if the working class is the ruling class
(as Marxists claim) then, anarchists argue, how can they
delegate their power to a government and remain so? Either
the working class directly manages its own affairs (and so
society) or the government does. Any state is simply rule by a
few and so is incompatible with socialism (we discuss this issue
in section H.3.7). The obvious
implication of this is that Marxism seeks party rule, not working
class direct management of society (as we discuss in
section H.3.8,
the Leninist tradition is extremely clear on this matter).
Then there is the question of the building blocks of socialism.
Yet again, there is a clear difference between anarchism and
Marxism. Anarchists have always argued that the basis of socialism
is working class organisations, created in the struggle against
capitalism and the state. This applies to both the social and
economic structure of a post-revolutionary society. For most
forms of Marxism, a radically different picture has been the
dominant one. As we discuss in section H.3.10,
Marxists only reached a similar vision for the political structure
of socialism in 1917 when Lenin supported the soviets as the framework
of his workers' state. However, as we prove in
section H.3.11,
he did so for instrumental purposes only, namely as the best means of
assuring Bolshevik power. If the soviets clashed with the
party, it was the latter which took precedence. Unsurprisingly,
the Bolshevik mainstream moved from "All Power to the Soviets"
to "dictatorship of the party" rather quickly. Thus, unlike
anarchism, most forms of Marxism aim for party power, a
"revolutionary" government above the organs of working class
self-management.
Economically, there are also clear differences. Anarchists have
consistently argued that the workers "ought to be the real
managers of industries." [Peter Kropotkin, Fields, Factories
and Workshops Tomorrow, p. 157] To achieve this, we have
pointed to various organisations over time, such as factory
committees and labour unions. As we discuss in more detail in
section H.3.12, Lenin, in
contrast, saw socialism as being constructed on the basis
of structures and techniques (including management ones)
developed under capitalism. Rather than see socialism as
being built around new, working class organisations, Lenin
saw it being constructed on the basis of developments in
capitalist organisation. "The Leninist road to socialism,"
notes one expert on Lenin, "emphatically ran through the
terrain of monopoly capitalism. It would, according to Lenin,
abolish neither its advanced technological base nor its
institutionalised means for allocating resources or
structuring industry. . . The institutionalised framework
of advanced capitalism could, to put it shortly, be utilised
for realisation of specifically socialist goals. They were
to become, indeed, the principal (almost exclusive)
instruments of socialist transformation." [Neil Harding,
Leninism, p.145]
The role of workers' in this vision was basically unchanged.
Rather than demand, like anarchists, workers' self-management
of production in 1917, Lenin raised the demand for "country-wide,
all-embracing workers' control over the capitalists" (and
this is the "important thing", not "confiscation of
the capitalists' property") [The Lenin Anthology, p. 402]
Once the Bolsheviks were in power, the workers' own organs (the
factory committees) were integrated into a system of state control,
losing whatever power they once held at the point of production.
Lenin then modified this vision by replacing capitalists with
(state appointed) "one-man management" over the workers
(see section H.3.14).
In other words, a form of state
capitalism in which workers would still be wage slaves under
bosses appointed by the state. Unsurprisingly, the "control"
workers exercised over their bosses (i.e. those with real
power in production) proved to be as elusive in production
as it was in the state. In this, Lenin undoubtedly followed
the lead of the Communist Manifesto which stressed state
ownership of the means of production without a word about
workers' self-management of production. As we discuss in
section H.3.13, state "socialism"
cannot help being "state capitalism" by its very nature.
Needless to say, as far as means go, few anarchists and
syndicalists are complete pacifists. As syndicalist Emile
Pouget argued, "[h]istory teaches that the privileged have
never surrendered their privileges without having been compelled
so to do and forced into it by their rebellious victims. It
is unlikely that the bourgeoisie is blessed with an exceptional
greatness of soul and will abdicate voluntarily" and so
"[r]ecourse to force . . . will be required." [The Party
Of Labour] This does not mean that libertarians glorify
violence or argue that all forms of violence are acceptable
(quite the reverse!), it simply means that for self-defence
against violent opponents violence is, unfortunately, sometimes
required.
The way an anarchist revolution would defend itself also shows
a key difference between anarchism and Marxism. As we discussed
in section H.2.1,
anarchists (regardless of Marxist claims) have
always argued that a revolution needs to defend itself. This
would be organised in a federal, bottom-up way as the social
structure of a free society. It would be based on voluntary
working class militias. This model of working
class self-defence was applied successfully in both the Spanish
and Ukrainian revolutions (by the CNT-FAI and the Makhnovists,
respectively). In contrast, the Bolshevik method of defending a
revolution was the top-down, hierarchical and centralised "Red
Army". As the example of the Makhnovists showed, the "Red Army"
was not the only way the Russian Revolution could have been defended
although it was the only way Bolshevik power could be.
So while Anarchists have consistently argued that socialism
must be based on working class self-management of production
and society based on working class organisations, the Leninist
tradition has not supported this vision (although it has
appropriated some of its imagery to gain popular support).
Clearly, in terms of the immediate aftermath of a revolution,
anarchists and Leninists do not seek the same thing. The former
want a free society organised and run from below-upwards by the
working class based on workers self-management of production
while the latter seek party power in a new state structure
which would preside over an essentially state capitalist
economy.
Lastly, there is the question of the long term goal. Even
in this vision of a classless and stateless society there
is very little in common between anarchist communism and
Marxist communism, beyond the similar terminology used to
describe it. This is blurred by the differences in terminology
used by both theories. Marx and Engels had raised in the 1840s
the (long term) goal of "an association, in which the free
development of each is the condition for the free development
of all" replacing "the old bourgeois society, with its classes
and class antagonisms," in the Communist Manifesto. Before
this "vast association of the whole nation" was possible, the
proletariat would be "raise[d] . . . to the position of ruling
class" and "all capital" would be "centralise[d] . . . in the
hands of the State, i.e. of the proletariat organised as the
ruling class." As economic classes would no longer exist,
"the public power would lose its political character" as
political power "is merely the organised power of one class
for oppressing another." [Selected Works, p. 53]
It was this, the means to the end, which was the focus of much
debate (see section H.1.1
for details). However, it cannot be
assumed that the ends desired by Marxists and anarchists are
identical. The argument that the "public power" could stop being
"political" (i.e. a state) is a tautology, and a particularly
unconvincing one at that. After all, if "political power" is
defined as being an instrument of class rule it automatically
follows that a classless society would have a non-political
"public power" and so be without a state! This does not imply
that a "public power" would no longer exist as a structure
within (or, more correctly, over) society, it just implies
that its role would no longer be "political" (i.e. an
instrument of class rule). Given that, according to the
Manifesto, the state would centralise the means of production,
credit and transportation and then organise it "in accordance
with a common plan" using "industrial armies, especially for
agriculture" this would suggest that the state structure
would remain even after its "political" aspects had, to use
Engels words, "die[d] out." [Marx and Engels, Op. Cit.,
pp. 52-3 and p. 424]
From this perspective, the difference between anarchist
communism and Marxist-communism is clear. "While both,"
notes John Clark, "foresee the disappearance of the state,
the achievement of social management of the economy, the
end of class rule, and the attainment of human equality,
to mention a few common goals, significant differences
in ends still remain. Marxist thought has inherited a
vision which looks to high development of technology
with a corresponding degree of centralisation of social
institutions which will continue even after the coming
of the social revolution. . . . The anarchist vision sees
the human scale as essential, both in the techniques which
are used for production, and for the institutions which
arise from the new modes of association . . . In addition,
the anarchist ideal has a strong hedonistic element which
has seen Germanic socialism as ascetic and Puritanical."
[The Anarchist Moment, p. 68] Thus Marx presents "a
formulation that calls not for the ultimate abolition of the
State but suggests that it will continue to exist (however
differently it is reconstituted by the proletariat) as a
'nonpolitical' (i.e., administrative) source of authority."
[Murray Bookchin, The Ecology of Freedom, p. 196fn]
Moreover, it is unlikely that such a centralised system
could become stateless and classless in actuality. As
Bakunin argued, in the Marxist state "there will be no
privileged class. Everybody will be equal, not only from
the judicial and political but also from the economic
standpoint. This is the promise at any rate . . . So there
will be no more class, but a government, and, please note,
an extremely complicated government which, not content
with governing and administering the masses politically
. . . will also administer them economically, by taking
over the production and fair sharing of wealth,
agriculture, the establishment and development of factories,
the organisation and control of trade, and lastly the
injection of capital into production by a single banker,
the State." Such a system would be, in reality, "the reign
of the scientific mind, the most aristocratic, despotic,
arrogant and contemptuous of all regimes" base on "a new
class, a new hierarchy of real or bogus learning, and
the world will be divided into a dominant, science-based
minority and a vast, ignorant majority." [Michael Bakunin:
Selected Writings, p. 266]
George Barrett's words also seem appropriate:
"The modern Socialist . . . have steadily worked for
centralisation, and complete and perfect organisation
and control by those in authority above the people. The
anarchist, on the other hand, believes in the abolition
of that central power, and expects the free society to
grow into existence from below, starting with those
organisations and free agreements among the people
themselves. It is difficult to see how, by making a
central power control everything, we can be making a
step towards the abolition of that power." [Objections
to Anarchism, p. 348]
Indeed, by giving the state increased economic activities it ensures
that this so-called "transitional" state grows with the implementation
of the Marxist programme. Moreover, given the economic tasks the state
now does it hardly makes much sense to assert it will "wither away"
- unless you think that the centralised economic planning which this
regime does also "withers away." Marx argued that once the "abolition
of classes" has "been attained" then "the power of
the State . . . disappears, and the functions of government are
transformed into simple administrative functions." [Marx, Engels
and Lenin, Anarchism and Anarcho-Syndicalism, p. 76] In other
words, the state apparatus does not "wither away" rather its function
as an instrument of class rule does. This is an automatic result of
classes themselves withering away as private property is nationalised.
Yet as class is defined as being rooted in ownership of the means of
production, this becomes a meaningless tautology. Obviously, as the state
centralises the means of production into its own hands then (the existing)
economic classes cease to exist and, as a result, the state "disappears."
Yet the power and size of the State is, in fact, increased by this process
and so the elimination of economic classes actually increases the power
and size of the state machine.
As Brain Morris notes, "Bakunin's fears that under Marx's kind of
socialism the workers would continue to labour under a regimented,
mechanised, hierarchical system of production, without direct control
over their labour, has been more than confirmed by the realities of the
Bolshevik system. Thus, Bakunin's critique of Marxism has taken on an
increasing relevance in the age of bureaucratic State capitalism."
[Bakunin: The Philosophy of Freedom, p. 132] Thus the "central
confusions of Marxist political theorists" are found in the discussion
on the state in The Communist Manifesto. If class is "an exclusively
economic category, and if the old conditions of production are changed so that
there is no longer any private ownership of the means of production, then
classes no longer exist by definition when they are defined in terms of . . .
the private ownership of the means of production . . . If Marx also defines
'political power' as 'the organised power of one [economic] class for oppressing
another', then the . . . argument is no more than a tautology, and is trivially
true." Unfortunately, as history has confirmed, "we cannot conclude . . .
if it is a mere tautology, that with a condition of no private ownership of the
means of production there could be no . . . dominant and subordinate
strata." [Alan Carter, Marx: A Radical Critique, p. 221 and pp. 221-2]
Unsurprisingly, therefore, anarchists are not convinced that a highly
centralised structure (as a state is) managing the economic life of society
can be part of a truly classless society. While economic class as defined
in terms of ownership of the means of production may not exist, social
classes (defined in terms of inequality of power, authority and control)
will continue simply because the state is designed to create and protect
minority rule (see section H.3.7). As
Bolshevik and Stalinist Russia showed, nationalising the means of
production does not end class society. As Malatesta argued:
"When F. Engels, perhaps to counter anarchist criticisms,
said that once classes disappear the State as such has no
raison d'ętre and transforms itself from a government of
men into an administration of thing, he was merely playing
with words. Whoever has power over things has power over men;
whoever governs production also governs the producers; who
determines consumption is master over the consumer.
"This is the question; either things are administered on the
basis of free agreement of the interested parties, and this
is anarchy; or they are administered according to laws made
by administrators and this is government, it is the State,
and inevitably it turns out to be tyrannical.
"It is not a question of the good intentions or the good will
of this or that man, but of the inevitability of the situation,
and of the tendencies which man generally develops in given
circumstances." [Errico Malatesta: His Life and Ideas, p. 145]
The anarchist vision of the future society, therefore, does not
exactly match the state communist vision, as much as the latter
would like to suggest it does. The difference between the two is
authority, which cannot be anything but the largest difference
possible. Anarchist economic and organisational theories are
built around an anti-authoritarian core and this informs both
our means and aims. For anarchists, the Leninist vision of
socialism is unattractive. Lenin continually stressed that his
conception of socialism and "state capitalism" were basically
identical. Even in State and Revolution, allegedly Lenin's
most libertarian work, we discover this particularly unvisionary
and uninspiring vision of "socialism":
"All citizens are transformed into the salaried employees of
the state . . . All citizens become employees and workers of
a single national state 'syndicate' . . . The whole of
society will have become a single office and a single factory
with equality of work and equality of pay." [Essential Works
of Lenin, p. 348]
To which, anarchists point to Engels and his comments on the
tyrannical and authoritarian character of the modern factory
(as we discuss in section H.4.4).
Clearly, Lenin's idea of turning the world into one big factory
takes on an extremely frightening nature given Engels' lovely
vision of the lack of freedom in the workplace.
For these reasons anarchists reject the simplistic Marxist
analysis of inequality being rooted simply in economic class.
Such an analysis, as the comments of Lenin and Engels prove,
show that social inequality can be smuggled in by the backdoor
of a proposed classless and stateless society. Thus Bookchin:
"Basic to anti-authoritarian Socialism --specifically,
to Anarchist Communism - is the notion that hierarchy and
domination cannot be subsumed by class rule and economic
exploitation, indeed, that they are more fundamental to
an understanding of the modern revolutionary project . . .
Power of human over human long antedates the
very formation of classes and economic modes of social
oppression. . . . This much is clear: it will no longer
do to insist that a classless society, freed from material
exploitation, will necessarily be a liberated society.
There is nothing in the social future to suggest that
bureaucracy is incompatible with a classless society,
the domination of women, the young, ethnic groups or
even professional strata." [Toward an Ecological
Society, pp. 208-9]
Ultimately, anarchists see that "there is a realm of domination
that is broader than the realm of material exploitation. The
tragedy of the socialist movement is that, steeped in the past,
it uses the methods of domination to try to 'liberate' us from
material exploitation." Needless to say, this is doomed to
failure. Socialism "will simply mire us in a world we are
trying to overcome. A non-hierarchical society, self-managed
and free of domination in all its forms, stands on the agenda
today, not a hierarchical system draped in a red flag."
[Bookchin, Op. Cit., p. 272 and pp. 273-4]
In summary, it cannot be said that anarchists and most Marxists
want the same thing. While they often use the same terms, these
terms often hide radically different concepts. Just because, say,
anarchists and mainstream Marxists talk about "social revolution,"
"socialism," "all power to the soviets" and so on, it does
not mean that we mean the same thing by them. For example, the phrase
"all power to the soviets" for anarchists means exactly that (i.e.
that the revolution must be directly managed by working class
organs). Leninists mean "all power to a central government
elected by a national soviet congress." Similarly with other
similar phrases (which shows the importance of looking at the
details of any political theory and its history).
We have shown that discussion over ends is as important
as discussion over means as they are related. As Kropotkin
once pointed out, those who downplay the importance of
discussing the "order of things which . . . should emerge
from the coming revolution" in favour of concentrating on
"practical things" are being less than honest as "far from
making light of such theories, they propagate them, and all
that they do now is a logical extension of their ideas. In
the end those words 'Let us not discuss theoretical questions'
really mean: 'Do not subject our theory to discussion, but
help us to put it into execution.'" [Words of a Rebel,
p. 200]
Hence the need to critically evaluate both ends and means.
This shows the weakness of the common argument that anarchists
and Leftists share some common visions and so we should work
with them to achieve those common things. Who knows what
happens after that? As can be seen, this is not the case.
Many aspects of anarchism and Marxism are in opposition and
cannot be considered similar (for example, what a Leninist
considers as socialism is extremely different to what an
anarchist thinks it is). If you consider "socialism" as
being a "workers' state" presided over by a "revolutionary"
government, then how can this be reconciled with the
anarchist vision of a federation of self-managed communes
and workers' associations? As the Russian Revolution shows,
only by the armed might of the "revolutionary" government
crushing the anarchist vision.
The only thing we truly share with these groups is a mutual
opposition to existing capitalism. Having a common enemy does
not make someone friends. Hence anarchists, while willing
to work on certain mutual struggles, are well aware there is
substantial differences in both terms of means and goals. The
lessons of revolution in the 20th Century is that once in power,
Leninists will repress anarchists, their current allies against
the capitalist system. This is does not occur by accident, it
flows from the differences in vision between the two movements,
both in terms of means and goals.
Some Marxists, such as the International Socialist Tendency,
like to portray their tradition as being "socialism from below."
Under "socialism from below," they place the ideas of Marx,
Engels, Lenin and Trotsky, arguing that they and they alone have
continued this, the true, ideal of socialism (Hal Draper's essay
"The Two Souls of Socialism" seems to have been the first to
argue along these lines). They contrast this idea of socialism "from
below" with "socialism from above," in which they place
reformist socialism (social democracy, Labourism, etc.), elitist
socialism (Lassalle and others who wanted educated and liberal
members of the middle classes to liberate the working class) and
Stalinism (bureaucratic dictatorship over the working class). Anarchism,
it is argued, should be placed in the latter camp, with Proudhon and
Bakunin showing that anarchist libertarianism simply a "myth".
For those who uphold this idea, "Socialism from below" is simply
the self-emancipation of the working class by its own efforts. To anarchist
ears, the claim that Marxism (and in particular Leninism) is socialism
"from below" sounds paradoxical, indeed laughable. This is because
anarchists from Proudhon onwards have used the imagery of socialism being
created and run from below upwards. They have been doing so for far longer
than Marxists have. As such, "socialism from below" simply sums up
the anarchist ideal!
Thus we find Proudhon in 1848 talking about being a "revolutionary from
below" and that every "serious and lasting Revolution" was
"made from below, by the people." A "Revolution from
above" was "pure governmentalism," "the negation of
collective activity, of popular spontaneity" and is "the oppression
of the wills of those below." [quoted by George Woodcock, Pierre-Joseph
Proudhon, p. 143] For Proudhon, the means of this revolution "from
below" would be federations of working class associations for both credit
(mutual banks) and production (workers' associations or co-operatives) as well
as federations of communes (democratically organised communities). The workers,
"organised among themselves, without the assistance of the capitalist"
would march by "[w]ork to the conquest of the world" by the "force
of principle." Thus capitalism would be reformed away by the actions
of the workers themselves. The "problem of association," Proudhon
argued, "consists in organising . . . the producers, and by
this subjecting capital and subordinating power. Such is the war of liberty
against authority, a war of the producer against the non-producer; a war
of equality against privilege . . . An agricultural and industrial
combination must be found by means of which power, today the ruler of
society, shall become its slave." [quoted by K. Steven Vincent,
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon and the Rise of French Republican Socialism,
p. 148 and p. 157] Ultimately, "any revolution, to be effective, must
be spontaneous and emanate, not from the heads of authorities, but from
the bowels of the people . . . the only connection between government and
labour is that labour, in organising itself, has the abrogation of governments
as its mission." [Proudhon, No Gods, No Masters, vol. 1, p. 52]
Similarly, Bakunin saw an anarchist revolution as coming "from below."
As he put it, "liberty can be created only by liberty, by an insurrection
of all the people and the voluntary organisation of the workers from below
upward." [Statism and Anarchy, p. 179] Elsewhere he wrote
that "popular revolution" would "create its own organisation
from the bottom upwards and from the circumference inwards, in accordance
with the principle of liberty, and not from the top downwards and from
the centre outwards, as in the way of authority." [Michael Bakunin:
Selected Writings, p. 170] His vision of revolution and revolutionary
self-organisation and construction from below was a core aspect of his
anarchist ideas and he argued repeatedly for "the free organisation of the
people's lives in accordance with their needs - not from the top down,
as we have it in the State, but from the bottom up, an organisation formed
by the people themselves . . . a free union of associations of agricultural
and factory workers, of communes, regions, and nations." He stressed
that "the politics of the Social Revolution" was "the abolition
of the State" and "the economic, altogether free organisation of
the people, an organisation from below upward, by means of federation."
[The Political Philosophy of Bakunin, pp. 297-8]
While Proudhon wanted to revolutionise society, he rejected revolutionary
means to do so (i.e. collective struggle, strikes, insurrection, etc.).
Bakunin, however, was a revolutionary in this, the popular, sense of the
word. Yet he shared with Proudhon the idea of socialism being created
by the working class itself. As he put it, in "a social revolution,
which in everything is diametrically opposed to a political revolution,
the actions of individuals hardly count at all, whereas the spontaneous
action of the masses is everything. All that individuals can do is clarify,
propagate and work out the ideas corresponding to the popular instinct, and,
what is more, to contribute their incessant efforts to revolutionary
organisation of the natural power of the masses - but nothing else beyond
that; the rest can and should be done by the people themselves . . .
revolution can be waged and brought to its full development only through
the spontaneous and continued mass action of groups and associations of
the people." [Op. Cit., pp. 298-9]
Therefore, the idea of "socialism from below" is a distinctly
anarchist notion, one found in the works of Proudhon and Bakunin and
repeated by anarchists ever since. As such, to hear Marxists appropriate
this obviously anarchist terminology and imagery appears to many anarchists
as opportunistic and attempt to cover the authoritarian reality of mainstream
Marxism with anarchist rhetoric. Moreover, the attempt to suggest that
anarchism is part of the elitist "socialism from above" school rests
on little more that selective quoting of Proudhon and Bakunin (including
from Bakunin's pre-anarchist days) to present a picture of their ideas
distinctly at odds with reality. However, there are "libertarian" strains
of Marxism which are close to anarchism. Does this mean that there are no
elements of a "socialism from below" to be found in Marx and Engels?
If we look at Marx, we get contradictory impressions. On the one
hand, he argued that freedom "consists in converting the state
from an organ superimposed upon society into one completely
subordinate to it." Combine this with his comments on the Paris
Commune (see his "The Civil War in France"), we can say that
there are clearly elements of "socialism from below" in Marx's
work. On the other hand, he often stresses the need for strict
centralisation of power. In 1850, for example, he argued that
the workers must "not only strive for a single and indivisible
German republic, but also within this republic for the most
determined centralisation of power in the hands of the state
authority." This was because "the path of revolutionary
activity" can "proceed only from the centre." This meant that
the workers must be opposed to the "federative republic"
planned by the democrats and "must not allow themselves to be
misguided by the democratic talk of freedom for the
communities, of self-government, etc." This centralisation
of power was essential to overcome local autonomy, which
would allow "every village, every town and every province"
to put "a new obstacle in the path" the revolution due to
"local and provincial obstinacy." Decades later, Marx
dismissed Bakunin's vision of "the free organisation of the
worker masses from bottom to top" as "nonsense." [Marx-Engels
Reader, p. 537, p. 509 and p. 547]
Thus we have a contradiction. While arguing that the state
must become subordinate to society, we have a central power
imposing its will on "local and provincial obstinacy." This
implies a vision of revolution in which the centre (indeed,
"the state authority") forces its will on the population,
which (by necessity) means that the centre power is
"superimposed upon society" rather than "subordinate"
to it. Given his dismissal of the idea of organisation from
bottom to top, we cannot argue that by this he meant simply
the co-ordination of local initiatives. Rather, we are struck
by the "top-down" picture of revolution Marx presents. Indeed,
his argument from 1850 suggests that Marx favoured centralism
not only in order to prevent the masses from creating obstacles
to the revolutionary activity of the "centre," but also to
prevent them from interfering with their own liberation.
Looking at Engels, we discover him writing that "[a]s soon
as our Party is in possession of political power it has
simply to expropriate the big landed proprietors just like the
manufacturers in industry . . . thus restored to the community
[they] are to be turned over by us to the rural workers who
are already cultivating them and are to be organised into
co-operatives." He even states that this expropriation may
"be compensated," depending on "the circumstances which
we obtain power, and particularly by the attitude adopted by
these gentry." [Selected Writings, pp. 638-9]
Thus we have the party taking power, then expropriating the
means of life for the workers and, lastly, "turning over"
these to them. While this fits into the general scheme of
the Communist Manifesto, it cannot be said to be "socialism
from below" which can only signify the direct expropriation
of the means of production by the workers themselves, organising
themselves into free producer associations to do so.
It may be argued that Marx and Engels did not exclude such a solution
to the social question. For example, we find Engels stating that "the
question is not whether the proletariat when it comes to power will simply
seize by force the tools of production, the raw materials and means of
subsistence" or "whether it will redeem property therein by
instalments spread over a long period." To attempt to predict this
"for all cases would be utopia-making." [Collected Works,
vol. 23, p. 386] However, Engels is assuming that the social revolution
(the proletariat "com[ing] to power") comes before the
social revolution (the seizure of the means of production). In this,
we can assume that it is the "revolutionary" government which does the
seizing (or redeeming) rather than rebel workers.
This vision of revolution as the party coming to power can
be seen from Engels' warning that the "worse thing that can
befall the leader of an extreme party is to be compelled to
assume power at a time when the movement is not yet ripe
for the domination of the class he represents and for the
measures this domination implies." [Op. Cit.,
vol. 10, p. 469] Needless to say, such a vision is hard to
equate with "socialism from below" which implies the active
participation of the working class in the direct management
of society from the bottom-up. If the leaders "assume power"
then they have the real power, not the class they claim
to "represent." Equally, it seems strange that socialism can
be equated with a vision which equates "domination" of a
class being achieved by the fact a leader "represents" it.
Can the working class really be said to be the ruling class
if its role in society is to select those who exercise power
on its behalf (i.e. to elect representatives)? Bakunin quite
rightly answered in the negative. While representative
democracy may be acceptable to ensure bourgeois rule, it
cannot be assumed that it can be utilised to create a socialist
society. It was designed to defend class society and its
centralised and top-down nature reflects this role.
Moreover, Marx and Engels had argued in The Holy Family
that the "question is not what this or that proletarian,
or even the whole of the proletariat at the moment considers
as its aim. The question is what the proletariat is, and
what, consequent on that being, it will be compelled to do."
[quoted by Murray Bookchin, The Spanish Anarchists, p. 280]
As Murray Bookchin argued:
"These lines and others like them in Marx's writings were to provide
the rationale for asserting the authority of Marxist parties and
their armed detachments over and even against the proletariat.
Claiming a deeper and more informed comprehension of the situation
than 'even the whole of the proletariat at the given moment,' Marxist
parties went on to dissolve such revolutionary forms of proletarian
organisation as factory committees and ultimately to totally regiment
the proletariat according to lines established by the party leadership."
[Op. Cit., p. 289]
Thus the ideological underpinning of a "socialism from above" is
expounded, one which dismisses what the members of the working class
actually want or desire at a given point (a position which Trotsky, for
one, explicitly argued). A few years later, they argued in The Communist
Manifesto that "a portion of the bourgeois goes over to the
proletariat, and in particular, a portion of the bourgeois ideologists,
who have raised themselves to the level of comprehending theoretically
the historical movement as a whole." They also noted that the Communists
are "the most advanced and resolute section of the working-class parties"
and "they have over the great mass of the proletariat the advantage of
clearly understanding the line of march, the conditions, and the general
results of the proletarian movement." This gives a privileged place to
the party (particularly the "bourgeois ideologists" who join it),
a privileged place which their followers had no problem abusing in favour
of party power and hierarchical leadership from above. As we discuss in
section H.5, Lenin was just expressing orthodox
Social-Democratic (i.e. Marxist) policy when he argued that socialist
consciousness was created by bourgeois intellectuals and introduced into
the working class from outside. Against this, we have to note that the
Manifesto states that the proletarian movement was "the self-conscious,
independent movement of the immense majority, in the interests of the
immense majority" (although, as discussed in
section H.1.1, when they wrote
this the proletariat was a minority in all countries bar
Britain). [Selected Works, p. 44, p. 46 and p. 45]
Looking at the tactics advocated by Marx and Engels, we see a strong
support for "political action" in the sense of participating
in elections. This support undoubtedly flows from Engels's comments
that universal suffrage "in an England two-thirds of whose
inhabitants are industrial proletarians means the exclusive political
rule of the working class with all the revolutionary changes in social
conditions which are inseparable from it." [Collected Works,
vol. 10, p. 298] Marx, likewise, repeatedly argued along identical lines.
For example, in 1855, he stated that "universal suffrage . . . implies
the assumption of political power as means of satisfying [the workers']
social means" and, in Britain, "revolution is the direct content
of universal suffrage." [Op. Cit., vol. 11, pp. 335-6] Yet
how could an entire class, the proletariat organised as a "movement"
exercise its power under such a system? While the atomised voting to
nominate representatives (who, in reality, held the real power in
society) may be more than adequate to ensure bourgeois, i.e. minority,
power, could it be used for working class, i.e. majority, power?
This seems highly unlikely because such institutions are designed to
place policy-making in the hands of representatives and were created
explicitly to exclude mass participation in order to ensure
bourgeois control (see section B.2.5).
They do not (indeed, cannot) constitute a "proletariat organised
as a ruling class." If public policy, as distinguished from
administrative activities, is not made by the people themselves,
in federations of self-managed assemblies, then a movement of the
vast majority does not, cannot, exist. For people to acquire real
power over their lives and society, they must establish institutions
organised and run, as Bakunin constantly stressed, from below. This
would necessitate that they themselves directly manage their own affairs,
communities and workplaces and, for co-ordination, mandate federal
assemblies of revocable and strictly controllable delegates, who will
execute their decisions. Only in this sense can a majority class,
especially one committed to the abolition of all classes, organise as
a class to manage society.
As such, Marx and Engels tactics are at odds with any idea of
"socialism from below." While, correctly, supporting strikes
and other forms of working class direct action (although,
significantly, Engels dismissed the general strike) they
placed that support within a general political strategy which
emphasised electioneering and representative forms. This,
however, is a form of struggle which can only really be
carried out by means of leaders. The role of the masses
is minor, that of voters. The focus of the struggle is at
the top, in parliament, where the duly elected leaders are.
As Luigi Galleani argued, this form of action involved the
"ceding of power by all to someone, the delegate, the
representative, individual or group." This meant that
rather than the anarchist tactic of "direct pressure
put against the ruling classes by the masses," the Socialist
Party "substituted representation and the rigid discipline
of the parliamentary socialists," which inevitably resulted
in it "adopt[ing] class collaboration in the legislative
arena, without which all reforms would remain a vain hope."
It also resulted in the socialists needing "authoritarian
organisations", i.e. ones which are centralised and disciplined
from above down. [The End of Anarchism?, p. 14, p. 12 and
p. 14] The end result was the encouragement of a viewpoint
that reforms (indeed, the revolution) would be the work of
leaders acting on behalf of the masses whose role would be
that of voters and followers, not active participants in the
struggle (see section J.2 for a
discussion on direct action and why anarchists reject electioneering).
By the 1890s, the top-down and essentially reformist nature
of these tactics had made their mark in both Engels' politics
and the practical activities of the Social-Democratic parties.
Engels "introduction" to Marx's The Class Struggles in France
indicated how far Marxism had progressed and undoubtedly
influenced by the rise of Social-Democracy as an electoral
power, it stressed the use of the ballot box as the ideal way,
if not the only way, for the party to take power. He noted
that "[w]e, the 'revolutionists', the 'overthrowers'" were
"thriving far better on legal methods than on illegal methods
and overthrow" and the bourgeoisie "cry despairingly . . .
legality is the death of us" and were "much more afraid of
the legal than of the illegal action of the workers' party,
of the results of elections than of those of rebellion." He
argued that it was essential "not to fitter away this daily
increasing shock force [of party voters] in vanguard skirmishes,
but to keep it intact until the decisive day." [Selected
Writings, p. 656, p. 650 and p. 655]
The net effect of this would simply be keeping the class
struggle within the bounds decided upon by the party leaders,
so placing the emphasis on the activities and decisions of
those at the top rather than the struggle and decisions of
the mass of working class people themselves. As we noted in
section H.1.1, when the party
was racked by the "revisionism" controversy after Engels
death, it was fundamentally a conflict between those who wanted
the party's rhetoric to reflect its reformist tactics and those
who sought the illusion of radical words to cover the reformist
practice. The decision of the Party leadership to support their
state in the First World War simply proved that radical words
cannot defeat reformist tactics.
Needless to say, from this contradictory inheritance Marxists
had two ways of proceeding. Either they become explicitly
anti-state (and so approach anarchism) or become explicitly
in favour of party and state power and so, by necessity,
"revolution from above." The council communists and other
libertarian Marxists followed the first path, the Bolsheviks
and their followers the second. As we discuss in the
next section, Lenin explicitly
dismissed the idea that Marxism proceeded "only from below,"
stating that this was an anarchist principle. Nor was he shy in
equating party power with working class power. Indeed, this vision
of socialism as involving party power was not alien to the mainstream
social-democracy Leninism split from. The leading left-wing
Menshevik Martov argued as follows:
"In a class struggle which has entered the phase of civil war,
there are bound to be times when the advance guard of the
revolutionary class, representing the interests of the broad
masses but ahead of them in political consciousness, is
obliged to exercise state power by means of a dictatorship
of the revolutionary minority. Only a short-sighted and
doctrinaire viewpoint would reject this prospect as such.
The real question at stake is whether this dictatorship, which
is unavoidable at a certain stage of any revolution, is
exercised in such a way as to consolidate itself and create
a system of institutions enabling it to become a permanent
feature, or whether, on the contrary, it is replaced as soon
as possible by the organised initiative and autonomy of the
revolutionary class or classes as a whole. The second of
these methods is that of the revolutionary Marxists who,
for this reason, style themselves Social Democrats; the
first is that of the Communists." [The Mensheviks in the
Russian Revolution, Abraham Ascher (ed.), p. 119]
All this is to be expected, given the weakness of the Marxist
theory of the state. As we discuss in
section H.3.7, Marxists
have always had an a-historic perspective on the state,
considering it as purely an instrument of class rule rather
than what it is, an instrument of minority class rule. For
anarchists, the "State is the minority government, from the
top downward, of a vast quantity of men." This automatically
means that a socialism, like Marx's, which aims for a socialist
government and a workers' state automatically becomes, against
the wishes of its best activists, "socialism from above."
As Bakunin argued, Marxists are "worshippers of State power,
and necessarily also prophets of political and social discipline
and champions of order established from the top downwards,
always in the name of universal suffrage and the sovereignty
of the masses, for whom they save the honour and privilege of
obeying leaders, elected masters." [Michael Bakunin: Selected
Writings, p. 265 and pp. 237-8]
For this reason anarchists from Bakunin onwards have argued for
a bottom-up federation of workers' councils as the basis of
revolution and the means of managing society after capitalism
and the state have been abolished. If these organs of workers'
self-management are co-opted into a state structure (as happened
in Russia) then their power will be handed over to the real power
in any state - the government and its bureaucracy. The state
is the delegation of power - as such, it means that the idea
of a "workers' state" expressing "workers' power" is a logical
impossibility. If workers are running society then power rests
in their hands. If a state exists then power rests in the hands
of the handful of people at the top, not in the hands of all.
The state was designed for minority rule. No state can be an
organ of working class (i.e. majority) self-management due to
its basic nature, structure and design.
So, while there are elements of "socialism from below" in the
works of Marx and Engels they are placed within a distinctly
centralised and authoritarian context which undermines them.
As John Clark summarises, "in the context of Marx's consistent
advocacy of centralist programmes, and the part these programmes
play in his theory of social development, the attempt to construct
a libertarian Marxism by citing Marx's own proposals for social
change would seem to present insuperable difficulties." [Op. Cit.,
p. 93]
As discussed in the last section,
Marx and Engels left their
followers with an ambiguous legacy. On the one hand, there are
elements of "socialism from below" in their politics
(most explicitly in Marx's comments on the libertarian
influenced Paris Commune). On the other, there are distinctly
centralist and statist themes in their work.
From this legacy, Leninism took the statist themes. This
explains why anarchists think the idea of Leninism being
"socialism from below" is incredible. Simply put, the actual
comments and actions of Lenin and his followers show that
they had no commitment to a "socialism from below." As we
will indicate, Lenin disassociated himself repeatedly from
the idea of politics "from below," considering it (quite
rightly) an anarchist idea. In contrast, he stressed the
importance of a politics which somehow combined action
"from above" and "from below." For those Leninists who
maintain that their tradition is "socialism from below"
(indeed, the only "real" socialism "from below"), this is
a major problem and, unsurprisingly, they generally fail
to mention it.
So what was Lenin's position on "from below"? In 1904, during
the debate over the party split into Bolsheviks and Mensheviks,
Lenin stated that the argument "[b]ureaucracy versus democracy
is in fact centralism versus autonomism; it is the organisational
principle of revolutionary Social-Democracy as opposed to the
organisational principle of opportunist Social-Democracy. The
latter strives to proceed from the bottom upward, and, therefore,
wherever possible . . . upholds autonomism and 'democracy,'
carried (by the overzealous) to the point of anarchism. The
former strives to proceed from the top downward." [Collected
Works, vol. 7, pp. 396-7] Thus it is the non-Bolshevik
("opportunist") wing of Marxism which bases itself on the
"organisational principle" of "from the bottom upward," not
the Bolshevik tradition (as we note in
section H.5.5, Lenin
also rejected the "primitive democracy" of mass assemblies as
the basis of the labour and revolutionary movements). Moreover,
this vision of a party run from the top down was enshrined in
the Bolshevik ideal of "democratic centralism".
How you can have "socialism from below" when your "organisational
principle" is "from the top downward" is not explained by Leninist
exponents of "socialism from below."
Lenin repeated this argument in his discussion on the right
tactics to apply during the near revolution of 1905. He
mocked the Mensheviks for only wanting "pressure from below"
which was "pressure by the citizens on the revolutionary
government." Instead, he argued for "pressure . . . from above
as well as from below," where "pressure from above" was
"pressure by the revolutionary government on the citizens."
