Capitalism in Crisis
Oct 16 2008
The Socialist Party of Great Britain which have been referred to in the crisis thread on the forum are holding a public meeting on the current crisis on 18th Sat at their Head Office at 7 30pm .
It should be remembered that the SPGB are the only socialist party still in existence from the time of the Great Crash and the ensuing Hungry Thirties and produced a pamphlet in 1932 on why Capitalism will NOT collapse that concluded:-
"... The lesson to be learned is that there is no simple way out of Capitalism by leaving the system to collapse of its own accord. Until a sufficient number of workers are prepared to organise politically for the conscious purpose of ending Capitalism, that system will stagger on indefinitely...So long as the workers are prepared to resign themselves to the evils of Capitalism, and so long as they are prepared to place in control of Parliament parties that will use their power for the purpose of maintaining Capitalism, there is no escape from the effects of Capitalism. The workers will continue to suffer from the normal hardships of the capitalist system when trade is relatively good, and from the aggravated hardships which are the workers’ lot during trade depressions."
Oct 16 2008
#2
Capitalism will not collapse of its own accord, workers must vote on it first perhaps?
Oct 16 2008
#3
Parliament should pass the following legislation:
The Socialism of the People Act 2008
1. The definition of capitalism
(1) For the purposes of the Act, “capitalism” means an institution which—
(a) is not very nice
(b) exists independently from the state, and can be abolished by it
(2) Nothing in (1) above shall be construed as an understanding of—
(a) Social relations and the way in which they a materially reproduced on a daily basis
(b) The fact the bourgeois state cannot be used to abolish bourgeois society
(c) The fact that (a) and (b) together render 'socialist parliamentarianism' at best niave and at worst counter-revolutionary
2. The abolition of capitalism
(1) Capitalism is hereby abolished—
(a) yay!! that was easy
(b) kthxbai
Oct 16 2008
#4
Quote:
Location: Scotland , India
Also, stop defying the laws of time and space right now or I'm voting Lib Dem.
Oct 16 2008
#5
he's a subatomic quantum socialist. to be fair puts my internationalism to shame.
Oct 16 2008
#6
Actually to add to the confusion , i'm in London right now .
The Socialist Party of Great Britain has never held that a merely formal majority at the polls will give the workers power to achieve Socialism. We have always emphasised that such a majority must be educated in the essentials of Socialist principles and have a party democratically organised .
William Morris wrote.:-
"It should be our special aim to make Socialists by putting before people, and especially the working classes, the elementary truths of socialism… before any definite socialist action can be attempted, it must be backed up by a great body of intelligent opinion — the opinion of a great mass of people who are already socialists…"
It is the quality of the voters behind the vote that, in the revolutionary struggle, will be decisive.
No-one can be exactly sure which form the revolutionary process will take but the SPGB has always held that the potential use of parliament as part of a revolutionary process may prove vitally important in neutralising the ruling class's hold on state power. For us, this is the most effective way of abolishing the state and ushering in the revolutionary society . Surely the working class cannot enter the class war with one arm tied behind its back.
Oct 16 2008
#7
no,it must enter the class war with legs tied, blindfolded and after spinning around the stop 50 times, after drinking a litre of cheap vodka.
Oct 16 2008
#8
ajjohnstone wrote:
Surely the working class cannot enter the class war with one arm tied behind its back.
i don't see an absence of MPs as a handicap. a working class that puts its faith in anything other than our own capacity to change the world is doomed to servitude, so it doesn't matter the 'quality' so long as the class remain 'voters.'
Oct 16 2008
#9
If we ever reach a point where the vast majority of the working class consciously decide we want to change the world in our interests, I hope that with those numbers we dont need to go through parliament to check its ok first.
Oct 16 2008
#10
ajjohnstone wrote:
We have always emphasised that such a majority must be educated in the essentials of Socialist principles and have a party democratically organised .
And what happens if they educate themselves democratically and become too educated and democratic for your fuckin Trotsky covers band?
Oct 16 2008
#11
You ask too many questions, comrade. 
Oct 16 2008
#12
Alan wrote:
ajjohnstone wrote:
We have always emphasised that such a majority must be educated in the essentials of Socialist principles and have a party democratically organised .And what happens if they educate themselves democratically and become too educated and democratic for your fuckin Trotsky covers band?
Would you cut the shit with your constant tankie and trot accusations. The SPGB are deleonists from what I understand, you are thinking of the SPUK, who are part of the CWI.
Oct 17 2008
#13
weeler , many thanks for your defence of our organisation from this Alan's uninformed attack on the SPGB .
