The spatial spread of socialist society

[Young Master Smeet]

LBird,I did once upset an anarchist leaning member (who has since gone off to be a vicar(!!!)) by talking about democratic control of the police.  And I still think that an early step would be to remove the quasi military structure of police and introduce more democracy into their structures, as part of the capture of state power.  I still, also, think, we might end up putting police on the picket lines.To keep the scabs out, obviously.

Lbird wrote:

Well, since I think that there will be a multiplicity of 'workers' parties' organised around different theories and assumptions about various policies, I don't see them as 'the same thing' as workers' councils.

You get much the same thing at a Labour CLP meeting, different factions meet and fight.  The point/forum at which the different strands come together and acknowledge their belonging to a common movement is the point we can talk about the party/councils.  Fetishising workers councils is as sensible as fetishising the chairs in the meeting hall, they're just how it's happened sometimes.  The point is that the working class will need a democratic forum in which to organise.  Within that, I would also note that local councils and other elective bodies would do just as nicely, except they can't be as exclusive.  'Worker' isn't a definite category on which to base a franchise, so we will continue to need universal suffrage and the free association of self-identified workers to ifnluence it.

[ALB]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

Fetishising workers councils is as sensible as fetishising the chairs in the meeting hall, they're just how it's happened sometimes.  The point is that the working class will need a democratic forum in which to organise.  Within that, I would also note that local councils and other elective bodies would do just as nicely, except they can't be as exclusive.  'Worker' isn't a definite category on which to base a franchise, so we will continue to need universal suffrage and the free association of self-identified workers to ifnluence it.

This question came up at the recent discussion we had in Birmingham with the Midlands Discussion Forum. One of them took on board the criticism that "workers councils" excluded workers who weren't actually at work and suggested they could be supplemented by "neighbourhood councils".In discussing with him during the break I asked him what's the point of duplicating the already existing local councils structure (why set up a rival rubbish collection service, for example), but I couldn't get through to him. He wasn't prepared to exclude local councils from the destruction of the state; they too had to be "smashed". But if there's a majority of socialists in an area why can't they simply take over control of the council via the ballot box and use its existing structure to keep local services going during the changeover from capitalism to socialism?  I could have mentioned the Paris Commune as an example of this but there had already been enough exchanges in the meeting about what Marx said or meant or didn't say or didn't mean (which, in the end, is irrelevant).I can sort of understand why they might want to destroy the central state with its coercive functions, but why local councils which are already purely administrative bodies? Why abolish the wheel and then re-invent it? The "workers council" fetishists seem to want to reconstruct everything from scratch, but what's the point and, anyway, that's not how social change occurs. 

[Anonymous]

Perhaps a new thread on:'What will SPGB delegates do if elected to parliament?' 

[proletarian.]

That's a very good question Vin. I commented on this aspect of the SPGB case on a Libcom thread.After listening to the first half an hour (Midlands Discussion Forum recording) I have concluded the only way to settle this debate is that various organisations and individuals join in common work to elect a socialist (as opposed to 'Old' Labour 'socialist') MP to test whether they would be corrupted with their true socialism and what effect they would or can have. As long as this whole question is not practiced in the modern day this question will just go in circles and pop up now and again for a very long time. Why not attempt to test the question in practice? The answer I fear would be that it would cost too much money, would be unsuccessful, take too much effort and resources away from everything else. 

[robbo203]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

Robin,the state, in the form of communication nodes; command and control points; files, records, archives, procedures and the like, is a very real Thing. Oh, and guns.  Lots of guns.   I for one am allergic to dying of typhoid on the morning after the revolution.Capitalism has a past record of continuing in the face of it's apparent imminent abolition: the historic response has been to fight.  Just as the Southern Slave owners, faced with their imminent doom chose one of the bloodiest wars in history as an option.