He notes that Engels "appreciated the importance of action
from above" and that he saw the need for "the utilisation of
the revolutionary governmental power." Lenin summarised his
position (which he considered as being in line with that of
orthodox Marxism) by stating: "Limitation, in principle,
of revolutionary action to pressure from below and renunciation
of pressure also from above is anarchism." [Op. Cit.,
vol. 8, p. 474, p. 478, p. 480 and p. 481] This seems to have been a
common Bolshevik position at the time, with Stalin stressing in the
same year that "action only from 'below'" was "an anarchist
principle, which does, indeed, fundamentally contradict Social-Democratic
tactics." [Collected Works, vol. 1, p. 149]
It is in this context of "above and below" in which we must
place Lenin's comments in 1917 that socialism was "democracy
from below, without a police, without a standing army, voluntary
social duty by a militia formed from a universally armed
people." [Op. Cit., vol. 24, p. 170] Given
that Lenin had rejected the idea of "only from below" as
an anarchist principle (which it is), we need to bear in
mind that this "democracy from below" was always placed
in the context of a Bolshevik government. Lenin always
stressed that the "Bolsheviks must assume power." The
Bolsheviks "can and must take state power into their
own hands." He raised the question of "will the Bolsheviks
dare take over full state power alone?" and answered it: "I
have already had occasion . . . to answer this question in the
affirmative." Moreover, "a political party . . . would have
no right to exist, would be unworthy of the name of party . . . if
it refused to take power when opportunity offers." [Op. Cit.,
vol. 26, p. 19 and p. 90] Lenin's "democracy from below" always
meant representative government, not popular power or self-management.
The role of the working class was that of voters and so the Bolsheviks' first
task was "to convince the majority of the people that its programme
and tactics are correct." The second task "that confronted our
Party was to capture political power." The third task was for
"the Bolshevik Party" to "administer Russia,"
to be the "governing party." [Op. Cit., vol. 27,
pp. 241-2] Thus Bolshevik power was equated with working class power.
Towards the end of 1917, he stressed this vision of a Bolshevik
run "democracy from below" by arguing that since "the 1905
revolution Russia has been governed by 130,000 landowners . . . Yet
we are told that the 240,000 members of the Bolshevik party will not
be able to govern Russia, govern her in the interests of the poor."
He even equated rule by the party with rule by the class, noting that
"proletarian revolutionary power" and Bolshevik power"
are "now one the same thing." He admitted that the proletariat
could not actually govern itself for "[w]e know that an unskilled labourer
or a cook cannot immediately get on with the job of state administration
. . . We demand that training in th[is] work . . . be conducted
by the class-conscious workers and soldiers." The "class-conscious
workers must lead, but for the work of administration they can enlist the
vast mass of the working and oppressed people." Thus democratic
sounding rhetoric, in reality, hide the fact that the party would govern
(i.e., have power) and working people would simply administer the means
by which its decisions would be implemented. Lenin also indicated that
once in power, the Bolsheviks "shall be fully and unreservedly in favour
of a strong state power and of centralism." [Op. Cit., vol. 26,
p. 111, p. 179, p. 113, p. 114 and p. 116]
Clearly, Lenin's position had not changed. The goal of the revolution
was simply a Bolshevik government, which, if it were to be effective,
had to have the real power in society. Thus, socialism would be
implemented from above, by the "strong" and centralised government
of the "class-conscious workers" who would "lead" and so
the party would "govern" Russia, in the "interests" of
the masses. Rather than govern themselves, they would be subject to
"the power of the Bolsheviks". While, eventually, the "working"
masses would take part in the administration of state decisions, their
role would be the same as under capitalism as, we must note, there is a
difference between making policy and carrying it out, between the
"work of administration" and governing, a difference Lenin obscures.
In fact, the name of this essay clearly shows who would be in control under
Lenin: "Can the Bolsheviks retain State Power?"
As one expert noted, the Bolsheviks made "a distinction between the
execution of policy and the making of policy. The 'broad masses' were to
be the executors of state decrees, not the formulators of legislation."
However, by "claiming to draw 'all people' into [the state] administration,
the Bolsheviks claimed also that they were providing a greater degree
of democracy than the parliamentary state." [Frederick I. Kaplan,
Bolshevik Ideology and the Ethics of Soviet Labor, p. 212] The
difference is important. Ante Ciliga, once a political prisoner
under Stalin, once noted how the secret police "liked to boast of the
working class origin of its henchmen." He quoted a fellow prisoner,
and ex-Tsarist convict, who retorted: "You are wrong if you believe
that in the days of the Tsar the gaolers were recruited from among
dukes and the executioners from among the princes!" [The Russian
Enigma, pp. 255-6]
All of which explains the famous leaflet addressed to the workers of
Petrograd immediately after the October Revolution, informing them that
"the revolution has won." The workers were called upon to "show
. . . the greatest firmness and endurance, in order to facilitate
the execution of all the aims of the new People's Government." They
were asked to "cease immediately all economic and political strikes, to
take up your work, and do it in perfect order . . . All to your places"
as the "best way to support the new Government of Soviets in these
days" was "by doing your job." [quoted by John Read, Ten
Days that Shook the World, pp. 341-2] Which smacks far more of
"socialism from above" than "socialism from below"!
The implications of Lenin's position became clearer after the Bolsheviks
had taken power. Now it was the concrete situation of a "revolutionary"
government exercising power "from above" onto the very class it
claimed to represent. As Lenin explained to his political police, the
Cheka, in 1920:
"Without revolutionary coercion directed against the avowed enemies of
the workers and peasants, it is impossible to break down the resistance
of these exploiters. On the other hand, revolutionary coercion is bound
to be employed towards the wavering and unstable elements among the masses
themselves." [Op. Cit., vol. 42, p. 170]
It could be argued that this position was forced on Lenin by the problems
facing the Bolsheviks in the Civil War, but such an argument is flawed.
This is for two main reasons. Firstly, according to Lenin himself civil
war was inevitable and so, unsurprisingly, Lenin considered his comments
as universally applicable. Secondly, this position fits in well with the
idea of pressure "from above" exercised by the "revolutionary"
government against the masses (and nothing to do with any sort of
"socialism from below"). Indeed, "wavering" and "unstable"
elements is just another way of saying "pressure from below," the
attempts by those subject to the "revolutionary" government to influence
its policies. As we noted in section H.1.2,
it was in this period (1919 and 1920) that the Bolsheviks openly argued
that the "dictatorship of the proletariat" was, in fact, the
"dictatorship of the party" (see section H.3.8
on how the Bolsheviks modified the Marxist theory of the state in line
with this). Rather than the result of the problems facing Russia at the
time, Lenin's comments simply reflect the unfolding of certain aspects of
his ideology when his party held power (as we make clear in
section H.6" the ideology of the ruling
party and the ideas held by the masses are also factors in history).
To show that Lenin's comments were not caused by circumstantial factors,
we can turn to his infamous work Left-Wing Communism. In this 1920
tract, written for the Second Congress of the Communist International,
Lenin lambasted those Marxists who argued for direct working class power
against the idea of party rule (i.e. the various council communists around
Europe). We have already noted in section H.1.2
that Lenin had argued in that work that it was "ridiculously absurd, and
stupid" to "a contrast, in general, between the dictatorship of
the masses and the dictatorship of the leaders." [The Lenin Anthology,
p. 568] Here we provide his description of the "top-down" nature of
Bolshevik rule:
"In Russia today, the connection between leaders, party, class and masses
. . . are concretely as follows: the dictatorship is exercised by the
proletariat organised in the Soviets and is guided by the Communist Party
. . . The Party, which holds annual congresses . . ., is directed by a
Central Committee of nineteen elected at the congress, while the current
work in Moscow has to be carried on by [two] still smaller bodies . . .
which are elected at the plenary sessions of the Central Committee,
five members of the Central Committee to each bureau. This, it would
appear, is a full-fledged 'oligarchy.' No important political or
organisational question is decided by any state institution in our
republic [sic!] without the guidance of the Party's Central Committee.
"In its work, the Party relies directly on the trade unions,
which . . .have a membership of over four million and are formally
non-Party. Actually, all the directing bodies of the vast
majority of the unions . . . are made up of Communists, and carry
out of all the directives of the Party. Thus . . . we have a formally
non-communist . . . very powerful proletarian apparatus, by means of
which the Party is closely linked up with the class and the
masses, and by means of which, under the leadership of the Party,
the class dictatorship of the class is exercised."
[Op. Cit., pp. 571-2]
This was "the general mechanism of the proletarian state power viewed
'from above,' from the standpoint of the practical realisation of the
dictatorship" and so "all this talk about 'from above' or
'from below,' about 'the dictatorship of leaders' or 'the
dictatorship of the masses,'" is "ridiculous and childish
nonsense." [Op. Cit., p. 573] Lenin, of course, did not bother
to view "proletarian" state power "from below," from the
viewpoint of the proletariat. If he had, perhaps he would have recounted
the numerous strikes and protests broken by the Cheka under martial law,
the gerrymandering and disbanding of soviets, the imposition of "one-man
management" onto the workers in production, the turning of the unions
into agents of the state/party and the elimination of working class freedom
by party power? Which suggests that there are fundamental differences,
at least for the masses, between "from above" and "from below."
At the Comintern congress itself, Zinoviev announced that "the
dictatorship of the proletariat is at the same time the dictatorship
of the Communist Party." [Proceedings and Documents of the
Second Congress 1920, vol. 1, p. 152] Trotsky also universalised
Lenin's argument when he pondered the important decisions of the
revolution and who would make them in his reply to the delegate
from the Spanish anarcho-syndicalist union the CNT:
"Who decides this question [and others like it]? We have
the Council of People's Commissars but it has to be subject
to some supervision. Whose supervision? That of the working
class as an amorphous, chaotic mass? No. The Central
Committee of the party is convened to discuss . . . and to
decide . . . Who will solve these questions in Spain? The
Communist Party of Spain." [Op. Cit., p. 174]
As is obvious, Trotsky was drawing general lessons from the Russian
Revolution for the international revolutionary movement. Needless to
say, he still argued that the "working class, represented and led
by the Communist Party, [was] in power here" in spite of it
being "an amorphous, chaotic mass" which did not make any
decisions on important questions affecting the revolution!
Incidentally, his and Lenin's comments of 1920 disprove
Trotsky's later assertion that it was "[o]nly after the
conquest of power, the end of the civil war, and the
establishment of a stable regime" when "the Central
Committee little by little begin to concentrate the
leadership of Soviet activity in its hands. Then would
come Stalin's turn." [Stalin, vol. 1, p. 328] While it
was definitely the "conquest of power" by the Bolsheviks
which lead to the marginalisation of the soviets, this
event cannot be shunted to after the civil war as Trotsky
would like (particularly as Trotsky admitted that in 1917 "[a]fter
eight months of inertia and of democratic chaos, came the
dictatorship of the Bolsheviks." [Op. Cit., vol. 2, p. 242]).
We must note Trotsky argued for the "objective necessity" of the
"revolutionary dictatorship of a proletarian party" well into
the 1930s (see section H.1.2) .
Clearly, the claim that Leninism (and its various off-shoots
like Trotskyism) is "socialism from below" is hard to take
seriously. As proven above, the Leninist tradition is explicitly
against the idea of "only from below," with Lenin explicitly
stating that it was an "anarchist stand" to be for "'action
only from below', not 'from below and from above'" which was
the position of Marxism. [Collected Works, vol. 9, p. 77]
Once in power, Lenin and the Bolsheviks implemented this vision
of "from below and from above," with the highly unsurprising
result that "from above" quickly repressed "from below"
(which was dismissed as "wavering" by the masses). This was
to be expected, for a government to enforce its laws, it has to have
power over its citizens and so socialism "from above" is a
necessary side-effect of Leninist theory.
Ironically, Lenin's argument in State and Revolution
comes back to haunt him. In that work he had argued that the
"dictatorship of the proletariat" meant "democracy
for the people" which "imposes a series of restrictions
on the freedom of the oppressors, the exploiters, the capitalists."
These must be crushed "in order to free humanity from wage-slavery;
their resistance must be broken by force; it is clear that where
there is suppression there is also violence, there is no freedom,
no democracy." [Essential Works of Lenin, pp. 337-8]
If the working class itself is being subject to "suppression"
then, clearly, there is "no freedom, no democracy" for that
class - and the people "will feel no better if the stick with
which they are being beaten is labelled 'the people's stick'."
[Bakunin, Bakunin on Anarchism, p. 338]
So when Leninists argue that they stand for the "principles
of socialism from below" and state that this means the direct
and democratic control of society by the working class then,
clearly, they are being less than honest. Looking at the
tradition they place themselves, the obvious conclusion which
must be reached is that Leninism is not based on "socialism
from below" in the sense of working class self-management of
society (i.e. the only condition when the majority can "rule"
and decisions truly flow from below upwards). At best, they
subscribe to the distinctly bourgeois vision of "democracy"
as being simply the majority designating (and trying to
control) its rulers. At worse, they defend politics which
have eliminated even this form of democracy in favour of
party dictatorship and "one-man management" armed with
"dictatorial" powers in industry (most members of such parties
do not know how the Bolsheviks gerrymandered and disbanded
soviets to maintain power, raised the dictatorship of the
party to an ideological truism and wholeheartedly advocated
"one-man management" rather than workers' self-management of
production). As we discuss in
section H.5, this latter
position flows easily from the underlying assumptions of
vanguardism which Leninism is based on.
So, Lenin, Trotsky and so on simply cannot be considered as
exponents of "socialism from below." Any one who makes such a
claim is either ignorant of the actual ideas and practice of
Bolshevism or they seek to deceive. For anarchists, "socialism
from below" can only be another name, like libertarian socialism,
for anarchism (as Lenin, ironically enough, acknowledged). This
does not mean that "socialism from below," like "libertarian
socialism," is identical to anarchism, it simply means that
libertarian Marxists and other socialists are far closer to
anarchism than mainstream Marxism.
No, far from it. While it is impossible to quote everything
a person or an ideology says, it is possible to summarise
those aspects of a theory which influenced the way it
developed in practice. As such, any account is "selective"
in some sense, the question is whether this results in a
critique rooted in the ideology and its practice or whether
it presents a picture at odds with both. As Maurice Brinton
put it in the introduction to his classic account of workers'
control in the Russian Revolution:
"Other charges will also be made. The quotations from Lenin
and Trotsky will not be denied but it will be stated that
they are 'selective' and that 'other things, too' were said.
Again, we plead guilty. But we would stress that there are
hagiographers enough in the trade whose 'objectivity' . . .
is but a cloak for sophisticated apologetics . . . It
therefore seems more relevant to quote those statements of
the Bolshevik leaders of 1917 which helped determine Russia's
evolution [towards Stalinism] rather those other statements
which, like the May Day speeches of Labour leaders, were forever
to remain in the realm of rhetoric." [The Bolsheviks
and Workers' Control, p. xv]
Hence the need to discuss all aspects of Marxism rather than
take what its adherents like to claim for it as granted. In
this, we agree with Marx himself who argued that we cannot
judge people by what they say about themselves but rather what
they do. Unfortunately while many self-proclaimed Marxists
(like Trotsky) may quote these comments, fewer apply them
to their own ideology or actions (again, like Trotsky).
This can be seen from the almost ritualistic way many Marxists
response to anarchist (or other) criticisms of their ideas.
When they complain that anarchists "selectively" quote from
the leading proponents of Marxism, they are usually at pains
to point people to some document which they have selected
as being more "representative" of their tradition. Leninists
usually point to Lenin's State and Revolution, for example,
for a vision of what Lenin "really" wanted. To this anarchists
reply by, as we discussed in section H.1.7,
pointing out that much of that passes for 'Marxism' in State and
Revolution is anarchist and, equally important, it was not
applied in practice. This explains an apparent contradiction. Leninists
point to the Russian Revolution as evidence for the democratic nature of
their politics. Anarchists point to it as evidence of Leninism's
authoritarian nature. Both can do this because there is a
substantial difference between Bolshevism before it took power
and afterwards. While the Leninists ask you to judge them by
their manifesto, anarchists say judge them by their record!
Simply put, Marxists quote selectively from their own
tradition, ignoring those aspects of it which would be
unappealing to potential recruits. While the leaders may
know their tradition has skeletons in its closet, they
try their best to ensure no one else gets to know. Which,
of course, explains their hostility to anarchists doing so!
That there is a deep divide between aspects of Marxist
rhetoric and its practice and that even its rhetoric is
not consistent we will now prove. By so doing, we can show
that anarchists do not, in fact, quote Marxist's "selectively."
As an example, we can point to the leading Bolshevik Grigorii
Zinoviev. In 1920, as head of the Communist International he
wrote a letter to the Industrial Workers of the World, a
revolutionary labour union, which stated that the "Russian
Soviet Republic . . . is the most highly centralised government
that exists. It is also the most democratic government in
history. For all the organs of government are in constant
touch with the working masses, and constantly sensitive to
their will." The same year he explained to the Second
Congress of the Communist International that "[t]oday,
people like Kautsky come along and say that in Russia you do not
have the dictatorship of the working class but the dictatorship
of the party. They think this is a reproach against us. Not in
the least! We have a dictatorship of the working class and that
is precisely why we also have a dictatorship of the Communist
Party. The dictatorship of the Communist Party is only a function,
an attribute, an expression of the dictatorship of the working
class . . . [T]he dictatorship of the proletariat is at the same
time the dictatorship of the Communist Party." [Proceedings
and Documents of the Second Congress 1920, vol. 2, p. 928 and
pp. 151-2]
It seems redundant to note that the second quote is the accurate
one, the one which matches the reality of Bolshevik Russia. Therefore
it is hardly "selective" to quote the latter and not the
former, as it expresses the reality of Bolshevism rather than
its rhetoric.
This duality and the divergence between practice and rhetoric
comes to the fore when Trotskyists discuss Stalinism and try
to counter pose the Leninist tradition to it. For example,
we find the British SWP's Chris Harman arguing that the "whole
experience of the workers' movement internationally teaches
that only by regular elections, combined with the right of
recall by shop-floor meetings can rank-and-file delegates be
made really responsible to those who elect them." [Bureaucracy
and Revolution in Eastern Europe, pp. 238-9] Significantly,
Harman does not mention that both Lenin and Trotsky rejected
this experience once in power. As we discuss in
section H.3.8, Leninism came not
only to practice but to argue theoretically for state power explicitly
to eliminate such control from below. How can the numerous statements
of leading Leninists (including Lenin and Trotsky) on the necessity
of party dictatorship be reconciled with it?
The ironies do not stop there, of course. Harman correctly notes
that under Stalinism, the "bureaucracy is characterised, like the
private capitalist class in the West, by its control over the
means of production." [Op. Cit., p. 147] However, he fails to
note that it was Lenin, in early 1918, who had raised and then
implemented such "control" in the form of "one-man management."
As he put it: "Obedience, and unquestioning obedience at that, during
work to the one-man decisions of Soviet directors, of the dictators elected
or appointed by Soviet institutions, vested with dictatorial powers."
[Collected Works, vol. 27, p. 316] To fail to note this
link between Lenin and the Stalinist bureaucracy on this issue is quoting
"selectively."
The contradictions pile up. Harman argues that "people who seriously
believe that workers at the height of revolution need a police
guard to stop them handing their factories over to capitalists
certainly have no real faith in the possibilities of a socialist
future." [Op. Cit., p. 144] Yet this does not stop him praising
the regime of Lenin and Trotsky and contrasting it with Stalinism,
in spite of the fact that this was precisely what the Bolsheviks
did from 1918 onwards! Indeed this tyrannical practice played a
role in provoking the strikes in Petrograd which preceded the
Kronstadt revolt in 1921, when "the workers wanted the special
squads of armed Bolsheviks, who carried out a purely police
function, withdrawn from the factories." [Paul Avrich, Kronstadt
1921, p. 42] It seems equally strange that Harman denounces the
Stalinist suppression of the Hungarian revolution for workers' democracy
and genuine socialism while he defends the Bolshevik suppression of the
Kronstadt revolt for the same goals. Similarly, when Harman argues that
if by "political party" it is "meant a party of the usual sort,
in which a few leaders give orders and the masses merely obey . . . then
certainly such organisations added nothing to the Hungarian revolution."
However, as we discuss in
section H.5, such a party
was precisely what Leninism argued for and applied in
practice. Simply put, the Bolsheviks were never a party "that
stood for the councils taking power." [Op. Cit., p. 186
and p. 187] As Lenin repeatedly stressed, its aim was for
the Bolshevik party to take power through the councils
(see section H.3.11). Once in
power, the councils were quickly marginalised and became little
more than a fig-leaf for party rule.
This confusion between what was promised and what was done
is a common feature of Leninism. Felix Morrow, for example,
wrote what is usually considered the definitive Trotskyist
work on the Spanish Revolution (in spite of it being, as we
discuss in the appendix "Marxists
and Spanish Anarchism," deeply flawed). Morrow stated
that the "essential points of a revolutionary program [are]
all power to the working class, and democratic organs of the
workers, peasants and combatants, as the expression of the workers'
power." [Revolution and Counter-Revolution in Spain, p. 133]
How this can be reconciled with, say, Trotsky's opinion of ten
years previously that "[w]ith us the dictatorship of the party
(quite falsely disputed theoretically by Stalin) is the expression
of the socialist dictatorship of the proletariat . . . The
dictatorship of a party is a part of the socialist revolution"?
[Leon Trotsky on China, p. 251] Or with Lenin's
and Trotsky's repeated call for the party to seize and exercise power?
Or their opinion that an organisation taking in the whole proletariat
cannot directly exercise the proletarian dictatorship? How can the
working class "have all power" if power is held not by mass
organisations but rather by a vanguard party? Particularly, as we note
in section H.1.2 when party dictatorship
is placed at the heart of Leninist ideology.
Given all this, who is quoting who "selectively"? The Marxists
who ignore what the Bolsheviks did when in power and repeatedly point
to Lenin's The State and Revolution or the anarchists who
link what they did with what they said outside of that holy text?
Considering this absolutely contradictory inheritance, anarchists
feel entitled to ask the question "Will the real Leninist please
stand up?" What is it to be, popular democracy or party rule? If
we look at Bolshevik practice, the answer is the latter anarchists
argue. Ironically, the likes of Lenin and Trotsky concurred,
incorporating the necessity of party power into their ideology as a
key lesson of the Russian revolution. As such, anarchists do not feel
they are quoting Leninism "selectively" when they argue that it
is based on party power, not working class self-management. That
Leninists often publicly deny this aspect of their own ideology
or, at best, try to rationalise and justify it, suggests that
when push comes to shove (as it does in every revolution) they
will make the same decisions and act in the same way.
In addition there is the question of what could be called the
"social context." Marxists often accuse anarchists of failing
to place the quotations and actions of, say, the Bolsheviks
into the circumstances which generated them. By this they mean
that Bolshevik authoritarianism can be explained purely in
terms of the massive problems facing them (i.e. the rigours
of the Civil War, the economic collapse and chaos in Russia
and so on). As we discuss this question in section H.6,
we will simply summarise the anarchist reply by noting that this
argument has three major problems with it. Firstly, there is
the problem that Bolshevik authoritarianism started before
the start of the Civil War and, moreover, intensified after its end.
As such, the Civil War cannot be blamed. The second problem is
simply that Lenin continually stressed that civil war and economic
chaos was inevitable during a revolution. If Leninist politics cannot
handle the inevitable then they are to be avoided. Equally,
if Leninists blame what they should know is inevitable for
the degeneration of the Bolshevik revolution it would suggest
their understanding of what revolution entails is deeply flawed.
The last problem is simply that the Bolsheviks did not care. As
Samuel Farber notes, "there is no evidence indicating that Lenin
or any of the mainstream Bolshevik leaders lamented the loss of
workers' control or of democracy in the soviets, or at least referred
to these losses as a retreat, as Lenin declared with the replacement
of War Communism by NEP in 1921. In fact . . . the very opposite is
the case." [Before Stalinism, p. 44] Hence the continuation
(indeed, intensification) of Bolshevik authoritarianism after their
victory in the civil war. Given this, it is significant that many of
the quotes from Trotsky given above date from the late 1930s. To argue,
therefore, that "social context" explains the politics and actions of
the Bolsheviks seems incredulous.
Lastly, it seems ironic that Marxists accuse anarchists of
quoting "selectively." After all, as proven in
section H.2, this is exactly
what Marxists do to anarchism!
In summary, rather than quote "selectively" from the works
and practice of Marxism, anarchists summarise those tendencies
of both which, we argue, contribute to its continual failure in
practice as a revolutionary theory. Moreover, Marxists themselves
are equally as "selective" as anarchists in this respect. Firstly,
as regards anarchist theory and practice and, secondly, as regards
their own.
As is obvious in any account of the history of socialism,
Marxists (of various schools) have appropriated key anarchist
ideas and (often) present them as if Marxists thought of them
first.
For example, as we discuss in
section H.3.10, it was anarchists
who first raised the idea of smashing the bourgeois state and
replacing it with the fighting organisations of the working
class (such as unions, workers' councils, etc.). It was only
in 1917, decades after anarchists had first raised the idea,
that Marxists started to argue these ideas but, of course,
with a twist. While anarchists meant that working class
organisations would be the basis of a free society, Lenin
saw these organs as the best means of achieving Bolshevik
party power.
Similarly with the libertarian idea of the "militant
minority." By this, anarchists and syndicalists meant
groups of workers who gave an example by their direct
action which their fellow workers could imitate (for
example by leading wildcat strikes which would use
flying pickets to get other workers to join in). This
"militant minority" would be at the forefront of social
struggle and would show, by example, practice and
discussion, that their ideas and tactics were the
correct ones. After the Russian Revolution of 1917,
Bolsheviks argued that this idea was similar to their
idea of a vanguard party. This ignored two key differences.
Firstly that the libertarian "militant minority" did not
aim to take power on behalf of the working class but
rather to encourage it, by example, to manage its own
struggles and affairs (and, ultimately, society).
Secondly, that "vanguard parties" are organised in
hierarchical ways alien to the spirit of anarchism. While
both the "militant minority" and "vanguard party"
approaches are based on an appreciation of the uneven development
of ideas within the working class, vanguardism transforms this
into a justification for party rule over the working class
by a so-called "advanced" minority (see
section H.5 for a
full discussion). Other concepts, such as "workers' control,"
direct action, and so on have suffered a similar fate.
A classic example of this appropriation of anarchist ideas into
Marxism is provided by the general strike. In 1905, Russia had
a near revolution in which the general strike played a key role.
Unsurprisingly, as anarchists had been arguing for the general strike
since the 1870s, we embraced these events as a striking confirmation
of our long held ideas on revolutionary change. Marxists had a harder
task as such ideas were alien to mainstream Social Democracy. Yet faced
with the success and power of the general strike in practice, the more
radical Marxists, like Rosa Luxemburg, had to incorporate it into their
politics.
Yet they faced a problem. The general strike was indelibly linked
with such hearsays as anarchism and syndicalism. Had not Engels himself
proclaimed the nonsense of the general strike in his diatribe "The
Bakuninists at work"? Had his words not been repeated ad infinitum
against anarchists (and radical socialists) who questioned the wisdom
of social democratic tactics, its reformism and bureaucratic inertia?
The Marxist radicals knew that Engels would again be invoked by the
bureaucrats and reformists in the Social Democratic movement to throw
cold water over any attempt to adjust Marxist politics to the economic
power of the masses as expressed in mass strikes. The Social Democratic
hierarchy would simply dismiss them as "anarchists." This meant that
Luxemburg was faced with the problem of proving Engels was right, even
when he was wrong.
She did so in an ingenious way. Like Engels himself, she simply
distorted what the anarchists thought about the general strike in order
to make it acceptable to Social Democracy. Her argument was simple.
Yes, Engels had been right to dismiss the "general strike" idea of
the anarchists in the 1870s. But today, thirty years later, Social
Democrats should support the general strike (or mass strike, as she
called it) because the concepts were different. The anarchist "general
strike" was utopian. The Marxist "mass strike" was practical.
To discover why, we need to see what Engels had argued in the 1870s.
Engels, mocked the anarchists (or "Bakuninists") for thinking that
"a general strike is the lever employed by which the social revolution
is started." He accusing them of imagining that "[o]ne fine
morning, all the workers in all the industries of a country, or even of
the whole world, stop work, thus forcing the propertied classes either
humbly to submit within four weeks at most, or to attack the workers,
who would then have the right to defend themselves and use the
opportunity to pull down the entire old society." He stated that
at the September 1 1873 Geneva congress of the anarchist Alliance of
Social Democracy, it was "universally admitted that to carry out
the general strike strategy, there had to be a perfect organisation
of the working class and a plentiful funds." He noted that that
was "the rub" as no government would stand by and "allow the
organisation or funds of the workers to reach such a level." Moreover,
the revolution would happen long before "such an ideal organisation"
was set up and if they had been "there would be no need to use the
roundabout way of a general strike" to achieve it. [Collected
Works, vol. 23, pp. 584-5]
Rosa Luxemburg repeated Engels arguments in her essay "The Mass
Strike, the Political Party and the Trade Unions" in order to
show how her support for the general strike was in no way contrary
to Marxism. [Rosa Luxemburg Speaks, pp. 153-218] Her "mass strike"
was different from the anarchist "general strike" as mocked by Engels
as it was dynamic process and could not be seen as one act, one
isolated action which overthrows the bourgeoisie. Rather, the
mass strike to the product of the everyday class struggle within
society, leads to a direct confrontation with the capitalist state and
so it was inseparable from the revolution.
The only problem with all this is that the anarchists did not
actually argue along the lines Engels and Luxemburg claimed.
Most obviously, as we indicated in section H.2.8,
Bakunin saw the general strike as a dynamic process which
would not be set for a specific date and did not need all
workers to be organised before hand. As such, Bakunin's ideas are totally
at odds with Engels assertions on what anarchist ideas on the general
strike were about (they, in fact, reflect what actually happened in 1905).
But what of the "Bakuninists"? Again, Engels account leaves a lot to be
desired. Rather than the September 1873 Geneva congress being, as he
claimed, of the (disbanded) Alliance of Social Democracy, it was in
fact a meeting of the non-Marxist federations of the First International.
Contra Engels, anarchists did not see the general strike as requiring
all workers to be perfectly organised and then passively folding arms
"one fine morning." The Belgian libertarians who proposed the
idea at the congress saw it as a tactic which could mobilise workers for
revolution, "a means of bringing a movement onto the street and
leading the workers to the barricades." Moreover, leading anarchist
James Guillaume explicitly rejected the idea that it had "to break out
everywhere at an appointed day and hour" with a resounding "No!"
In fact, he stressed that they did "not even need to bring up this
question and suppose things could be like this. Such a supposition could
lead to fatal mistakes. The revolution has to be contagious." [quoted
by Caroline Cahm, Kropotkin and the Rise of Revolutionary Anarchism
1872-1886, p. 223 and p. 224]
Another account of this meeting notes that how the general strike was to
start was "left unsaid", with Guillaume "recognis[ing] that it
as impossible for the anarchists simply to set the hour for the general
strike." Another anarchist did "not believe that the strike was
a sufficient means to win the social revolution" but could "set
the stage for the success of an armed insurrection." Only one
delegate, regardless of Engels' claims, thought it "demanded the
utmost organisation of the working class" and if that were the
case "then the general strike would not be necessary." This
was the delegate from the reformist British trade unions and he
was "attack[ing]" the general strike as "an absurd and
impractical proposition." [Phil H. Goodstein, The Theory of
the General Strike, pp. 43-5]
Perhaps this is why Engels did not bother to quote a single anarchist
when recounting their position on this matter? Needless to say,
Leninists continue to parrot Engels assertions to this day. The
facts are somewhat different. Clearly, the "anarchist" strategy of
overthrowing the bourgeoisie with one big general strike set for a
specific date exists only in Marxist heads, nowhere else. Once we remove
the distortions promulgated by Engels and repeated by Luxemburg, we see
that the 1905 revolution and "historical dialectics" did not, as
Luxemburg claim, validate Engels and disprove anarchism. Quite the reverse
as the general strikes in Russia followed the anarchist ideas of a what a
general strike would be like quite closely. Little wonder, then, that
Kropotkin argued that the 1905 general strike "demonstrated" that
the Latin workers who had been advocating the general strike "as a
weapon which would irresistible in the hands of labour for imposing its
will" had been "right." [Selected Writings on Anarchism
and Revolution, p. 288]
So, contra Luxemburg, "the fatherland of Bakunin" was not
"the burial-place of [anarchism's] teachings." [Op. Cit.,
p. 157] As Nicholas Walter argued, while the numbers of actual anarchists
was small, "the 1905 Revolution was objectively an anarchist revolution.
The military mutinies, peasant uprisings and workers' strikes (culminating
in a general strike), led to the establishment of soldiers' and workers'
councils . . . and peasants' communes, and the beginning of agrarian and
industrial expropriation - all along the lines suggested by anarchist
writers since Bakunin." [The Anarchist Past and Other Essays,
p. 122] The real question must be when will Marxists realise that quoting
Engels does not make it true?
Moreover, without becoming an insurrection, as anarchists had stressed, the
limits of the general strike were exposed in 1905. Unlike the some of the
syndicalists in the 1890s and 1900s, this limitation was understood by
the earliest anarchists. Consequently, they saw the general strike as
the start of a revolution and not as the revolution itself. So, for all
the Leninist accounts of the 1905 revolution claiming it for their ideology,
the facts suggest that it was anarchism, not Marxism, which was vindicated
by it. Luxemburg was wrong. The "land of Bakunin's birth" provided
an unsurpassed example of how to make a revolution precisely because it
applied (and confirmed) anarchist ideas on the general strike (and, it
should be added, workers' councils). Marxists (who had previously quoted
Engels to dismiss such things) found themselves repudiating aspect upon
aspect of their dogma to remain relevant. Luxemburg, as Bookchin noted,
"grossly misrepresented the anarchist emphasis on the general strike
after the 1905 revolution in Russia in order to make it acceptable to
Social Democracy." (he added that Lenin "was to engage in the same
misrepresentation on the issue of popular control in State and
Revolution"). [Towards an Ecological Society, p. 227fn]
As such, while Marxists have appropriated certain anarchist concepts,
it does not automatically mean that they mean exactly the same thing
by them. Rather, as history shows, radically different concepts can
be hidden behind similar sounding rhetoric. As Murray Bookchin argued,
many Marxist tendencies "attach basically alien ideas to the withering
conceptual framework of Marxism - not to say anything new but to preserve
something old with ideological formaldehyde - to the detriment of any
intellectual growth that the distinctions are designed to foster. This
is mystification at its worst, for it not only corrupts ideas but the
very capacity of the mind to deal with them. If Marx's work can be rescued
for our time, it will be by dealing with it as an invaluable part of the
development of ideas, not as pastiche that is legitimated as a 'method' or
continually 'updated' by concepts that come from an alien zone of ideas."
[Op. Cit., p. 242f]
This is not some academic point. The ramifications of Marxists
appropriating such "alien ideas" (or, more correctly, the
rhetoric associated with those ideas) has had negative impacts
on actual revolutionary movements. For example, Lenin's
definition of "workers' control" was radically different than
that current in the factory committee movement during the
Russian Revolution (which had more in common with anarchist
and syndicalist use of the term). The similarities in rhetoric
allowed the factory committee movement to put its weight behind
the Bolsheviks. Once in power, Lenin's position was implemented
while that of the factory committees was ignored. Ultimately,
Lenin's position was a key factor in creating state capitalism
rather than socialism in Russia (see
section H.3.14 for more
details).
This, of course, does not stop modern day Leninists appropriating
the term workers' control "without bating an eyelid. Seeking to
capitalise on the confusion now rampant in the movement, these
people talk of 'workers' control' as if a) they meant by those
words what the politically unsophisticated mean (i.e. that working
people should themselves decide about the fundamental matters
relating to production) and b) as if they - and the Leninist
doctrine to which they claim to adhere - had always supported
demands of this kind, or as if Leninism had always seen in workers'
control the universally valid foundation of a new social order,
rather than just a slogan to be used for manipulatory purposes
in specific and very limited historical contexts." [Maurice
Brinton, The Bolsheviks and Workers' Control, p. iv] This
clash between the popular idea of workers' control and the Leninist
one was a key reason for the failure of the Russian Revolution
precisely because, once in power, the latter was imposed.
Thus the fact that Leninists have appropriated libertarian (and
working class) ideas and demands does not, in fact, mean that we
aim for the same thing (as we discussed in
section H.3.1, this is
far from the case). The use of anarchist/popular rhetoric and
slogans means little and we need to look at the content of the
ideas proposed. Given the legacy of the appropriation of
libertarian terminology to popularise authoritarian parties and
its subsequent jettison in favour of authoritarian policies once
the party is in power, anarchists have strong grounds to take
Leninist claims with a large pinch of salt!
Equally with examples of actual revolutions. As Martin Buber
noted, while "Lenin praises Marx for having 'not yet, in
1852, put the concrete question as to what should be set up
in place of the State machinery after it had been abolished,'"
Lenin argued that "it was only the Paris Commune that taught
Marx this." However, as Buber correctly pointed out, the Paris
Commune "was the realisation of the thoughts of people who had
put this question very concretely indeed . . . the historical
experience of the Commune became possible only because in the
hearts of passionate revolutionaries there lived the picture of
a decentralised, very much 'de-Stated' society, which picture
they undertook to translate into reality. The spiritual fathers
of the Commune had such that ideal aiming at decentralisation
which Marx and Engels did not have, and the leaders of the
Revolution of 1871 tried, albeit with inadequate powers, to
begin the realisation of that idea in the midst of revolution."
[Paths in Utopia, pp. 103-4] Thus, while the Paris Commune
and other working class revolts are praised, their obvious
anarchistic elements (which were usually often predicted by anarchist
thinkers) are not mentioned. This results in some strange
dichotomies. For example, Bakunin's vision of revolution is based
on a federation of workers' councils, predating Marxist support
for such bodies by decades, yet Marxists argue that Bakunin's
ideas have nothing to teach us. Or, the Paris Commune being
praised by Marxists as the first "dictatorship of the
proletariat" when it implements federalism, delegates being
subjected to mandates and recall and raises the vision of a
socialism of associations while anarchism is labelled
"petit-bourgeois" in spite of the fact that these ideas can
be found in works of Proudhon and Bakunin which predate the
1871 revolt!
From this, we can draw two facts. Firstly, anarchism has
successfully predicted certain aspects of working class
revolution. Anarchist K.J. Kenafick stated the obvious when
he argues that any "comparison will show that the programme
set out [by the Paris Commune] is . . . the system of Federalism,
which Bakunin had been advocating for years, and which had first
been enunciated by Proudhon. The Proudhonists . . . exercised
considerable influence in the Commune. This 'political form'
was therefore not 'at last' discovered; it had been discovered
years ago; and now it was proven to be correct by the very fact
that in the crisis the Paris workers adopted it almost
automatically, under the pressure of circumstance, rather
than as the result of theory, as being the form most suitable
to express working class aspirations." [Michael Bakunin and
Karl Marx, pp. 212-3] Rather than being somehow alien
to the working class and its struggle for freedom, anarchism
in fact bases itself on the class struggle. This means that
it should come as no surprise when the ideas of anarchism are
developed and applied by those in struggle, for those ideas
are just generalisations derived from past working class
struggles! If anarchism ideas are applied spontaneously by
those in struggle, it is because those involved are themselves
drawing similar conclusions from their own experiences.