Just one point , however , some in the SPGB consider the DeLeonist's to be "political cousins" , but we have throughout the party's history been consistent critics of Daniel DeLeon and the SLP positions such as the proposed Socialist Industrial Unions (http://www.worldsocialism.org/articles/socialist_industrial_unions.php ) . DeLeon put forward a three-stage theory of revolution: socialists winning the battle of ideas, victory at the ballot-box, and socialist industrial unions supplying the economic might to enforce electoral victory and workers’ power to create a future socialist society that would be an industrial unionist administration.
The SPGB countered that socialist unions were never to be the short-cut to a mass class-conscious movement that De Leon hoped for. Unlike the political wing, an understanding of basic socialist principles was not a condition of membership. We argue that De Leon was not wrong to condemn “pure and simple” trade unions but that his mistake was to attach too much importance to leadership, assuming that dishonest leaders imposed themselves on unwilling union memberships. The fact is that these leaders had the support of the workers and this would not be changed by retreating into socialist-run unions, but only by sustained persuasion of those who accepted the union status-quo .
Another big difference was ,of course ,that many in the SLP advocated Labour Time Vouchers and the SPGB call for the abolition of money and free access.
But enough of this polemic since i originally merely wished to cordially and comradely invite like-minded souls to a meeting that i thought an exchange of views on a crisis that is still unfolding and has many unanswered questions could be fruitful .
Oct 17 2008
#14
Those last 2 posts are more Trot than the fuckin smartass narcissist foureyes himself.
Oct 17 2008
#15
‘Four Eyed Narcissists’ working with Lenin
Quote:
when I received a message from Radek asking me to call on a matter of
great urgency. Wondering, I entered the automobile he had sent for me
and was driven at a fast clip through the city till we reached the
former quarters of the German Legation, now occupied by the Third
International. The elegant reception hall was filled with callers and
foreign delegates, some of whom were curiously examining the bullet
marks in the mosaic floor and walls --- reminders of the violent
death Mirbach had met in this room at the hands of Left Social
Revolutionists opposed to the Brest peace.I was conscious of the disapproving looks directed at me when, out of
my turn, I was requested to follow the attendant to the private
office of the Secretary of the Communist International. Radek
received me very cordially, inquired about my health, and thanked me
for so promptly responding to his call. Then, handing me a thick
manuscript, he said:"Ilyitch (Lenin) has just finished this work and he is anxious to
have you render it into English for the British Mission. You will do
us a great service."
It was the manuscript of "The Infantile Sickness of Leftism." I had
already heard about the forthcoming work and knew it to be an attack
on the Left revolutionary tendencies critical of Leninism. I turned
over some pages, with their profusely underscored lines corrected in
Lenin's small but legible handwriting. "Petty bourgeois ideology of
Anarchism," I read; "the infantile stupidity of Leftism," "the
ultrarevolutionists suffocating in the fervor of their childish
enthuslasm." The pale faces of the Butirki hunger strikers rose
before me. I saw their burning eyes peering accusingly at me through
the iron bars. "Have you forsaken us?" I heard them whisper.
"We are in a great hurry about this translation." Radek was saying,
and I felt impatience in his voice. "We want it done within three
days.""It will require at least a week," I replied. "Besides, I have other
work on hand, already promised.""I know, Losovsky's," he remarked with a disparaging tilt of the
head; "that's all right. Lenin's takes precedence. You can drop
everything else, on my responsibility."
"I will undertake it if I may add a preface.""This is no joking matter, Berkman." Radek was frankly displeased.
"I speak seriously. This pamphlet misrepresents and besmirches all my
ideals. I cannot agree to translate it without adding a few words in
defense."
"Otherwise you decline?""I do."
Radek's manner lacked warmth as I took my departure.
. . . . . .
A subtle change has taken place in the attitude of the Communists
toward me. I notice coldness in their greeting, a touch of resentment
even. My refusal to translate Lenin's brochure has become known, and
I am made to feel guilty of lèse majesté.
http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/bright/berkman/bmyth/bmch19.html
So whilst `Anarchist' intellectuals were playing happy families with
Leninists dictators, the Marxists (the Mensheviki) were pre-occupied
elsewhere.