 YMS A state entails guns – yes certainly – and all the other stuff you mention.  But guns dont necessarily entail a state – anymore than a peice of machinery necessarily entails "capital".  The "state" and "capital" are only phenomena that happen under certain socio-economic conditions i.e. the state implies the existence of class relations.  No classes means no state  So guns can indeed exist outside the framework of a statist (class-based)  society.  That said, I have no doubt that, come a socialist society, swords will very rapidly be turned into plouhshares and AK47s into laptops or whatever. Unlike some on the Left  with  their hopelessly romantic and deparately dangeorus talk of barricades and armed revolt, I take the view that the growth of socialist movement will in fact, if anything, make for  a fundamentally pacifying effect on society as democratic socialist values seep into every nook and cranny, incrementally transforming the general social outlook.  States will be increasingly restrained and held captive by an electorate that, more and more, is not going to stand for war as a means of revolving conflict. A sifting process will commence that  will expel those more brutal elements of capitalist polity – like fascism – to the political margins or beyond – extinction.   Two sets of diametrically opposed ideas and values cannot flourish in the same soil.  Interpersonal relations too are going to be affected. Less and less will we see as others as simply a means to our own self interested ends.  What, for want of a better term, I call a "proletarian morality" (Engels) will take root and spread So I would fundamentally question your claim that Capitalism's historic response in the face of its "apparent eminent abolition" has been to fight .  We  have never ever been in this situation.  Not even remotely.  So the radically pacifying effect of a growing global socialist movement on capitalism has never had th opportunity to be tested or put into effect. If the state seriously wanted to crush the enemies of capitalism, NOW would be the time to do it when its enemies are weak and few in number.  When the writing is on the wall for capitalism it will be far too late . More to the point,  the very inclination to want to do so would have been selected out through a process of ideological evolution as a waning dominant ideology struggles to hegemonically maintain it grip and finds itself having to adapt to accommodate the changing currents of social opinion. One final thought. Yes the state is a "very real thing".  But only in the Durkhiemian sense of a "social fact". However, there is a very real danger of transferring a mode of  looking at the world pertaining the physical sciences to the social sciences. I'm talking about the problem of "reflexivity "as it is called.  We are part of the very thing we are "observing". It is impossible to step outside society abd "scientifically" examine it from an external standpoint as one might a rock or a plant or aome chemical reaction.  Indeed, at a more fundamental level of quantum physics with a phenomenom like the "observer effect", some  might even question that last claim. Point is that the state is rather like a kind of collective conspiracy or motivating myth.   We invest it with a normative "reality".  We develop a set of expectations around, and in relation to,  this "thing" we call a state – which expectations coercively influence, or reinforce compliance, in others. That is what a social institution is – a routinised regularised pattern of rule-dominated behaviour and the state is a prime example of a social institition. This to me is the strongest argument of all for "capturing" the state .  It affords the opportunity for a kind of cathartic symbolic switchdover from  one set of social rules to another  Rather like a ballon which we catch in our hands and then proceed to prick with a pin, the state instantly implodes.  And all that hot air generated by a generations of capitalist politicians dissipates safely into the atmospehere.  Or on second thoughts maybe we could recycle all that hot air even if it it does not count as a very clean energy source. Didn't Willaim Morris suggest in News from Nowhere turning the Houses of Parliament into a gassworks?    

[ALB]

Proletarian, your proposal to elect a single socialist MP as an experiment won't work as it assumes that socialist understanding would express itself in just one constituency whereas it is much more likely that when the movement for socialism takes off it will spread more or less evenly in different areas.I've got a counter suggestion. Why don't all the Left Communists (and any anarchists they can get to tag along) get a job in the same factory, acquire some arms, take over the factory, proclaim a "workers council" , form a workers militia and see what happens?Fortunately there is no need to carry out this experiment for workers to know that this won't work. There are other ways of learning than through direct experience, again fortunately. People can learn from the past experience of others as by hearing or reading about them.