The other fact is that while mainstream Marxism often appropriated
certain aspects of libertarian theory and practice, it does
so selectively and places them into an authoritarian context
which undermines their libertarian nature. Hence anarchist support
for workers councils becomes transformed by Leninists into a means
to ensure party power (i.e. state authority) rather than working
class power or self-management (i.e. no authority). Similarly,
anarchist support for leading by example becomes transformed
into support for party rule (and often dictatorship). Ultimately,
the practice of mainstream Marxism shows that libertarian ideas
cannot be transplanted selectively into an authoritarian ideology
and be expected to blossom.
Significantly, those Marxists who do apply anarchist ideas
honestly are usually labelled by their orthodox comrades as
"anarchists." As an example of Marxists appropriating libertarian
ideas honestly, we can point to the council communist and currents
within Autonomist Marxism. The council communists broke with
the Bolsheviks over the question of whether the party would
exercise power or whether the workers' councils would. Needless
to say, Lenin labelled them an "anarchist deviation." Currents
within Autonomist Marxism have built upon the council communist
tradition, stressing the importance of focusing analysis on
working class struggle as the key dynamic in capitalist society.
In this they go against the mainstream Marxist orthodoxy and
embrace a libertarian perspective. As libertarian socialist
Cornelius Castoriadis argued, "the economic theory expounded
[by Marx] in Capital is based on the postulate that capitalism
has managed completely and effectively to transform the worker -
who appears there only as labour power - into a commodity;
therefore the use value of labour power - the use the capitalist
makes of it - is, as for any commodity, completely determined
by the use, since its exchange value - wages - is determined
solely by the laws of the market . . . This postulate is
necessary for there to be a 'science of economics' along the
physico-mathematical model Marx followed . . . But he contradicts
the most essential fact of capitalism, namely, that the use value
and exchange value of labour power are objectively indeterminate;
they are determined rather by the struggle between labour and
capital both in production and in society. Here is the ultimate
root of the 'objective' contradictions of capitalism . . . The
paradox is that Marx, the 'inventor' of class struggle, wrote a
monumental work on phenomena determined by this struggle in which
the struggle itself was entirely absent." [Political and Social
Writings, vol. 2, pp. 202-3] Castoriadis explained the limitations
of Marx's vision most famously in his "Modern Capitalism and
Revolution." [Op. Cit., pp. 226-343]
By rejecting this heritage which mainstream Marxism bases itself
on and stressing the role of class struggle, Autonomist Marxism
breaks decisively with the Marxist mainstream and embraces a
position previously associated with anarchists and other libertarian
socialists. The key role of class struggle in invalidating all
deterministic economic "laws" was expressed by French syndicalists
at the start of the twentieth century. This insight predated the
work of Castoriadis and the development of Autonomist Marxism by
over 50 years and is worth quoting at length:
"the keystone of socialism . . . proclaimed that 'as a
general rule, the average wage would be no more than what
the worker strictly required for survival'. And it was said:
'That figure is governed by capitalist pressure alone and this
can even push it below the minimum necessary for the working
man's subsistence . . . The only rule with regard to wage
levels is the plentiful or scarce supply of man-power . . .'
"By way of evidence of the relentless operation of this law
of wages, comparisons were made between the worker and a
commodity: if there is a glut of potatoes on the market,
they are cheap; if they are scarce, the price rises . . . It
is the same with the working man, it was said: his wages
fluctuate in accordance with the plentiful supply or dearth
of labour!
"No voice was raised against the relentless arguments of this
absurd reasoning: so the law of wages may be taken as right
. . . for as long as the working man [or woman] is content to
be a commodity! For as long as, like a sack of potatoes, she
remains passive and inert and endures the fluctuations of the
market . . . For as long as he bends his back and puts up with
all of the bosses' snubs, . . . the law of wages obtains.
"But things take a different turn the moment that a glimmer of
consciousness stirs this worker-potato into life. When, instead
off dooming himself to inertia, spinelessness, resignation and
passivity, the worker wakes up to his worth as a human being
and the spirit of revolt washes over him: when he bestirs himself,
energetic, wilful and active . . . [and] once the labour bloc
comes to life and bestirs itself . . . then, the laughable
equilibrium of the law of wages is undone." [Emile Pouget,
Direct Action, pp. 9-10]
And Marx, indeed, had compared the worker to a commodity,
stating that labour power "is a commodity, neither more
nor less than sugar. The former is measured by the clock,
the latter by the scale." [Selected Works,
p. 72] However, as Castoridias argued, unlike sugar the
extraction of the use value of labour power "is not a
technical operation; it is a process of bitter struggle
in which half the time, so to speak, the capitalists
turn out to be losers." [Op. Cit., p. 248] A fact which
Pouget stressed in his critique of the mainstream
socialist position:
"A novel factor has appeared on the labour market: the will
of the worker! And this factor, not pertinent when it comes
to setting the price of a bushel of potatoes, has a bearing
upon the setting of wages; its impact may be large or small,
according to the degree of tension of the labour force which
is a product of the accord of individual wills beating in
unison - but, whether it be strong or weak, there is no
denying it.
"Thus, worker cohesion conjures up against capitalist might a
might capable of standing up to it. The inequality between the
two adversaries - which cannot be denied when the exploiter is
confronted only by the working man on his own - is redressed in
proportion with the degree of cohesion achieved by the labour
bloc. From then on, proletarian resistance, be it latent or
acute, is an everyday phenomenon: disputes between labour and
capital quicken and become more acute. Labour does not always
emerge victorious from these partial struggles: however, even
when defeated, the struggle workers still reap some benefit:
resistance from them has obstructed pressure from the employers
and often forced the employer to grant some of the demands put."
[Op. Cit., p. 10]
The best currents of Autonomist Marxism share this anarchist
stress on the power of working people to transform society
and to impact on how capitalism operates. Unsurprisingly,
most Autonomist Marxists reject the idea of the vanguard
party and instead, like the council communists, stress the
need for autonomist working class self-organisation and
self-activity (hence the name!). They agree with Pouget
when he argued that direct action "spells liberation for the
masses of humanity", it "puts paid to the age of miracles
- miracles from Heaven, miracles from the State - and, in
contraposition to hopes vested in 'providence' (no matter
what they may be) it announces that it will act upon the
maxim: salvation lies within ourselves!" [Op. Cit.,
p. 3] As such,
they draw upon anarchistic ideas and rhetoric (for many,
undoubtedly unknowingly) and draw anarchistic conclusions.
This can be seen from the works of the leading US Autonomist
Marxist Harry Cleaver. His excellent essay "Kropotkin,
Self-Valorisation and the Crisis of Marxism" is by far the
best Marxist account of Kropotkin's ideas and shows the
similarities between communist-anarchism and Autonomist
Marxism. [Anarchist Studies, vol.2 , no. 2, pp. 119-36]
Both, he points out, share a "common perception and sympathy
for the power of workers to act autonomously" regardless of
the "substantial differences" on other issues. [Reading
Capital Politically, p. 15]
As such, the links between the best Marxists and anarchism
can be substantial. This means that some Marxists have taken
on board many anarchist ideas and have forged a version of
Marxism which is basically libertarian in nature. Unfortunately,
such forms of Marxism have always been a minority current
within it. Most cases have seen the appropriation of anarchist
ideas by Marxists simply as part of an attempt to make mainstream,
authoritarian Marxism more appealing and such borrowings have
been quickly forgotten once power has been seized.
Therefore appropriation of rhetoric and labels should not be
confused with similarity of goals and ideas. The list of groupings
which have used inappropriate labels to associate their ideas
with other, more appealing, ones is lengthy. Content is what
counts. If libertarian sounding ideas are being raised, the
question becomes one of whether they are being used simply
to gain influence or whether they signify a change of heart.
As Bookchin argued:
"Ultimately, a line will have to be drawn that, by definition,
excludes any project that can tip decentralisation to the
side of centralisation, direct democracy to the side of
delegated power, libertarian institutions to the side of
bureaucracy, and spontaneity to the side of authority. Such
a line, like a physical barrier, must irrevocably separate
a libertarian zone of theory and practice from the
hybridised socialisms that tend to denature it. This zone
must build its anti-authoritarian, utopian, and revolutionary
commitments into the very recognition it has of itself, in
short, into the very way it defines itself. . . . to admit
of domination is to cross the line that separates the
libertarian zone from the [state] socialist." [Op. Cit.,
pp. 223-4]
Unless we know exactly what we aim for, how to get there and
who our real allies are we will get a nasty surprise once
our self-proclaimed "allies" take power. As such, any attempt
to appropriate anarchist rhetoric into an authoritarian ideology
will simply fail and become little more than a mask obscuring
the real aims of the party in question. As history shows.
Some Marxists will dismiss our arguments, and anarchism, out of
hand. This is because anarchism has not lead a "successful"
revolution while Marxism has. The fact, they assert, that there has
never been a serious anarchist revolutionary movement, let alone a
successful anarchist revolution, in the whole of history proves that
Marxism works. For some Marxists, practice determines validity. Whether
something is true or not is not decided intellectually in wordy
publications and debates, but in reality.
For Anarchists, such arguments simply show the ideological
nature of most forms of Marxism. The fact is, of course,
that there has been many anarchistic revolutions which,
while ultimately defeated, show the validity of anarchist
theory (the ones in Spain and in the Ukraine being the
most significant). Moreover, there have been serious
revolutionary anarchist movements across the world, the
majority of them crushed by state repression (usually
fascist or communist based). However, this is not the most
important issue, which is the fate of these "successful"
Marxist movements and revolutions. The fact that there has
never been a "Marxist" revolution which has not become a
party dictatorship proves the need to critique Marxism.
So, given that Marxists argue that Marxism is the
revolutionary working class political theory, its actual
track record has been appalling. After all, while many
Marxist parties have taken part in revolutions and even
seized power, the net effect of their "success" have been
societies bearing little or no relationship to socialism.
Rather, the net effect of these revolutions has been to
discredit socialism by associating it with one-party
states presiding over state capitalist economies.
Equally, the role of Marxism in the labour movement has
also been less than successful. Looking at the first
Marxist movement, social democracy, it ended by becoming
reformist, betraying socialist ideas by (almost always)
supporting their own state during the First World War
and going so far as crushing the German revolution and
betraying the Italian factory occupations in 1920. Indeed,
Trotsky stated that the Bolshevik party was "the only
revolutionary" section of the Second International,
which is a damning indictment of Marxism. [Stalin,
vol. 1, p. 248] Just as damning is the fact that neither
Lenin or Trotsky noticed it before 1914! In fact, Lenin praised
the "fundamentals of parliamentary tactics" of German
and International Social Democracy, expressing the opinion
that they were "at the same time implacable on questions
of principle and always directed to the accomplishment of
the final aim" in his obituary of August Bebel in 1913!
[Collected Works, vol. 19, p. 298] For those that way
inclined, some amusement can be gathered comparing Engels
glowing predictions for these parties and their actual
performance (in the case of Spain and Italy, his comments
seem particularly ironic).
As regards Bolshevism itself, the one "revolutionary" party
in the world, it avoided the fate of its sister parties simply
because there no question of applying social democratic tactics
within bourgeois institutions as these did not exist in Tsarist
Russia. Moreover, the net result of its seizure of power was,
first, a party dictatorship and state capitalism under Lenin,
then their intensification under Stalin and the creation of a
host of Trotskyist sects who spend a considerable amount of time
justifying and rationalising the ideology and actions of the
Bolsheviks which helped create the Stalinism. Given the fate of
Bolshevism in power, Bookchin simply stated the obviously:
"None of the authoritarian technics of change has provided successful
'paradigms', unless we are prepared to ignore the harsh fact that the
Russian, Chinese, and Cuban 'revolutions' were massive counterrevolutions
that blight our entire century." [The Ecology of Freedom, p. 446]
Clearly, a key myth of Marxism is the idea that it has been
a successful movement. In reality, its failures have been
consistent and devastating so suggesting it is time to
re-evaluate the whole ideology and embrace a revolutionary
theory like anarchism. Indeed, it would be no exaggeration
to argue that every "success" of Marxism has, in fact, proved
that the anarchist critique of Marxism was correct. Thus, as
Bakunin predicted, the Social-Democratic parties became
reformist and the "dictatorship of the proletariat" became
the "dictatorship over the proletariat." With "victories"
like these, Marxism does not need failures! Thus Murray
Bookchin:
"A theory which is so readily 'vulgarised,' 'betrayed,' or,
more sinisterly, institutionalised into bureaucratic power
by nearly all its adherents may well be one that lends
itself to such 'vulgarisations,' 'betrayals,' and bureaucratic
forms as a normal condition of its existence. What may
seem to be 'vulgarisations, 'betrayals,' and bureaucratic
manifestations of its tenets in the heated light of doctrinal
disputes may prove to be the fulfilment of its tenets in the
cold light of historical development." [Toward an Ecological
Society, p. 196]
Hence the overwhelming need to critically evaluate Marxist
ideas and history (such as the Russian Revolution - see
section H.6). Unless we honestly discuss and
evaluate all aspects of revolutionary ideas, we will never
be able to build a positive and constructive revolutionary
movement. By seeking the roots of Marxism's problems, we
can enrich anarchism by avoiding possible pitfalls and
recognising and building upon its strengths (e.g., where
anarchists have identified, however incompletely, problems
in Marxism which bear on revolutionary ideas, practice and
transformation).
If this is done, anarchists are sure that Marxist claims
that Marxism is the revolutionary theory will be exposed
for the baseless rhetoric they are.
For anarchists, the idea that a state (any state) can be
used for socialist ends is simply ridiculous. This is
because of the nature of the state as an instrument of
minority class rule. As such, it precludes the mass
participation required for socialism and would create
a new form of class society.
As we discussed in section B.2, the state
is defined by certain characteristics (most importantly, the
centralisation of power into the hands of a few).
Thus, for anarchists, "the word 'State' . . .
should be reserved for those societies with the
hierarchical system and centralisation." [Peter
Kropotkin, Ethics, p. 317f] This defining feature
of the state has not come about by chance. As Kropotkin
argued in his classic history of the state, "a social
institution cannot lend itself to all the desired
goals, since, as with every organ, [the state] developed
according to the function it performed, in a definite
direction and not in all possible directions." This
means, by "seeing the State as it has been in history,
and as it is in essence today" the conclusion anarchists
"arrive at is for the abolition of the State." Thus the
state has "developed in the history of human societies
to prevent the direct association among men [and women]
to shackle the development of local and individual
initiative, to crush existing liberties, to prevent their
new blossoming - all this in order to subject the masses
to the will of minorities." [The State: Its Historic Role,
p. 56]
So if the state, as Kropotkin stressed, is defined by "the
existence of a power situated above society, but also of a
territorial concentration as well as the concentration
in the hands of a few of many functions in the life of
societies" then such a structure has not evolved by chance.
Therefore "the pyramidal organisation which is the essence
of the State" simply "cannot lend itself to a function
opposed to the one for which it was developed in the
course of history," such as the popular participation from
below required by social revolution and socialism. [Op. Cit.,
p. 10, p. 59 and p. 56] Based on this evolutionary analysis
of the state, Kropotkin, like all anarchists, drew the
conclusion "that the State organisation, having been the
force to which the minorities resorted for establishing
and organising their power over the masses, cannot be the
force which will serve to destroy these privileges."
[Evolution and Environment, p. 82]
This does not mean that anarchists dismiss differences
between types of state, think the state has not changed
over time or refuse to see that different states exist
to defend different ruling minorities. Far from it.
Anarchists argue that "[e]very economic phase has a
political phase corresponding to it, and it would be
impossible to touch private property unless a new mode
of political life be found at the same time." "A society
founded on serfdom," Kropotkin explained, "is in keeping
with absolute monarchy; a society based on the wage system,
and the exploitation of the masses by the capitalists
finds it political expression in parliamentarianism."
As such, the state form changes and evolves, but its
basic function (defender of minority rule) and structure
(delegated power into the hands of a few) remains.
Which means that "a free society regaining possession
of the common inheritance must seek, in free groups
and free federations of groups, a new organisation, in
harmony with the new economic phase of history."
[The Conquest of Bread, p. 54]
As with any social structure, the state has evolved to
ensure that it carries out its function. In other words, the
state is centralised because it is an instrument of minority
domination and oppression. Insofar as a social system is
based on decentralisation of power, popular self-management,
mass participation and free federation from below upwards,
it is not a state. If a social system is, however, marked
by delegated power and centralisation it is a state and
cannot be, therefore, a instrument of social liberation.
Rather it will become, slowly but surely, "whatever title
it adopts and whatever its origin and organisation may
be" what the state has always been, a instrument for
"oppressing and exploiting the masses, of defending the
oppressors and the exploiters." [Malatesta, Anarchy,
p. 23] Which, for obvious reasons, is why anarchists argue for the
destruction of the state by a free federation of self-managed
communes and workers' councils (see
section H.1.4 for further discussion).
This explains why anarchists reject the Marxist definition
and theory of the state. For Marxists, "the state is nothing
but a machine for the oppression of one class by another."
While it has been true that, historically, it is "the state
of the most powerful, economically dominant class, which,
through the medium of the state, becomes also the politically
dominant class, and this acquires the means of holding down
and exploiting the oppressed class," this need not always be
the case. The state is "at best an evil inherited by the
proletariat after its victorious struggle for class supremacy,"
although it "cannot avoid having to lop off at once as much
as possible" of it "until such time as a generation reared
in new, free social conditions is able to throw the entire
lumber of the state on the scrap heap." This new state,
often called the "dictatorship of the proletariat," would
slowly "wither away" (or "dies out") as classes disappear
and the state "at last . . . becomes the real representative
of the whole of society" and so "renders itself unnecessary."
Engels is at pains to differentiate this position from that of the
anarchists, who demand "the abolition of the state out of hand."
[Selected Works, p. 258, pp. 577-8, p. 528 and p. 424]
For anarchists, this argument has deep flaws. Simply put,
unlike the anarchist one, this is not an empirically based
theory of the state. Rather, we find such a theory mixed up
with a metaphysical, non-empirical, a-historic definition
which is based not on what the state is but rather what is
could be. Thus the argument that the state "is nothing but
a machine for the oppression of one class by another" is
trying to draw out an abstract essence of the state rather
than ground what the state is on empirical evidence and
analysis. This perspective, anarchists argue, simply confuses
two very different things, namely the state and popular social
organisation, with potentially disastrous results. By calling
the popular self-organisation required by a social revolution
the same name as a hierarchical and centralised body constructed
for, and evolved to ensure, minority rule, the door is wide
open to confuse popular power with party power, to confuse
rule by the representatives of the working class with
working class self-management of the revolution and society.
Indeed, at times, Marx seemed to suggest that any form of
social organisation is a state. At one point he complained that
the French mutualists argued that "[e]verything [was] to
broken down into small 'groupes' or 'communes',
which in turn form an 'association', but not a state."
[Collected Works, vol. 42, p. 287] Unsurprisingly, then,
that Kropotkin noted "the German school which takes pleasure in
confusing State with Society." This was a "confusion"
made by those "who cannot visualise Society without a concentration
of the State." Yet this "is to overlook the fact that Man lived
in Societies for thousands of years before the State had been
heard of" and that "communal life" had "been destroyed
by the State." So "large numbers of people [have] lived in communes
and free federations" and these were not states as the state "is
only one of the forms assumed by society in the course of history. Why
then make no distinction between what is permanent and what is accidental?"
[The State: Its Historic Role, pp. 9-10]
As we discussed in
section H.2.1, anarchist opposition to
the idea of a "dictatorship of the proletariat" should not
be confused with idea that anarchists do not think that a
social revolution needs to be defended. Rather, our opposition
to the concept rests on the confusion which inevitably occurs
when you mix up scientific analysis with metaphysical concepts.
By drawing out an a-historic definition of the state, Engels
helped ensure that the "dictatorship of the proletariat"
became the "dictatorship over the proletariat" by implying
that centralisation and delegated power into the hands of
the few can be considered as an expression of popular power.
To explain why, we need only to study the works of Engels
himself. Engels, in his famous account of the Origin
of the Family, Private Property and the State, defined
the state as follows:
"The state is . . . by no means a power forced on society from
without . . . Rather, it is a product of society at a certain
stage of development; it is an admission . . . that it has
split into irreconcilable antagonisms . . . in order that
these antagonisms and classes with conflicting economic
interests might not consume themselves and society in
fruitless struggle, it became necessary to have power
seemingly standing above society that would alleviate the
conflict . . . this power, arisen out of society but placing
itself above it, and alienating itself more and more from it,
is the state." [Selected Writings, p. 576]
The state has two distinguishing features, firstly (and least
importantly) it "divides its subjects according to territory."
The second "is the establishment of a public power which
no longer directly coincides with the population organising
itself as an armed force. This special public power is necessary
because a self-acting armed organisation of the population
has become impossible since the split into classes . . . This
public power exists in every state; it consists not merely of
armed men but also of material adjuncts, prisons and institutions
of coercion of all kinds." Thus "an essential feature of the
state is a public power distinct from the mass of the people."
[Op. Cit., pp. 576-7 and pp. 535-6]
In this, the Marxist position concurs with the anarchist. Engels
discussed the development of numerous ancient societies to prove
his point. Talking of Greek society, he argued that it was based
on a popular assembly which was "sovereign" plus a council.
This social system was not a state because "when every adult
male member of the tribe was a warrior, there was as yet no public
authority separated from the people that could have been set up
against it. Primitive democracy was still in full bloom, and this
must remain the point of departure in judging power and the status
of the council." Discussing the descent of this society into
classes, he argued that this required "an institution that would
perpetuate, not only the newly-rising class division of society, but
the right of the possessing class to exploit the non-possessing class
and the rule of the former over the latter." Unsurprisingly,
"this institution arrived. The state was invented." The
original communal organs of society were "superseded by real
governmental authorities" and the defence of society ("the
actual 'people in arms'") was "taken by an armed 'public
power' at the service of these authorities and, therefore, also
available against the people." With the rise of the state,
the communal council was "transformed into a senate."
[Op. Cit., pp. 525-6, p. 528 and p. 525]
Thus the state arises specifically to exclude popular self-government,
replacing it with minority rule conducted via a centralised,
hierarchical top-down structure ("government . . . is the
natural protector of capitalism and other exploiters of popular
labour." [Bakunin, Michael Bakunin: Selected Writings, p. 239]).
This account of the rise of the state is at direct odds with
Engels argument that the state is simply an instrument of
class rule. For the "dictatorship of the proletariat" to
be a state, it would have to constitute a power above society,
be different from the people armed, and so be "a public power
distinct from the mass of the people." However, Marx and
Engels are at pains to stress that the "dictatorship of
the proletariat" will not be such a regime. However, how
can you have something (namely "a public power distinct
from the mass of the people") you consider as "an essential
feature" of a state missing in an institution you call the
same name? It is a bit like calling a mammal a "new kind
of reptile" in spite of the former not being cold-blooded,
something you consider as "an essential feature" of the
latter!
This contradiction helps explains Engels comments that
"[w]e would therefore propose to replace state everywhere
by Gemeinwesen, a good old German word which can very
well convey the meaning of the French word 'commune'"
He even states that the Paris Commune "was no longer a
state in the proper sense of the word." However, this
comment does not mean that Engels sought to remove any
possible confusion on the matter, for he still talked
of "the state" as "only a transitional institution
which is used in the struggle, in the revolution, to
hold down's one's adversaries by force . . . so long
as the proletariat still uses the state, it does
not use it the interests of freedom but in order to
hold down its adversaries, and as soon as it becomes
possible to speak of freedom the state as such ceases
to exist." [Op. Cit., p. 335] Thus the state would
still exist and, furthermore, is not identified with
the working class as a whole ("a self-acting armed
organisation of the population"), rather it is an
institution standing apart from the "people armed"
which is used, by the proletariat, to crush its enemies.
(As an aside, we must stress that to state that it only
becomes possible to "speak of freedom" after the state
and classes cease to exist is a serious theoretical
error. Firstly, it means to talk about "freedom" in the
abstract, ignoring the reality of class and hierarchical
society. To state the obvious, in class society working
class people have their freedom restricted by the state,
wage labour and other forms of social hierarchy. The
aim of social revolution is the conquest of liberty by the
working class by overthrowing hierarchical rule. Freedom
for the working class, by definition, means stopping
any attempts to restrict that freedom by its adversaries.
To state the obvious, it is not a "restriction" of the
freedom of would-be bosses to resist their attempts to impose
their rule! As such, Engels failed to consider revolution from
a working class perspective - see section H.4.7
for another example of this flaw. Moreover his comments have
been used to justify restrictions on working class freedom,
power and political rights by Marxist parties once they have
seized power. "Whatever power the State gains," correctly
argued Bookchin, "it always does so at the expense of
popular power. Conversely, whatever power the people
gain, they always acquire at the expense of the State.
To legitimate State power, in effect, is to delegitimate
popular power." [Remaking Society, p. 160])
Elsewhere, we have Engels arguing that "the characteristic
attribute of the former state" is that while society
"had created its own organs to look after its own
special interests" in the course of time "these organs,
at whose head was the state power, transformed themselves
from the servants of society into the masters of society."
[Op. Cit., p. 257] Ignoring the obvious contradiction with
his earlier claims that the state and communal organs were
different, with the former destroying the latter, we are
struck yet again by the idea of the state as being defined
as an institution above society. Thus, if the post
revolutionary society is marked by "the state" being
dissolved into society, placed under its control, then it
is not a state. To call it a "new and truly democratic"
form of "state power" makes as little sense as calling a
motorcar a "new" form of bicycle. As such, when Engels
argues that the Paris Commune "was no longer a state in
the proper sense of the word" or that when the proletariat
seizes political power it "abolishes the state as state" we
may be entitled to ask what it is, a state or not a state.
[Op. Cit., p. 335 and p. 424] It cannot be both, it cannot
be a "public power distinct from the mass of the people"
and "a self-acting armed organisation of the population."
If it is the latter, then it does not have what Engels
considered as "an essential feature of the state" and
cannot be considered one. If it is the former, then any
claim that such a regime is the rule of the working class
is automatically invalidated. That Engels mocked the
anarchists for seeking a revolution "without a provisional
government and in the total absence of any state or
state-like institution, which are to be destroyed" we can
safely say that it is the former. [Marx, Engels and Lenin,
Anarchism and Anarcho-Syndicalism, p. 156]
Given that "primitive democracy," as Engels noted, defended
itself against its adversaries without such an institution shows
that to equate the defence of working class freedom with the state
is not only unnecessary, it simply leads to confusion. For this
reason anarchists do not confuse the necessary task of defending
and organising a social revolution with creating a state. Thus,
the problem for Marxism is that the empirical definition of the
state collides with the metaphysical, the actual state with its
Marxist essence. As Italian Anarchist Camillo Berneri argued:
"'The Proletariat' which seizes the state, bestowing
on it the complete ownership of the means of production and
destroying itself as proletariat and the state 'as the state'
is a metaphysical fantasy, a political hypostasis of social
abstractions." ["The Abolition and Extinction of the
State," pp. 50-1, Cienfuegos Press Anarchist Review,
no. 4, p. 50]
This is no academic point, as we explain in the
next section
this confusion has been exploited to justify party power
over the proletariat. Thus, as Berneri argued, Marxists
"do not propose the armed conquest of the commune by the
whole proletariat, but they propose the conquest of the
State by the party which imagines it represents the
proletariat. The Anarchists allow the use of direct power
by the proletariat, but they understand the organ of
this power to be formed by the entire corpus of systems
of communist administration - corporate organisations
[i.e. industrial unions], communal institutions, both
regional and national - freely constituted outside and
in opposition to all political monopoly by parties and
endeavouring to a minimum administrational centralisation."
Thus "the Anarchists desire the destruction of the classes
by means of a social revolution which eliminates, with the
classes, the State." ["Dictatorship of the Proletariat and
State Socialism", pp 51-2, Op. Cit., p. 52] Anarchists are
opposed to the state because it is not neutral, it cannot be made
to serve our interests. The structures of the state are
only necessary when a minority seeks to rule over the
majority. We argue that the working class can create our
own structures, organised and run from below upwards, to
ensure the efficient running of everyday life.
By confusing two radically different things, Marxism
ensures that popular power is consumed and destroyed by
the state, by a new ruling elite. In the words of Murray
Bookchin:
"Marx, in his analysis of the Paris Commune of 1871, has
done radical social theory a considerable disservice. The
Commune's combination of delegated policy-making with the
execution of policy by its own administrators, a feature
of the Commune which Marx celebrated, is a major failing
of that body. Rousseau quite rightly emphasised that popular
power cannot be delegated without being destroyed. One either
has a fully empowered popular assembly or power belongs to the
State." ["Theses on Libertarian Municipalism", pp. 9-22,
The Anarchist Papers, Dimitrios Roussopoulos (ed.), p. 14]
If power belongs to the state, then the state is a
public body distinct from the population and, therefore,
not an instrument of working class power. Rather, as an
institution designed to ensure minority rule, it would
ensure its position within society and become either the
ruling class itself or create a new class which instrument
it would be. As we discuss in section H.3.9
the state cannot be considered as a neutral instrument of economic
class rule, it has specific interests in itself which can and does
mean it can play an oppressive and exploitative role in society
independently of an economically dominant class.
Which brings us to the crux of the issue whether this
"new" state will, in fact, be unlike any other state
that has ever existed. Insofar as this "new" state is
based on popular self-management and self-organisation,
anarchists argue that such an organisation cannot be
called a state as it is not based on delegated power.
"As long as," as Bookchin stressed, "the institutions
of power consisted of armed workers and peasants as
distinguished from a professional bureaucracy, police
force, army, and cabal of politicians and judges, they
were no[t] a State . . . These institutions, in fact
comprised a revolutionary people in arms . . . not a
professional apparatus that could be regarded as a State
in any meaningful sense of the term." ["Looking Back at
Spain," pp. 53-96, The Radical Papers, Dimitrios I.
Roussopoulos (ed.), p. 86] This was why Bakunin was at pains to emphasis
that a "federal organisation, from below upward, of workers'
associations, groups, communes, districts, and
ultimately, regions and nations" could not be considered
as the same as "centralised states" and were "contrary to
their essence." [Statism and Anarchy, p. 13]
So when Lenin argued in State and Revolution that
in the "dictatorship of the proletariat" the "organ
of suppression is now the majority of the population,
and not the minority" and that "since the majority of
the people itself suppresses its oppressors, a
'special force' for the suppression [of the bourgeoisie]
is no longer necessary" he is confusing two
fundamentally different things. As Engels made clear, such
a social system of "primitive democracy" is not a
state. However, when Lenin argued that "the more the
functions of state power devolve upon the people generally,
the less need is there for the existence of this power,"
he was implicitly arguing that there would be, in fact, a
"public power distinct from mass of the people" and
so a state in the normal sense of the word based on delegated
power, "special forces" separate from the armed people
and so on. [Essential Works of Lenin, p. 301]
That such a regime would not "wither away" has been proven
by history. The state machine does not (indeed, cannot)
represent the interests of the working classes due to its
centralised, hierarchical and elitist nature - all it can
do is represent the interests of the party in power, its
own bureaucratic needs and privileges and slowly, but
surely, remove itself from popular control. This, as
anarchists have constantly stressed, is why the state
is based on the delegation of power, on hierarchy and
centralisation. The state is organised in this way to
facilitate minority rule by excluding the mass of people
from taking part in the decision making processes within
society. If the masses actually did manage society directly,
it would be impossible for a minority class to dominate it.
Hence the need for a state. Which shows the central fallacy
of the Marxist theory of the state, namely it argues that
the rule of the proletariat will be conducted by a structure,
the state, which is designed to exclude the popular
participation such a concept demands!
Considered another way, "political power" (the state) is
simply the power of minorities to enforce their wills. This
means that a social revolution which aims to create socialism
cannot use it to further its aims. After all, if the state
(i.e. "political power") has been created to further minority
class rule (as Marxists and anarchists agree) then, surely,
this function has determined how the organ which exercises
it has developed. Therefore, we would expect organ and function
to be related and impossible to separate. So when Marx argued
that the conquest of political power had become the great duty
of the working class because landlords and capitalists always
make use of their political privileges to defend their economic
monopolies and enslave labour, he drew the wrong conclusion.
Building on a historically based (and so evolutionary)
understanding of the state, anarchists concluded that it
was necessary not to seize political power (which could
only be exercised by a minority within any state) but
rather to destroy it, to dissipate power into the hands of
the working class, the majority. By ending the regime of
the powerful by destroying their instrument of rule, the
power which was concentrated into their hands automatically
falls back into the hands of society. Thus, working class
power can only be concrete once "political power" is
shattered and replaced by the social power of the working
class based on its own class organisations (such as factory
committees, workers' councils, unions, neighbourhood
assemblies and so on). As Murray Bookchin put it:
"the slogan 'Power to the people' can only be put into
practice when the power exercised by social elites is
dissolved into the people. Each individual can then take
control of his [or her] daily life. If 'Power to the people'
means nothing more than power to the 'leaders' of the people,
then the people remain an undifferentiated, manipulated mass,
as powerless after the revolution as they were before."
[Post-Scarcity Anarchism, p. xif]
In practice, this means that any valid social revolution needs
to break the state and not replace it with another one.
This is because, in order to be a state, any state structure
must be based on delegated power, hierarchy and centralisation
("every State, even the most Republican and the most democratic
. . . . are in essence only machines governing the masses from
above" and "[i]f there is a State, there must necessarily be
domination, and therefore slavery; a State without slavery,
overt or concealed, is unthinkable - and that is why we are
enemies of the State." [Bakunin, The Political Philosophy of
Bakunin, p. 211 and p. 287]). If power is devolved to the working
class then the state no longer exists as its "essential feature"
(of delegated power) is absent. What you have is a new form of the
"primitive democracy" which existed before the rise of the state.
While this new, modern, form of self-management will have to defend itself
against those seeking to recreate minority power, this does not mean that
it becomes a state. After all, the tribes with "primitive democracy"
had to defend themselves against their adversaries and so that, in itself,
does not means that these communities had a state (see
section H.2.1).
Thus defence of a revolution, as anarchists have constantly stressed, does
not equate to a state as it fails to address the key issue, namely who has
power in the system - the masses or their leaders.
This issue is fudged by Marx. When Bakunin, in "Statism and Anarchy",
asked the question "Will the entire proletariat head the government?",
Marx argued in response:
"Does in a trade union, for instance, the whole union
constitute the executive committee? Will all division of
labour in a factory disappear and also the various functions
arising from it? And will everybody be at the top in Bakunin's
construction built from the bottom upwards? There will in
fact be no below then. Will all members of the commune also
administer the common affairs of the region? In that case
there will be no difference between commune and region.
'The Germans [says Bakunin] number nearly 40 million. Will,
for example, all 40 million be members of the government?'
Certainly, for the thing begins with the self-government
of the commune." [Marx, Engels and Lenin, Anarchism and
Anarcho-Syndicalism, pp. 150-1]
As Alan Carter argues, "this might have seemed to Marx
[over] a century ago to be satisfactory rejoinder, but
it can hardly do today. In the infancy of the trade unions,
which is all Marx knew, the possibility of the executives
of a trade union becoming divorced from the ordinary members
may not have seemed to him to be a likely outcome, We,
however, have behind us a long history of union leaders
'selling out' and being out of touch with their members.
Time has ably demonstrated that to reject Bakunin's fears
on the basis of the practice of trade union officials
constitutes a woeful complacency with regard to power
and privilege - a complacency that was born ample fruit
in the form of present Marxist parties and 'communist'
societies . . . [His] dispute with Bakunin shows quite
clearly that Marx did not stress the continued control
of the revolution by the mass of the people as a
prerequisite for the transcendence of all significant
social antagonisms." [Marx: A Radical Critique,
pp. 217-8] Non-anarchists have also noticed the poverty of
Marx's response. For example, as David W. Lovell puts it, "[t]aken
as a whole, Marx's comments have dodged the issue. Bakunin
is clearly grappling with the problems of Marx's transition period,
in particular the problem of leadership, while Marx refuses to
discuss the political form of what must be (at least in part)
class rule by the proletariat." [From Marx to Lenin,
p. 64]
As we discussed in
section H.3.1, Marx's "Address to
the Communist League," with its stress on "the most determined
centralisation of power in the hands of the state authority" and
that "the path of revolutionary activity . . . can only proceed
with full force from the centre," suggests that Bakunin's fears
were valid and Marx's answer simply inadequate. [Marx-Engels Reader,
p. 509] Simply put, if, as Engels argued, "an essential feature of
the state is a public power distinct from the mass of the people,"
then, clearly Marx's argument of 1850 (and others like it) signifies
a state in the usual sense of the word, one which has to be "distinct"
from the mass of the population in order to ensure that the masses are
prevented from interfering with their own revolution. This was not, of
course, the desire of Marx and Engels but this result flows from their theory
of the state and its fundamental flaws. These flaws can be best seen from
their repeated assertion that the capitalist democratic state could be
captured via universal suffrage and used to introduce socialism (see
section H.3.10 but it equally applies
to notions of creating new states based on the centralisation of power
favoured by ruling elites since class society began.
As Kropotkin stressed, "one does not make an historical institution
follow in the direction to which one points - that is in the opposite direction
to the one it has taken over the centuries." To expect this would be a
"a sad and tragic mistake" simply because "the old machine, the
old organisation, [was] slowly developed in the course of history to crush freedom,
to crush the individual, to establish oppression on a legal basis, to create
monopolists, to lead minds astray by accustoming them to servitude".
[The State: Its Historic Role, pp. 57-8] A social revolution needs
new, non-statist, forms of social organisation to succeed:
"To give full scope to socialism entails rebuilding from top to bottom
a society dominated by the narrow individualism of the shopkeeper. It
is not as has sometimes been said by those indulging in metaphysical
wooliness just a question of giving the worker 'the total product of
his labour'; it is a question of completely reshaping all relationships
. . . In ever street, in every hamlet, in every group of men gathered
around a factory or along a section of the railway line, the creative,
constructive and organisational spirit must be awakened in order to
rebuild life - in the factory, in the village, in the store, in
production and in distribution of supplies. All relations between
individuals and great centres of population have to be made all over
again, from the very day, from the very moment one alters the existing
commercial or administrative organisation.
"And they expect this immense task, requiring the free expression of popular
genius, to be carried out within the framework of the State and the pyramidal
organisation which is the essence of the State! They expect the State . . .
to become the lever for the accomplishment of this immense transformation.
They want to direct the renewal of a society by means of decrees and electoral
majorities... How ridiculous!" [Kropotkin, Op. Cit., pp. 58-9]
Ultimately, the question, of course, is one of power. Does the
"executive committee" have the fundamental decision making
power in society, or does that power lie in the mass assemblies
upon which a federal socialist society is built? If the former,
we have rule by a few party leaders and the inevitable bureaucratisation
of the society and a state in the accepted sense of the word. If the
latter, we have a basic structure of a free and equal society and a
new organisation of popular self-management which eliminates the
existence of a public power above society. This is not playing with
words. It signifies the key issue of social transformation, an issue
which Marxism tends to ignore or confuse matters about when discussing.
