SWP march for poland.

[Nigel Irritable]

"Yes, that meant that groups such as the SP and yourselves weren't particularly consistent in their opposition to stalinist regimes.

Bit of a cheek for a self-declared Trotskyist to slander Trotsky's position on Stalinism like that. As you are well aware, the Socialist Party opposed the Stalinist regimes while at the same time opposing the restoration of capitalism. The SWP by contrast cheered on a collapse in working class living standards across Eastern Europe unparalleled outside of a major war. Nice going.

 

[TremulousTetra]

Bit of a cheek for a self-declared Trotskyist to slander Trotsky's position on Stalinism like that. As you are well aware, the Socialist Party opposed the Stalinist regimes while at the same time opposing the restoration of capitalism. The SWP by contrast cheered on a collapse in working class living standards across Eastern Europe unparalleled outside of a major war. Nice going.

yes Trotsky was wrong. but your others are pretty strange views. You would chastise anybody who celebrated the collapse of the American Empire, because any such collapse would inevitably lead to a fall in American working-class living standards, i presume?)

It also meant that the SWP (and its predecessor) had very strange views on things like the Korean War and supported proxy armies of the CIA in Afghanistan. All the time while equating the USSR with the USA. The fact that until those regimes collapsed capitalist economists wouldn't include their economic data in world economic figures (because they weren't capitalist economies) seemed to go right over your heads.....

pretty strange view that. Why in the world do you argue that Russia wasn'tprone to exactly the same economic problems as the other capitalist countries, when the collapse of the Russian empire was in large part due to the meltdown of the economic base?

resistanceMP3

PS. Cockney Rebel what political affiliation are you?

 

[cockneyrebel]

I'm in Workers Power....

yes Trotsky was wrong. but your others are pretty strange views. You would chastise anybody who celebrated the collapse of the American Empire, because any such collapse would inevitably lead to a fall in American working-class living standards, i presume?)

No because this leaves out the fact that groups like the SP and WP see the USA as imperialist but didn't see the USSR as imperialist (but as a degenerated workers state).

pretty strange view that. Why in the world do you argue that Russia wasn'tprone to exactly the same economic problems as the other capitalist countries, when the collapse of the Russian empire was in large part due to the meltdown of the economic base?

I don't really understand this. Any economy can go down hill, including a worker's state or degenerated workers state. The thing that is important here is the modes of production within those economies. Because the degenerated workers states clearly weren't capitalist economies and didn't run on the basis of profit capitalist economists excluded them from world economic data.

 

[JoePolitix]

I'm in Workers Power....

No because this leaves out the fact that groups like the SP and WP see the USA as imperialist but didn't see the USSR as imperialist (but as a degenerated workers state).

Is Putin's Russia still a moribund workers state?

 

[dennisr]

Is Putin's Russia still a moribund workers state?

well we can all agree its a 'feckin state' at the moment

(a think cr's answer would be no)

 

[Groucho]

Gdansk - Solidarnosc - 1980-1

The insanity of the idea of a deformed or degenerate workers state in the context of USSR and its satelites always struck me as insane.

Sure if the state was full of degenerate workers then perhaps that explains the 'need' for extensive control and repression against those very same!

A 'Workers State' where workers have no democratic control over the decision making process?

A 'Workers state' where there is no right to strike?

A Workers state where workers uprisings are violently put down by the military wing of the workers state (were they workers tanks? Hmmm?)

If as Marx said The emancipation of the working class has to be the act of the working class how then were deformed or degenerate or corrupted or malformed or whatever workers states formed without any involvement (let alone consent) of the workers? e.g. Romania?

Why were the workers so discontent with their own state? To the extent that they formed illegal unions? They went on strike illegally? They rallied in their millions to tear down the Berlin wall? They stood by and many cheered as capitalism was 'restored' for the most part by the er former Communists.

What is China now? The most successful capitalist country in the World (in purely capitalist terms)? Or is it some form of post-capitalist degenerate or otherwise workers state? Or is it by any chance both?!

Oh, but it's state ownership of property that equals a workers state eh? Regardless as to who controls the state and therefore the property? So was British rail a workers railway? Is the British military a workers militia by dint of the fact that it is not privately owned? Hmm?

Granted the argument re State Capitalism, law of value, competition etc cn get into difficult terrain, but the argument that these so called Communist regimes were progressive is not sustainable. The description of them as some kind of workers state is a joke. A sick and damaging joke. Why on earth would ANY worker want to live in a workers state if the USSR post Stalin was any example?

 

[TremulousTetra]

didn't run on the basis of profit capitalist economists excluded them from world economic data.