[LBird]

robbo203 wrote:

However, there is a very real danger of transferring a mode of looking at the world pertaining the physical sciences to the social sciences. I'm talking about the problem of "reflexivity "as it is called. We are part of the very thing we are "observing". It is impossible to step outside society abd "scientifically" examine it from an external standpoint as one might a rock or a plant or aome chemical reaction. Indeed, at a more fundamental level of quantum physics with a phenomenom like the "observer effect", some might even question that last claim.

[my bold]Yes, "it is also impossible to step outside of society" to examine a rock or the other real things you mention, robbo. Understanding rocks requires a social standpoint, just like social things.What we have to ensure is that proletarian science is based on this realisation. That is, that the 'physical sciences' are brought under the same method as the 'social sciences', which is the complete opposite of the bourgeoisie's 19th century attempt to bring the 'method of physics' into 'social studies', like history, for example.As you say, 'we are part of the very thing we are "observing" '. Nature is examining itself, rock and human, alike.

[alanjjohnstone]

No, let's not go to extremes. ALB.  Let them by all means get a job in the same factory and then get elected to the local trade union positions and then dissove the branch and become autonomous as trade unions in the workplace are 'counter-revolutionary' according to many Left Communist arguments i have read and instead hold daily, weekly workers assemblies…and see what happens.A much more interesting experiment and a practicable one, once the problem of convincing the work-force to elect them is resolved. If it spreads to other work-places then indeed the question has been answered that such a manner of organisation  is more reflective of workers wishes and more effective in  producing gains so it can be more widely advocated .  If, on the other hand, management grows stronger and imposes it will easier… we will know trade unions with all their faults do have a constructive role as a counter-balance.

[ALB]

Fair enough Alan, I accept your amendment. But, to test their ideas, they'd have to be on strike all the time as they are opposed to any permanent workplace defensive organisation (as proto-unions, even the IWW) and favour only strike committees which are dissolved after the end of the strike.

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

If, on the other hand, management grows stronger and imposes it will easier… we will know trade unions with all their faults do have a constructive role as a counter-balance.

But 'trade unions' are defensive organisations for workers within capitalism. They are not organisations for building offensive means against capitalism, to destroy it.Surely, with the development of Communist class consciousness, workers will themselves realise that the defensive trade unions have to be also destroyed, and replaced with offensive workers' organisations.In fact, I'd see the presence of trade unions (and workers' acceptance of them as necessary to defend themselves), as itself an indicator of a lack of class consciousness.That is, the growth and extension of trade unions in a society is a measure of its non-revolutionary temper. I don't see 'class consciousness' developing merely from 'struggle'. If that 'struggle' doesn't have a conscious, Communist underpinning, then the result won't be wider class consciousness. Just, perhaps, better wages and conditions. This isn't to deny those as advantages to workers under capitalism, or a reason not to struggle for those things, but it is to say that it's nothing to do with class consciousness. Class consciousness is the desire to destroy wages, not to improve them.I know that this viewpoint separates me from those comrades who think that 'struggle', in itself, leads to consciousness. I don't think it does, and basing our efforts on the trades unions is, I think, a measure of our weakness as Communists, and of the lack of class consciousness within our class.Hence, I see the role of propaganda and the battle of ideas within our class as a fundamental one, rather than struggle alone.If I were to make these opposing points of view plain, I would say:"struggle leads to consciousness" is being mistaken for "class struggle leads to class consciousness"It needs to be:class consciousness leads to class struggle.Ideas come from humans, not the 'material world' or 'experience'.Ideas have to be tested in the material world or through experience, but the ideas come first, not experience of struggle.The experience of 'pay and job struggles' will lead to consciousness of the need for 'pay and jobs', that is, the wage system.

[ALB]

LBird wrote:

But 'trade unions' are defensive organisations for workers within capitalism. They are not organisations for building offensive means against capitalism, to destroy it.Surely, with the development of Communist class consciousness, workers will themselves realise that the defensive trade unions have to be also destroyed, and replaced with offensive workers' organisations.