Bookchin clarified what is at stake:
"To some neo-Marxists who see centralisation and
decentralisation merely as difference of degree, the
word 'centralisation' may merely be an awkward way of
denoting means for co-ordinating the decisions made
by decentralised bodies. Marx, it is worth noting,
greatly confused this distinction when he praised the
Paris Commune as a 'working, not a parliamentary body,
executive and legislative at the same time.' In point
of fact, the consolidation of 'executive and legislative'
functions in a single body was regressive. It simply
identified the process of policy-making, a function that
rightly should belong to the people in assembly, with the
technical execution of these policies, a function that
should be left to strictly administrative bodies subject
to rotation, recall, limitations of tenure . . .
Accordingly, the melding of policy formation with
administration placed the institutional emphasis of
classical [Marxist] socialism on centralised bodies,
indeed, by an ironical twist of historical events,
bestowing the privilege of formulating policy on the
'higher bodies' of socialist hierarchies and their
execution precisely on the more popular 'revolutionary
committees' below." [Toward an Ecological Society,
pp. 215-6]
By confusing co-ordination with the state (i.e. with delegation of
power), Marxism opens the door wide open to the "dictatorship of
the proletariat" being a state "in the proper sense." In
fact, not only does Marxism open that door, it even invites the state
"in the proper sense" in! This can be seen from Engels comment
that just as "each political party sets out to establish its rule
in the state, so the German Social-Democratic Workers' Party is striving
to establish its rule, the rule of the working class."
[Collected Works, vol. 23, p. 372] By confusing rule by
the party "in the state" with "rule of the working class,"
Engels is confusing party power and popular power. For the party
to "establish its rule," the state in the normal
sense (i.e. a structure based on the delegation of power) has to
be maintained. As such, the "dictatorship of the proletariat"
signifies the delegation of power by the proletariat into the hands of
the party and that implies a "public power distinct from the mass
of the people" and so minority rule. This aspect of Marxism,
as we argue in the next section, was developed
under the Bolsheviks and became "the dictatorship of the party" (i.e.
the dictatorship over the proletariat):
"since Marx vigorously opposed Bakunin's efforts to ensure that only
libertarian and decentralist means were employed by revolutionaries
so as to facilitate the revolution remaining in the hands of the
mass of workers, he must accept a fair measure of culpability for
the authoritarian outcome of the Russian Revolution . . .
"Bakunin was not satisfied with trusting revolutionary leaders
to liberate the oppressed . . . The oppressed people had to made
aware that the only security against replacing one repressive
structure with another was the deliberate retaining of control of
the revolution by the whole of the working classes, and not
naively trusting it to some vanguard." [Alan Carter, Marx:
A Radical Critique pp. 218-9]
It is for this reason why anarchists are extremely critical
of Marxist ideas of social revolution. As Alan Carter argues:
"It is to argue not against revolution, but against
'revolutionary' praxis employing central authority.
It is to argue that any revolution must remain in the
hands of the mass of people and that they must be aware
of the dangers of allowing power to fall into the hands
of a minority in the course of the revolution. Latent
within Marxist theory . . . is the tacit condoning of
political inequality in the course and aftermath of
revolutionary praxis. Only when such inequality is openly
and widely rejected can there be any hope of a libertarian
communist revolution. The lesson to learn is that we must
oppose not revolutionary practice, but authoritarian
'revolutionary' practice. Such authoritarian practice
will continue to prevail in revolutionary circles as
long as the Marxist theory of the state and the
corresponding theory of power remain above criticism
within them." [Op. Cit., p. 231]
In summary, the Marxist theory of the state is simply
a-historic and postulates some kind of state "essence"
which exists independently of actual states and their
role in society. To confuse the organ required by a
minority class to execute and maintain its rule and that
required by a majority class to manage society is to
make a theoretical error of great magnitude. It opens
the door to the idea of party power and even party
dictatorship. As such, the Marxism of Marx and Engels
is confused on the issue of the state. Their comments
fluctuate between the anarchist definition of the state
(based, as it is, on generalisations from historical
examples) and the a-historic definition (based not on
historical example but rather derived from a
supra-historical analysis). Trying to combine the
metaphysical with the scientific, the authoritarian
with the libertarian, could only leave their followers
with a confused legacy and that is what we find.
Since the death of the founding fathers of Marxism, their
followers have diverged into two camps. The majority have
embraced the metaphysical and authoritarian concept of the
state and proclaimed their support for a "workers' state."
This is represented by social-democracy and it radical
offshoot, Leninism. As we discuss in the
next section, this
school has used the Marxist conception of the state to allow
for rule over the working class by the "revolutionary" party.
The minority has become increasingly and explicitly anti-state,
recognising that the Marxist legacy is contradictory and that
for the proletarian to directly manage society then there can
be no power above them. To this camp belongs the libertarian
Marxists of the council communist, Situationist and other
schools of thought which are close to anarchism.
As discussed in the
last section, there is a contradiction at
the heart of the Marxist theory of the state. On the one hand,
it acknowledges that the state, historically, has always been
an instrument of minority rule and is structured to ensure
this. On the other, it argues that you can have a state (the
"dictatorship of the proletariat") which transcends this
historical reality to express an abstract essence of the
state as an "instrument of class rule." This means that Marxism
usually confuses two very different concepts, namely the state
(a structure based on centralisation and delegated power) and
the popular self-management and self-organisation required
to create and defend a socialist society.
This confusion between two fundamentally different concepts
proved to be disastrous when the Russian Revolution broke out.
Confusing party power with working class power, the Bolsheviks
aimed to create a "workers' state" in which their party would
be in power (see section H.3.3).
As the state was an instrument
of class rule, it did not matter if the new "workers' state"
was centralised, hierarchical and top-down like the old state
as the structure of the state was considered irrelevant in
evaluating its role in society. Thus, while Lenin seemed to
promise a radical democracy in which the working class would
directly manage its own affairs in his State and Revolution,
in practice he implemented a "dictatorship of the proletariat"
which was, in fact, "the organisation of the vanguard of the
oppressed as the ruling class." [Essential Works of Lenin,
p. 337] In other words, the vanguard party in the position of head of
the state, governing on behalf of the working class which, in turn,
meant that the new "workers' state" was fundamentally a state in the
usual sense of the word. This quickly lead to a dictatorship over,
not of, the proletariat (as Bakunin had predicted). This development
did not come as a surprise to anarchists, who had long argued that a
state is an instrument of minority rule and cannot change its nature.
To use the state to affect socialist change is impossible, simply
because it is not designed for such a task. As we argued in
section B.2, the state is based on
centralisation of power explicitly to ensure minority rule and
for this reason has to be abolished during a social revolution.
As Voline summarised, there is "an explicit, irreconcilable contradiction
between the very essence of State Socialist power (if it triumphs) and
that of the true Social Revolutionary process." This was
because "the basis of State Socialism and delegated
power is the explicit non-recognition of [the] principles of
the Social Revolution. The characteristic traits of Socialist
ideology and practice . . . do not belong to the future, but are
wholly a part of the bourgeois past . . . Once this model has
been applied, the true principles of the Revolution are
fatally abandoned. Then follows, inevitably, the rebirth,
under another name, of the exploitation of the labouring masses,
with all its consequences." Thus "the forward march of the
revolutionary masses towards real emancipation, towards the
creation of new forms of social life, is incompatible with the very
principle of State power . . . the authoritarian principle and the
revolutionary principle are diametrically opposed and mutually
exclusive." [The Unknown Revolution, p. 247 and p. 248]
Ironically, the theoretical lessons Leninists gained from
the experience of the Russian Revolution confirm the
anarchist analysis that the state structure exists to
facilitate minority rule and marginalise and disempower
the majority to achieve that rule. This can be seen from
the significant revision of the Marxist position which
occurred once the Bolshevik party become the ruling party.
Simply put, after 1917 leading representatives of Leninism
stressed that state power was not required
to repress resistance by the ex-ruling class as such, but,
in fact, was also necessitated by the divisions within the
working class. In other words, state power was required
because the working class was not able to govern itself
and so required a grouping (the party) above it to ensure
the success of the revolution and overcome any "wavering"
within the masses themselves.
While we have discussed this position in
section H.1.2 and
so will be repeating ourselves to some degree, it is worth
summarising again the arguments put forward to justify this
revision. This is because they confirm what anarchists have
always argued, namely that the state is an instrument of
minority rule and not one by which working class people
can manage their own affairs directly. As the quotations
from leading Leninists make clear, it is precisely this
feature of the state which recommends it for party (i.e.
minority) power. The contradiction at the heart of the
Marxist theory of the state we pointed out in the
section H.3.7
has been resolved in Leninism. It supports
the state precisely because it is "a public power distinct
from the mass of the people," rather than an instrument of
working class self-management of society.
Needless to say, his latter day followers point to Lenin's
apparently democratic, even libertarian, sounding 1917 work,
The State and Revolution when asked about the Leninist
theory of the state. As our discussion in section H.1.7
proved, the ideas expounded in his pamphlet were rarely, if at
all, applied in practice by the Bolsheviks. Moreover, it was
written before the seizure of power. In order to see the validity
of his argument we must compare it to his and his fellow Bolshevik
leaders opinions once the revolution had "succeeded." What lessons
did they generalise from their experiences and how did these lessons
relate to State and Revolution?
The change can be seen from Trotsky, who argued quite
explicitly that "the proletariat can take power only through
its vanguard" and that "the necessity for state power arises
from an insufficient cultural level of the masses and their
heterogeneity." Only with "support of the vanguard by the
class" can there be the "conquest of power" and it was in
"this sense the proletarian revolution and dictatorship are
the work of the whole class, but only under the leadership of
the vanguard." Thus, rather than the working class as a whole
seizing power, it is the "vanguard" which takes power - "a
revolutionary party, even after seizing power . . . is still
by no means the sovereign ruler of society." Thus state power
is required to govern the masses, who cannot exercise power
themselves. As Trotsky put it, "[t]hose who propose the abstraction
of Soviets to the party dictatorship should understand that only thanks
to the Bolshevik leadership were the Soviets able to lift themselves
out of the mud of reformism and attain the state form of the proletariat."
[Writings 1936-37, p. 490, p. 488 and p. 495]
Logically, though, this places the party in a privileged position. So
what happens if the working class no longer supports the vanguard? Who
takes priority? Unsurprisingly, in both theory and practice, the party is
expected to rule over the masses. This idea that state power was required
due to the limitations within the working class is reiterated a few years
later in 1939. Moreover, the whole rationale for party dictatorship came
from the fundamental rationale for democracy, namely that any government
should reflect the changing opinions of the masses:
"The very same masses are at different times inspired by different moods
and objectives. It is just for this reason that a centralised organisation
of the vanguard is indispensable. Only a party, wielding the authority it
has won, is capable of overcoming the vacillation of the masses themselves
. . . if the dictatorship of the proletariat means anything at all, then
it means that the vanguard of the proletariat is armed with the resources
of the state in order to repel dangers, including those emanating from the
backward layers of the proletariat itself." ["The Moralists and
Sycophants against Marxism", pp. 53-66, Their Morals and Ours,
p. 59]
Needless to say, by definition everyone is "backward"
when compared to the "vanguard of the proletariat." Moreover,
as it is this "vanguard" which is "armed with the resources
of the state" and not the proletariat as a whole we are
left with one obvious conclusion, namely party dictatorship rather
than working class democracy. How Trotsky's position is compatible
with the idea of the working class as the "ruling class" is not
explained. However, it fits in well with the anarchist analysis of
the state as an instrument designed to ensure minority rule.
Thus the possibility of party dictatorship exists if popular support fades.
Which is, significantly, precisely what had happened when Lenin and
Trotsky were in power. In fact, these arguments built upon other, equally
elitist statement which had been expressed by Trotsky when he held the
reins of power. In 1920, for example, he argued that while the Bolsheviks
have "more than once been accused of having substituted for the
dictatorship of the Soviets the dictatorship of the party," in fact
"it can be said with complete justice that the dictatorship of the
Soviets became possible only by means of the dictatorship of the party."
This, just to state the obvious, was his argument seventeen years later.
"In this 'substitution' of the power of the party for the power of the
working class," Trotsky added, "there is nothing accidental, and in
reality there is no substitution at all. The Communists express the
fundamental interests of the working class." [Terrorism and
Communism, p. 109] In early 1921, he argued again for Party
dictatorship at the Tenth Party Congress:
"The Workers' Opposition has come out with dangerous slogans,
making a fetish of democratic principles! They place the
workers' right to elect representatives above the Party, as
if the party were not entitled to assert its dictatorship
even if that dictatorship temporarily clashed with the passing
moods of the workers' democracy. It is necessary to create
amongst us the awareness of the revolutionary birthright of
the party, which is obliged to maintain its dictatorship,
regardless of temporary wavering even in the working classes.
This awareness is for us the indispensable element. The
dictatorship does not base itself at every given moment on the
formal principle of a workers' democracy." [quoted by Samuel
Farber, Before Stalinism, p. 209]
The similarities with his arguments of 1939 are obvious.
Unsurprisingly, he maintained this position in the intervening
years. He stated in 1922 that "we maintain the dictatorship of our
party!" [The First Five Years of the Communist International,
vol. 2, p. 255] The next year saw him arguing that "[i]f
there is one question which basically not only does not
require revision but does not so much as admit the
thought of revision, it is the question of the dictatorship
of the Party." He stressed that "[o]ur party is the ruling
party" and that "[t]o allow any changes whatever in this
field" meant "bring[ing] into question all the achievements
of the revolution and its future." He indicated the fate of
those who did question the party's position: "Whoever
makes an attempt on the party's leading role will, I hope,
be unanimously dumped by all of us on the other side of
the barricade." [Leon Trotsky Speaks, p. 158 and p. 160]
By 1927, when Trotsky was in the process of being "dumped"
on the "other side of the barricade" by the ruling bureaucracy,
he still argued for "the Leninist principle, inviolable for
every Bolshevik, that the dictatorship of the proletariat is and can be
realised only through the dictatorship of the party." It was stressed
that the "dictatorship of the proletariat [sic!] demands as its very
core a single proletarian party." [The Challenge of the Left
Opposition (1926-7), p. 395 and p. 441] As we noted in
section H.1.2, ten years later,
he was still explicitly arguing for the "revolutionary
dictatorship of a proletarian party".
Thus, for Trotsky over a twenty year period, the "dictatorship
of the proletariat" was fundamentally a "dictatorship of the
party." While the working class may be allowed some level of
democracy, the rule of the party was repeatedly given precedence.
While the party may be placed into power by a mass revolution,
once there the party would maintain its position of power and
dismiss attempts by the working class to replace it as "wavering"
or "vacillation" due to the "insufficient cultural level of
the masses and their heterogeneity." In other words, the party
dictatorship was required to protect working class people from
themselves, their tendency to change their minds based on changing
circumstances, evaluating the results of past decisions, debates
between different political ideas and positions, make their own
decisions, reject what is in their best interests (as determined by
the party), and so on. Thus the underlying rationale for democracy
(namely that it reflects the changing will of the voters, their
"passing moods" so to speak) is used to justify party
dictatorship!
The importance of party power over the working class was not
limited to Trotsky. It was considered of general validity by all
leading Bolsheviks and, moreover, quickly became mainstream Bolshevik
ideology. In March 1923, for example, the Central Committee of the
Communist Party in a statement issued to mark the 25th anniversary
of the founding of the Bolshevik Party. This statement summarised the
lessons gained from the Russian revolution. It stated that "the party
of the Bolsheviks proved able to stand out fearlessly against the vacillations
within its own class, vacillations which, with the slightest weakness in the
vanguard, could turn into an unprecedented defeat for the proletariat."
Vacillations, of course, are expressed by workers' democracy. Little wonder
the statement rejects it: "The dictatorship of the working class finds
its expression in the dictatorship of the party." ["To the Workers
of the USSR" in G. Zinoviev, History of the Bolshevik Party,
p. 213 and p. 214]
Trotsky and other leading Bolsheviks were simply following Lenin's lead,
who had admitted at the end of 1920 that while "the dictatorship of
the proletariat" was "inevitable" in the "transition of
socialism," it is "not exercised by an organisation which takes
in all industrial workers." The reason "is given in the theses of
the Second Congress of the Communist International on the role of
political parties" (more on which later). This means that "the
Party, shall we say, absorbs the vanguard of the proletariat, and this
vanguard exercises the dictatorship of the proletariat." This was
required because "in all capitalist countries . . . the proletariat
is still so divided, so degraded, and so corrupted in parts" that
it "can be exercised only by a vanguard . . . the dictatorship of the
proletariat cannot be exercised by a mass proletarian organisation."
[Collected Works, vol. 32, p. 20 and p. 21] For Lenin,
"revolutionary coercion is bound to be employed towards the
wavering and unstable elements among the masses themselves."
[Op. Cit., vol. 42, p. 170] Needless to say, Lenin failed
to mention this aspect of his system in The State and Revolution
(a failure usually repeated by his followers). It is, however, a striking
confirmation of Bakunin's comments "the State cannot be sure of its own
self-preservation without an armed force to defend it against its own
internal enemies, against the discontent of its own people."
[Michael Bakunin: Selected Writings, p. 265]
Looking at the lessons leading leaders of Leninism gained from
the experience of the Russian Revolution, we have to admit that
the Leninist "workers' state" will not be, in fact, a "new" kind
of state, a "semi-state," or, to quote Lenin, a "new state" which
"is no longer a state in the proper sense of the word." If, as
Lenin argued in early 1917, the state "in the proper sense of the term is
domination over the people by contingents of armed men divorced from the
people," then Bolshevism in power quickly saw the need for a state "in
the proper sense." [Op. Cit., vol. 24, p. 85] While this state
"in the proper sense" had existed from the start of Bolshevik rule,
it was only from early 1919 onwards (at the latest) that the leaders of
Bolshevism had openly brought what they said into line with what they did.
It was only by being a "state in the proper sense" could the
Bolshevik party rule and exercise "the dictatorship of the party"
over the "wavering" working class.
So when Lenin stated that "Marxism differs from anarchism in
that it recognises the need for a state for the purpose of
the transition to socialism," anarchists agree. [Op. Cit.,
vol. 24, p. 85] Insofar as "Marxism" aims for, to quote Lenin, the
party to "take state power into [its] own hands," to become
"the governing party" and considers one of its key tasks for
"our Party to capture political power" and to "administer"
a country, then we can safely say that the state needed is a state "in
the proper sense," based on the centralisation and delegation of power
into the hands of a few (see our discussion of Leninism as "socialism
from above" in section H.3.3
for details).
This recreation of the state "in the proper sense" did not
come about by chance or simply because of the "will to power"
of the leaders of Bolshevism. Rather, there are strong institutional
pressures at work within any state structure (even a so-called
"semi-state") to turn it back into a "proper" state. We
discuss this in more detail in section H.3.9.
However, we should not ignore that many of the roots of Bolshevik tyranny
can be found in the contradictions of the Marxist theory of the state. As
noted in the last section, for Engels, the
seizure of power by the party meant that the working class was in power.
The Leninist tradition builds on this confusion between party and class
power. It is clear that the "dictatorship of the proletariat" is,
in fact, rule by the party. In Lenin's words:
"Engels speaks of a government that is required for the
domination of a class . . . Applied to the proletariat,
it consequently means a government that is required for
the domination of the proletariat, i.e. the dictatorship
of the proletariat for the effectuation of the socialist
revolution." [Op. Cit., vol. 8, p. 279]
The role of the working class in this state was also indicated,
as "only a revolutionary dictatorship supported by the vast
majority of the people can be at all durable." [Op. Cit.,
p. 291] In other words the "revolutionary government" has the
power, not the working class in whose name it governs. In
1921 he made this explicit: "To govern you need an army of
steeled revolutionary Communists. We have it, and it is
called the Party." The "Party is the leader, the vanguard
of the proletariat, which rules directly." For Lenin, as
"long as we, the Party's Central Committee and the whole
Party, continue to run things, that is govern we shall
never - we cannot - dispense with . . . removals, transfers,
appointments, dismissals, etc." of workers, officials and
party members from above. [Op. Cit., vol. 32, p. 62,
p. 98 and p. 99] Unsurprisingly, these powers were used by
Lenin, and then Stalin, to destroy opposition (although the
latter applied coercive measures within the party which
Lenin only applied to non-party opponents).
So much for "workers' power," "socialism from below"
and other such rhetoric.
This vision of "socialism" being rooted in party power over
the working class was the basis of the Communist International's
resolution of the role of the party. This resolution is, therefore,
important and worth discussing. It argues that the Communist Party
"is part of the working class," namely its "most
advanced, most class-conscious, and therefore most revolutionary
part." It is "distinguished from the working class as a
whole in that it grasps the whole historic path of the working
class in its entirety and at every bend in that road endeavours
to defend not the interests of individual groups or occupations but
the interests of the working class as a whole." [Proceedings
and Documents of the Second Congress 1920, vol. 1, p. 191] However,
in response it can be argued that this simply means the "interests
of the party" as only it can understand what "the interests of
the working class as a whole" actually are. Thus we have the
possibility of the party substituting its will for that of the working
class simply because of what Leninists term the "uneven development"
of the working class. As Alan Carter argues, these "conceptions of
revolutionary organisation maintain political and ideological domination
by retaining supervisory roles and notions of privileged access to
knowledge . . . the term 'class consciousness' is employed to facilitate
such domination over the workers. It is not what the workers think, but
what the party leaders think they ought to think that constitutes the
revolutionary consciousness imputed to the workers." The ideological
basis for a new class structure is created as the "Leninist
revolutionary praxis . . . is carried forward to post-revolutionary
institutions," [Marx: A Radical Critique, p. 175]
The resolution stresses that before the revolution, the party
"will encompass . . . only a minority of the workers."
Even after the "seizure of power," it will still "not
be able to unite them all into its ranks organisationally."
It is only after the "final defeat of the bourgeois order"
will "all or almost all workers begin to join" it. Thus
the party is a minority of the working class. The
resolution then goes on to state that "[e]very class struggle
is a political struggle. This struggle, which inevitably becomes
transformed into civil war, has as its goal the conquest of
political power. Political power cannot be seized, organised,
and directed other than by some kind of political party."
[Op. Cit., p. 192, p. 193] And as the party is a "part"
of the working class which cannot "unite" all workers
"into its ranks," this means that political power can
only be "seized, organised, and directed" by a
minority.
Thus we have minority rule, with the party (or more correctly its
leaders) exercising political power. The idea that the party
"must dissolve into the councils, that the councils
can replace the Communist Party" is "fundamentally
wrong and reactionary." This is because, to "enable the
soviets to fulfil their historic tasks, there must . . . be a
strong Communist Party, one that does not simply 'adapt' to the
soviets but is able to make them renounce 'adaptation' to the
bourgeoisie." [Op. Cit., p. 196] Thus rather than
the workers' councils exercising power, their role is simply
that of allowing the Communist Party to seize political party.
As we indicated in section H.3.4, the
underlying assumption behind this resolution was made clear by
Zinoviev during his introductory speech to the congress
meeting which finally agreed the resolution: the dictatorship of
the party was the dictatorship of the proletariat. Little
wonder that Bertrand Russell, on his return from Lenin's Russia
in 1920, wrote that:
"Friends of Russia here [in Britain] think of the dictatorship of
the proletariat as merely a new form of representative government,
in which only working men and women have votes, and the constituencies
are partly occupational, not geographical. They think that 'proletariat'
means 'proletariat,' but 'dictatorship' does not quite mean 'dictatorship.'
This is the opposite of the truth. When a Russian Communist speak of a
dictatorship, he means the word literally, but when he speaks of the
proletariat, he means the word in a Pickwickian sense. He means the
'class-conscious' part of the proletariat, i.e. the Communist Party.
He includes people by no means proletarian (such as Lenin and Tchicherin)
who have the right opinions, and he excludes such wage-earners as have
not the right opinions, whom he classifies as lackeys of the
bourgeoisie." [The Practice and Theory of Bolshevism,
pp. 26-27]
Significantly, Russell pointed, like Lenin, to the Comintern resolution
on the role of the Communist Party. In addition, he noted the reason why
this party dictatorship was required: "No conceivable system of free
elections would give majorities to the Communists, either in the town or
country." [Op. Cit., pp. 40-1]
Nor are followers of Bolshevism shy in repeating its elitist
conclusions. Founder and leader of the British SWP, Tony Cliff,
for example, showed his lack of commitment to working class
democracy when he opined that the "actual level of democracy,
as well as centralism, [during a revolution] depends on three
basic factors: 1. the strength of the proletariat; 2. the material
and cultural legacy left to it by the old regime; and 3. the
strength of capitalist resistance. The level of democracy
feasible must be in direct proportion to the first two factors,
and in inverse proportion to the third. The captain of an ocean
liner can allow football to be played on his vessel; on a tiny
raft in a stormy sea the level of tolerance is far lower."
[Lenin, vol. 3, p. 179] That Cliff compares working class
democracy to football says it all. Rather than seeing
it as the core gain of a revolution, he relegates it to the level
of a game, which may or may not be "tolerated"! And
need we speculate who the paternalistic "captain" in charge
of the ship of the state would be?
Replacing Cliff's revealing analogies we get the following: "The
party in charge of a workers' state can allow democracy when the
capitalist class is not resisting; when it is resisting strongly,
the level of tolerance is far lower." So, democracy will be
"tolerated" in the extremely unlikely situation that the
capitalist class will not resist a revolution! That the party has
no right to "tolerate" democracy or not is not even entertained
by Cliff, its right to negate the basic rights of the working class
is taken as a given. Clearly the key factor is that the party is
in power. It may "tolerate" democracy, but ultimately
his analogy shows that Bolshevism considers it as an added extra whose
(lack of) existence in no way determines the nature of the "workers'
state" (unless, of course, he is analysing Stalin's regime rather
than Lenin's then it becomes of critical importance!). Perhaps,
therefore, we may add another "basic factor" to Cliff's three;
namely "4. the strength of working class support for the party."
The level of democracy feasible must be in direct proportion to this
factor, as the Bolsheviks made clear. As long as the workers vote for
the party, then democracy is wonderful. If they do not, then their
"wavering" and "passing moods" cannot be "tolerated"
and democracy is replaced by the dictatorship of the party. Which is
no democracy at all.
Obviously, then, if, as Engels argued, "an essential feature
of the state is a public power distinct from the mass of
the people" then the regime advocated by Bolshevism is
not a "semi-state" but, in fact, a normal state. Trotsky
and Lenin are equally clear that said state exists to ensure
that the "mass of the people" do not participate in public
power, which is exercised by a minority, the party (or,
more correctly, the leaders of the party). One of the key aims
of this new state is to repress the "backward" or "wavering"
sections of the working class (although, by definition,
all sections of the working class are "backward" in relation
to the "vanguard"). Hence the need for a "public power
distinct from the people" (as the suppression of the strike
wave and Kronstadt in 1921 shows, elite troops are always
needed to stop the army siding with their fellow workers).
And as proven by Trotsky's comments after he was squeezed
out of power, this perspective was not considered as a
product of "exceptional circumstances." Rather it was
considered a basic lesson of the revolution, a position
which was applicable to all future revolutions. In this,
Lenin and other leading Bolsheviks concurred.
The irony (and tragedy) of all this should not be lost. In
his 1905 diatribe against anarchism, Stalin had denied that
Marxists aimed for party dictatorship. He stressed that there
was "a dictatorship of the minority, the dictatorship of a
small group . . . which is directed against the people . . .
Marxists are the enemies of such a dictatorship, and they
fight such a dictatorship far more stubbornly and
self-sacrificingly than do our noisy Anarchists." The
practice of Bolshevism and the ideological revisions it
generated easily refutes Stalin's claims. The practice of
Bolshevism showed that his claim that "[a]t the head" of
the "dictatorship of the proletarian majority . . . stand
the masses" is in sharp contradiction with Bolshevik
support for "revolutionary" governments. Either you have
(to use Stalin's expression) "the dictatorship of the
streets, of the masses, a dictatorship directed against
all oppressors" or you have party power in the name of
the street, of the masses. [Collected Works, vol. 1,
p. 371-2] The fundamental flaw in Leninism is that it confuses
the two and so lays the ground for the very result anarchists
predicted and Stalin denied.
While anarchists are well aware of the need to defend a
revolution (see
section H.2.1), we do not make the mistake
of equating this with a state. Ultimately, the state
cannot be used as an instrument of liberation - it is
not designed for it. Which, incidentally, is why we have
not discussed the impact of the Russian Civil War on the
development of Bolshevik ideology. Simply put, the "workers'
state" is proposed, by Leninists, as the means to defend
a revolution. As such, you cannot blame what it is meant to
be designed to withstand (counter-revolution and civil war)
for its "degeneration." If the "workers' state" cannot handle
what its advocates claim it exists for, then its time to
look for an alternative and dump the concept in the dustbin
of history.
In summary, Bolshevism is based on a substantial revision of
the Marxist theory of the state. While Marx and Engels were
at pains to stress the accountability of their new state to
the population under it, Leninism has made a virtue of the fact
that the state has evolved to exclude that mass participation
in order to ensure minority rule. Leninism has done so explicitly
to allow the party to overcome the "wavering" of the working
class, the very class it claims is the "ruling class" under socialism!
In doing this, the Leninist tradition exploited the confused nature
of the state theory of traditional Marxism. The Leninist theory of
the state is flawed simply because it is based on creating a
"state in the proper sense of the word," with a public power
distinct from the mass of the people. This was the major lesson gained
by the leading Bolsheviks (including Lenin and Trotsky) from the Russian
Revolution and has its roots in the common Marxist error of confusing
party power with working class power. So when Leninists point to Lenin's
State and Revolution as the definitive Leninist theory of the
state, anarchists simply point to the lessons Lenin himself gained
from actually conducting a revolution. Once we do, the slippery
slope to the Leninist solution to the contradictions inherit in
the Marxist theory of the state can be seen, understood and combated.
As we discussed in
section H.3.7, the Marxist theory of
the state confuses an empirical analysis of the state with
a metaphysical one. While Engels is aware that the state
developed to ensure minority class rule and, as befits its
task, evolved specific characteristics to execute that
role, he also raised the idea that the state ("as a rule")
is "the state of the most powerful, economically dominant
class" and "through the medium of the state, becomes also
the politically dominant class." Thus the state can be
considered, in essence, as "nothing but a machine for the
oppression of one class by another." "At a certain stage
of economic development", Engels stressed, "which was necessarily
bound up with the split in society into classes, the state became
a necessity owning to this split." [Selected Works,
pp. 577-8, p. 579 and p. 258] For Lenin, this was "the
basic idea of Marxism on the question of the historical role and
meaning of the state," namely that "the state is an organ of
class rule, the organ for the oppression of one
class by another." [Essential Works of Lenin, p. 273
and p. 274]
The clear implication is that the state is simply an instrument,
without special interests of its own. If this is the case, the
use of a state by the proletariat is unproblematic (and so the
confusion between working class self-organisation and the state
we have discussed in various sections above is irrelevant). This
argument can lead to simplistic conclusions, such as once a
"revolutionary" government is in power in a "workers state" we
need not worry about abuses of power or even civil liberties
(this position was commonplace in Bolshevik ranks during the
Russian Civil War, for example). It also is at the heart of
Trotsky's contortions with regards to Stalinism, refusing to
see the state bureaucracy as a new ruling class simply because
the state, by definition, could not play such a role.
For anarchists, this position is a fundamental weakness
of Marxism, a sign that the mainstream Marxist position
significantly misunderstands the nature of the state and
the needs of social revolution. However, we must stress
that anarchists would agree that the state generally does
serve the interests of the economically dominant classes.
Bakunin, for example, argued that the State "is authority,
domination, and forced, organised by the property-owning
and so-called enlightened classes against the masses." He
saw the social revolution as destroying capitalism and the
state at the same time, that is "to overturn the State's
domination, and that of the privileged classes whom it
solely represents." [The Basic Bakunin, p. 140]
However, anarchists do not reduce our analysis and
understanding of the state to this simplistic Marxist
level. While being well aware that the state is the
means of ensuring the domination of an economic elite,
as we discussed in section B.2.5,
anarchists recognise that the state machine also has
interests of its own. The state, for anarchists, is the
delegation of power into the hands of a few. This creates,
by its very nature, a privileged position for those at
the top of the hierarchy:
"A government [or state], that is a group of people entrusted
with making the laws and empowered to use the collective
force to oblige each individual to obey them, is already
a privileged class and cut off from the people. As any
constituted body would do, it will instinctively seek to
extend its powers, to be beyond public control, to impose
its own policies and to give priority to its special
interests. Having been put in a privileged position,
the government is already at odds with the people whose
strength it disposes of." [Malatesta, Anarchy,
p. 36]
The Bolshevik regime during the Russia revolution proved the
validity of this analysis. The Bolsheviks seized power in the
name of the soviets yet soon marginalised, gerrymandered and
disbanded them to remain in power while imposing a vision of
socialism (more correctly, state capitalism) at odds with
popular aspirations.
Why this would be the case is not hard to discover. Given that
the state is a highly centralised, top-down structure it is
unsurprising that it develops around itself a privileged class,
a bureaucracy, around it. The inequality in power implied by the
state is a source of privilege and oppression independent of
property and economic class. Those in charge of the state's
institutions would aim to protect (and expand) their area of
operation, ensuring that they select individuals who share their
perspectives and who they can pass on their positions. By
controlling the flow of information, of personnel and resources,
the members of the state's higher circles can ensure its, and
their own, survival and prosperity. As such, politicians who
are elected are at a disadvantage. The state is the permanent
collection of institutions that have entrenched power structures
and interests. The politicians come and go while the power in
the state lies in its institutions due to their permanence.
It is to be expected that such institutions would have their
own interests and would pursue them whenever they can.
This would not fundamentally change in a new "workers' state" as
it is, like all states, based on the delegation and centralisation
of power into a few hands. Any "workers' government" would need a
new apparatus to enforce its laws and decrees. It would need effective
means of gathering and collating information. It would thus create
"an entirely new ladder of administration to extend it rule and
make itself obeyed." While a social revolution needs mass
participation, the state limits initiative to the few who are in power
and "it will be impossible for one or even a number of individuals
to elaborate the social forms" required, which "can only be the
collective work of the masses . . . Any kind of external authority will
merely be an obstacle, a hindrance to the organic work that has to be
accomplished; it will be no better than a source of discord and of
hatreds." [Kropotkin, Words of a Rebel, p. 169 and
pp. 176-7]
Rather than "withering away," any "workers' state" would
tend to grow in terms of administration and so the
government creates around itself a class of bureaucrats
whose position is different from the rest of society.
This would apply to production as well. Being unable to
manage everything, the state would have to re-introduce
hierarchical management in order to ensure its orders are
met and that a suitable surplus is extracted from the
workers to feed the needs of the state machine. By
creating an economically powerful class which it can rely
on to discipline the workforce, it would simply recreate
capitalism anew in the form of "state capitalism" (this is
precisely what happened during the Russian Revolution). To
enforce its will onto the people it claims to represent,
specialised bodies of armed people (police, army) would be
required and soon created. All of which is to be expected,
as state socialism "entrusts to a few the management of
social life and [so] leads to the exploitation and oppression
of the masses by the few." [Malatesta, Op. Cit., p. 47]
This process takes time. However, the tendency for government to
escape from popular control and to generate privileged and powerful
institutions around it can be seen in all revolutions, including
the Paris Commune and the Russian Revolution. In the former, the
Communal Council was "largely ignored . . . after it was
installed. The insurrection, the actual management of the
city's affairs and finally the fighting against the
Versaillese, were undertaken mainly by popular clubs, the
neighbourhood vigilance committees, and the battalions of
the National Guard. Had the Paris Commune (the Municipal
Council) survived, it is extremely doubtful that it could
have avoided conflict with these loosely formed street and
militia formations. Indeed, by the end of April, some
six weeks after the insurrection, the Commune constituted
an 'all-powerful' Committee of Public Safety, a body
redolent with memories of the Jacobin dictatorship
and the Terror , which suppressed not only the right
in the Great [French] Revolution of a century earlier,
but also the left." [Murray Bookchin, Post-Scarcity
Anarchism, p. 90] A minority of council members
(essentially those active in the International) stated
that "the Paris Commune has surrendered its authority
to a dictatorship" and it was "hiding behind a dictatorship
that the electorate have not authorised us to accept
or to recognise." [The Paris Commune of 1871: The View
from the Left, Eugene Schulkind (ed.), p. 187] The
Commune was crushed before this process could fully
unfold, but the omens were there (although it would
have undoubtedly been hindered by the local scale of the
institutions involved). As we discuss in
section H.6, a
similar process of a "revolutionary" government escaping
from popular control occurred right from the start of the
Russian Revolution. The fact the Bolshevik regime lasted
longer and was more centralised (and covered a larger area)
ensured that this process developed fully, with the
"revolutionary" government creating around itself the
institutions (the bureaucracy) which finally subjected the
politicians and party leaders to its influence and then
domination.
Simply put, the vision of the state as merely an instrument
of class rule blinds its supporters to the dangers of
political inequality in terms of power, the dangers
inherent in giving a small group of people power over
everyone else. The state has certain properties because
it is a state and one of these is that it creates a
bureaucratic class around it due to its centralised,
hierarchical nature. Within capitalism, the state bureaucracy
is (generally) under the control of the capitalist class.
However, to generalise from this specific case is wrong
as the state bureaucracy is a class in itself - and so
trying to abolish classes without abolishing the state is
doomed to failure:
"The State has always been the patrimony of some privileged
class: the sacerdotal class, the nobility, the bourgeoisie
- and finally, when all the other classes have exhausted
themselves, the class of the bureaucracy enters upon the
stage and then the State falls, or rises, if you please to
the position of a machine." [Bakunin, The Political
Philosophy of Bakunin, p. 208]
Thus the state cannot simply be considered as an instrument
of rule by economic classes. It can be quite an effective
parasitical force in its own right, as both anthropological
and historical evidence suggest. The former raises the
possibility that the state arose before economic classes and
that its roots are in inequalities in power (i.e. hierarchy)
within society, not inequalities of wealth. The latter
points to examples of societies in which the state was
not, in fact, an instrument of (economic) class rule but
rather pursued an interest of its own.