Explain this please. Surplus value WAS extracted.

Rmp3

 

[cockneyrebel]

The insanity of the idea of a deformed or degenerate workers state in the context of USSR and its satelites always struck me as insane.

The insanity of the idea struck you as insane

Is Putin's Russia still a moribund workers state?

Very good and no.

A 'Workers State' where workers have no democratic control over the decision making process?

A 'Workers state' where there is no right to strike?

A Workers state where workers uprisings are violently put down by the military wing of the workers state (were they workers tanks? Hmmm?)

You're missing the point of the whole theory. Trotsky went as far as to compare the bureaucrat who ran the USSR to fascists. But this is nothing to do with the theory of DWSs, which rest purely on the economy and economic relations.

A better question would be to ask how can you have capitalism without profit or private property?

What is China now? The most successful capitalist country in the World (in purely capitalist terms)? Or is it some form of post-capitalist degenerate or otherwise workers state? Or is it by any chance both?!

I would argue that China is now clearly capitalist. It has huge swathes of private industry, is part of the WTO, has multinational firms etc

The argument you're putting forward that DWS were bad therefore capitalist completely misses the point. The argument, agree with it or not, is that as property relations still remain in the control of the state it would be easier for workers to seize control again than in a capitalist state. This economic gain is something worth fighting for.

So was British rail a workers railway? Is the British military a workers militia by dint of the fact that it is not privately owned? Hmm?

Again this totally misses the points, and the "dialectics". A nationalised industry within the context of a capitalist economy is clearly not the same as a planned economy. However I do find it a bit strange that the SWP will fight for defending a nationalised industry but not a whole planned economy.

Why on earth would ANY worker want to live in a workers state if the USSR post Stalin was any example?

Where did anyone say that any worker would wanna live in a DWS? Having said that many workers in ex-stalinist states said there were aspects of the old DWSs that they wish were still there. And guess, what, these were the economic aspects. No wonder when living standards have plummeted since the introduction of capitalism. The whole point of the theory of DWSs is that it is better for the working class to overthrow the bureaucracy and take control than slide back into capitalism.

Explain this please.

Capitalist economists, like the World Bank excluded ex DWS from world economic data. This was because even they didn't regard those states as capitalist economies. How could they when there was no private property or profits? But the SWP has the view that because stalinist states were bad, they must therefore be capitalist.

 

[Geoff Collier]

I would argue that China is now clearly capitalist. It has huge swathes of private industry, is part of the WTO, has multinational firms etc

So, how did it change from a workers' state without a violent counter revolution? That's the usual "orthodox" trotskyist objection to the idea that the USSR wasn't a workers' state any more. If China could do it.....

 

[TremulousTetra]

Capitalist economists, like the World Bank excluded ex DWS from world economic data. This was because even they didn't regard those states as capitalist economies. How could they when there was no private property or profits? But the SWP has the view that because stalinist states were bad, they must therefore be capitalist.

wat about the fact surplus value WAS extracted. U agree yes?

 

[mk12]

Capitalist economists, like the World Bank excluded ex DWS from world economic data. This was because even they didn't regard those states as capitalist economies.

...and this somehow proves they were not capitalist? Do you really believe capitalist economists would have wanted to prove that the S.U. was capitalist? It would have been going against their interests to do so.

And private property=capitalism is ridiculous. I've posted it many times on the revo boards, and i'll do it here:

Marx:

In each historical epoch, property has developed differently and under a set of entirely different social relations. Thus to define bourgeois property is nothing less than to give an exposition of all the social relations of bourgeois production. To try to give a definition of property as of an independent relation, a category apart – an abstract eternal idea – can be nothing but an illusion of metaphysics or jurisprudence.

[gotta love the dws v s.c. debates, although i am being a hypocrite considering my comments on the swp thread ]

 

[TremulousTetra]

[gotta love the dws v s.c. debates, although i am being a hypocrite considering my comments on the swp thread ]

aren't we all.

 

[cockneyrebel]

So, how did it change from a workers' state without a violent counter revolution? That's the usual "orthodox" trotskyist objection to the idea that the USSR wasn't a workers' state any more. If China could do it.....

I don't agree that there has to be violent counter revolution. The bureaucracy in China has pushed through the measures to introduce capitalism. Although I would say that the Chinese government has obviously used brutal oppression in pushing through the changes.....

wat about the fact surplus value WAS extracted. U agree yes?

There would be surplus labour even in a workers state, do you not agree? But what was the surplus labour used for in the USSR? There was no profit....how can you have capitalism without profit?

...and this somehow proves they were not capitalist? Do you really believe capitalist economists would have wanted to prove that the S.U. was capitalist? It would have been going against their interests to do so.