Quote:
The Secretary himself could give me little information about labor
conditions in the city and province, as he had only recently assumed
charge of his office. "I am not a local man," he said; "I was sent
from Moscow only a few weeks ago. You see, Comrade," he explained,
evidently assuming my membership in the Communist Party, "it became
necessary to liquidate the whole management of the Soviet and of most
of the unions. At their heads were Mensheviki. They conducted the
organization on the principle of alleged protection of the workers'
interests. Protection against whom?" he raged. "You understand how
counter-revolutionary such a conception is! Just a Menshevik cloak to
further their opposition to us."
http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/bright/berkman/bmyth/bmch23.html
Oct 17 2008
#16
Seriously dude pulling one chapter out in which Berkman refuses to do a translation and calling it 'playing happy families' with lenin is just ridiculous. Berkman's extended critique of Leninism - written during his unavoidable stay there (he was forcibly deported from the US) is one of the most scathing to be found, not least because like everyone else outside Russia at the time, he started off thinking the Russian revolution had succeeded and became steadily disillusioned with it.
I'll be charitable here and assume you're just ignorant of the rest of Berkman's writing during his experiences in Russia, so would suggest you read them before trying to come on a libertarian communist site and flag up pathetic distortions. There are plenty of examples of anarchists being knob-ends (Kropotkin's support for world war one for example, the CNT leadership's joining of the Republic), but this just makes you sound like an uninformed prat.
Oct 17 2008
#17
Alan wrote:
Those last 2 posts are more Trot than the fuckin smartass narcissist foureyes himself.
The SPGB aren't trots or leninists. They were around before 1917 and are something of a leftover from a more benign form of Marxism. Knightrose, a former member of the SPGB, has written about this before now.
Oct 17 2008
#18
That's just silly, Dave B - why immediately try to polarise the debate between selective portrayals of anarchism and marxism? This is petty and historically inaccurate. In fact many anarchists (and non-Menshevik left communist marxists such as Miasnikov) suffered the same fate as you describe happening to some Mensheviks. And some Mensheviks - such as Kollantai - joined the Bolsheviks. Other Mensheviks allied themselves with bourgeois democrats (or functioned as such themselves). Attempting to reduce in this way the history of revolutionary organisation to either/or loyalty to anarchism or marxism is plainly ridiculous.
Oct 17 2008
#19
Well actually I did not just find the little quote somewhere or other, I actually read Berkman’s ‘Bolshevik Myth’ book and it was a really interesting and good read. As was Victor Serge’s ‘Memoir’s of a Revolutionary’.
I also in fact have some sympathy with people like Berkman on their attitude to the Russian revolution at the time with their hope that despite all the problems somehow or other things might sort themselves out for the better.
There were plenty of others, as was mentioned in Berkmans book, when he was describing when representatives of the international left were given a tour of the new model ‘working class state’.
Just how close Berkman was to the Bolsheviks at the beginning people can judge for themselve’s by reading his own book, I don’t think the quote I gave misrepresented that.
As I remember Berkman was given some kind of commission by the Bolsheviks on some kind of academic cultural fact finding mission or something and was sent travelling around the country.
Other Anarchist as well as Marxist Mensheviks were being oppressed by the Bolshevik state whilst Berkman was working with them, and Berkman was aware of that, as also comes out in his book.
The Bolsheviks were cynically using Berkmans international reputation to gain international support, to his credit at some point he did decide enough was enough.
What we get from the standard history is that there was no Marxist opposition to the Bolsheviks from the very beginning and that all the opposition and oppression fell onto the ‘Anarchists’.
The Marxist Mensheviks, or the Left Mensheviks, were one of the first groups to get rolled up by Lenin's Cheka.
And throwing a little bit of light onto the truth of the matter draws the wrath of Anarchist and the Leninists alike.
So on something else on the Russian Marxist opposition to Leninism from Serge;
Memoirs of a Revolutionary, chapter 3,
1919-20;
Quote:
"The Mensheviks seem to me to be admirably intelligent, honest and
devoted to socialism, but completely overtaken by events. They stood
for a sound principal, that of working class democracy, but in a
situation fraught with such mortal danger that the state of siege did
not permit any functioning of democratic institutions."
Of the Marxist Mensheviks we here very little, as Trotsky put it they were ‘to be thrown into the dustbin of history’.
Most of what we know of them comes from the written record of Lenin’s own attacks on them and a few very rare non Leninist academic articles on them like the one below.
Oct 17 2008
#20
You wrongly argue as if Berkman's role is a dirty embarrassing secret hidden by anarchists - so who's been publishing his book for the last 80+ years?
Quote:
What we get from the standard history is that there was no Marxist opposition to the Bolsheviks from the very beginning and that all the opposition and oppression fell onto the ‘Anarchists’.The Marxist Mensheviks, or the Left Mensheviks, were one of the first groups to get rolled up by Lenin's Cheka.