Yes, the trade unions are merely defensive organisations of the working class within capitalism, but I don't think it follows that they necessarily need to be destroyed to play a part in the socialist revolution. As we say in our pamphlet What's Wrong With Using Parliament? (emphasis added):

Quote:

This is not to say that the socialist majority only needs to organise itself politically. It does need to organise politically so as to be able to win control of political power. But it also needs to organise economically to take over and keep production going immediately after the winning of political control. We can’t anticipate how such socialist workplace organisations will emerge, whether from the reform of the existing trade unions, from breakaways from them or from the formation of completely new organisations. All we can say now is that such workplace organisations will arise and that they too, like the socialist political party, will have to organise themselves on a democratic basis, with mandated delegates instead of leaders.

[ALB]

LBird wrote:

Hence, I see the role of propaganda and the battle of ideas within our class as a fundamental one, rather than struggle alone.

Exactly, but that's the point the Left Communists don't get and accuse us of "revolutionary pedagogy" and of being "socialist teachers" from outside the working class. A caricature of our position which shows that they don't learn from the experience of struggling to hear what exactly we do say.

[LBird]

ALB wrote:

LBird wrote:

But 'trade unions' are defensive organisations for workers within capitalism. They are not organisations for building offensive means against capitalism, to destroy it.Surely, with the development of Communist class consciousness, workers will themselves realise that the defensive trade unions have to be also destroyed, and replaced with offensive workers' organisations.

Yes, the trade unions are merely defensive organisations of the working class within capitalism, but I don't think it follows that they necessarily need to be destroyed to play a part in the socialist revolution. As we say in our pamphlet What's Wrong With Using Parliament? (emphasis added):

Quote:

This is not to say that the socialist majority only needs to organise itself politically. It does need to organise politically so as to be able to win control of political power. But it also needs to organise economically to take over and keep production going immediately after the winning of political control. We can’t anticipate how such socialist workplace organisations will emerge, whether from the reform of the existing trade unions, from breakaways from them or from the formation of completely new organisations. All we can say now is that such workplace organisations will arise and that they too, like the socialist political party, will have to organise themselves on a democratic basis, with mandated delegates instead of leaders.

But doesn't "will have to organise themselves on a democratic basis, with mandated delegates instead of leaders" in effect mean that they are not 'trade unions'? Perhaps we need to define what actually we mean by a 'trades union', to determine whether it's meaningful to say they can be 'reformed'. I think 'breakaways' or 'completely new organisations' will be the Communist route, rather than 'reform'.

[LBird]

ALB wrote:

LBird wrote:

Hence, I see the role of propaganda and the battle of ideas within our class as a fundamental one, rather than struggle alone.

Exactly, but that's the point the Left Communists don't get and accuse us of "revolutionary pedagogy" and of being "socialist teachers" from outside the working class. A caricature of our position which shows that they don't learn from the experience of struggling to hear what exactly we do say.

I'm inclined to think that there is a necessary link between Engels' positivist view of science, and the notion that 'struggle/experience' leads to consciousness. The Left Communists, I think, espouse Engels, rather than Marx, on this issue.Ideas come from humans, not rocks.

[ALB]

LBird wrote:

Perhaps we need to define what actually we mean by a 'trades union', to determine whether it's meaningful to say they can be 'reformed'. I think 'breakaways' or 'completely new organisations' will be the Communist route, rather than 'reform'.

There is no point in being dogmatic about it at this stage. What will happen will happen irrespective of what we today think should happen. But, as the saying goes, trade union members get the union they deserve, i.e the union reflects what they think and want. This being so, and since most unions have sufficiently democratic constitutions, if the members become socialist-minded they could transform the union. OK, they might prefer to break away and form a new organisation, but I don't think we can completely rule out the transformation from within of existing unions.

[Author]

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