As regards anthropology, Michael Taylor summarises that the
"evidence does not give [the Marxist] proposition [that the
rise of economic classes caused the creation of the state] a great
deal of support. Much of the evidence which has been offered
in support of it shows only that the primary states, not long
after their emergence, were economically stratified. But this
is of course consistent also with the simultaneous rise . . .
of political and economic stratification, or with the prior
development of the state - i.e. of political stratification
- and the creation of economic stratification by the ruling
class." [Community, Anarchy and Liberty, p. 132] He quotes
Elman Service on this:
"In all of the archaic civilisations and historically known
chiefdoms and primitive states the 'stratification' was . . .
mainly of two classes, the governors and the governed -
political strata, not strata of ownership groups." [quoted
by Taylor, Op. Cit., p. 133]
Taylor argues that it the "weakening of community and the
development of gross inequalities are the concomitants
and consequences of state formation." He points to the
"germ of state formation" being in the informal social
hierarchies which exist in tribal societies. [Op. Cit.,
p. 133 and p. 134] Thus the state is not, initially, a
product of economic classes but rather an independent
development based on inequalities of social power. Harold
Barclay, an anarchist who has studied anthropological
evidence on this matter, concurs:
"In Marxist theory power derives primarily, if not exclusively,
from control of the means of production and distribution of
wealth, that is, from economic factors. Yet, it is evident that
power derived from knowledge - and usually 'religious' style
knowledge - is often highly significant, at least in the social
dynamics of small societies. . . Economic factors are hardly the
only source of power. Indeed, we see this in modern society as
well, where the capitalist owner does not wield total power.
Rather technicians and other specialists command it as well,
not because of their economic wealth, but because of their
knowledge." [quoted by Alan Carter, Marx: A Radical Critique,
p. 191]
If, as Bookchin summarises, "hierarchies precede classes" then
trying to use a hierarchical structure like the state to abolish
them is simply wishful thinking.
As regards more recent human history, there have been numerous
examples of the state existing without being an instrument of
(economic) class rule. Rather, the state was the ruling
class. While the most obvious example is the Stalinist regimes
where the state bureaucracy ruled over a state capitalist economy,
there have been plenty of others, as Murray Bookchin pointed out:
"Each State is not necessarily an institutionalised system
of violence in the interests of a specific ruling class,
as Marxism would have us believe. There are many examples
of States that were the 'ruling class' and whose own
interests existed quite apart from - even in antagonism
to - privileged, presumably 'ruling' classes in a given
society. The ancient world bears witness to distinctly
capitalistic classes, often highly privileged and
exploitative, that were bilked by the State, circumscribed
by it, and ultimately devoured by it - which is in part
why a capitalist society never emerged out of the ancient
world. Nor did the State 'represent' other class interests,
such as landed nobles, merchants, craftsmen, and the like.
The Ptolemaic State in Hellenistic Egypt was an interest
in its own right and 'represented' no other interest than
its own. The same is true of the Aztec and the Inca States
until they were replaced by Spanish invaders. Under the
Emperor Domitian, the Roman State became the principal
'interest' in the empire, superseding the interests of
even the landed aristocracy which held such primacy in
Mediterranean society. . .
"Near-Eastern State, like the Egyptian, Babylonian, and
Persian, were virtually extended households of individual
monarchs . . . Pharaohs, kings, and emperors nominally
held the land (often co-jointly with the priesthood)
in the trust of the deities, who were either embodied in
the monarch or were represented by him. The empires of
Asian and North African kings were 'households' and the
population was seen as 'servants of the palace' . . .
"These 'states,' in effect, were not simply engines of
exploitation or control in the interests of a privileged
'class.' . . . The Egyptian State was very real but it
'represented' nothing other than itself." [Remaking
Society, pp. 67-8]
Bakunin pointed to Turkish Serbia, where economically
dominant classes "do not even exist - there is only a
bureaucratic class. Thus, the Serbian state will crush
the Serbian people for the sole purpose of enabling
Serbian bureaucrats to live a fatter life." [Statism
and Anarchy, p. 54] Leninist Tony Cliff, in his attempt
to prove that Stalinist Russia was state capitalist and
its bureaucracy a ruling class, pointed to various
societies which "had deep class differentiation,
based not on private property but on state property.
Such systems existed in Pharaonic Egypt, Moslem Egypt,
Iraq, Persia and India." He discusses the example of Arab
feudalism in more detail, where "the feudal lord had no
permanent domain of his own, but a member of a class
which collectively controlled the land and had the right
to appropriate rent." This was "ownership of the land by
the state" rather than by individuals. [State Capitalism
in Russia, pp. 316-8] As such, the idea that the state
is simply an instrument of class rule seems unsupportable.
As Gaston Leval argued, "the State, by its nature, tends
to have a life of its own." [quoted by Sam Dolgoff, A
Critique of Marxism, p. 10]
Marx's "implicit theory of the state - a theory which, in reducing
political power to the realisation of the interests of the dominant
economic classes, precludes any concern with the potentially
authoritarian and oppressive outcome of authoritarian and centralised
revolutionary methods . . . This danger (namely, the dismissal of
warranted fears concerning political power) is latent in the central
features of Marx's approach to politics." [Alan Carter,
Op. Cit., p. 219] To summarise the obvious conclusion:
"By focusing too much attention on the economic structure of
society and insufficient attention on the problems of political
power, Marx has left a legacy we would done better not to
inherit. The perceived need for authoritarian and centralised
revolutionary organisation is sanctioned by Marx's theory
because his theoretical subordination of political power to
economic classes apparently renders post-revolutionary political
power unproblematic." [Op. Cit., p. 231]
Many factors contributed to Stalinism, including Marxism's defective
theory of the state. In stressing that socialism meant nationalising
property, it lead to state management which, in turn, expropriated the
working class as a vast managerial bureaucracy was required to run it.
Moreover, Marxism disguised this new ruling class as it argues that the
state 'represents' a class and had no interests of itself. Thus we have
Trotsky's utter inability to understand Stalinism and his insane formula
that the proletariat remained the ruling class under Stalin (or, for that
matter, under himself and Lenin)! Simply put, by arguing that the state
was an instrument of class rule, Marxism ensured it presented a false
theory of social change and could not analysis its resulting class rule
when the inevitable consequences of this approach was implemented.
However, there is more to Marxism than its dominant theory of the state.
Given this blindness of orthodox Marxism to this issue, it seems ironic
that one of the people responsible for it also provides anarchists with
evidence to back up our argument that the state is not simply an instrument
of class rule but rather has interests of its own. Thus we find Engels
arguing that proletariat, "in order not to lose again its only just
conquered supremacy," would have "to safeguard itself against
its own deputies and officials, by declaring them all, without exception,
subject to recall at any moment." [Selected Works, p. 257]
Yet, if the state was simply an instrument of class rule such precautions
would not be necessary. Engels comments show an awareness that the state
can have interests of its own, that it is not simply a machine of class
rule.
Aware of the obvious contradiction, Engels argued that the state "is,
as a rule, the state of the most powerful, economically dominant class
which, through the medium of the state, becomes the politically dominant
class . . . By way of exception, however, periods occur in which the warring
classes balance each other, so nearly that the state power, as ostensible
mediator, acquires, for the moment, a certain degree of independence of both."
He pointed to the "absolute monarchy of the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries", which held the balance between the nobility and the bourgeoisie
against one another as well as "the Bonapartism of the First, and still
more of the Second French Empire." It should be noted that, elsewhere,
Engels was more precise on how long the state was, in fact, controlled by
the bourgeoisie, namely two years: "In France, where the bourgeoisie as
such, as a class in its entirety, held power for only two years, 1849 and
1850, under the republic, it was able to continue its social existence only
by abdicating its political power to Louis Bonaparte and the army."
[Op. Cit., pp. 577-8 and p. 238] So, in terms of French history,
Engels argued that "by way of exception" accounted for over 250
hundred years, the 17th and 18th centuries and most of the 19th, bar a
two year period! Even if we are generous and argue that the 1830 revolution
placed one section of the bourgeoisie (finance capital) into political power,
we are still left with over 200 hundred years of state "independence" from
classes! Given this, it would be fair to suggest that the "exception" should
be when it is an instrument of class rule, not when it is not!
This was no isolated case. In Prussia "members of the bourgeoisie have a
majority in the Chamber . . . But where is their power over the state? . . .
the mass of the bourgeoisie . . . does not want to rule." [Op.
Cit., pp. 236-7] And so, in Germany, there exists "alongside the basic
condition of the old absolute monarchy - an equilibrium between the landowner
aristocracy and the bourgeoisie - the basic condition of modern Bonapartism -
an equilibrium between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat." This meant
that "both in the old absolute monarchy and in the modern Bonapartist
monarchy the real government power lies in the hands of a special caste of
army officers and state officials" and so the "independence of this
case, which appears to occupy a position outside and, so to speak, above society,
gives the state the semblance of independence in relation to society."
However, this did not stop Engels asserting that the "state is nothing but
the organised collective power of the exploiting classes, the landlords and the
capitalists as against the exploited classes, the peasants and the workers. What
the individual capitalists . . . do not want, their state also does not want."
[Collected Works, vol. 23, p. 363 and p. 362]
So, according to Engels, the executive of the state, like the state itself, can
become independent from classes if the opposing classes were balanced. This analysis,
it must be pointed out, was an improvement on the earliest assertions of Marx and
Engels on the state. In the 1840s, it was a case of the "independence of the
state is only found nowadays in those countries where the estates have not yet
completely developed into classes . . . where consequently no section of the
population can achieve dominance over the others." [Op. Cit., vol. 5,
p. 90] For Engels, "[f]rom the moment the state administration and legislature
fall under the control of the bourgeoisie, the independence of the bureaucracy
ceases to exist." [Op. Cit., vol. 6, p. 88] It must, therefore, have
come as a surprise for Marx and Engels when the state and its bureaucracy
appeared to become independent in France under Napoleon III.
Talking of which, it should be noted that, initially for Marx, under Bonapartism
"the state power is not suspended in mid air. Bonaparte represents a class,
and the most numerous class of French society at that, the small-holding
[Parzellen] peasants." The Bonaparte "who dispersed the bourgeois
parliament is the chosen of the peasantry." However, this class is
"incapable of enforcing their class interests in their own name . . . They
cannot represent themselves, they must be represented. Their representative must
at the same time appear as their master, as an authority over them, as an unlimited
governmental power . . . The political influence of the small-holding peasants,
therefore, finds its final expression in the executive power subordinating
society to itself." Yet Marx himself admits that this regime experienced
"peasant risings in half of France", organised "raids on the
peasants by the army" and the "mass incarceration and transportation of
peasants." A strange form of class rule, when the class represented is
oppressed by the regime! Rest assured, though, the "Bonaparte dynasty
represents not the revolutionary, but the conservative peasant." Then Marx,
without comment, pronounced Bonaparte to be "the representative of the
lumpenproletariat to which he himself, his entourage, his government
and his army belong." [Selected Works, p. 170, p. 171
and p. 176]
It would be fair to say that Marx's analysis is somewhat confused and seems
an ad hoc explanation to the fact that in a modern society the state appeared
to become independent of the economically dominant class. Yet if a regime is
systematically oppressing a class then it is fair to conclude that is not
representing that class in any way. Bonaparte's power did not, in other words,
rest on the peasantry. Rather, like fascism, it was a means by which the
bourgeoisie could break the power of the working class and secure its own class
position against possible social revolution. As Bakunin argued, it was a
"despotic imperial system" which the bourgeois "themselves founded
out of fear of the Social Revolution." [The Basic Bakunin, p. 63]
Thus the abolition of bourgeois rule was more apparent than real:
"As soon as the people took equality and liberty seriously, the bourgeoisie
. . . retreated into reaction . . . They began by suppressing universal suffrage
. . . The fear of Social Revolution . . . . hurled this downfallen class . . .
into the arms of the dictatorship of Napoleon III . . . We should not think
that the Bourgeois Gentlemen were too inconvenienced . . . [Those who] applied
themselves earnestly and exclusively to the great concern of the bourgeoisie,
the exploitation of the people . . . were well protected and powerfully
supported . . . All went well, according to the desires of the bourgeoisie."
[Op. Cit., pp. 62-3]
Somewhat ironically, then, a key example used by Marxists for the "independence"
of the state is no such thing. Bonapartism did not represent a "balance" between
the proletariat and bourgeoisie but rather the most naked form of state rule
required in the fact of working class revolt. It was a counter-revolutionary
regime which reflected a defeat for the working class, not a "balance" between
it and the capitalist class.
Marx's confusions arose from his belief that, for the bourgeoisie, the
parliamentary republic "was the unavoidable condition of their
common rule, the sole form of state in which their general
class interest subjected itself at the same time both the claims of
their particular factions and all the remaining classes of society."
[Selected Works, pp. 152-3] The abolition of the republic, the
replacement of the government, was, for him, the end of the political
rule of the bourgeoisie as he argued that "the industrial bourgeoisie
applauds with servile bravos the coup d’état of December 2, the
annihilation of parliament, the downfall of its own rule, the dictatorship
of Bonaparte." He repeated this identification: "Passing of the
parliamentary regime and of bourgeois rule. Victory of Bonaparte."
[Selected Writings, pp. 164-5 and p. 166] Political rule was
equated to which party held power and so, logically, universal suffrage
was "the equivalent of political power for the working class . . .
where the proletariat forms the large majority of the population."
Its "inevitable result would be "the political supremacy of
the working class." [Collected Works, vol. 11, pp. 335-6]
This was, of course, simply wrong (on both counts) as he, himself,
seemed to became aware of two decades later.
In 1871 he argued that "the State power assumed more and more the
character of the national power of capital over labour, of a public force
organised for social enslavement, of an engine of class despotism."
This meant that "in view of the threatened upheaval of the proletariat,
[the bourgeoisie] now used that State power mercilessly and ostentatiously
as the national war-engine of capital against labour" and so were
"bound not only to invest the executive with continually increased
powers of repression, but at the same time to divest their own parliamentary
stronghold . . . of all its own means of defence against the Executive. The
Executive, in the person of Louis Bonaparte, turned them out." Marx
now admitted that this regime only "professed to rest upon the peasantry"
while, "[i]n reality, it was the only form of government possible at a
time when the bourgeoisie had already lost, and the working class had not
yet acquired, the faculty of ruling the nation." However, "[u]nder
its sway, bourgeois society, freed from political cares, attained a
development unexpected even by itself." [Selected Works, p. 285,
p. 286, pp. 286-7 and p. 287]
Yet capitalists often do well under regimes which suppress the basic
liberties of the working class and so the bourgeoisie remained the
ruling class and the state remained its organ. In other words, there
is no "balance" between classes under Bonapartism even if the political
regime is not subject to electoral control by the bourgeoisie and has
more independence to pursue its own agenda.
This is not the only confirmation of the anarchist critique of the Marxist
theory of the state which can be found in Marxism itself. Marx, at times, also
admitted the possibility of the state not being an instrument of
(economic) class rule. For example, he mentioned the so-called "Asiatic
Mode of Production" in which "there are no private landowners"
but rather "the state . . . which confronts" the peasants "directly
as simultaneously landowner and sovereign, rent and tax coincide . . . Here
the state is the supreme landlord. Sovereignty here is landed property
concentrated on a national scale." [Capital, vol. 3, p. 927]
Thus "the State [is] the real landlord" in the "Asiatic system"
[Collected Works, vol. 12, p. 215] In other words, the ruling class
could be a state bureaucracy and so be independent of economic classes.
Unfortunately this analysis remained woefully undeveloped and no conclusions
were drawn from these few comments, perhaps unsurprisingly as it undermines the
claim that the state is merely the instrument of the economically dominant
class. It also, of course, has applicability to state socialism and certain
conclusions could be reached that suggested it, as Bakunin warned, would be
a new form of class rule.
The state bureaucracy as the ruling class can be seen in Soviet Russia (and
the other so-called "socialist" regimes such as China and Cuba). As libertarian
socialist Ante Ciliga put it, "the manner in which Lenin organised industry
had handed it over entirely into the hands of the bureaucracy," and so the
workers "became once more the wage-earning manpower in other people's factories.
Of socialism there remained in Russia no more than the word." [The Russian
Enigma, p. 280 and p. 286] Capitalism became state capitalism under Lenin and
Trotsky and so the state, as Bakunin predicted and feared, became the new ruling
class under Marxism (see section H.3.14 for more
discussion of this).
The confusions of the Marxist theory of the state ensured that Trotsky, for
example, failed to recognise the obvious, namely that the Stalinist state
bureaucracy was a ruling class. Rather, it was the "new ruling caste",
or "the ruling stratum". While admitting, at one stage, that the
"transfer of the factories to the State changed the situation of the
workers only juridically" Trotsky then ignored the obvious conclusion
that this has left the working class as an exploited class under a (new)
form of capitalism to assert that the "nature" of Stalinist Russia
was "a proletarian State" because of its "nationalisation" of
the means of life (which "constitute the basis of the Soviet social
structure"). He admitted that the "Soviet Bureaucracy has expropriated
the proletariat politically" but has done so "in order by methods of
its own to defend the social conquests" of the October Revolution.
He did not ponder too deeply the implications of admitting that the "means
of production belong to the State. But the State, so to speak, 'belongs' to
the bureaucracy." [The Revolution Betrayed, p. 93, p. 136, p. 228,
p. 235 and p. 236] If that is so, only ideology can stop the obvious confusion
being drawn, namely that the state bureaucracy was the ruling class. But that
is precisely what happened with Trotsky's confusion
expressing itself thusly:
"In no other regime has a bureaucracy ever achieved such a degree of independence
from the dominating class . . . it is something more than a bureaucracy. It is in
the full sense of the word the sole privileged and commanding stratum in the Soviet
society." [Op. Cit., p. 235]
By this, Trotsky suggested that the working class was the "dominating class"
under Stalinism! In fact, the bureaucracy "continues to preserve State property
only to the extent it fears the proletariat" while, at the same time, the
bureaucracy has "become [society's] lord" and "the Soviet state has
acquired a totalitarian-bureaucratic character"! This nonsense is understandable,
given the unwillingness to draw the obvious conclusion from the fact that the
bureaucracy was "compelled to defend State property as the source of its power
and its income. In this aspect of its activity it still remains a weapon of
proletarian dictatorship." [Op. Cit., p. 112, p. 107, p. 238 and
p. 236] By commanding nationalised property, the bureaucracy, like private
capitalists, could exploit the labour of the working class and did. That the
state owned the means of production did not stop this being a form of class system.
It is simply nonsense to claim, as Trotsky did, that the "anatomy of
society is determined by its economic relations. So long as the forms of property
that have been created by the October Revolution are not overthrown, the proletariat
remains the ruling class." [Writings of Leon Trotsky 1933-34, p. 125]
How could the proletariat be the "ruling class" if it were under the heel
of a totalitarian dictatorship? State ownership of property was precisely the means
by which the bureaucracy enforced its control over production and so the source of
its economic power and privileges. To state the obvious, if the working class does
not control the property it is claimed to own then someone else does. The economic
relationship thus generated is a hierarchical one, in which the working class is
an oppressed class.
Significantly, Trotsky combated those of his followers who drew the same conclusions
as had anarchists and libertarian Marxists while he and Lenin held the reigns of power.
Perhaps this ideological blindness is understandable, given Trotsky's key role in
creating the bureaucracy in the first place. So Trotsky did criticise, if in a
confused manner, the Stalinist regime for its "injustice, oppression, differential
consumption, and so on, even if he had supported them when he himself was in the elite."
[Neil C. Fernandez, Capitalism and Class Struggle in the USSR, p. 180]). Then
there is the awkward conclusion that if the bureaucracy were a ruling class under
Stalin then Russia was also state capitalist under Lenin and Trotsky for the economic
relations were identical in both (this obvious conclusion haunts those, like the
British SWP, who maintain that Stalinism was State Capitalist but not Bolshevism -
see section H.3.13). Suffice to say, if the state
itself can be the "economically dominant class" then the state cannot be a mere
instrument of an economic class.
Moreover, Engels also presented another analysis of the state which suggested
that it arose before economic classes appeared. In 1886 he wrote of
how society "creates for itself an organ for the safeguarding of its common
interests against internal and external attacks. This organ is the state power.
Hardly come into being, this organ makes itself independent vis-ŕ-vis
society: and, indeed, the more so, the more it becomes the organ of a particular
class, the more it directly enforces the supremacy of that class."
"Society", he argued four years later, "gives rise to certain common
function which it cannot dispense with. The persons appointed for this purpose
form a new branch of the division of labour within society. This gives
them particular interests, distinct, too, from the interests of those who
empowered them; they make themselves independent of the latter and - the state
is in being." [Op. Cit., p. 617 and pp. 685-6] In this schema, the
independence of the state comes first and is then captured by rising
economically powerful class.
Regardless of when and how the state arises, the key thing is that
Engels recognised that the state was "endowed with relative
independence." Rather than being a simple expression of economic
classes and their interests, this "new independent power, while
having in the main to follow the movement of production, reacts in
its turn, by virtue of its inherent relative independence - that is,
the relative independence once transferred to it and gradually further
developed - upon the conditions and course of production. It is the
interaction of two unequal forces: on the one hand, the economic
movement, on the other, the new political power, which strives for
as much independence as possible, and which, having once been
established, is endowed with a movement of its own." There were
three types of "reaction of the state power upon economic development."
The state can act "in the same direction" and then it is "more
rapid" or it can "oppose" it and "can do great damage to
the economic development." Finally, it can "prevent the economic
development proceeding along certain lines, and prescribe other lines."
Finally he stated "why do we fight for the political dictatorship
of the proletariat is political power is economically impotent? Force
(that is, state power) is also an economic power!" [Op. Cit.,
p. 686 and p. 689]
Conversely, anarchists reply, why fight for "the political dictatorship
of the proletariat" when you yourself admit that the state can become
"independent" of the classes you claim it represents? Particularly
when you increase its potential for becoming independent by centralising
it even more and giving it economic powers to complement its political ones!
So the Marxist theory of the state is that is an instrument of class rule -
except when it is not. Its origins lie in the rise of class antagonisms -
except when it does not. It arises after the break up of society into classes -
except when it does not. Which means, of course, the state is not
just an instrument of class rule and, correspondingly, the anarchist critique
is confirmed. This explains why the analysis of the "Asiatic Mode of
Production" is so woefully underdeveloped in Marx and Engels as well
as the confused and contradictory attempt to understand Bonapartism.
To summarise, if the state can become "independent" of economic
classes or even exist without an economically dominant class, then that
implies that it is no mere machine, no mere "instrument" of class
rule. It implies the anarchist argument that the state has interests of
its own, generated by its essential features and so, therefore, cannot
be used by a majority class as part of its struggle for liberation is
correct. Simply put, Anarchists have long "realised - feared - that
any State structure, whether or not socialist or based on universal
suffrage, has a certain independence from society, and so may serve
the interests of those within State institutions rather than the people
as a whole or the proletariat." [Brian Morris, Bakunin: The
Philosophy of Freedom, p. 134] Thus "the state certainly has
interests of its own . . . [,] acts to protect [them] . . . and
protects the interests of the bourgeoisie when these interests happen
to coincide with its own, as, indeed, they usually do." [Carter,
Op. Cit., p. 226]
As Mark Leier quips, Marxism "has usually - save when battling anarchists -
argued that the state has some 'relative autonomy' and is not a direct, simple
reflex of a given economic system." [Bakunin: The Constructive Passion,
p. 275] The reason why the more sophisticated Marxist analysis of the state is
forgotten when it comes to attacking anarchism should be obvious - it undermines
the both the Marxist critique of anarchism and its own theory of the state.
Ironically, arguments and warnings about the "independence" of the state
by Marxists imply that the state has interests of its own and cannot be considered
simply as an instrument of class rule. They suggest that the anarchist
analysis of the state is correct, namely that any structure based on delegated
power, centralisation and hierarchy must, inevitably, have a privileged class in
charge of it, a class whose position enables it to not only exploit and oppress
the rest of society but also to effectively escape from popular control and
accountability. This is no accident. The state is structured to enforce minority
rule and exclude the majority.
One of the most widespread myths associated with Marxism is the
idea that Marxism has consistently aimed to smash the current
(bourgeois) state and replace it by a "workers' state" based
on working class organisations created during a revolution.
This myth is sometimes expressed by those who should know
better (i.e. Marxists). According to John Rees (of the
British Socialist Workers Party) it has been a "cornerstone
of revolutionary theory" that "the soviet is a superior form
of democracy because it unifies political and economic power."
This "cornerstone" has, apparently, existed "since Marx's
writings on the Paris Commune." ["In Defence of October,",
pp. 3-82, International Socialism, no. 52, p. 25] In fact, nothing
could be further from the truth, as Marx's writings on the
Paris Commune prove beyond doubt.
The Paris Commune, as Marx himself noted, was "formed of the municipal
councillors, chosen by universal suffrage in the various wards of the
town." [Selected Works, p. 287] As Marx made clear,
it was definitely not based on delegates from workplaces
and so could not unify political and economic power.
Indeed, to state that the Paris Commune was a soviet is
simply a joke, as is the claim that Marxists supported
soviets as revolutionary organs to smash and replace
the state from 1871. In fact Marxists did not subscribe
to this "cornerstone of revolutionary theory" until 1917
when Lenin argued that the Soviets would be the best means
of ensuring a Bolshevik government. Which explains why
Lenin's use of the slogan "All Power to the Soviets" and
call for the destruction of the bourgeois state came as
such a shock to his fellow Marxists. Unsurprisingly, given
the long legacy of anarchist calls to smash the state and
their vision of a socialist society built from below by
workers councils, many Marxists called Lenin an anarchist!
Therefore, the idea that Marxists have always supported
workers councils' is untrue and any attempt to push this
support back to 1871 simply a farcical.
Not all Marxists are as ignorant of their political tradition
as Rees. As his fellow party member Chris Harman recognised,
"[e]ven the 1905 [Russian] revolution gave only the most
embryonic expression of how a workers' state would in fact
be organised. The fundamental forms of workers' power - the
soviets (workers' councils) - were not recognised." It was
"[n]ot until the February revolution [of 1917 that] soviets
became central in Lenin's writings and thought." [Party and
Class, p. 18 and p. 19] Before then, Marxists had held the
position, to quote Karl Kautsky from 1909 (who is, in turn, quoting
his own words from 1893), that the democratic republic "was
the particular form of government in which alone socialism can be
realised." He added, after the Russian Revolution, that "not
a single Marxist revolutionary repudiated me, neither Rosa Luxemburg
nor Klara Zetkin, neither Lenin nor Trotsky." [The Road to
Power, p. 34 and p. xlviii]
Lenin himself, even after Social Democracy supported their respective
states in the First World War and before his return to Russia, still
argued that Kautsky's work contained "a most complete exposition of
the tasks of our times" and "it was most advantageous to the
German Social-Democrats (in the sense of the promise they held out),
and moreover came from the pen of the most eminent writer of the Second
International . . . Social-Democracy . . . wants conquest of political
power by the proletariat, the dictatorship of the proletariat."
[Collected Works, vol. 21, p. 94] There was no hint that Marxism
stood for anything other than seizing power in a republic, as expounded
by the likes of Kautsky.
Before continuing it should be stressed that Harman's summary
is correct only if we are talking about the Marxist movement.
Looking at the wider revolutionary movement, two groups definitely
recognised the importance of the soviets as a form of working class
power and as the framework of a socialist society. These were the
anarchists and the Social-Revolutionary Maximalists, both of whom
"espoused views that corresponded almost word for word with
Lenin's April 1917 program of 'All power to the soviets.'"
The "aims of the revolutionary far left in 1905" Lenin
"combined in his call for soviet power [in 1917], when he
apparently assimilated the anarchist program to secure the support
of the masses for the Bolsheviks." [Oskar Anweiler, The
Soviets, p. 94 and p. 96]
So before 1917, when Lenin claimed to have discovered what had
eluded all the previous followers of Marx and Engels (including
himself!), it was only anarchists (or those close to them such
as the SR-Maximalists) who argued that the future socialist
society would be structurally based around the organs working
class people themselves created in the process of the class
struggle and revolution. For example, the syndicalists "regarded
the soviets . . . as admirable versions of the bourses du
travail, but with a revolutionary function added to suit
Russian conditions. Open to all leftist workers regardless of
specific political affiliation, the soviets were to act as
nonpartisan labour councils improvised 'from below' . . . with
the aim of bringing down the old regime." The anarchists
of Khleb i Volia "also likened the 1905 Petersburg
Soviet - as a non-party mass organisation - to the central
committee of the Paris Commune of 1871." [Paul Avrich,
The Russian Anarchists, pp. 80-1] In 1907, it was
concluded that the revolution required "the proclamation
in villages and towns of workers' communes with soviets of
workers' deputies . . . at their head." [quoted by Alexandre
Skirda, Facing the Enemy, p. 77] These ideas can be traced
back to Bakunin, so, ironically, the idea of the superiority of
workers' councils has existed from around the time of the
Paris Commune, but only in anarchist theory.
So, if Marxists did not support workers' councils until
1917, what did Marxists argue should be the framework
of a socialist society before this date? To discover this,
we must look to Marx and Engels. Once we do, we discover
that their works suggest that their vision of socialist
transformation was fundamentally based on the bourgeois
state, suitably modified and democratised to achieve this
task. As such, rather than present the true account of the
Marxist theory of the state Lenin interpreted various
inexact and ambiguous statements by Marx and Engels
(particularly from Marx's defence of the Paris Commune) to
justify his own actions in 1917. Whether his 1917 revision
of Marxism in favour of workers' councils as the means to
socialism is in keeping with the spirit of Marx is
another matter of course. For the Socialist Party of Great
Britain and its sister parties, Lenin violated both the letter
and the spirit of Marx and they stress his arguments in
favour of utilising universal suffrage to introduce socialism
(indeed, their analysis of Marx and critique of Lenin is
substantially the same as the one presented here). For the
council communists, who embraced the idea of workers' councils
but broke with the Bolsheviks over the issue of whether the
councils or the party had power, Lenin's analysis, while flawed
in parts, is in the general spirit of Marx and they stress the
need to smash the state and replace it with workers' councils.
In this, they express the best in Marx. When faced with the
Paris Commune and its libertarian influences he embraced it,
distancing himself (for a while at least) with many of
his previous ideas.
So what was the original (orthodox) Marxist position?
It can be seen from Lenin who, as late December 1916
argued that "Socialists are in favour of utilising the
present state and its institutions in the struggle for
the emancipation of the working class, maintaining also
that the state should be used for a specific form of
transition from capitalism to socialism." Lenin attacked
Bukharin for "erroneously ascribing this [the anarchist]
view to the socialist" when he had stated socialists
wanted to "abolish" the state or "blow it up." He
called this "transitional form" the dictatorship of the
proletariat, "which is also a state." [Collected
Works, vol. 23, p. 165] In other words, the socialist
party would aim to seize power within the existing republican
state and, after making suitable modifications to it, use it
to create socialism.
That this position was the orthodox one is hardly surprising,
given the actual comments of both Marx and Engels. For example
Engels argued in April 1883 while he and Marx saw "the gradual
dissolution and ultimate disappearance of that political
organisation called the State" as "one of
the final results of the future revolution," they "at
the same time . . . have always held that . . . the proletarian
class will first have to possess itself of the organised political
force of the State and with its aid stamp out the resistance
of the Capitalist class and re-organise society." The idea
that the proletariat needs to "possess" the existing state
is made clear when he notes that the anarchists "reverse
the matter" by advocating that the revolution "has to
begin by abolishing the political organisation of the
State." For Marxists "the only organisation the victorious
working class finds ready-made for use, is that of the State.
It may require adaptation to the new functions. But to destroy
that at such a moment, would be to destroy the only organism
by means of which the working class can exert its newly conquered
power." [our emphasis, Op. Cit., vol. 47, p. 10]
Obviously the only institution which the working class "finds
ready-made for use" is the democratic (i.e., bourgeois) state,
although, as Engels stressed, it "may require adaptation." In
Engels 1871 introduction to Marx's "The Civil War in France",
this analysis is repeated when Engels asserted that the state "is
nothing but a machine for the oppression of one class by another"
and that it is "at best an evil inherited by the proletariat after
its victorious struggle for class supremacy, whose worst sides the
victorious proletariat, just like the Commune, cannot avoid having
to lop off at once as much as possible." [Selected Works,
p. 258]
If the proletariat creates a new state to replace the
bourgeois one, then how can it be "ready-made for use" and
"an evil inherited" by it? If, as Lenin argued, Marx and
Engels thought that the working class had to smash the bourgeois
state and replace it with a new one, why would it have "to lop
off at once as much as possible" from the state it had just
"inherited"?
Three years later, Engels made his position clear: "With respect
to the proletariat the republic differs from the monarchy only in
that it is the ready-for-use form for the future rule of the
proletariat." He went on to state that the French socialists
"are at an advantage compared to us in already having it" and
warned against "baseless" illusions such as seeking to "entrust
socialist tasks to it while it is dominated by the bourgeoisie."
[Marx and Engels, The Socialist Revolution, p. 296] This was,
significantly, simply repeating Engels 1891 argument from his critique
of the draft of the Erfurt program of the German Social Democrats:
"If one thing is certain it is that our Party and the working
class can only come to power under the form of a democratic
republic. This is even the specific form for the dictatorship
of the proletariat, as the Great French Revolution has already
shown." [Collected Works, vol. 27, p. 227]
Clearly Engels does not speak of a "commune-republic" or anything
close to a soviet republic, as expressed in Bakunin's work or the
libertarian wing of the First International with their ideas of a
"trade-union republic" or a free federation of workers' associations.
Clearly and explicitly he speaks of the democratic republic, the
current state ("an evil inherited by the proletariat") which
is to be seized and transformed.
Unsurprisingly, when Lenin came to quote this passage in State
and Revolution he immediately tried to obscure its meaning.
"Engels," he wrote, "repeated here in a particularly striking
form the fundamental idea which runs through all of Marx's work, namely,
that the democratic republic is the nearest approach to the dictatorship
of the proletariat." [The Lenin Anthology, p. 360] However,
obviously Engels did nothing of the kind. He did not speak of the political
form which "is the nearest approach" to the dictatorship, rather
he wrote only of "the specific form" of the dictatorship, the
"only" form in which "our Party" can come to power.
Hal Draper, likewise, denied that Engels meant what he clearly wrote,
arguing that he really meant the Paris Commune. "Because of
the expression 'great French revolution,'" Draper asserted,
"the assumption has often been made that Engels meant the French
Revolution of 1789; but the idea that he, or anyone else, could
view 1789 (or 1793) as a 'dictatorship of the proletariat' is too
absurd to entertain." [The 'dictatorship of the proletariat'
from Marx to Lenin, p. 37fn]
Yet, contextually, no evidence exists to support such a claim and what
does disputes it - Engels discusses French history and makes no mention
of the Commune but does mention the republic of 1792 to 1799
(significantly, Lenin makes no attempt to suggest that Engels meant
the Paris Commune or anything else bar a democratic republic). In
fact, Engels goes on to argue that "[f]rom 1792 to 1799 each
French department, each commune, enjoyed complete self-government
on the American model, and this is what we too must have. How
self-government is to be organised and how we can manage without
a bureaucracy has been shown to us by America and the first French
Republic." Significantly, Engels was explicitly discussing
the need for a "republican party programme", commenting that
it would be impossible for "our best people to become ministers"
under an Emperor and arguing that, in Germany at the time, they could
not call for a republic and had to raise the "demand for the
concentration of all political power in the hands of the people's
representatives." Engels stressed that "the proletariat
can only use the form of the one and indivisible republic" with
"self-government" meaning "officials elected by universal
suffrage". [Op. Cit., pp. 227-9]
Clearly, the "assumption" Draper denounced makes more sense than
his own or Lenin's. This is particularly the case when it is clear that
both Marx and Engels viewed the French Republic under the Jacobins as
a situation where the proletariat held political power (although, like
Marx with the Paris Commune, they do not use the term "dictatorship of
the proletariat" to describe it). Engels wrote of "the rule of the
Mountain party" as being "the short time when the proletariat was
at the helm of the state in the French Revolution" and "from
May 31, 1793 to July 26, 1794 . . . not a single bourgeois dared show
his face in the whole of France." Marx, similarly, wrote of this period
as one in which "the proletariat overthrows the political rule of the
bourgeoisie" but due to the "material conditions" its acts were
"in service" of the bourgeois revolution. The "bloody action of
the people" only "prepared the way for" the bourgeoisie by
destroying feudalism, something which the bourgeoisie was not capable of.
[Op. Cit., vol. 6, p. 373, p. 5 and p. 319]
Apparently Engels did not consider it "too absurd to entertain"
that the French Republic of 1793 was "a 'dictatorship of the
proletariat'" and, ironically, Draper's "anyone else" turned
out to be Marx! Moreover, this was well known in Marxist circles long before
Draper made his assertion. Julius Martov (for example) after quoting Marx on
this issue summarised that, for Marx and Engels, the "Reign of Terror
in France was the momentary domination of the democratic petty bourgeoisie
and the proletariat over all the possessing classes, including the authentic
bourgeoisie." [The State and Socialist Revolution, p. 51]
Similarly, Lenin quoted Engels on the proletariat seizing "state power"
and nationalising the means of production, an act by which it "abolishes
itself as proletariat" and "abolishes the state as state."
Significantly, it is Lenin who has to write that "Engels speaks
here of the proletarian revolution 'abolishing' the bourgeois state,
while the words about the state withering away refer to the remnants of
the proletariat state after the socialist revolution."
Yet Engels himself makes no such differentiation and talks purely of
"the state" and it "becom[ing] the real representative of
the whole of society" by "taking possession of the means of
production in the name of society." Perhaps Lenin was right and Engels
really meant two different states but, sadly, he failed to make that point
explicitly, so allowing Marxism, to use Lenin's words, to be subjected to
"the crudest distortion" by its followers, "prune[d]" and
"reduc[ed] . . . to opportunism." [Op. Cit., pp. 320-2]
Then there are Engels 1887 comments that in the USA the workers "next
step towards their deliverance" was "the formation of a political
workingmen's party, with a platform of its own, and the conquest of the
Capitol and the White House for its goal." This new party "like
all political parties everywhere . . . aspires to the conquest of political
power." Engels then discusses the "electoral battle" going on in
America. [Marx and Engels, Collected Works, vol. 26, p. 435 and
p. 437] Significantly, 40 years previously in 1847, Engels had argued
that the revolution "will establish a democratic constitution,
and through this, the direct . . . dominance of the proletariat" where
"the proletarians are already a majority of the people." He noted
that "a democratic constitution has been introduced" in America.
[Op. Cit., vol. 6, p. 350 and p. 356] The continuity is significant,
particularly as these identical arguments come before and after the Paris
Commune of 1871.