And throwing a little bit of light onto the truth of the matter draws the wrath of Anarchist and the Leninists alike.
This is strawmanning - what you are calling "wrath" here is simply pointing out your historical inaccuracy. E.g., the anarchist Maksimov in 'The Guillotine At Work', 1940, mentions in some detail the repression of dissident Bolsheviks, Mensheviks, and others who opposed the Bolshevik state. The anarchist Cienfuegos Press published articles in the 70s by and about Miasnikov. This site contains articles about Miasnikov, his comrades and other aspects of what has become known as the left-communist opposition. So your own sectarianism is leading you to project it as a mythology onto others. If there is relatively little mention of Menshevism it's possibly because your group are one of their few remaining heirs/fans, also perhaps because their role was not revolutionary and so of little interest to most.
Oct 18 2008
#21
Dave B wrote:
Of the Marxist Mensheviks we here very little, as Trotsky put it they were ‘to be thrown into the dustbin of history’.Most of what we know of them comes from the written record of Lenin’s own attacks on them and a few very rare non Leninist academic articles on them like the one below.
This is a fair point and from a quick glance that article looks interesting ...
Dave B wrote:
What we get from the standard history is that there was no Marxist opposition to the Bolsheviks from the very beginning and that all the opposition and oppression fell onto the ‘Anarchists’.The Marxist Mensheviks, or the Left Mensheviks, were one of the first groups to get rolled up by Lenin's Cheka.
And throwing a little bit of light onto the truth of the matter draws the wrath of Anarchist and the Leninists alike.
... but I don't see that this follows on. I can't remember reading anything from the original anarchist sources (Berkman, Maximoff, Voline etc.) which suggests that the Mensheviks didn't meet with the same repression as the anarchists. The problem is that Marxist interpretations of the Russian revolution have been dominated by Leninism of one sort or another - which isn't really the fault of anarchists.
Oct 18 2008
#22
ajjohnstone wrote:
..No-one can be exactly sure which form the revolutionary process will take..."
Agreed.
Quote:
"... but the SPGB has always held that the potential use of parliament as part of a revolutionary process may prove vitally important in neutralising the ruling class's hold on state power. For us, this is the most effective way of abolishing the state and ushering in the revolutionary society....
I might agree here as well, had you said that the use of parliament seemed likely to prove the least bloody means of ushering in a revolutionary society. (And minimizing bloodshed is indeed a worthy consideration.) But where on earth is the historical precedent for thinking it possible? Certainly neither Russia nor Spain came to good ends, but they were, at least, starts in the right direction. I am not aware of anything remotely similar on the part of parliamentarian attempts.
Oct 18 2008
#23
Quote:
Randy wrote I am not aware of anything remotely similar on the part of parliamentarian attempts.
Although we could consider the ending of the Shah reign's in Iran , Marcos and his dictatorship in Phillippines and of course the ending of the Iron Curtain as relatively bloodless revolutionary acts but of course they could be considered simply legalistic changes to governments however for the "revolutionary " change of social systems this example i am about to offer does match your definition of being very much remotely - emphasis on remotely- similar and i face the real possibility of being shot down by the more knowledgable .
I am thinking of the the revolutionary transformation of Japan from a feudal state into a capitalist one when the Meiji oligarchy abolished the four divisions of society through a series of economic and social reforms. The Japan of the mid-nineteenth century was profoundly feudalistic with its Confucian hierarchical social structure. Note that the merchants were at the very bottom of the social structure.The old Tokugawa class system of samurai, farmer, artisan, and merchant was abolished by 1871 and all were theoretically equal before the law but created new social divisions more akin to Capitalist class divisions . Capitalist developments such as private ownership was legalised, land deeds were issued and assessed at fair market value with taxes paid in cash rather than in kind as in pre-Meiji days .On the political sector, Japan received its first European style constitution in 1889. A parliament, was established while the emperor kept sovereignty: he stood at the top of the army, navy, executive and legislative powerbut in reality the ruling clique kept on holding the actual power.
And you are right about historic precedent since all previous social revolutions were all about the imposition of minority class rule upon the majority and therefore were mostly bloody , what the the SPGB ( and Marx ) are asserting in Parliament change is a historic precedent since the socialist revolution is going to the first that is about the majority class assuming political control which then of course dissolves itself as a class .
But really is the proper place to have this debate , i'm sure other readers may take issue with these exchanges on the announcements forum ? But you did ask a direct question so i though i had to respond - sort of
That should read only socialist party in the uk