This was no isolated statement. Engels had argued along the same lines
(and, likewise, echoed early statements) as regards Britain in 1881,
"where the industrial and agricultural working class forms the
immense majority of the people, democracy means the dominion of the
working class, neither more nor less. Let, then, that working class
prepare itself for the task in store for it - the ruling of this great
Empire . . . And the best way to do this is to use the power already in
their hands, the actual majority they possess . . . to send to Parliament
men of their own order." In case this was not clear enough, he lamented
that "[e]verywhere the labourer struggles for political power, for direct
representation of his class in the legislature - everywhere but in Great
Britain." [Op. Cit., vol. 24, p. 405] For Engels:
"In every struggle of class against class, the next end fought for is
political power; the ruling class defends its political supremacy, that
is to say its safe majority in the Legislature; the inferior class fights
for, first a share, then the whole of that power, in order to become
enabled to change existing laws in conformity with their own interests
and requirements. Thus the working class of Great Britain for years
fought ardently and even violently for the People's Charter [which
demanded universal suffrage and yearly general elections], which was
to give it that political power." [Op. Cit., p. 386]
The 1st of May, 1893, saw Engels argue that the task of the British working
class was not only to pursue economic struggles "but above all in
winning political rights, parliament, through the working class
organised into an independent party" (significantly, the original
manuscript stated "but in winning parliament, the political power").
He went on to state that the 1892 general election saw the workers
give a "taste of their power, hitherto unexerted." [Op. Cit.,
vol. 27, p. 395] This, significantly, is in line with his 1870 comment
that in Britain "the bourgeoisie could only get its real representative
. . . into government only by extension of the franchise, whose
consequences are bound to put an end to all bourgeois rule."
[Selected Works, p. 238]
Marx seems to see voting for a government as being the same as political
power as the "fundamental contradiction" of a democracy under
capitalism is that the classes "whose social slavery the constitution
is to perpetuate" it "puts in possession of political power through
universal suffrage." [Collected Works, vol. 10, p. 79] For Engels
in 1847, "democracy has as its necessary consequence the political rule of
the proletariat." Universal suffrage would "make political power pass
from the middle class to the working class" and so "the democratic
movement" is "striving for the political domination of the proletariat."
[Op. Cit., vol. 7, p. 299, p. 440 and p. 368] As noted in
section H.3.9, Marx concluded that Bonaparte's
coup ended the political power of the bourgeoisie and, for Engels, "the whole
bourgeoisie ruled, but for three years only" during the Second French
Republic of 1848-51. Significantly, during the previous regime of Louis-Philippe
(1830-48) "a very small portion of the bourgeois ruled the kingdom"
as "by far the larger part were excluded from the suffrage by high
[property] qualifications." [Op. Cit., vol. 27, p. 297]
All of which, of course, fits into Marx's account of the Paris
Commune where, as noted above, the Commune "was formed of
the municipal councillors" who had been "chosen by universal
suffrage in the various wards of the town" in the municipal
elections held on March 26th, 1871. Once voted into office, the
Commune then smashed the state machine inherited by it, recognising
that "the working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made
state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes." The
"first decree of the Commune . . . was the suppression of the
standing army, and the substitution for it of the armed people."
Thus the Commune lops off one of the "ubiquitous organs"
associated with the "centralised State power" once it had
inherited the state via elections. [Selected Works, p. 287,
p. 285, p. 287 and p. 285] Indeed, this is precisely what was
meant, as confirmed by Engels in a letter written in 1884 clarifying
what Marx meant:
"It is simply a question of showing that the victorious proletariat must
first refashion the old bureaucratic, administrative centralised state
power before it can use it for its own purposes: whereas all bourgeois
republicans since 1848 inveighed against this machinery so long as they
were in the opposition, but once they were in the government they took it
over without altering it and used it partly against the reaction but still
more against the proletariat." [Collected Works, vol. 47, p. 74]
Interestingly, in the second outline of the Civil War in France, Marx
used words almost identical to Engels latter explanation:
"But the proletariat cannot, as the ruling classes and their different
rival fractions have done in the successive hours of their triumph, simply
lay hold on the existent State body and wield this ready-made agency for
their own purpose. The first condition for the holding of political power,
is to transform its working machinery and destroy it as an instrument
of class rule." [our emphasis, Collected Works, vol. 22, p. 533]
It is, of course, true that Marx expressed in his defence of the Commune
the opinion that new "Communal Constitution" was to become a
"reality by the destruction of the State power" yet he immediately
argues that "the merely repressive organs of the old government power
were to be amputated" and "its legitimate functions were to be
wrestles from" it and "restored to the responsible agents of society."
[Selected Works, pp. 288-9] This corresponds to Engels arguments
about removing aspects from the state inherited by the proletariat
and signifies the "destruction" of the state machinery (its
bureaucratic-military aspects) rather than the republic itself.
In other words, Lenin was right to state that "Marx's idea is that the
working class must break up, smash the 'ready-made state machinery,'
and not confine itself to merely laying hold of it." This was never
denied by thinkers like Karl Kautsky, rather they stressed that for Marx
and Engels universal suffrage was the means by which political power would
be seized (at least in a republic) while violent revolution would be the
means to create a republic and to defend it against attempts to restore
the old order. As Engels put it in 1886, Marx had drawn "the conclusion
that, at least in Europe, England is the only country where the inevitable
social revolution might be effected entirely by peaceful and legal means.
He certainly never forgot to add that he hardly expected the English ruling
classes to submit, without a 'pro-slavery rebellion,' to this peaceful and
legal revolution." ["Preface to the English edition" in Marx,
Capital, vol. 1, p. 113] Thus Kautsky stressed that the abolition
of the standing army was "absolutely necessary if the state is to be
able to carry out significant social reforms" once the party of the
proletariat was in a position to "control legislation." This would
mean "the most complete democracy, a militia system" after, echoing
the Communist Manifesto, "the conquest of democracy" had been
achieved. [The Road to Power, p. 69, p. 70 and p. 72]
Essentially, then, Lenin was utilising a confusion between smashing the
state and smashing the state machine once the workers' party had achieved
a majority within a democratic republic. In other words, Lenin was wrong
to assert that "this lesson . . . had not only been completely ignored,
but positively distorted by the prevailing, Kautskyite, 'interpretation' of
Marxism." As we have proved "the false notion that universal suffrage
'in the present-day state' is really capable of revealing the will of
the majority of the working people and of securing its realisation" was
not invented by the "petty-bourgeois democrats" nor "the
social-chauvinists and opportunists." It can be found repeatedly in the
works of Engels and Marx themselves and so "Engels's perfectly clear,
concise and concrete statement is distorted at every step" not only
"at every step in the propaganda and agitation of the 'official' (i.e.,
opportunist) socialist parties" but also by Engels himself! [Op. Cit.
p. 336 and pp. 319-20]
Significantly, we find Marx recounting in 1852 how the "executive power
with its enormous bureaucratic and military organisation, with its
wide-ranging and ingenious state machinery . . . sprang up in the days
of the absolute monarchy, with the decay of the feudal system which it had
helped to hasten." After 1848, "in its struggle against the revolution,
the parliamentary republic found itself compelled to strengthen, along with
the repressive, the resources and centralisation of governmental power. All
revolutions perfected this machine instead of smashing it. The parties
that contended in turn for domination regarded the possession of this huge
state edifice as the principal spoils of the victor." However, "under
the absolute monarchy, during the first Revolution, under Napoleon,
bureaucracy was only the means of preparing the class rule of the bourgeoisie.
Under the Restoration, under Louis Philippe, under the parliamentary republic,
it was the instrument of the ruling class, however much it strove for power of
its own." It was "[o]nly under the second Bonaparte does the state
seem to have made itself completely independent." [Selected Works,
pp. 169-70]
This analysis is repeated in The Civil War in France, except the
expression "the State power" is used as an equivalent to the
"state machinery." Again, the state machine/power is portrayed
as coming into existence before the republic: "The centralised
state power, with its ubiquitous organs of standing army, police,
bureaucracy, clergy, and judicature . . . originates from the days of
absolute monarchy." Again, the "bourgeois republicans . . . took
the state power" and used it to repress the working class. Again,
Marx called for "the destruction of the state power" and noted
that the Commune abolished the standing army, the privileged role of
the clergy, and so on. The Commune's "very existence presupposed
the non-existence of monarchy, which, in Europe at least, is the normal
encumbrance and indispensable cloak of class rule. It supplied the
republic with the basis of really democratic institutions."
[Op. Cit. p. 285, p. 286, p. 288 and p. 290]
Obviously, then, what the socialist revolution had to smash existed
before the republican state was created and was an inheritance
of pre-bourgeois rule (even if the bourgeoisie utilised it for its
own ends). How this machine was to be smashed was left unspecified but
given that it was not identical to the "parliamentary republic"
Marx's arguments cannot be taken as evidence that the democratic state
needed to be smashed or destroyed rather than seized by means of universal
suffrage (and reformed appropriately, by "smashing" the "state
machinery" as well as including recall of representatives and the
combining of administrative and legislative tasks into their hands).
Clearly, Lenin's attempt to equate the "parliamentary republic"
with the "state machinery" cannot be supported in Marx's account.
At best, it could be argued that it is the spirit of Marx's analysis,
perhaps bringing it up to date. However, this was not Lenin's
position (he maintained that social democracy had hidden Marx's clear
call to smash the bourgeois democratic state).
Unsurprisingly, Lenin does not discuss the numerous quotes by Marx and Engels
on this matter which clearly contradict his thesis. Nor mention that in 1871,
a few months after the Commune, Marx argued that in Britain, "the way to show
[i.e., manifest] political power lies open to the working class. Insurrection
would be madness where peaceful agitation would more swiftly and surely do
the work." [Collected Works, vol. 22, p. 602] The following year,
saw him suggest that America could join it as "the workers can achieve their
aims by peaceful means" there as well [Op. Cit., vol. 23, p. 255]
How if Marx had concluded that the capitalist state had to be destroyed
rather than captured and refashioned then he quickly changed his mind! In fact,
during the Commune itself, in April 1871, Marx had written to his friend
Ludwig Kugelman "[i]f you look at the last chapter of my Eighteenth
Brumaire you will find that I say that the next attempt of the French
revolution will be no longer, as before, to transfer the bureaucratic military
machine from one hand to another, but to break it, and that is essential for
every real people’s revolution on the Continent. And this is what our heroic
Party [sic!] comrades in Paris are attempting." [Op. Cit., vol. 44,
p. 131] As noted above, Marx explicitly noted that the bureaucratic military
machine predated the republic and was, in effect, inherited by it.
Lenin did note that Marx "restricts his conclusion to the Continent"
on the issue of smashing the state machine, but does not list an obvious
factor, that the UK approximated universal suffrage, in why this was the
case (thus Lenin did not note that Engels, in 1891, added "democratic
republics like France" to the list of states where "the old society
may peacefully evolve into the new." [Op. Cit., vol. 27, p. 226]).
In 1917, Lenin argued, "this restriction" was "no longer valid"
as both Britain and America had "completely sunk into the all-European
filthy, bloody morass of bureaucratic-military institutions." [Op.
Cit., pp. 336-7] Subsequently, he repeated this claim in his polemic
against Karl Kautsky, stating that notions that reforming the state were
now out of date because of "the existence of militarism and a
bureaucracy" which "were non-existent in Britain and
America" in the 1870s. He pointed to how "the most democratic and
republican bourgeoisie in America . . . deal with workers on strike"
as further proof of his position. [Collected Works, vol. 28, p. 238
and p. 244] However, this does not impact on the question of whether
universal suffrage could be utilised in order to be in a position to
smash this state machine or not. Equally, Lenin failed to acknowledge
the violent repression of strikes in the 1870s and 1880s in America
(such as the Great Upheaval of 1877 or the crushing of the 8 hour day
movement after the Haymarket police riot of 1886). As Martov argued
correctly:
"The theoretic possibility [of peaceful reform] has not revealed itself in
reality. But the sole fact that he admitted such a possibility shows us
clearly Marx’s opinion, leaving no room for arbitrary interpretation.
What Marx designated as the 'destruction of the State machine' . . .
was the destruction of the military and bureaucratic apparatus that
the bourgeois democracy had inherited from the monarchy and perfected
in the process of consolidating the rule of the bourgeois class. There
is nothing in Marx’s reasoning that even suggests the destruction of
the State organisation as such and the replacement of the State
during the revolutionary period, that is during the dictatorship of
the proletariat, with a social bond formed on a principle opposed
to that of the State. Marx and Engels foresaw such a substitution
only at the end of a process of 'a progressive withering away' of
the State and all the functions of social coercion. They foresaw
this atrophy of the State and the functions of social coercion to
be the result of the prolonged existence of the socialist regime."
[Op. Cit., p. 31]
It should also be remembered that Marx's comments on smashing the state
machine were made in response to developments in France, a regime
that Marx and Engels viewed as not being purely bourgeois. Marx
notes in his account of the Commune how, in France, "[p]eculiar
historical circumstances" had "prevented the classical development
. . . of the bourgeois form of government." [Selected Works,
p. 289] For Engels, Proudhon "confuses the French Bureaucratic government
with the normal state of a bourgeoisie that rules both itself and the
proletariat." [Collected Works, vol. 11, p. 548] In the 1870s,
Marx considered Holland, Britain and the USA to have "the genuine
capitalist state." [Op. Cit., vol. 24, p. 499] Significantly,
it was precisely these states in which Marx had previously stated a
peaceful revolution could occur:
"We know that the institutions, customs and traditions in the different
countries must be taken into account; and we do not deny the existence
of countries like America, England, and if I knew your institutions
better I might add Holland, where the workers may achieve their aims
by peaceful means. That being the true, we must admit that in most
countries on the continent it is force which must be the lever of
our revolution; it is force which will have to be resorted to for a
time in order to establish the rule of the workers." [Op. Cit.,
vol. 23, p. 255]
Interestingly, in 1886, Engels expanded on Marx's speculation as regards
Holland and confirmed it. Holland, he argued, as well as "a residue of
local and provincial self-government" also had "an absence of any
real bureaucracy in the French or Prussian sense" because, alone in
Western Europe, it did not have an "absolute monarchy" between the
16th and 18th century. This meant that "only a few changes will have to
be made to establish that free self-government by the working [people]
which will necessarily be our best tool in the organisation of the mode
of production." [Op. Cit., vol. 47, pp. 397-8] Few would argue
that smashing the state and its replacement with a new workers' one would
really constitute a "few changes"! However, Engels position does fit
in with the notion that the "state machine" to be smashed is a legacy
of absolute monarchy rather than the state structure of a bourgeois democratic
republic. It also shows the nature of a Marxist revolution in a republic, in
a "genuine capitalist state" of the type Marx and Engels expected to
be the result of the first stage of any revolt.
The source of Lenin's restatement of the Marxist theory of the state which came
as such a shock to so many Marxists can be found in the nature of the Paris
Commune. After all, the major influence in terms of "political vision"
of the Commune was anarchism. The "rough sketch of national organisation
which the Commune had no time to develop" which Marx praises but does not
quote was written by a follower of Proudhon. [Selected Works, p. 288]
It expounded a clearly federalist and "bottom-up" organisational
structure. It clearly implied "the destruction of the State power"
rather than seeking to "inherit" it. Based on this libertarian revolt,
it is unsurprising that Marx's defence of it took on a libertarian twist.
As noted by Bakunin, who argued that its "general effect was so striking
that the Marxists themselves, who saw their ideas upset by the uprising, found
themselves compelled to take their hats off to it. They went further, and
proclaimed that its programme and purpose where their own, in face of the
simplest logic . . . This was a truly farcical change of costume, but they
were bound to make it, for fear of being overtaken and left behind in the
wave of feeling which the rising produced throughout the world."
[Michael Bakunin: Selected Writings, p. 261]
The nature of The Civil War in France and the circumstances in
which it was written explains why. Marx, while publicly opposing any
kind of revolt before hand, did support the Commune once it began. His
essay is primarily a propaganda piece in defence of it and is,
fundamentally, reporting on what the Commune actually did and advocated.
Thus, as well as reporting the Communal Constitution's vision of a
federation of communes, we find Marx noting, also without comment,
that Commune decreed "the surrender to associations of workmen, under
reserve of compensation, of all closed workshops and factories."
[Op. Cit., p. 294] While Engels, at times, suggested that this
could be a possible policy for a socialist government, it is fair to
say that few Marxists consider Marx's reporting of this particular
aspect of the Commune as being a key aspect of his ideology. As Marx's
account reports on the facts of the Commune it could hardly not
reflect the libertarian ideas which were so strong in both it and the
French sections of the International - ideas he had spent much time
and energy opposing. Moreover, given the frenzy of abuse the Communards
were subject to it by the bourgeoisie, it was unlikely that Marx would
have aided the reaction by being overly critical. Equally, given how
positively the Commune had been received in working class and radical
circles Marx would have been keen to gain maximum benefit from it
for both the International and his own ideology and influence.
This would also have ensured that Marx kept his criticisms quiet,
particularly as he was writing on behalf of an organisation which was
not Marxist and included various different socialist tendencies.
This means that to fully understand Marx and Engels, we need to look at
all their writings, before and after the Paris Commune. It is,
therefore, significant that immediately after the Commune Marx
stated that workers could achieve socialism by utilising existing
democratic states and that the labour movement should take part
in political action and send workers to Parliament. There is no mention
of a federation of communes in these proposals and they reflect ideas
both he and Engels had expressed since the 1840s. Ten years after the
Commune, Marx stated that it was "merely an uprising of one city in
exceptional circumstances. [Collected Works, vol. 46, p. 66]
Similarly, a mere 3 years after the Commune, Engels argued that the
key thing in Britain was "to form anew a strong workers' party with
a definite programme, and the best political programme they could wish
for was the People's Charter." [Op. Cit., vol. 23, p. 614]
The Commune was not mentioned and, significantly, Marx had previously
defined this programme in 1855 as being "to increase and extend the
omnipotence of Parliament by elevating it to people’s power. They [the
Chartists] are not breaking up parliamentarism but are raising it to a
higher power." [Op. Cit., vol. 14, p. 243]
As such, Marx's defence of the Commune should not mean ignoring the
whole body of his and Engels work, nor should Marx's conclusion that the
"state machinery" must be smashed in a successful revolution be
considered to be in contradiction with his comments on utilising the
existing democratic republic. It does, however, suggest that Marx's
reporting of the Proudhon-influenced ideas of the Communards cannot
be taken as a definitive account of his ideas on social transformation.
The fact that Marx did not mention anything about abolishing the
existing state and replacing it with a new one in his contribution to
the "Program of the French Workers Party" in 1880 is significant.
It said that the "collective appropriation" of the means of production
"can only proceed from a revolutionary action of the class of producers -
the proletariat - organised in an independent political party." This
would be "pursued by all the means the proletariat has at its disposal
including universal suffrage which will thus be transformed from the
instrument of deception that it has been until now into an instrument of
emancipation." [Op. Cit., vol. 24, p. 340] There is
nothing about overthrowing the existing state and replacing it with a
new state, rather the obvious conclusion which is to be drawn is that
universal suffrage was the tool by which the workers would achieve
socialism. It does fit in, however, with Marx's repeated comments that
universal suffrage was the equivalent of political power for the working
class where the proletariat was the majority of the population. Or, indeed,
Engels numerous similar comments. It explains the repeated suggestion by
Marx that there were countries like America and Britain "where the
workers can achieve their aims by peaceful means." There is Engels:
"One can imagine that the old society could peacefully grow into
the new in countries where all power is concentrated in the people's
representatives, where one can constitutionally do as one pleases as
soon as a majority of the people give their support; in democratic
republics like France and America, in monarchies such as England,
where the dynasty is powerless against the popular will. But in
Germany, where the government is virtually all-powerful and the
Reichstag and other representative bodies are without real power,
to proclaim likewise in Germany . . . is to accept the fig leaf of
absolutism and to bind oneself to it." [Op. Cit., vol. 27,
p. 226]
This, significantly, repeats Marx's comments in an unpublished article
from 1878 on the Reichstag debates on the anti-socialist laws where,
in part, he suggested that "[i]f in England . . . or the United States,
the working class were to gain a majority in Parliament or Congress,
they could by lawful means, rid themselves of such laws and institutions
as impeded their development . . . However, the 'peaceful' movement might
be transformed into a 'forcible' one by resistance on the part of those
interested in restoring the former state of affairs; if . . . they
are put down by force, it is as rebels against 'lawful' force."
[Op. Cit., vol. 24, p. 248] Sadly, he never finished and published
it but it is in line with many of his public pronouncements on this
subject.
Marx also excluded countries on the European mainland (with the
possible exception of Holland) from his suggestions of peaceful
reform. In those countries, presumably, the first stage of the
revolution would be, as stressed in the Communist Manifesto,
creating a fully democratic republic ("to win the battle for
democracy" - see section H.1.1).
As Engels put it, "the first and direct result of the revolution
with regard to the form can and must be nothing but
the bourgeois republic. But this will be here only a brief
transitional period . . . The bourgeois republic . . . will enable
us to win over the great masses of the workers to revolutionary
socialism . . . Only them can we successfully take over."
The "proletariat can only use the form of the one and indivisible
republic" for it is "the sole political form in which the
struggle between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie can be fought
to a finish." [Marx and Engels, The Socialist Revolution,
p. 265, p. 283 and p. 294] As he summarised:
"Marx and I, for forty years, repeated ad nauseam that for us the
democratic republic is the only political form in which the struggle
between the working class and the capitalist class can first be
universalised and then culminate in the decisive victory of the
proletariat." [Collected Works, vol. 27, p. 271]
It is for these reasons that orthodox Marxism up until 1917 held the
position that the socialist revolution would be commenced by seizing
the existing state (usually by the ballot box, or by insurrection if
that was impossible). Martov in his discussion of Lenin's "discovery"
of the "real" Marxist theory on the state (in State and Revolution)
stressed that the idea that the state should be smashed by the workers
who would then "transplant into the structure of society the forms
of their own combat organisations" was a libertarian idea,
alien to Marx and Engels. While acknowledging that "in our time,
working people take to 'the idea of the soviets' after knowing them
as combat organisations formed in the process of the class struggle
at a sharp revolutionary stage," he distanced Marx and Engels
quite successfully from such a position. [Op. Cit., p. 42] As
such, he makes a valid contribution to Marxism and presents a necessary
counter-argument to Lenin's claims (at which point, we are sure, nine
out of ten Leninists will dismiss our argument regardless of how well
it explains apparent contradictions in Marx and Engels or how much
evidence can be presented in support of it!).
This position should not be confused with a totally reformist position, as
social-democracy became. Marx and Engels were well aware that a revolution
would be needed to create and defend a republic. Engels, for example,
noted "how totally mistaken is the belief that a republic, and not only
a republic, but also a communist society, can be established in a cosy,
peaceful way." Thus violent revolution was required to create a republic
- Marx and Engels were revolutionaries, after all. Within a republic, both
recognised that insurrection would be required to defend democratic
government against attempts by the capitalist class to maintain its
economic position. Universal suffrage was, to quote Engels, "a splendid
weapon" which, while "slower and more boring than the call to revolution",
was "ten times more sure and what is even better, it indicates with the most
perfect accuracy the day when a call to armed revolution has to be made."
This was because it was "even ten to one that universal suffrage, intelligently
used by the workers, will drive the rulers to overthrow legality, that is, to
put us in the most favourable position to make revolution." "The big
mistake", Engels argued, was "to think that the revolution is something
that can be made overnight. As a matter of fact it is a process of development
of the masses that takes several years even under conditions accelerating this
process." Thus it was a case of, "as a revolutionary, any means which
leads to the goal is suitable, including the most violent and the most pacific."
[Marx and Engels, The Socialist Revolution, p. 283, p. 189, p. 265 and p. 274]
However, over time and as social democratic parties and universal suffrage spread,
the emphasis did change from insurrection (the Communist Manifesto's
"violent overthrow of the bourgeoisie") to Engels last pronouncement
that "the conditions of struggle had essentially changed. Rebellion in the
old style, street fighting with barricades . . . , was to a considerable extent
obsolete." [Selected Works, p. 45 and pp. 653-4]
Obviously, neither Marx nor Engels (unlike Bakunin, significantly) saw the
rise of reformism which usually made this need for the ruling class to
"overthrow legality" redundant. Nor, for that matter, did they see the
effect of economic power in controlling workers parties once in office. Sure,
armed coups have taken place to overthrow even slightly reformist governments
but, thanks to the use of "political action", the working class was in no
position to "make revolution" in response. Not, of course, that
these have been required in most republics as utilising Marxist methods
have made many radical parties so reformist that the capitalists can easily
tolerate their taking office or can utilise economic and bureaucratic pressures
to control them.
So far from arguing, as Lenin suggested, for the destruction of the capitalist
state, Marx and Engels consistently advocated the use of universal suffrage to
gain control over the state, control which then would be used to smash or shatter
the "state machine." Revolution would be required to create a republic
and to defend it against reaction, but the key was the utilisation of political
action to take political power within a democratic state. The closest that Marx
or Engels came to advocating workers councils was in 1850 when Marx suggested
that the German workers "establish their own revolutionary workers'
governments" alongside of the "new official governments". These
could be of two forms, either of "municipal committees and municipal
councils" or "workers' clubs or workers' committees." There is
no mention of how these would be organised but their aim would be to supervise
and threaten the official governments "by authorities backed by the whole
mass of the workers." These clubs would be "centralised". In
addition, "workers candidates are [to be] put up alongside of the
bourgeois-democratic candidates" to "preserve their independence".
(although this "independence" meant taking part in bourgeois institutions
so that "the demands of the workers must everywhere be governed by
the concessions and measures of the democrats."). [The Marx-Engels
Reader, p. 507, p. 508 and p. 510] So while these "workers'
committees" could, in theory, be elected from the workplace Marx
made no mention of this possibility (talk of "municipal councils"
suggests that such a possibility was alien to him). It also should be
noted that Marx was echoing Proudhon who, the year before, had argued
that the clubs "had to be organised. The organisation of popular
societies was the fulcrum of democracy, the corner-stone of the
republican order." [No Gods, No Masters, vol. 1, p. 48]
So, as with the soviets, even the idea of workers' clubs as a means of
ensuring mass participation was first raised by anarchists (although,
of course, inspired by working class self-organisation during the 1848
French revolution).
All this may seem a bit academic to many. Does it matter? After all, most
Marxists today subscribe to some variation of Lenin's position and so, in
some aspects, what Marx and Engels really thought is irrelevant. Indeed,
it is possible that Marx faced with workers' councils, as he was with the
Commune, would have embraced them (perhaps not, as he was dismissive of
similar ideas expressed in the libertarian wing of the First International).
After all, the Mensheviks used Marx's 1850s arguments to support their
activities in the soviets in 1905 (while the Bolshevik's expressed hostility
to both the policy and the soviets) and, of course, there is nothing in
them to exclude such a position. What is important is that the idea that
Marxists have always subscribed to the idea that a social revolution would
be based on the workers' own combat organisations (be they unions, soviets
or whatever) is a relatively new one to the ideology. If, as John Rees asserts,
"the socialist revolution must counterpoise the soviet to parliament . . .
precisely because it needs an organ which combines economic power - the power
to strike and take control of the workplaces - with an insurrectionary bid for
political power" and "breaking the old state" then the ironic thing
is that it was Bakunin, not Marx, who advocated such a position.
[Op. Cit., p. 25] Given this, the shock which met Lenin's arguments
in 1917 can be easily understood.
Rather than being rooted in the Marxist vision of revolution, as it has
been in anarchism since at least the 1860s, workers councils have played,
rhetoric aside, the role of fig-leaf for party power (libertarian Marxism
being a notable exception). They have been embraced by its Leninist wing
purely as a means of ensuring party power. Rather than being seen as the
most important gain of a revolution as they allow mass participation,
workers' councils have been seen, and used, simply as a means by which
the party can seize power. Once this is achieved, the soviets can be
marginalised and ignored without affecting the "proletarian" nature of
the revolution in the eyes of the party:
"while it is true that Lenin recognised the different functions and
democratic raison d'ętre for both the soviets and his party, in the
last analysis it was the party that was more important than the soviets.
In other words, the party was the final repository of working-class
sovereignty. Thus, Lenin did not seem to have been reflected on or have
been particularly perturbed by the decline of the soviets after 1918."
[Samuel Farber, Before Stalinism, p. 212]
This perspective can be traced back to the lack of interest Marx and
Engels expressed in the forms which a proletarian revolution would
take, as exemplified by Engels comments on having to "lop off"
aspects of the state "inherited" by the working class. The idea
that the organisations people create in their struggle for freedom may
help determine the outcome of the revolution is missing. Rather, the
idea that any structure can be appropriated and (after suitable modification)
used to rebuild society is clear. This cannot but flow from the flawed
Marxist theory of the state we discussed in section H.3.7.
If, as Marx and Engels argued, the state is simply an instrument of class
rule then it becomes unproblematic to utilise the existing republican state
or create a new form of state complete with representative structures.
The Marxist perspective, moreover, cannot help take emphasis away from the
mass working class organisations required to rebuild society in a socialist
manner and place it on the group who will "inherit" the state and
"lop off" its negative aspects, namely the party and the leaders
in charge of both it and the new "workers' state."
This focus towards the party became, under Lenin (and the Bolsheviks in general)
a purely instrumental perspective on workers' councils and other organisations.
They were of use purely in so far as they allowed the Bolshevik party to take
power (indeed Lenin constantly identified workers' power and soviet power with
Bolshevik power and as Martin Buber noted, for Lenin "All power to the
Soviets!" meant, at bottom, "All power to the Party through the
Soviets!"). It can, therefore, be argued that his book State and
Revolution was a means to use Marx and Engels to support his new found
idea of the soviets as being the basis of creating a Bolshevik government
rather than a principled defence of workers' councils as the framework of a
socialist revolution. We discuss this issue in the
next section.
The short answer depends on which branch of Marxism you mean.
If you are talking about libertarian Marxists such as council communists,
Situationists and so on, then the answer is a resounding "yes." Like
anarchists, these Marxists see a social revolution as being based on
working class self-management and, indeed, criticised (and broke with)
Bolshevism precisely on this question. Some Marxists, like the Socialist
Party of Great Britain, stay true to Marx and Engels and argue for
using the ballot box (see last section)
although this not exclude utilising such organs once political power is
seized by those means. However, if we look at the mainstream Marxist
tradition (namely Leninism), the answer has to be an empathic "no."
As we noted in
section H.1.4,
anarchists have long argued that
the organisations created by the working class in struggle
would be the initial framework of a free society. These organs,
created to resist capitalism and the state, would be the means
to overthrow both as well as extending and defending the
revolution (such bodies have included the "soviets" and "factory
committees" of the Russian Revolution, the collectives in the
Spanish revolution, popular assemblies of the 2001 Argentine
revolt against neo-liberalism and the French Revolution, revolutionary
unions and so on). Thus working class self-management is at the
core of the anarchist vision and so we stress the importance
(and autonomy) of working class organisations in the revolutionary
movement and the revolution itself. Anarchists work within such
bodies at the base, in the mass assemblies, and do not seek to
replace their power with that of their own organisation (see
section J.3.6).
Leninists, in contrast, have a different perspective on such
bodies. Rather than placing them at the heart of the revolution,
Leninism views them purely in instrumental terms - namely, as
a means of achieving party power. Writing in 1907, Lenin argued
that "Social-Democratic Party organisations may, in case of
necessity, participate in inter-party Soviets of Workers'
Delegates . . . and in congresses . . . of these organisations,
and may organise such institutions, provided this is done on
strict Party lines for the purpose of developing and strengthening
the Social-Democratic Labour Party", that is "utilise"
such organs "for the purpose of developing the Social-Democratic
movement." Significantly, given the fate of the soviets
post-1917, Lenin noted that the party "must bear in mind that
if Social-Democratic activities among the proletarian masses are
properly, effectively and widely organised, such institutions
may actually become superfluous." [Collected Works,
vol. 12, pp. 143-4] Thus the means by which working class can
manage their own affairs would become "superfluous" once
the party was in power. How the working class could be considered
the "ruling class" in such a society is hard to understand.
As Oscar Anweiler summarises in his account of the soviets
during the two Russian Revolutions:
"The drawback of the new 'soviet democracy' hailed by
Lenin in 1906 is that he could envisage the soviets only
as controlled organisations; for him they were instruments
by which the party controlled the working masses, rather
than true forms of a workers democracy. The basic
contradiction of the Bolshevik soviet system - which
purports to be a democracy of all working people but in
reality recognises only the rule of one party - is already
contained in Lenin's interpretation of the soviets during
the first Russian revolution." [The Soviets, p. 85]
Thirteen years later, Lenin repeated this same vision of party
power as the goal of revolution in his infamous diatribe
against "Left-wing" Communism (i.e. those Marxists close
to anarchism) as we noted in section H.3.3.
The Bolsheviks had, by this stage, explicitly argued for party
dictatorship and considered it a truism that the whole proletariat
could not rule nor could the proletarian dictatorship be exercised
by a mass working class organisation. Therefore, rather than seeing
revolution being based upon the empowerment of working class organisation
and the socialist society being based on this, Leninists see workers
organisations in purely instrumental terms as the means of achieving
a Leninist government:
"With all the idealised glorification of the soviets as
a new, higher, and more democratic type of state, Lenin's
principal aim was revolutionary-strategic rather than
social-structural . . . The slogan of the soviets was
primarily tactical in nature; the soviets were in theory
organs of mass democracy, but in practice tools for the
Bolshevik Party. In 1917 Lenin outlined his transitional
utopia without naming the definitive factor: the party.
To understand the soviets' true place in Bolshevism, it
is not enough, therefore, to accept the idealised picture
in Lenin's state theory. Only an examination of the actual
give-and-take between Bolsheviks and soviets during the
revolution allows a correct understanding of their
relationship." [Oscar Anweiler, Op. Cit., pp. 160-1]
Simply out, Leninism confuses the party power and workers'
power. An example of this "confusion" can be found in most
Leninist works. For example, John Rees argues that "the
essence of the Bolsheviks' strategy . . . was to take power
from the Provisional government and put it in the hands of
popular organs of working class power - a point later made
explicit by Trotsky in his Lessons of October." ["In
Defence of October", pp. 3-82, International Socialism,
no. 52, p. 73] However, in reality Lenin had always been clear
that the essence of the Bolsheviks' strategy was the taking of
power by the Bolshevik party itself. He explicitly
argued for Bolshevik power during 1917, considering the soviets
as the best means of achieving this. He constantly equated
Bolshevik rule with working class rule. Once in power, this
identification did not change. As such, rather than argue
for power to be placed into "the hands of popular organs
of working class power" Lenin argued this only insofar as
he was sure that these organs would then immediately
pass that power into the hands of a Bolshevik government.
This explains his turn against the soviets after July 1917
when he considered it impossible for the Bolsheviks to gain
a majority in them. It can be seen when the Bolshevik party's
Central Committee opposed the idea of a coalition government
immediately after the overthrow of the Provisional Government
in October 1917. As it explained, "a purely Bolshevik
government" was "impossible to refuse" since "a majority at
the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets . . . handed power
over to this government." [quoted by Robert V. Daniels, A
Documentary History of Communism, pp. 127-8] A mere ten days
after the October Revolution the Left Social Revolutionaries
charged that the Bolshevik government was ignoring the Central
Executive Committee of the Soviets, established by the second
Congress of Soviets as the supreme organ in society. Lenin
dismissed their charges, stating that "the new power could
not take into account, in its activity, all the rigmarole
which would set it on the road of the meticulous observation
of all the formalities." [quoted by Frederick I. Kaplan,
Bolshevik Ideology and the Ethics of Soviet Labour, p. 124]
Clearly, the soviets did not have "All Power," they promptly
handed it over to a Bolshevik government (and Lenin implies
that he was not bound in any way to the supreme organ of the
soviets in whose name he ruled). All of which places Rees'
assertions into the proper context and shows that the slogan
"All Power to the Soviets" is used by Leninists in a radically
different way than most people would understand by it! It also
explains why soviets were disbanded if the opposition won
majorities in them in early 1918 (see section H.6.1).
The Bolsheviks only supported "Soviet power" when the soviets
were Bolshevik. As was recognised by leading left-Menshevik Julius
Martov, who argued that the Bolsheviks loved Soviets only when they
were "in the hands of the Bolshevik party." [quoted by Israel
Getzler, Op. Cit., p. 174] Which explains Lenin's comment
that "[o]nly the development of this war [Kornilov's
counter-revolutionary rebellion in August 1917] can bring
us to power but we must speak of this as little
as possible in our agitation (remembering very well that even
tomorrow events may put us in power and then we will not let it
go)." [quoted by Neil Harding, Leninism, p. 253]
All this can be confirmed, unsurprisingly enough, by looking at
the essay Rees references. When studying Trotsky's work we find
the same instrumentalist approach to the question of the "popular
organs of working class power." Yes, there is some discussion
on whether soviets or "some of form of organisation" like
factory committees could become "organs of state power" but
this is always within the context of party power. This is stated
quite clearly by Trotsky in his essay when he argued that the
"essential aspect" of Bolshevism was the "training,
tempering, and organisation of the proletarian vanguard as
enables the latter to seize power, arms in hand." [Lessons of
October, p. 167 and p. 127] As such, the vanguard seizes power,
not "popular organs of working class power." Indeed,
the idea that the working class can seize power itself is raised
and dismissed:
"But the events have proved that without a party capable of directing
the proletarian revolution, the revolution itself is rendered impossible.
The proletariat cannot seize power by a spontaneous uprising . . . there
is nothing else that can serve the proletariat as a substitute for its
own party." [Op. Cit., p. 117]
Hence soviets were not considered as the "essence" of Bolshevism,
rather the "fundamental instrument of proletarian revolution is the
party." Popular organs are seen purely in instrumental terms, with
such organs of "workers' power" discussed in terms of the strategy and
program of the party not in terms of the value that such organs have as
forms of working class self-management of society. Why should he, when
"the task of the Communist party is the conquest of power for the
purpose of reconstructing society"? [Op. Cit., p. 118 and
p. 174]
This can be clearly seen from Trotsky's discussion of the "October Revolution"
of 1917 in Lessons of October. Commenting on the Bolshevik Party
conference of April 1917, he stated that the "whole of . . . [the]
Conference was devoted to the following fundamental question: Are we
heading toward the conquest of power in the name of the socialist revolution
or are we helping (anybody and everybody) to complete the democratic revolution?
. . . Lenin's position was this: . . . the capture of the soviet majority; the
overthrow of the Provisional Government; the seizure of power through the
soviets." [Op. Cit., p. 134] Note, through the soviets not
by the soviets, thus showing that the Party would hold the real
power, not the soviets of workers' delegates. This is confirmed when Trotsky
stated that "to prepare the insurrection and to carry it out under cover
of preparing for the Second Soviet Congress and under the slogan of defending
it, was of inestimable advantage to us" and that it was "one thing to
prepare an armed insurrection under the naked slogan of the seizure of power
by the party, and quite another thing to prepare and then carry out an
insurrection under the slogan of defending the rights of the Congress of
Soviets." The Soviet Congress just provided "the legal cover"
for the Bolshevik plans. [Op. Cit., p. 134, p. 158 and p. 161]
Thus we have the "seizure of power through the soviets" with "an
armed insurrection" for "the seizure of power by the party"
being hidden by "the slogan" ("the legal cover") of
defending the Soviets! Hardly a case of placing power in the hands of
working class organisations. Trotsky did note that in 1917 the
"soviets had to either disappear entirely or take real power into their
hands." However, he immediately added that "they could take power . . .
only as the dictatorship of the proletariat directed by a single party."
[Op. Cit., p. 126] Clearly, the "single party" has the real
power, not the soviets an unsurprisingly the rule of "a single
party" also amounted to the soviets effectively disappearing as
they quickly became mere ciphers it. Soon the "direction" by
"a single party" became the dictatorship of that party over
the soviets, which (it should be noted) Trotsky defended wholeheartedly when
he wrote Lessons of October (and, indeed, into the 1930s).
This cannot be considered as a one-off. Trotsky repeated this
analysis in his History of the Russian Revolution, when he
stated that the "question, what mass organisations were to
serve the party for leadership in the insurrection, did not
permit an a priori, much less a categorical, answer." Thus
the "mass organisations" serve the party, not vice versa. This
instrumentalist perspective can be seen when Trotsky noted that
when "the Bolsheviks got a majority in the Petrograd Soviet,
and afterward a number of others," the "phrase 'Power to the
Soviets' was not, therefore, again removed from the order of
the day, but received a new meaning: All power to the Bolshevik
soviets." This meant that the "party was launched on the road
of armed insurrection through the soviets and in the name of
the soviets." As he put it in his discussion of the July days
in 1917, the army "was far from ready to raise an insurrection
in order to give power to the Bolshevik Party" and so
"the state of popular consciousness . . . made impossible the
seizure of power by the Bolsheviks in July." [vol. 2, p. 303,
p. 307, p. 78 and p. 81] So much for "all power to the Soviets"!
He even quotes Lenin: "The Bolsheviks have no right to await
the Congress of Soviets. They ought to seize the power right
now." Ultimately, the "Central Committee adopted the motion
of Lenin as the only thinkable one: to form a government of
the Bolsheviks only." [vol. 3, pp. 131-2 and p. 299]
So where does this leave the assertion that the Bolsheviks
aimed to put power into the hands of working class organisations?
Clearly, Rees' summary of both Trotsky's essay and the "essence"
of Bolshevism leave a lot to be desired. As can be seen, the
"essence" of Trotsky's essay and of Bolshevism is the importance
of party power, not workers' power (as recognised by another
member of the SWP: "The masses needed to be profoundly
convinced that there was no alternative to Bolshevik power."
[Tony Cliff, Lenin, vol. 2, p. 265]). Trotsky even provided
us with an analogy which effectively and simply refutes Rees'
claims. "Just as the blacksmith cannot seize the red hot
iron in his naked hand," Trotsky asserted, "so the proletariat
cannot directly seize power; it has to have an organisation
accommodated to this task." While paying lip service to
the soviets as the organisation "by means of which the
proletariat can both overthrow the old power and replace
it," he added that "the soviets by themselves do not settle
the question" as they may "serve different goals according
to the programme and leadership. The soviets receive their
programme from the party . . . the revolutionary party
represents the brain of the class. The problem of
conquering the power can be solved only by a definite
combination of party with soviets." [The History of the
Russian Revolution, vol. 3, pp. 160-1 and p. 163]
Thus the key organisation was the party, not the mass
organisations of the working class. Indeed, Trotsky was quite
explicit that such organisations could only become the state form
of the proletariat under the party dictatorship. Significantly,
Trotsky fails to indicate what would happen when these two
powers clash. Certainly Trotsky's role in the Russian
revolution tells us that the power of the party was more
important to him than democratic control by workers through
mass bodies and as we have shown in section H.3.8,
Trotsky explicitly argued that a state was required to overcome the
"wavering" in the working class which could be expressed by
democratic decision making.
Given this legacy of viewing workers' organisations in
purely instrumental terms, the opinion of Martov (the
leading left-Menshevik during the Russian Revolution)
seems appropriate. He argued that "[a]t the moment when
the revolutionary masses expressed their emancipation from
the centuries old yoke of the old State by forming
'autonomous republics of Kronstadt' and trying Anarchist
experiments such as 'workers' control,' etc. - at that
moment, the 'dictatorship of the proletariat and the poorest
peasantry' (said to be incarnated in the real dictatorship of
the opposed 'true' interpreters of the proletariat and the
poorest peasantry: the chosen of Bolshevist Communism) could
only consolidate itself by first dressing itself in such
Anarchist and anti-State ideology." [The State and Socialist
Revolution, p. 47] As can be seen, Martov had a point. As the
text used as evidence that the Bolsheviks aimed to give power
to workers organisations shows, this was not an aim of the
Bolshevik party. Rather, such workers organs were seen purely
as a means to the end of party power.
In contrast, anarchists argue for direct working class self-management
of society. When we argue that working class organisations must be the
framework of a free society we mean it. We do not equate party
power with working class power or think that "All power to the
Soviets" is possible if they immediately delegate that power to the
leaders of the party. This is for obvious reasons:
"If the revolutionary means are out of their hands,
if they are in the hands of a techno-bureaucratic elite,
then such an elite will be in a position to direct to
their own benefit not only the course of the revolution,
but the future society as well. If the proletariat are
to ensure that an elite will not control the future
society, they must prevent them from controlling the
course of the revolution." [Alan Carter, Marx: A
Radical Critique, p. 165]
Thus the slogan "All power to the Soviets" for anarchists means
exactly that - organs for the working class to run society directly,
based on mandated, recallable delegates. This slogan fitted perfectly
with our ideas, as anarchists had been arguing since the 1860's that
such workers' councils were both a weapon of class struggle against
capitalism and the framework of the future libertarian society. For
the Bolshevik tradition, that slogan simply means that a Bolshevik
government will be formed over and above the soviets. The difference
is important, "for the Anarchists declared, if 'power' really
should belong to the soviets, it could not belong to the Bolshevik
party, and if it should belong to that Party, as the Bolsheviks
envisaged, it could not belong to the soviets." [Voline, The
Unknown Revolution, p. 213] Reducing the soviets to simply
executing the decrees of the central (Bolshevik) government and
having their All-Russian Congress be able to recall the government
(i.e. those with real power) does not equal "all power,"
quite the reverse - the soviets will simply be a fig-leaf for party power.
In summary, rather than aim to place power into the hands of
workers' organisations, most Marxists do not. Their aim is to
place power into the hands of the party. Workers' organisations
are simply means to this end and, as the Bolshevik regime showed,
if they clash with that goal, they will be simply be disbanded.
However, we must stress that not all Marxist tendencies subscribe
to this. The council communists, for example, broke with the
Bolsheviks precisely over this issue, the difference between
party and class power.
A key idea in most forms of Marxism is that the evolution
of capitalism itself will create the preconditions for
socialism. This is because capitalism tends to result in
big business and, correspondingly, increased numbers of
workers subject to the "socialised" production process
within the workplace. The conflict between the socialised
means of production and their private ownership is at the
heart of the Marxist case for socialism:
"Then came the concentration of the means of production
and of the producers in large workshops and manufactories,
their transformation into actual socialised means of
production and socialised producers. But the socialised
producers and means of production and their products
were still treated, after this change, just as they
had been before . . . the owner of the instruments of
labour . . . appropriated to himself . . . exclusively
the product of the labour of others. Thus, the products
now produced socially were not appropriated by those who
actually set in motion the means of production and
actually produced the commodities, but by the
capitalists . . . The mode of production is subjected
to this [individual or private] form of appropriation,
although it abolishes the conditions upon which the
latter rests.
"This contradiction, which gives to the new mode of
production its capitalistic character, contains the
germ of the whole of the social antagonisms of today."
[Engels, Marx-Engels Reader, pp. 703-4]
It is the business cycle of capitalism which show this
contradiction between socialised production and capitalist
appropriation the best. Indeed, the "fact that the
socialised organisation of production within the factory
has developed so far that it has become incompatible
with the anarchy of production in society, which exists
side by side with and dominates it, is brought home to
the capitalists themselves by the violent concentration
of capital that occurs during crises." The pressures of
socialised production results in capitalists merging
their properties "in a particular branch of industry
in a particular country" into "a trust, a union for
the purpose of regulating production." In this way,
"the production of capitalistic society capitulates
to the production upon a definite plan of the invading
socialistic society." This "transformation" can
take the form of "joint-stock companies and trusts, or
into state ownership." The later does not change the
"capitalist relation" although it does have
"concealed within it" the "technical conditions
that form the elements of that solution." This "shows
itself the way to accomplishing this revolution. The
proletariat seizes political power and turns the means
of production into state property." [Op. Cit.,
p. 709, p. 710, p. 711, p. 712 and p. 713]
Thus the centralisation and concentration of production
into bigger and bigger units, into big business, is seen
as the evidence of the need for socialism. It provides
the objective grounding for socialism, and, in fact, this
analysis is what makes Marxism "scientific socialism."
This process explains how human society develops through
time:
"In the social production of their life, men enter into
definite relations that are indispensable and independent
of their will, relations of production which correspond
to a definite stage of development of their material
productive forces. The sum total of these relations of
production constitutes the economic structure of society,
the real foundation, on which rises a legal and political
superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of
social consciousness . . . At a certain stage of their
development, the material productive forces come in
conflict with the existing relations of production or
- what is but a legal expression for the same thing
- with the property relations within which they have
been at work hitherto. From forms of development of the
productive forces these relations turn into their
fetters. Then begins an epoch of social revolution.
With the change of the economic foundation the entire
immense superstructure is more or less rapidly
transformed." [Marx, Op. Cit., pp. 4-5]
The obvious conclusion to be drawn from this is that socialism
will come about due to tendencies inherent within the development
of capitalism. The "socialisation" implied by collective
labour within a firm grows steadily as capitalist companies grow
larger and larger. The objective need for socialism is therefore
created and so, for most Marxists, "big is beautiful."
Indeed, some Leninists have invented terminology to describe
this, which can be traced back to at least as far as Bolshevik
(and Left Oppositionist) Evgeny Preobrazhensky (although his
perspective, like most Leninist ones, has deep roots in the
Social Democratic orthodoxy of the Second International).
Preobrazhensky, as well as expounding the need for "primitive
socialist accumulation" to build up Soviet Russia's industry,
also discussed "the contradiction of the law of planning and
the law of value." [Hillel Ticktin, "Leon Trotsky and the
Social Forces Leading to Bureaucracy, 1923-29", pp. 45-64,
The Ideas of Leon Trotsky, Hillel Ticktin and Michael Cox
(eds.), p. 45] Thus Marxists in this tradition (like Hillel Ticktin)
argue that the increased size of capital means that more and more
of the economy is subject to the despotism of the owners and
managers of capital and so the "anarchy" of the market is
slowly replaced with the conscious planning of resources. Marxists
sometimes call this the "objective socialisation of labour"
(to use Ernest Mandel's term). Thus there is a tendency for Marxists
to see the increased size and power of big business as providing
objective evidence for socialism, which will bring these socialistic
tendencies within capitalism to full light and full development.
Needless to say, most will argue that socialism, while developing
planning fully, will replace the autocratic and hierarchical
planning of big business with democratic, society-wide planning.
This position, for anarchists, has certain problems
associated with it. One key drawback, as we discuss in
the
next section,
is it focuses attention away from the internal organisation
within the workplace onto ownership and links between economic
units. It ends up confusing capitalism with the market relations
between firms rather than identifying it with its essence, wage
slavery. This meant that many Marxists consider that the basis
of a socialist economy was guaranteed once property was nationalised.
This perspective tends to dismiss as irrelevant the way production
is managed. The anarchist critique that this simply replaced a
multitude of bosses with one, the state, was (and is) ignored.
Rather than seeing socialism as being dependent on workers'
management of production, this position ends up seeing
socialism as being dependent on organisational links between
workplaces, as exemplified by big business under capitalism. Thus
the "relations of production" which matter are not
those associated with wage labour but rather those associated with
the market. This can be seen from the famous comment in The
Manifesto of the Communist Party that the bourgeoisie "cannot
exist without constantly revolutionising the instruments of
production, and thereby the relations of production, and with them
the whole relations of society." [Marx and Engels, Op. Cit.,
p. 476] But the one relation of production it cannot revolutionise
is the one generated by the wage labour at the heart of capitalism, the
hierarchical relations at the point of production. As such, it is clear
that by "relations of production" Marx and Engels meant something
else than wage slavery, namely, the internal organisation of what they term
"socialised production."
Capitalism is, in general, as dynamic as Marx and Engels stressed. It
transforms the means of production, the structure of industry and the
links between workplaces constantly. Yet it only modifies the form of
the organisation of labour, not its content. No matter how it transforms
machinery and the internal structure of companies, the workers are still
wage slaves. At best, it simply transforms much of the hierarchy which
governs the workforce into hired managers. This does not transform the
fundamental social relationship of capitalism, however and so the
"relations of production" which prefigure socialism are, precisely,
those associated with the "socialisation of the labour process"
which occurs within capitalism and are no way antagonistic to it.
This mirrors Marx's famous prediction that the capitalist mode of production
produces "the centralisation of capitals" as one capitalist "always
strikes down many others." This leads to "the further socialisation
of labour and the further transformation of the soil and other means
of production into socially exploited and therefore communal means of
production takes on a new form." Thus capitalist progress itself
objectively produces the necessity for socialism as it socialises the
production process and produces a working class "constantly increasing
in numbers, and trained, united and organised by the very mechanism of
the capitalist process of production. The monopolisation of capital
becomes a fetter upon the mode of production . . . The centralisation
of the means of production and the socialisation of labour reach a
point at which they become incompatible with their capitalist integument.
This integument is burst asunder. The knell of capitalist private property
sounds. The expropriators are expropriated." [Capital, vol. 1,
pp. 928-9] Note, it is not the workers who organise themselves but rather
they are "organised by the very mechanism of the capitalist process of
production." Even in his most libertarian work, "The Civil War in
France", this perspective can be found. He, rightly, praised attempts
by the Communards to set up co-operatives (although distinctly failed to
mention Proudhon's obvious influence) but then went on to argue that the
working class had "no ready-made utopias to introduce" and that
"to work out their own emancipation, and along with it that that higher
form to which present society is irresistibly tending by its own economical
agencies" they simply had "to set free the elements of the new
society with which old collapsing bourgeois society itself is pregnant."
[Marx-Engels Reader, pp. 635-6]
Then we have Marx, in his polemic against Proudhon, arguing that social
relations "are closely bound up with productive forces. In acquiring
new productive forces men change their mode of production; and in
changing their mode of production, in changing the way of earning
their living, they change their social relations. The hand-mill gives
you society with the feudal lord; the steam-mill, society with the
industrial capitalist." [Collected Works, vol. 6, p. 166]
On the face of it, this had better not be true. After all, the
aim of socialism is to expropriate the property of the industrial
capitalist. If the social relationships are dependent on the
productive forces then, clearly, socialism is impossible as it will have
to be based, initially, on the legacy of capitalism. Fortunately, the
way a workplace is managed is not predetermined by the technological
base of society. As is obvious, a steam-mill can be operated by a
co-operative, so making the industrial capitalist redundant. That a
given technological basis (or productive forces) can produces many
different social and political systems can easily be seen from history.
Murray Bookchin gives one example:
"Technics . . . does not fully or even adequately account for the
institutional differences between a fairly democratic federation
such as the Iroquois and a highly despotic empire such as the Inca.
From a strictly instrumental viewpoint, the two structures were
supported by almost identical 'tool kits.' Both engaged in
horticultural practices that were organised around primitive
implements and wooden hoes. Their weaving and metalworking
techniques were very similar . . . At the community level,
Iroquois and Inca populations were immensely similar . . .
"Yet at the political level of social life, a democratic confederal
structure of five woodland tribes obviously differs decisively from
a centralised, despotic structure of mountain Indian chiefdoms. The
former, a highly libertarian confederation . . . The latter, a massively
authoritarian state . . . Communal management of resources and produce
among the Iroquois tribes occurred at the clan level. By contrast, Inca
resources were largely state-owned, and much of the empire's produce
was simply confiscation . . . and their redistribution from central and
local storehouses. The Iroquois worked together freely . . . the Inca
peasantry provided corvee labour to a patently exploitative priesthood
and state apparatus under a nearly industrial system of management."
[The Ecology of Freedom, pp. 331-2]
Marx's claim that a given technological level implies a specific social
structure is wrong. However, it does suggest that our comments that,
for Marx and Engels, the new "social relationships" which
develop under capitalism which imply socialism are relations between
workplaces, not those between individuals and so classes are correct.
The implications of this position became clear during the Russian revolution.
Later Marxists built upon this "scientific" groundwork. Lenin,
for example, argued that "the difference between a socialist
revolution and a bourgeois revolution is that in the latter
case there are ready made forms of capitalist relationships;
Soviet power [in Russia] does not inherit such ready made
relationships, if we leave out of account the most developed
forms of capitalism, which, strictly speaking, extended to a
small top layer of industry and hardly touched agriculture."
[Collected Works, vol. 27, p. 90] Thus, for Lenin, "socialist"
relationships are generated within big business, relationships
"socialism" would "inherit" and universalise. As such, his
comments fit in with the analysis of Marx and Engels we have
presented above. However, his comments also reveal that Lenin
had no idea that socialism meant the transformation of the
relations of production, i.e. workers managing their own
activity. This, undoubtedly, explains the systematic
undermining of the factory committee movement by the
Bolsheviks in favour of state control (see Maurice Brinton's
classic account of this process, The Bolsheviks and Workers'
Control).
The idea that socialism involved simply taking over the state
and nationalising the "objectively socialised" means of
production can be seen in both mainstream social-democracy
and its Leninist child. Rudolf Hilferding argued that capitalism was
evolving into a highly centralised economy, run by big banks and
big firms. All what was required to turn this into socialism
would be its nationalisation:
"Once finance capital has brought the most important branches of
production under its control, it is enough for society, through
its conscious executive organ - the state conquered by the working
class - to seize finance capital in order to gain immediate control
of these branches of production . . . taking possession of six large
Berlin banks would . . . greatly facilitate the initial phases of
socialist policy during the transition period, when capitalist
accounting might still prove useful." [Finance Capital,
pp. 367-8]
Lenin basically disagreed with this only in-so-far as the party
of the proletariat would take power via revolution rather than
by election ("the state conquered by the working class" equals
the election of a socialist party). Lenin took it for granted
that the difference between Marxists and anarchists is that
"the former stand for centralised, large-scale communist
production, while the latter stand for disconnected small
production." [Collected Works, vol. 23, p. 325]
The obvious implication of this is that anarchist views
"express, not the future of bourgeois society, which is
striving with irresistible force towards the socialisation of
labour, but the present and even the past of that society, the
domination of blind chance over the scattered and isolated
small producer." [Op. Cit., vol. 10, p. 73]
Lenin applied this perspective during the Russian Revolution.
For example, he argued in 1917 that his immediate aim was for
a "state capitalist" economy, this being a necessary
stage to socialism. As he put it, "socialism is merely
the next step forward from state-capitalist monopoly . . .
socialism is merely state-capitalist monopoly which is
made to serve the interests of the whole people and has
to that extent ceased to be capitalist monopoly."
[Op. Cit., vol. 25, p. 358] The Bolshevik road to
"socialism" ran through the terrain of state capitalism and,
in fact, simply built upon its institutionalised means of allocating
recourses and structuring industry. As Lenin put it, "the modern
state possesses an apparatus which has extremely close connections with
the banks and syndicates [i.e., trusts] , an apparatus which performs
an enormous amount of accounting and registration work . . . This
apparatus must not, and should not, be smashed. It must be
wrestled from the control of the capitalists," it "must be
subordinated to the proletarian Soviets" and "it must be
expanded, made more comprehensive, and nation-wide." This
meant that the Bolsheviks would "not invent the organisational
form of work, but take it ready-made from capitalism" and
"borrow the best models furnished by the advanced countries."
[Op. Cit., vol. 26, pp. 105-6 and p. 110]
The institutional framework of capitalism would be utilised
as the principal (almost exclusive) instruments of "socialist"
transformation. "Without big banks Socialism would be
impossible," argued Lenin, as they "are the 'state apparatus'
which we need to bring about socialism, and which we take
ready-made from capitalism; our task here is merely to
lop off what capitalistically mutilates this excellent
apparatus, to make it even bigger, even more democratic,
even more comprehensive. A single State Bank, the biggest
of the big . . . will constitute as much as nine-tenths of
the socialist apparatus. This will be country-wide
book-keeping, country-wide accounting of the production
and distribution of goods." While this is "not fully a
state apparatus under capitalism," it "will be so with us,
under socialism." For Lenin, building socialism was easy.
This "nine-tenths of the socialist apparatus" would be
created "at one stroke, by a single decree." [Op. Cit.,
p. 106] Once in power, the Bolsheviks implemented this vision of
socialism being built upon the institutions created by
monopoly capitalism. Moreover, Lenin quickly started to
advocate and implement the most sophisticated capitalist
methods of organising labour, including "one-man management"
of production, piece-rates and Taylorism ("scientific
management"). This was not done accidentally or because
no alternative existed (as we discuss in section H.6.2,
workers were organising federations of factory committees which
could have been, as anarchists argued at the time, the basis of
a genuine socialist economy).
As Gustav Landuer commented, when mainstream Marxists
"call the capitalist factory system a social production
. . . we know the real implications of their socialist
forms of labour." [For Socialism, p. 70] As can be
seen, this glorification of large-scale, state-capitalist
structures can be traced back to Marx and Engels, while
Lenin's support for capitalist production techniques can
be explained by mainstream Marxism's lack of focus on the
social relationships at the point of production.
For anarchists, the idea that socialism can be built on the
framework provided to us by capitalism is simply ridiculous.
Capitalism has developed industry and technology to further the
ends of those with power, namely capitalists and managers. Why
should they use that power to develop technology and industrial
structures which lead to workers' self-management and power
rather than technologies and structures which enhance their own
position vis-ŕ-vis their workers and society as a whole? As
such, technological and industrial development is not "neutral"
or just the "application of science." They are shaped by class
struggle and class interest and cannot be used for different
ends. Simply put, socialism will need to develop new forms
of economic organisation based on socialist principles. The
concept that monopoly capitalism paves the way for socialist
society is rooted in the false assumption that the forms of
social organisation accompanying capital concentration are
identical with the socialisation of production, that the
structures associated with collective labour under capitalism
are the same as those required under socialism is achieve
genuine socialisation. This false assumption, as can be
seen, goes back to Engels and was shared by both Social Democracy
and Leninism despite their other differences.
While anarchists are inspired by a vision of a non-capitalist,
decentralised, diverse society based on appropriate technology
and appropriate scale, mainstream Marxism is not. Rather, it
sees the problem with capitalism is that its institutions are
not centralised and big enough. As Alexander Berkman correctly
argues:
"The role of industrial decentralisation in the revolution
is unfortunately too little appreciated. . . Most people
are still in the thraldom of the Marxian dogma that
centralisation is 'more efficient and economical.' They
close their eyes to the fact that the alleged 'economy' is
achieved at the cost of the workers' limb and life, that
the 'efficiency' degrades him to a mere industrial cog,
deadens his soul, kills his body. Furthermore, in a system
of centralisation the administration of industry becomes
constantly merged in fewer hands, producing a powerful
bureaucracy of industrial overlords. It would indeed be
the sheerest irony if the revolution were to aim at such
a result. It would mean the creation of a new master class."
[What is Anarchism?, p. 229]
That mainstream Marxism is soaked in capitalist ideology can be seen
from Lenin's comments that when "the separate establishments are
amalgamated into a single syndicate, this economy [of production]
can attain tremendous proportions, as economic science teaches us."
[Op. Cit., vol. 25, p. 344] Yes, capitalist economic
science, based on capitalist definitions of efficiency and
economy and on capitalist criteria! That Bolshevism bases
itself on centralised, large scale industry because it is more
"efficient" and "economic" suggests nothing less than that its
"socialism" will be based on the same priorities of capitalism.
This can be seen from Lenin's idea that Russia had to learn from
the advanced capitalist countries, that there was only one way to
develop production and that was by adopting capitalist methods of
"rationalisation" and management. Thus, for Lenin in early 1918
"our task is to study the state capitalism of the Germans, to
spare no effort in copying it and not to shrink from adopting
dictorial methods to hasten the copying of it."
[Op. Cit., vol. 27, p. 340] In the words of Luigi Fabbri:
"Marxist communists, especially Russian ones, are beguiled by
the distant mirage of big industry in the West or America and
mistake for a system of production what is only a typically
capitalist means of speculation, a means of exercising
oppression all the more securely; and they do not appreciate
that that sort of centralisation, far from fulfilling the
real needs of production, is, on the contrary, precisely
what restricts it, obstructs it and applies a brake to it
in the interests of capital.
"Whenever [they] talk about 'necessity of production' they
make no distinction between those necessities upon which
hinge the procurement of a greater quantity and higher
quality of products - this being all that matters from
the social and communist point of view - and the necessities
inherent in the bourgeois regime, the capitalists' necessity
to make more profit even should it mean producing less to
do so. If capitalism tends to centralise its operations,
it does so not for the sake of production, but only for the
sake of making and accumulating more money." ["Anarchy
and 'Scientific' Communism", pp. 13-49, The Poverty of
Statism, Albert Meltzer (ed.), pp. 21-22]
Efficiency, in other words, does not exist independently of
a given society or economy. What is considered "efficient"
under capitalism may be the worse form of inefficiency in a
free society. The idea that socialism may have different
priorities, need different methods of organising production,
have different visions of how an economy was structured than
capitalism, is absent in mainstream Marxism. Lenin thought that
the institutions of bourgeois economic power, industrial
structure and capitalist technology and techniques could be
"captured" and used for other ends. Ultimately, though,
capitalist means and organisations can only generate capitalist
ends. It is significant that the "one-man management,"
piece-work, Taylorism, etc. advocated and implemented under
Lenin are usually listed by his followers as evils of Stalinism
and as proof of its anti-socialist nature.
Equally, it can be argued that part of the reason why large
capitalist firms can "plan" production on a large scale is
because they reduce the decision making criteria to a few
variables, the most significant being profit and loss. That
such simplification of input data may result in decisions
which harm people and the environment goes without a saying.
"The lack of context and particularity," James C. Scott
correctly notes, "is not an oversight; it is the necessary
first premise of any large-scale planning exercise. To the
degree that the subjects can be treated as standardised
units, the power of resolution in the planning exercise is
enhanced. Questions posed within these strict confines can
have definitive, quantitative answers. The same logic applies
to the transformation of the natural world. Questions about
the volume of commercial wood or the yield of wheat in
bushels permit more precise calculations than questions
about, say, the quality of the soil, the versatility and
taste of the grain, or the well-being of the community. The
discipline of economics achieves its formidable resolving
power by transforming what might otherwise be considered
qualitative matters into quantitative issues with a single
metric and, as it were, a bottom line: profit or loss."
[Seeing like a State, p. 346] Whether a socialist society
could factor in all the important inputs which capitalism
ignores within an even more centralised planning structure
is an important question. It is extremely doubtful that there
could be a positive answer to it. This does not mean, we just
stress, that anarchists argue exclusively for "small-scale"
production as many Marxists, like Lenin, assert (as we prove in
section I.3.8, anarchists
have always argued for appropriate levels of production
and scale). It is simply to raise the possibility of what
works under capitalism may be undesirable from a perspective
which values people and planet instead of power and profit.
As should be obvious, anarchism is based on critical evaluation
of technology and industrial structure, rejecting the whole
capitalist notion of "progress" which has always been part of
justifying the inhumanities of the status quo. Just because
something is rewarded by capitalism it does not mean that it makes
sense from a human or ecological perspective. This informs our
vision of a free society and the current struggle. We have long
argued that that capitalist methods cannot be used for socialist
ends. In our battle to democratise and socialise the workplace,
in our awareness of the importance of collective initiatives by
the direct producers in transforming their work situation, we
show that factories are not merely sites of production, but
also of reproduction - the reproduction of a certain structure
of social relations based on the division between those who give
orders and those who take them, between those who direct and
those who execute.
It goes without saying that anarchists recognise that a social
revolution will have to start with the industry and technology
which is left to it by capitalism and that this will have to be
expropriated by the working class (this expropriation will, of
course, involve transforming it and, in all likelihood, rejecting
of numerous technologies, techniques and practices considered
as "efficient" under capitalism). This is not the issue. The
issue is who expropriates it and what happens to it next. For
anarchists, the means of life are expropriated directly by
society, for most Marxists they are expropriated by the state.
For anarchists, such expropriation is based workers'
self-management and so the fundamental capitalist "relation
of production" (wage labour) is abolished. For most Marxists,
state ownership of production is considered sufficient to ensure
the end of capitalism (with, if we are lucky, some form of
"workers' control" over those state officials who do management
production - see section H.3.14).
In contrast to the mainstream Marxist vision of socialism
being based around the institutions inherited from capitalism,
anarchists have raised the idea that the "free commune" would
be the "medium in which the ideas of modern Socialism may
come to realisation." These "communes would federate" into
wider groupings. Labour unions (or other working class organs
created in the class struggle such as factory committees)
were "not only an instrument for the improvement of the
conditions of labour, but also . . . an organisation
which might . . . take into its hands the management of
production." Large labour associations would "come into
existence for the inter-communal service[s]." Such communes
and workers' organisations as the basis of "Socialist forms
of life could find a much easier realisation" than the
"seizure of all industrial property by the State, and
the State organisation of agriculture and industry." Thus
railway networks "could be much better handled by a Federated
Union of railway employees, than by a State organisation."
Combined with co-operation "both for production and for
distribution, both in industry and agriculture," workers'
self-management of production would create "samples of
the bricks" of the future society ("even samples of some
of its rooms"). [Kropotkin, The Conquest of Bread,
pp. 21-23]
This means that anarchists also root our arguments for
socialism in a scientific analysis of tendencies within
capitalism. However, in opposition to the analysis of
mainstream Marxism which focuses on the objective tendencies
within capitalist development, anarchists emphasis the
oppositional nature of socialism to capitalism. Both
the "law of value" and the "law of planning" are tendencies
within capitalism, that is aspects of capitalism. Anarchists
encourage class struggle, the direct conflict of working class
people against the workings of all capitalism's "laws". This
struggle produces mutual aid and the awareness that we can
care best for our own welfare if we unite with others - what
we can loosely term the "law of co-operation" or "law of
mutual aid". This law, in contrast to the Marxian "law of
planning" is based on working class subjectively and develops
within society only in opposition to capitalism. As such,
it provides the necessary understanding of where socialism will
come from, from below, in the spontaneous self-activity
of the oppressed fighting for their freedom. This means that the
basic structures of socialism will be the organs created by working
class people in their struggles against exploitation and oppress
(see section I.2.3 for more details).
Gustav Landauer's basic insight is correct (if his means were not
totally so) when he wrote that "Socialism will not grow out of
capitalism but away from it" [Op. Cit., p. 140] In
other words, tendencies opposed to capitalism rather than
ones which are part and parcel of it.
Anarchism's recognition of the importance of these tendencies
towards mutual aid within capitalism is a key to understanding
what anarchists do in the here and now, as will be discussed
in
section J.
In addition, it also laid the foundation of
understanding the nature of an anarchist society and what
creates the framework of such a society in the here and now.
Anarchists do not abstractly place a better society (anarchy)
against the current, oppressive one. Instead, we analysis what
tendencies exist within current society and encourage those
which empower and liberate people. Based on these tendencies,
anarchists propose a society which develops them to their
logical conclusion. Therefore an anarchist society is created
not through the developments within capitalism, but in social
struggle against it.
For anarchists, the idea that socialism can be achieved
via state ownership is simply ridiculous. For reasons
which will become abundantly clear, anarchists argue
that any such "socialist" system would simply be a
form of "state capitalism." Such a regime would not
fundamentally change the position of the working class,
whose members would simply be wage slaves to the state
bureaucracy rather than to the capitalist class. Marxism
would, as Kropotkin predicted, be "the worship of the
State, of authority and of State Socialism, which is in
reality nothing but State capitalism." [quoted by
Ruth Kinna, "Kropotkin's theory of Mutual Aid in
Historical Context", pp. 259-283, International
Review of Social History, No. 40, p. 262]
However, before beginning our discussion of why anarchists
think this we need to clarify our terminology. This is
because the expression "state capitalism" has three distinct,
if related, meanings in socialist (particularly Marxist)
thought. Firstly, "state capitalism" was/is used to describe
the current system of big business subject to extensive state
control (particularly if, as in war, the capitalist state
accrues extensive powers over industry). Secondly, it was
used by Lenin to describe his immediate aims after the October
Revolution, namely a regime in which the capitalists would
remain but would be subject to a system of state control
inherited by the new "proletarian" state from the old
capitalist one. The third use of the term is to signify a regime
in which the state replaces the capitalist class totally
via nationalisation of the means of production. In such a regime, the
state would own, manage and accumulate capital rather than individual
capitalists.
Anarchists are opposed to all three systems described by
the term "state capitalism." Here we concentrate on the
third definition, arguing that state socialism would be
better described as "state capitalism" as state ownership
of the means of life does not get to the heart of capitalism,
namely wage labour. Rather it simply replaces private bosses
with the state and changes the form of property (from private
to state property) rather than getting rid of it.
The idea that socialism simply equals state ownership
(nationalisation) is easy to find in the works of Marxism.
The Communist Manifesto, for example, states that the
"proletariat will use its political supremacy to wrest, by
degrees, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralise all
instruments of production into the hands of the State."
This meant the "[c]entralisation of credit in the hands of
the State, by means of a national bank with State capital and
an exclusive monopoly," the "[c]entralisation of the
means of communication and transport in the hands of the State,"
"[e]xtension of factories and instruments of production owned
by the State" and the "[e]stablishment of industrial armies,
especially for agriculture." [Marx and Engels, Selected Works,
pp. 52-3] Thus "feudal estates . . . mines, pits, and so forth,
would become property of the state" as well as "[a]ll
means of transport," with "the running of large-scale
industry and the railways by the state." [Collected
Works, vol. 7, p. 3, p. 4 and p. 299]
Engels repeats this formula thirty-two years later in
Socialism: Utopian and Scientific by asserting that
capitalism itself "forces on more and more the
transformation of the vast means of production, already
socialised, into state property. The proletariat seizes
political power and turns the means of production into
state property." Socialism is not equated with state
ownership of productive forces by a capitalist state,
"but concealed within it are the technical conditions
that form the elements of that solution" to the social
problem. It simply "shows itself the way to accomplishing
this revolution. The proletariat seizes political power
and turns the means of production into state property."
Thus state ownership after the proletariat seizes power
is the basis of socialism, when by this "first act" of
the revolution the state "really constitutes itself as the
representative of the whole of society." [Marx-Engels
Reader, p. 713, p. 712 and p. 713]
What is significant from these programmatic statements on
the first steps of socialism is the total non-discussion
of what is happening at the point of production, the
non-discussion of the social relations in the workplace.
Rather we are subjected to discussion of "the contradiction
between socialised production and capitalist appropriation"
and claims that while there is "socialised organisation
of production within the factory," this has become
"incompatible with the anarchy of production in society."
The obvious conclusion to be drawn is that "socialism"
will inherit, without change, the "socialised" workplace
of capitalism and that the fundamental change is that
of ownership: "The proletariat seized the public power,
and by means of this transforms the socialised means of
production . . . into public property. By this act, the
proletariat frees the means of production from the
character of capital they have thus far borne."
[Engels, Op. Cit., p. 709 and p. 717]
That the Marxist movement came to see state ownership
rather than workers' management of production as the
key issue is hardly surprising. Thus we find leading
Social-Democrats arguing that socialism basically meant
the state, under Social-Democratic control of course,
acquiring the means of production and nationalising them.
Rudolf Hilferding presented what was Marxist orthodoxy at the
time when he argued that in "a communist society"
production "is consciously determined by the social
central organ," which would decide "what is to be
produced and how much, where and by whom." While this
information is determined by the market forces under
capitalism, in socialism it "is given to the members
of the socialist society by their authorities . . . we
must derive the undisturbed progress of the socialist
economy from the laws, ordinances and regulations of
socialist authorities." [quoted by Nikolai Bukharin,
Economy Theory of the Leisure Class, p. 157]
The Bolsheviks inherited this concept of "socialism" and
implemented it, with terrible results.
This vision of society in which the lives of the
population are controlled by "authorities" in a
"social central organ" which tells the workers what
to do, while in line with the Communist Manifesto,
seems less that appealing. It also shows why state
socialism is not socialism at all. Thus George Barrett:
"If instead of the present capitalist class there were
a set of officials appointed by the Government and set
in a position to control our factories, it would bring
about no revolutionary change. The officials would have
to be paid, and we may depend that, in their privileged
positions, they would expect good remuneration. The
politicians would have to be paid, and we already know
their tastes. You would, in fact, have a non-productive
class dictating to the producers the conditions upon
which they were allowed to use the means of production.
As this is exactly what is wrong with the present system
of society, we can see that State control would be no
remedy, while it would bring with it a host of new
troubles . . . under a governmental system of society,
whether it is the capitalism of today or a more a
perfected Government control of the Socialist State,
the essential relationship between the governed and
the governing, the worker and the controller, will be
the same; and this relationship so long as it lasts can
be maintained only by the bloody brutality of the
policeman's bludgeon and the soldier's rifle." [The
Anarchist Revolution, pp. 8-9]
The key to seeing why state socialism is simply state
capitalism can be found in the lack of change in the
social relationships at the point of production. The
workers are still wage slaves, employed by the state
and subject to its orders. As Lenin stressed in State
and Revolution, under Marxist Socialism "[a]ll citizens
are transformed into hired employees of the state . . .
All citizens become employees and workers of a single
country-wide state 'syndicate' . . . The whole of society
will have become a single office and a single factory,
with equality of labour and pay." [Collected Works,
vol. 25, pp. 473-4] Given that Engels had argued, against
anarchism, that a factory required subordination, authority,
lack of freedom and "a veritable despotism independent of
all social organisation," Lenin's idea of turning the world
into one big factory takes on an extremely frightening
nature. [Marx-Engels Reader, p. 731] A reality which one
anarchist described in 1923 as being the case in Lenin's
Russia:
"The nationalisation of industry, removing the workers
from the hands of individual capitalists, delivered them
to the yet more rapacious hands of a single, ever-present
capitalist boss, the State. The relations between the
workers and this new boss are the same as earlier
relations between labour and capital, with the sole
difference that the Communist boss, the State, not only
exploits the workers, but also punishes them himself . . .
Wage labour has remained what it was before, except that
it has taken on the character of an obligation to the
State . . . It is clear that in all this we are dealing
with a simple substitution of State capitalism for private
capitalism." [Peter Arshinov, History of the Makhnovist
Movement, p. 71]
All of which makes Bakunin's comments seem justified (as
well as stunningly accurate):
"Labour financed by the State - such is the fundamental
principle of authoritarian Communism, of State Socialism.
The State, having become the sole proprietor . . . will
have become sole capitalist, banker, money-lender, organiser,
director of all national work, and the distributor of its
profits." [The Political Philosophy of Bakunin, p. 293]
Such a system, based on those countries "where modern
capitalist development has reached its highest point of
development" would see "the gradual or violent expropriation
of the present landlords and capitalists, or of the
appropriation of all land and capital by the State. In
order to be able to carry out its great economic and
social mission, this State will have to be very far-reaching,
very powerful and highly centralised. It will administer
and supervise agriculture by means of its appointed
mangers, who will command armies of rural workers
organised and disciplined for that purpose. At the
same time, it will set up a single bank on the ruins
of all existing banks." Such a system, Bakunin correctly
predicted, would be "a barracks regime for the proletariat,
in which a standardised mass of men and women workers would
wake, sleep, work and live by rote; a regime of privilege
for the able and the clever." [Michael Bakunin: Selected
Writings, p. 258 and p. 259]
Proudhon, likewise was well aware that state ownership did
not mean the end of private property, rather it meant a
change in who ordered the working class about. "We do
not want," he stated, "to see the State confiscate the
mines, canals and railways; that would be to add to
monarchy, and more wage slavery. We want the mines,
canals, railways handed over to democratically organised
workers' associations" which would be the start of a
"vast federation of companies and societies woven into
the common cloth of the democratic social Republic."
He contrasted workers' associations run by and for
their members to those "subsidised, commanded and
directed by the State," which would crush "all liberty
and all wealth, precisely as the great limited companies
are doing." [No Gods, No Masters, vol. 1, p. 62 and
p. 105]
Simply put, if workers did not directly manage their own
work then it matters little who formally owns the workplaces
in which they toil. As Maurice Brinton argued, libertarian
socialists "hold that the 'relations of production' - the
relations which individuals or groups enter into with one
another in the process of producing wealth - are the
essential foundations of any society. A certain pattern
of relations of production is the common denominator of
all class societies. This pattern is one in which the
producer does not dominate the means of production but
on the contrary both is 'separated from them' and from
the products of his [or her] own labour. In all class
societies the producer is in a position of subordination
to those who manage the productive process. Workers'
management of production - implying as it does the total
domination of the producer over the productive process -
is not for us a marginal matter. It is the core of our
politics. It is the only means whereby authoritarian
(order-giving, order-taking) relations in production can
be transcended and a free, communist or anarchist, society
introduced." He went on to note that "the means of
production may change hands (passing for instance from
private hands into those of a bureaucracy, collectively
owning them) without this revolutionising the relations
of production. Under such circumstances - and whatever
the formal status of property - the society is still a
class society for production is still managed by an agency
other than the producers themselves. Property relations,
in other words, do not necessarily reflect the relations
of production. They may serve to mask them - and in fact
they often have." [The Bolsheviks and Workers' Control,
pp. vii-vii]
As such, for anarchists (and libertarian Marxists) the
idea that state ownership of the means of life (the land,
workplaces, factories, etc.) is the basis of socialism is
simply wrong. Therefore, "Anarchism cannot look upon the
coming revolution as a mere substitution . . . of the
State as the universal capitalist for the present
capitalists." [Kropotkin, Evolution and Environment,
p. 106] Given that the "State organisation having always
been . . . the instrument for establishing monopolies
in favour of the ruling minorities, [it] cannot be made
to work for the destruction of these monopolies. The
anarchists consider, therefore, that to hand over to
the State all the main sources of economic life - the
land, the mines, the railways, banking, insurance, and
so on - as also the management of all the main branches
of industry . . . would mean to create a new instrument
of tyranny. State capitalism would only increase the
powers of bureaucracy and capitalism." [Kropotkin,
Anarchism, p. 286] Needless to say, a
society which was not democratic in the workplace would
not remain democratic politically either. Either
democracy would become as formal as it is within any
capitalist republic or it would be replaced by dictatorship.
So, without a firm base in the direct management of
production, any "socialist" society would see working
class social power ("political power") and liberty wither
and die, just like a flower ripped out of the soil.
Unsurprisingly, given all this, we discover throughout
history the co-existence of private and state property.
Indeed, the nationalisation of key services and
industries has been implemented under all kinds of
capitalist governments and within all kinds of
capitalist states (which proves the non-socialist
nature of state ownership). Moreover, anarchists can
point to specific events where the capitalist class
has used nationalisation to undermine revolutionary
gains by the working class. The best example by far
is in the Spanish Revolution, when the Catalan
government used nationalisation against the wave of
spontaneous, anarchist inspired, collectivisation which
had placed most of industry into the direct hands
of the workers. The government, under the guise of
legalising the gains of the workers, placed them
under state ownership to stop their development,
ensure hierarchical control and so class society. A
similar process occurred during the Russian Revolution
under the Bolsheviks. Significantly, "many managers, at
least those who remained, appear to have preferred
nationalisation (state control) to workers' control and
co-operated with Bolshevik commissars to introduce it.
Their motives are not too difficult to understand . . .
The issue of who runs the plants - who makes decisions -
is, and probably always will be, the crucial question for
managers in any industrial relations system." [Jay B.
Sorenson, The Life and Death of Soviet Trade Unionism,
pp. 67-8] As we discuss in the
next section, the managers
and capitalists were not the only ones who disliked "workers'
control," the Bolsheviks did so as well, and they ensured that
it was marginalised within a centralised system of state control
based on nationalisation.
As such, anarchists think that a utterly false dichotomy has
been built up in discussions of socialism, one which has served
the interests of both capitalists and state bureaucrats. This
dichotomy is simply that the economic choices available to
humanity are "private" ownership of productive means
(capitalism), or state ownership of productive means (usually
defined as "socialism"). In this manner, capitalist nations
used the Soviet Union, and continue to use autocracies like
North Korea, China, and Cuba as examples of the evils of
"public" ownership of productive assets. While the hostility of
the capitalist class to such regimes is often used by Leninists
as a rationale to defend them (as "degenerated workers' states",
to use the Trotskyist term) this is a radically false conclusion.
As one anarchist argued in 1940 against Trotsky (who first raised
this notion):
"Expropriation of the capitalist class is naturally terrifying
to 'the bourgeoisie of the whole world,' but that does not prove
anything about a workers' state . . . In Stalinist Russia expropriation
is carried out . . . by, and ultimately for the benefit of, the
bureaucracy, not by the workers at all. The bourgeoisie are afraid of
expropriation, of power passing out of their hands, whoever seizes
it from them. They will defend their property against any class or
clique. The fact that they are indignant [about Stalinism] proves their
fear - it tells us nothing at all about the agents inspiring that
fear." [J.H., "The Fourth International", pp. 37-43,
The Left and World War II, Vernon Richards (ed.), pp. 41-2]
Anarchists see little distinction between "private" ownership of
the means of life and "state" ownership. This is because the
state is a highly centralised structure specifically designed to
exclude mass participation and so, therefore, necessarily composed
of a ruling administrative body. As such, the "public" cannot
actually "own" the property the state claims to hold in its name.
The ownership and thus control of the productive means is then
in the hands of a ruling elite, the state administration (i.e.
bureaucracy). The "means of wealth production" are "owned
by the state which represents, as always, a privileged class - the
bureaucracy." The workers "do not either individually or
collectively own anything, and so, as elsewhere, are compelled to
sell their labour power to the employer, in this case the state."
["USSR - The Anarchist Position", pp. 21-24, Op. Cit.,
p. 23] Thus, the means of production and land of a state "socialist"
regime are not publicly owned - rather, they are owned by
a bureaucratic elite, in the name of the people, a subtle
but important distinction. As one Chinese anarchist put it:
"Marxian socialism advocates the centralisation not only of
political power but also of capital. The centralisation of
political power is dangerous enough in itself; add to that the
placing of all sources of wealth in the hands of the government,
and the so-called state socialism becomes merely state capitalism,
with the state as the owner of the means of production and the
workers as its labourers, who hand over the value produced by
their labour. The bureaucrats are the masters, the workers their
slaves. Even though they advocate a state of the dictatorship of
workers, the rulers are bureaucrats who do not labour, while
workers are the sole producers. Therefore, the suffering of workers
under state socialism is no different from that under private
capitalism." [Ou Shengbai, quoted by Arif Dirlik, Anarchism in
the Chinese Revolution, p. 224]
In this fashion, decisions about the allocation and use of the
productive assets are not made by the people themselves, but by
the administration, by economic planners. Similarly, in "private"
capitalist economies, economic decisions are made by a coterie
of managers. In both cases the managers make decisions which
reflect their own interests and the interests of the owners
(be it shareholders or the state bureaucracy) and not the
workers involved or society as a whole. In both cases, economic
decision-making is top-down in nature, made by an elite of
administrators - bureaucrats in the state socialist economy,
capitalists or managers in the "private" capitalist economy.
The much-lauded distinction of capitalism is that unlike the
monolithic, centralised state socialist bureaucracy it has
a choice of bosses (and choosing a master is not freedom).
And given the similarities in the relations of production
between capitalism and state "socialism," the obvious
inequalities in wealth in so-called "socialist" states
are easily explained. The relations of production and the
relations of distribution are inter-linked and so inequality
in terms of power in production means inequality in control
of the social product, which will be reflected in inequality
in terms of wealth. The mode of distributing the social product
is inseparable from the mode of production and its social
relationships. Which shows the fundamentally confused nature
of Trotsky's attempts to denounce the Stalinist regime's privileges
as "bourgeois" while defending its "socialist" economic base (see
Cornelius Castoriadis, "The Relations of Production in Russia",
pp. 107-158, Political and Social Writings, vol. 1).
In other words, private property exists if some individuals
(or groups) control/own things which are used by other people.
This means, unsurprising, that state ownership is just a form
of property rather than the negation of it. If you have a
highly centralised structure (as the state is) which plans
and decides about all things within production, then this
central administrative would be the real owner because it
has the exclusive right to decide how things are used, not
those using them. The existence of this central administrative
strata excludes the abolition of property, replacing socialism
or communism with state owned "property," i.e. state
capitalism. As such, state ownership does not end wage
labour and, therefore, social inequalities in terms of wealth
and access to resources. Workers are still order-takers under
state ownership (whose bureaucrats control the product of
their labour and determine who gets what). The only difference
between workers under private property and state property is
the person telling them what to do. Simply put, the capitalist
or company appointed manager is replaced by a state appointed
one.
As anarcho-syndicalist Tom Brown stressed, when "the many
control the means whereby they live, they will do so by
abolishing private ownership and establishing common
ownership of the means of production, with workers' control
of industry." However, this is "not to be confused with
nationalisation and state control" as "ownership is, in
theory, said to be vested in the people" but, in fact
"control is in the hands of a small class of bureaucrats."
Then "common ownership does not exist, but the labour market
and wage labour go on, the worker remaining a wage slave to
State capitalism." Simply put, common ownership "demands
common control. This is possible only in a condition of
industrial democracy by workers' control." [Syndicalism,
p. 94] In summary:
"Nationalisation is not Socialisation, but State Capitalism
. . . Socialisation . . . is not State ownership, but the
common, social ownership of the means of production, and
social ownership implies control by the producers, not by
new bosses. It implies Workers' Control of Industry -
and that is Syndicalism." [Op. Cit., p. 111]
However, many Marxists (in particular Leninists) state they
are in favour of both state ownership and "workers'
control." As we discuss in more depth in
next section, while they mean
the same thing as anarchists do by the first term, they have
a radically different meaning for the second (it is for this
reason modern-day anarchists generally use the term "workers'
self-management"). To anarchist ears, the combination of
nationalisation (state ownership) and "workers' control"
(and even more so, self-management) simply expresses
political confusion, a mishmash of contradictory ideas which
simply hides the reality that state ownership, by its very
nature, precludes workers' control. As such, anarchists reject
such contradictory rhetoric in favour of "socialisation" and
"workers' self-management of production." History shows that
nationalisation will always undermine workers' control at the
point of production and such rhetoric always paves the way for
state capitalism.
Therefore, anarchists are against both nationalisation
and privatisation, recognising both as forms of
capitalism, of wage slavery. We believe in genuine public
ownership of productive assets, rather than corporate/private
or state/bureaucratic control. Only in this manner can the
public address their own economic needs. Thus, we see a
third way that is distinct from the popular "either/or"
options forwarded by capitalists and state socialists, a
way that is entirely more democratic. This is workers'
self-management of production, based on social ownership
of the means of life by federations of self-managed
syndicates and communes.
Finally, it should be mentioned that some Leninists do have an
analysis of Stalinism as "state capitalist," most noticeably the
British SWP. According to the creator of this theory, Tony Cliff,
Stalinism had to be considered a class system because "[i]f the
state is the repository of the means of production and the workers
do not control it, they do not own the means of production, i.e.,
they are not the ruling class." Which is fine, as far as it goes
(anarchists would stress the social relations within production
as part of our criteria for what counts as socialism). The problems
start to accumulate when Cliff tries to explain why Stalinism was
(state) capitalist.
For Cliff, internally the USSR could be viewed as one big factory
and the division of labour driven by bureaucratic decree. Only when
Stalinism was "viewed within the international economy the basic
features of capitalism can be discerned." Thus it is international
competition which makes the USSR subject to "the law of value" and,
consequently, capitalist. However, as international trade was tiny
under Stalinism "competition with other countries is mainly
military." It is this indirect competition in military matters
which made Stalinist Russia capitalist rather than any internal
factor. [State capitalism in Russia, pp. 311-2, p. 221 and
p. 223]
The weakness of this argument should be obvious. From an anarchist
position, it fails to discuss the social relations within production
and the obvious fact that workers could, and did, move workplaces
(i.e., there was a market for labour). Cliff only mentions the fact
that the Stalinist regime's plans were never fulfilled when he shows
up the inefficiencies of Stalinist mismanagement. With regards to
labour, that appears to be divided according to the plan. Similarly,
to explain Stalinism's "capitalist" nature as being a product of
military competition with other, more obviously, capitalist states
is a joke. It is like arguing that Ford is a capitalist company
because BMW is! As one libertarian Marxist put it: "One can only
wonder as to the type of contortions Cliff might have got into if
Soviet military competition had been with China alone!" [Neil C.
Fernandez, Capitalism and Class Struggle in the USSR, p. 65]
Significantly, Cliff raised the possibility of single world-wide
Stalinist regime and concluded it would not be state
capitalist, it would "be a system of exploitation not subject
to the law of value and all its implications." [Op. Cit.,
p. 225] As Fernandez correctly summarises:
"Cliff's position appears untenable when it is remembered that
whatever capitalism may or may not entail, what it is
a mode of production, defined by a certain type of social
production relations. If the USSR is capitalist simply because
it produces weaponry to compete with those countries that
themselves would have been capitalist even without such
competition, then one might as well say the same about tribes
whose production is directed to the provision of tomahawks
in the fight against colonialism." [Op. Cit., p. 65]
Strangely, as Marxist, Cliff seemed unaware that, for Marx, "competition"
did not define capitalism. As far as trade goes, the "character of
the production process from which [goods] derive is immaterial"
and so on the market commodities come "from all modes of production"
(for example, they could be "the produce of production based on
slavery, the product of peasants . . ., of a community . . . , of state
production (such as existed in earlier epochs of Russian history, based
on serfdom) or half-savage hunting peoples"). [Capital,
vol. 2, pp. 189-90] This means that trade "exploits a given mode of
production but does not create it" and so relates "to the mode
of production from outside." [Capital, vol. 3, p. 745] Much
the same can be said of military competition - it does not define the
mode of production.
There are other problems with Cliff's argument, namely that it
implies that Lenin's regime was also state capitalist (as
anarchists stress, but Leninists deny). If, as Cliff suggests, a
"workers' state" is one in which "the proletariat has direct
or indirect control, no matter how restricted, over the state power"
then Lenin's regime was not one within six months. Similarly,
workers' self-management was replaced by one-man management under
Lenin, meaning that Stalin inherited the (capitalistic) relations
of production rather than created them. Moreover, if it were military
competition which made Stalinism "state capitalist" then, surely,
so was Bolshevik Russia when it was fighting the White and Imperialist
armies during the Civil War. Nor does Cliff prove that a proletariat
actually existed under Stalinism, raising the clear contradiction
that "[i]f there is only one employer, a 'change of masters' is
impossible . . . a mere formality" while also attacking those
who argued that Stalinism was "bureaucratic collectivism" because
Russian workers were not proletarians but rather slaves. So
this "mere formality" is used to explain that the Russian
worker is a proletarian, not a slave, and so Russia was state
capitalist in nature! [Cliff, Op. Cit., p. 310, p. 219,
p. 350 and p. 348]
All in all, attempts to draw a clear line between Leninism and
Stalinism as regards its state capitalist nature are doomed to
failure. The similarities are far too obvious and simply support
the anarchist critique of state socialism as nothing more than
state capitalism. Ultimately, "Trotskyism merely promises
socialism by adopting the same methods, and mistakes, which have
produced Stalinism." [J.H., "The Fourth International",
pp. 37-43, The Left and World War II, Vernon Richards (ed.), p. 43]
As we discussed in the
last section, anarchists consider
the usual association of state ownership with socialism to
be false. We argue that it is just another form of the wages
system, of capitalism, albeit with the state replacing the
capitalist and so state ownership, for anarchists, is
simply state capitalism. Instead we urge socialisation
based on workers' self-management of production. Libertarian
Marxists concur.
Some mainstream Marxists, however, say they seek to combine
state ownership with "workers' control." This can be seen
from Trotsky, for example, who argued in 1938 for "workers'
control . . . the penetration of the workers' eye into all
open and concealed springs of capitalist economy . . . workers'
control becomes a school for planned economy. On the basis of
the experience of control, the proletariat will prepare itself
for direct management of nationalised industry when the hour
for that eventuality strikes." This, it is argued, proves
that nationalisation (state ownership and control) is not "state
capitalism" but rather "control is the first step along the
road to the socialist guidance of economy." [The Death Agony
of Capitalism and the Tasks of the Fourth International, p. 73
and p. 74] This explains why many modern day Leninists are often
heard voicing support for what anarchists consider an obvious
oxymoron, namely "nationalisation under workers' control."
Anarchists are not convinced. This is because of two reasons.
Firstly, because by the term "workers' control" anarchists
and Leninists mean two radically different things. Secondly, when
in power Trotsky advocated radically different ideas. Based
on these reasons, anarchists view Leninist calls for "workers'
control" simply as a means of gaining popular support, calls
which will be ignored once the real aim, party power, has been
achieved: it is an example of Trotsky's comment that "[s]logans
as well as organisational forms should be subordinated to the indices
of the movement." [Op. Cit., p. 72] In other words, rather
than express a commitment to the ideas of worker's control of
production, mainstream Marxist use of the term "workers' control"
is simply an opportunistic technique aiming at securing support
for the party's seizure of power and once this is achieved it
will be cast aside in favour of the first part of the demands,
namely state ownership and so control. In making this claim
anarchists feel they have more than enough evidence, evidence
which many members of Leninist parties simply know nothing about.
We will look first at the question of terminology. Anarchists
traditionally used the term "workers' control" to mean workers'
full and direct control over their workplaces, and their work.
However, after the Russian Revolution a certain ambiguity arose
in using that term. This is because specific demands which were
raised during that revolution were translated into English as
"workers' control" when, in fact, the Russian meaning of the
word (kontrolia) was far closer to "supervision" or
"steering." Thus the term "workers' control" is used
to describe two radically different concepts.
This can be seen from Trotsky when he argued that the workers
should "demand resumption, as public utilities, of work in
private businesses closed as a result of the crisis. Workers'
control in such case would be replaced by direct workers'
management." [Op. Cit., p. 73] Why workers' employed in
open capitalist firms were not considered suitable for
"direct workers' management" is not explained, but the fact
remains Trotsky clearly differentiated between management and
control. For him, "workers' control" meant "workers
supervision" over the capitalist who retained power. Thus
the "slogan of workers’ control of production" was not equated
to actual workers’ control over production. Rather, it was "a sort
of economic dual power" which meant that "ownership and right
of disposition remain in the hands of the capitalists." This was
because it was "obvious that the power is not yet in the hands of
the proletariat, otherwise we would have not workers' control of
production but the control of production by the workers' state as an
introduction to a regime of state production on the foundations of
nationalisation." [Trotsky, The Struggle Against Fascism in
Germany, p. 91 and p. 92]
This vision of "workers' control" as simply supervision of
the capitalist managers and a prelude to state control and, ultimately,
nationalisation can be found in Lenin. Rather than seeing "workers'
control" as workers managing production directly, he always saw
it in terms of workers' "controlling" those who did. It simply
meant "the country-wide, all-embracing, omnipresent, most precise
and most conscientious accounting of the production and
distribution of goods." He clarified what he meant, arguing
for "country-wide, all-embracing workers' control over the
capitalists" who would still manage production. Significantly, he
considered that "as much as nine-tenths of the socialist
apparatus" required for this "country-wide book-keeping,
country-wide accounting of the production and distribution of
goods" would be achieved by nationalising the "big banks,"
which "are the 'state apparatus' which we need to
bring about socialism" (indeed, this was considered "something
in the nature of the skeleton of socialist society"). This
structure would be taken intact from capitalism for "the modern
state possesses an apparatus which has extremely close connection
with the banks and [business] syndicates . . . this apparatus must
not, and should not, be smashed." [Collected Works, vol. 26,
p. 105, p. 107, p. 106 and pp. 105-6] Over time, this system would move
towards full socialism.
Thus, what Leninists mean by "workers' control" is radically
different than what anarchists traditionally meant by that term
(indeed, it was radically different from the workers' definition,
as can be seen from a resolution of the Bolshevik dominated
First Trade Union Congress which complained that "the workers
misunderstand and falsely interpret workers' control." [quoted
by M. Brinton, The Bolsheviks and Workers' Control, p. 32]).
It is for this reason that from the 1960s English speaking anarchists
and other libertarian socialists have been explicit
and have used the term "workers' self-management" rather than
"workers' control" to describe their aims. Mainstream Marxists,
however have continued to use the latter slogan, undoubtedly,
as we note in section H.3.5,
to gain members from the confusion
in meanings.
Secondly, there is the example of the Russian Revolution itself. As
historian S.A. Smith correctly summarises, the Bolshevik party
"had no position on the question of workers' control prior to
1917." The "factory committees launched the slogan of
workers' control of production quite independently of the Bolshevik
party. It was not until May that the party began to take it up."
However, Lenin used "the term ['workers' control'] in a very
different sense from that of the factory committees." In fact
Lenin's proposals were "thoroughly statist and centralist
in character, whereas the practice of the factory committees
was essentially local and autonomous." While those
Bolsheviks "connected with the factory committees assigned
responsibility for workers' control of production chiefly to the
committees" this "never became official Bolshevik party
policy." In fact, "the Bolsheviks never deviated before or
after October from a commitment to a statist, centralised solution
to economic disorder. The disagreement between the two wings of the
socialist movement [i.e., the Mensheviks and Bolsheviks] was not
about state control in the abstract, but what kind of state
should co-ordinate control of the economy: a bourgeois state or a
workers' state?" They "did not disagree radically in the
specific measures which they advocated for control of the economy."
Lenin "never developed a conception of workers' self-management.
Even after October, workers' control remained for him fundamentally
a matter of 'inspection' and 'accounting' . . . rather than as being
necessary to the transformation of the process of production by the
direct producers. For Lenin, the transformation of capitalist relations
of production was achieved at central-state level, rather than at
enterprise level. Progress to socialism was guaranteed by the
character of the state and achieved through policies by the central
state - not by the degree of power exercised by workers on the shop
floor." [Red Petrograd, p. 153, p. 154, p. 159, p. 153, p. 154
and p. 228]
Thus the Bolshevik vision of "workers' control" was always
placed in a statist context and it would be exercised not by workers'
organisations but rather by state capitalist institutions. This
has nothing in common with control by the workers themselves and
their own class organisations as advocated by anarchists. In
May 1917, Lenin was arguing for the "establishment of state
control over all banks, and their amalgamation into a single
central bank; also control over the insurance agencies and big
capitalist syndicates." [Collected Works, vol. 24,
p. 311] He reiterated this framework later that year, arguing
that "the new means of control have been created not
by us, but by capitalism in its military-imperialist stage"
and so "the proletariat takes its weapons from capitalism and
does not 'invent' or 'create them out of nothing.'" The aim
was "compulsory amalgamation in associations under state
control," "by workers' control of the workers' state."
[Op. Cit., vol. 26, p. 108, p. 109 and p. 108] The
factory committees were added to this "state capitalist"
system but they played only a very minor role in it. Indeed, this
system of state control was designed to limit the power of the
factory committees:
"One of the first decrees issues by the Bolshevik Government
was the Decree on Workers' Control of 27 November 1917. By
this decree workers' control was institutionalised . . .
Workers' control implied the persistence of private ownership
of the means of production, though with a 'diminished' right
of disposal. The organs of workers' control, the factory
committees, were not supposed to evolve into workers'
management organs after the nationalisation of the factories.
The hierarchical structure of factory work was not questioned
by Lenin . . . To the Bolshevik leadership the transfer of
power to the working class meant power to its leadership,
i.e. to the party. Central control was the main goal of the
Bolshevik leadership. The hasty creation of the VSNKh (the
Supreme Council of the National Economy) on 1 December 1917,
with precise tasks in the economic field, was a significant
indication of fact that decentralised management was not among
the projects of the party, and that the Bolsheviks intended to
counterpoise central direction of the economy to the possible
evolution of workers' control toward self-management."
[Silvana Malle, The Economic Organisation of War Communism,
1918-1921, p. 47]
Once in power, the Bolsheviks soon turned away from even
this limited vision of workers' control and in favour of
"one-man management." Lenin raised this idea in late April
1918 and it involved granting state appointed "individual
executives dictatorial powers (or 'unlimited' powers)."
Large-scale industry required "thousands subordinating
their will to the will of one," and so the revolution
"demands" that "the people unquestioningly obey the single
will of the leaders of labour." Lenin's "superior forms of
labour discipline" were simply hyper-developed capitalist
forms. The role of workers in production was the same, but
with a novel twist, namely "unquestioning obedience to the
orders of individual representatives of the Soviet government
during the work." This support for wage slavery was combined
with support for capitalist management techniques. "We must
raise the question of piece-work and apply and test it in
practice," argued Lenin, "we must raise the question of
applying much of what is scientific and progressive in the
Taylor system; we must make wages correspond to the total
amount of goods turned out." [Lenin, Op. Cit.,
vol. 27, p. 267, p. 269, p. 271 and p. 258]
This vision had already been applied in practice, with the
"first decree on the management of nationalised enterprises in
March 1918" which had "established two directors at the head of
each enterprise . . . Both directors were appointed by the
central administrators." An "economic and administrative
council" was also created in the workplace, but this "did not
reflect a syndicalist concept of management." Rather it
included representatives of the employees, employers, engineers,
trade unions, the local soviets, co-operatives, the local
economic councils and peasants. This composition "weakened
the impact of the factory workers on decision-making . . .
The workers' control organs [the factory committees] remained
in a subordinate position with respect to the council." Once
the Civil War broke out in May 1918, this process was
accelerated. By 1920, most workplaces were under one-man
management and the Communist Party at its Ninth Congress had
"promoted one-man management as the most suitable form of
management." [Malle, Op. Cit., p. 111, p. 112,
p. 141 and p. 128] In other words, the manner in which
Lenin organised industry had handed it over entirely into
the hands of the bureaucracy.
Trotsky did not disagree with all this, quite the reverse - he
wholeheartedly defended the imposing of "one-man management".
As he put it in 1920, "our Party Congress . . . expressed itself
in favour of the principle of one-man management in the administration
of industry . . . It would be the greatest possible mistake, however,
to consider this decision as a blow to the independence of the working
class. The independence of the workers is determined and measured
not by whether three workers or one are placed at the head
of a factory." As such, it "would consequently be a most
crying error to confuse the question as to the supremacy of
the proletariat with the question of boards of workers at the
head of factories. The dictatorship of the proletariat is
expressed in the abolition of private property in the means
of production, in the supremacy over the whole Soviet mechanism
of the collective will of the workers, and not at all in the
form in which individual economic enterprises are administered."
The term "collective will of the workers" is simply a euphemism
for the Party which Trotsky had admitted had "substituted" its
dictatorship for that of the Soviets (indeed, "there is nothing
accidental" in this "'substitution' of the power of the party
for the power of the working class" and "in reality there is no
substitution at all." The "dictatorship of the Soviets became
possible only by means of the dictatorship of the party"). The
unions "should discipline the workers and teach them to place the
interests of production above their own needs and demands." He
even argued that "the only solution to economic difficulties from
the point of view of both principle and of practice is to treat the
population of the whole country as the reservoir of the necessary
labour power . . . and to introduce strict order into the work of
its registration, mobilisation and utilisation." [Terrorism
and Communism, p. 162, p. 109, p. 143 and p. 135]
Trotsky did not consider this a result of the Civil War.
Again, the opposite was the case: "I consider if the civil
war had not plundered our economic organs of all that was
strongest, most independent, most endowed with initiative,
we should undoubtedly have entered the path of one-man
management in the sphere of economic administration much
sooner and much less painfully." [Op. Cit., pp. 162-3]
Significantly, discussing developments in Russia since the N.E.P,
Trotsky a few years later argued that it was "necessary for
each state-owned factory, with its technical director and
with its commercial director, to be subjected not only
to control from the top - by the state organs - but
also from below, by the market which will remain the
regulator of the state economy for a long time to come."
Workers' control, as can be seen, was not even mentioned,
nor considered as an essential aspect of control "from
below." As Trotsky also stated that "[u]nder socialism
economic life will be directed in a centralised manner,"
our discussion of the state capitalist nature of mainstream
Marxism we presented in the
last section is confirmed.
[The First Five Years of the Communist International,
vol. 2, p. 237 and p. 229]
The contrast between what Trotsky did when he was in
power and what he argued for after he had been expelled
is obvious. Indeed, the arguments of 1938 and 1920 are
in direct contradiction to each other. Needless to say,
Leninists and Trotskyists today are fonder of quoting
Trotsky and Lenin when they did not have state power
rather than when they did. Rather than compare what they
said to what they did, they simply repeat ambiguous slogans
which meant radically different things to Lenin and Trotsky
than to the workers' who thrust them into power. For obvious
reasons, we feel. Given the opportunity for latter day
Leninists to exercise power, we wonder if a similar process
would occur again? Who would be willing to take that chance?
As such, any claim that mainstream Marxism considers "workers'
control" as an essential feature of its politics is simply
nonsense. For a comprehensive discussion of "workers' control"
during the Russian Revolution Maurice Brinton's account cannot be
bettered. As he stressed, "only the ignorant or those willing
to be deceived can still kid themselves into believing that
proletarian power at the point of production was ever a
fundamental tenet or objective of Bolshevism." [The
Bolsheviks and Workers' Control, p. 14]
All this is not some academic point. As Brinton noted, faced "with the
bureaucratic monstrosity of Stalinist and post-Stalinist Russia, yet wishing
to retain some credibility among their working class supporters, various
strands of Bolshevism have sought posthumously to rehabilitate the concept
of 'workers' control.'" The facts show that between 1917 and 1921
"all attempts by the working class to assert real power over production
- or to transcend the narrow role allocated by to it by the Party - were
smashed by the Bolsheviks, after first having been denounced as anarchist
or anarcho-syndicalist deviations. Today workers' control is presented as
a sort of sugar coating to the pill of nationalisation of every Trotskyist
or Leninist micro-bureaucrat on the make. Those who strangled the viable
infant are now hawking the corpse around " [For Workers' Power,
p. 165] Little has changes since Brinton wrote those words in the 1960s,
with Leninists today proclaiming with a straight face that they stand for
"self-management"!
The roots of this confusion can be found in Marx and Engels.
In the struggle between authentic socialism (i.e. workers'
self-management) and state capitalism (i.e. state ownership)
there are elements of the correct solution to be found in
their ideas, namely their support for co-operatives. For
example, Marx praised the efforts made within the Paris
Commune to create co-operatives, so "transforming the means
of production, land and capital . . . into mere instruments
of free and associated labour." He argued that "[i]f
co-operative production is not to remain a shame and a snare;
if it is to supersede the Capitalist system; if united
co-operative societies are to regulate national production
upon a common plan, thus taking it under their own control,
and putting an end to the constant anarchy and periodical
convulsions which are the fatality of Capitalist production
- what else . . . would it be but Communism, 'possible'
Communism?" [Selected Works, pp. 290-1] In the 1880s,
Engels suggested as a reform the putting of public works and
state-owned land into the hands of workers' co-operatives
rather than capitalists. [Collected Works, vol. 47,
p. 239]
These comments should not be taken as being totally without aspects
of nationalisation. Engels argued for "the transfer - initially
on lease - of large estates to autonomous co-operatives under state
management and effected in such a way that the State retains ownership
of the land." He stated that neither he nor Marx "ever doubted
that, in the course of transition to a wholly communist economy,
widespread use would have to be made of co-operative management as
an intermediate stage. Only it will mean so organising things that
society, i.e. initially the State, retains ownership of the means
of production and thus prevents the particular interests of the
co-operatives from taking precedence over those of society as a
whole." [Op. Cit., p. 389] However, Engels comments simply
bring home the impossibilities of trying to reconcile state ownership
and workers' self-management. While the advocacy of co-operatives is
a positive step forward from the statist arguments of the Communist
Manifesto, Engels squeezes these libertarian forms of organising
production into typically statist structures. How "autonomous
co-operatives" can co-exist with (and under!) "state management"
and "ownership" is not explained, not to mention the fatal
confusion of socialisation with nationalisation.
In addition, the differences between the comments of Marx and
Engels are obvious. While Marx talks of "united co-operative
societies," Engels talks of "the State." The former
implies a free federation of co-operatives, the latter a
centralised structure which the co-operatives are squeezed
into and under. The former is socialist, the latter is state
capitalist. From Engels argument, it is obvious that the stress
is on state ownership and management rather than self-management.
This confusion became a source of tragedy during the Russian
Revolution when the workers, like their comrades during the
Commune, started to form a federation of factory committees
while the Bolsheviks squeezed these bodies into a system of
state control which was designed to marginalise them.
Moreover, the aims of the Paris workers were at odds with
the vision of the Communist Manifesto and in line with
anarchism - most obviously Proudhon's demands for workers
associations to replace wage labour and what he called,
in his Principle of Federation, an "agro-industrial
federation." Thus the Commune's idea of co-operative
production was a clear expression of what Proudhon explicitly
called "industrial democracy," a "reorganisation of
industry, under the jurisdiction of all those who compose it."
[quoted by K. Steven Vincent, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon and the
Rise of French Republican Socialism, p. 225] Thus, while
Engels (in part) echoes Proudhon's ideas, he does not go fully
towards a self-managed system of co-operation and co-ordination
based on the workers' own organisations. Significantly, Bakunin
and later anarchists simply developed these ideas to their logical
conclusion.
Marx, to his credit, supported these libertarian visions
when applied in practice by the Paris workers during the
Commune and promptly revised his ideas. This fact has been
obscured somewhat by Engels historical revisionism in this
matter. In his 1891 introduction to Marx's "The Civil War in
France", Engels painted a picture of Proudhon being opposed
to association (except for large-scale industry) and stressed
that "to combine all these associations in one great union"
was "the direct opposite of the Proudhon doctrine" and so
"the Commune was the grave of the Proudhon doctrine."
[Selected Works, p. 256] However, as noted, this is nonsense.
The forming of workers' associations and their federation was a
key aspect of Proudhon's ideas and so the Communards were obviously
acting in his spirit. Given that the Communist Manifesto
stressed state ownership and failed to mention co-operatives at
all, the claim that the Commune acted in its spirit seems a tad
optimistic. He also argued that the "economic measures"
of the Commune were driven not by "principles" but by "simple,
practical needs." This meant that "the confiscation of
shut-down factories and workshops and handing them over to workers'
associations" were "not at all in accordance with the spirit
of Proudhonism but certainly in accordance with the spirit of German
scientific socialism"! This seems unlikely, given Proudhon's
well known and long-standing advocacy of co-operatives as well as
Marx's comment in 1866 that in France the workers ("particularly
those of Paris"!) "are strongly attached, without knowing it [!],
to the old rubbish" and that the "Parisian gentlemen had their
heads full of the emptiest Proudhonist phrases." [Marx, Engels,
Lenin, Anarchism and Anarcho-Syndicalism, p. 92, p. 46 and p. 45]
What did this "old rubbish" consist of? Well, in 1869 the
delegate of the Parisian Construction Workers' Trade Union
argued that "[a]ssociation of the different corporations
[labour unions/associations] on the basis of town or country
. . . leads to the commune of the future . . . Government is
replaced by the assembled councils of the trade bodies, and
by a committee of their respective delegates." In addition,
"a local grouping which allows the workers in the same area
to liase on a day to day basis" and "a linking up of the
various localities, fields, regions, etc." (i.e. international
trade or industrial union federations) would ensure that
"labour organises for present and future by doing away with
wage slavery." This "mode of organisation leads to the labour
representation of the future." [No Gods, No Masters, vol. 1,
p. 184]
To state the obvious, this had clear links with both Proudhon's
ideas and what the Commune did in practice. Rather than
being the "grave" of Proudhon's ideas on workers' associations,
the Commune saw their birth, i.e. their application. Rather than the
Parisian workers becoming Marxists without knowing it, Marx had become
a follower of Proudhon! The idea of socialism being based on a
federation of workers' associations was not buried with the Paris
Commune. It was integrated into all forms of social anarchism
(including communist-anarchism and anarcho-syndicalism) and recreated
every time there is a social revolution.
In ending we must note that anarchists are well aware that
individual workplaces could pursue aims at odds with the
rest of society (to use Engels expression, their "particular
interests"). This is often termed "localism." Anarchists,
however, argue that the mainstream Marxist solution is worse
than the problem. By placing self-managed workplaces under
state control (or ownership) they become subject to even
worse "particular interests," namely those of the state
bureaucracy who will use their power to further their own
interests. In contrast, anarchists advocate federations of
self-managed workplaces to solve this problem. This is because
the problem of "localism" and any other problems
faced by a social revolution will be solved in the interests
of the working class only if working class people solve them
themselves. For this to happen it requires working class
people to manage their own affairs directly and that implies
self-managed organising from the bottom up (i.e. anarchism)
rather than delegating power to a minority at the top, to a
"revolutionary" party or state. This applies economically,
socially and politically. As Bakunin argued, the "revolution
should not only be made for the people's sake; it should also
be made by the people." [No Gods, No Masters, vol. 1,
p. 141]
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