Really, so why do world economists now put China into their figures?

And private property=capitalism is ridiculous. I've posted it many times on the revo boards, and i'll do it here:

And as I've said to you before Marx was using that quote to show a point that was almost exactly the opposite from the point you're trying to show.

 

[Groucho]

The argument you're putting forward that DWS were bad therefore capitalist completely misses the point. The argument, agree with it or not, is that as property relations still remain in the control of the state it would be easier for workers to seize control again than in a capitalist state. This economic gain is something worth fighting for.

Actually I haven't gone so far as to argue that. I will happily argue over whether the Soviet Union was capitalist or not, but my point has been completely brushed over.

Your definition of a workers state as post-capitalist and progressive does not stand up. These 'workers states' had to be defended by the state from workers!! So my argument has, so far, gone no further than to state that such a repressive undemocratic system where workers are brutalised subjects cannot be called a workers state

Trotsky's definition of a degenerated workers state rested on the fact that workers had taken power and had created the beginings of workers democracy, but that a parasitic bureaucracy had developed that needed to be overthrown by a political revolution. For Trotsky this state of affairs was incredibly precarious. Either capitalism would be restored through violent counter-revolution or the workers would overthrow the bureaucracy within a few years! The position of the bureaucracy was unstustainable in the medium term. Furthermore Trotsky's definition would not have accepted that such 'degenerated' workers states could be exported by force without the ivolvement of workers.

Of course if Trotsky was a messiah then he can't have been wrong (although when messiah Trotsky disagreed with messiah Lenin, then well Lenin was the daddy) and er the reality is massaged through various contorted contraptions of intellect to make them fit the theory. Trotsky also argued that the end of WW2 would result in a major capitalist crisis that would undermine the social basis of reformism.

Workers did not lift a finger to defend the workers states because they did not recognise them as such. Stupid bloody workers don't know what's good for 'em, eh!

 

[mk12]

He was writing against Proudhon, in The Poverty of Philosophy who "entangled the whole of these economic relations [the capitalist relations of productions] in the general juristic conception of ‘property’."

 

[Groucho]

There would be surplus value even in a workers state, do you not agree? But what was the surplus value used for in the USSR? There was no profit....how can you have capitalism without profit?

Is there a difference between production of a surplus over and above immediate need, and extraction of surplus value? To say that surplus value would be extracted in a workers state, well that depends on your definition. A surplus produced over and above immediate need that is collectively owned and democratically planned and distributed; is this surplus value ? The extraction of surplus value is usually meant by Marxists to denote the theft of labour from the worker. If workers own the entire fruits of their labour, even if they own this collectively, then is surplus value extracted from their labour?

Presumably you are happy to accept that the Stalinist bureaucracies extracted surplus value from the workers and that the bureaucracy controlled the surplus. In other words that the wealth produced by workers was stolen from them? (In a workers state?!) What do you think the bureaucracy then did with this surplus and why? Did they simply use it to enrich themselves as was the case with feudal aristocracies? Feudal societies stagnated over centuries precisely because production only produced enough to further enrich the rich. Sure it was spent on wars to steal more wealth to enrich the rich even more, but it was not generally invested to increase production.

You don't think the USSR bureaucracy 'invested' to increase future surplus value and productivity of workers? Would this surplus value not then be considered 'profit'? The surplus did not simply 'buy' smart clothes and posh food and decent living standards for the rich did it? It was used to build factories, machines, transport, technology (and bombs) designed to increase production. What was the motor that drove this investment? Competition with the West by any chance? Economically and militarily? So we have 'surplus value' or profit, competition but no workers democracy.

Sure there was no private property but it didn't take long for Communist bureaucrats to make the transition to private capitalists. Didn't even require a transfer of power, or violent overthrow. Why was that?

You can't really rest anargument that workers have a steak in the economy simply by pointing to the absence of private property. Trouble is if you do, you end up defending the very states that crushed the workers in Hungary '56, Poland 80/81 etc.

 

[articul8]

workers have a steak in the economy

 

[Groucho]

We live in a steak-holder society - and too much steak gives you bowl cancer.

 

[cockneyrebel]

He was writing against Proudhon, in The Poverty of Philosophy who "entangled the whole of these economic relations [the capitalist relations of productions] in the general juristic conception of ‘property’.

But the point Marx was making was that you had to look at the property relations in context. He says that Proudhon's thoughts:

oblige him to resort to psychological and moral considerations

which in fact is far more of a criticism of state capitalism than DWS theory. The fact that no profit existeded in DWSs says it all. The central essence of capitalism did not exist. But say state capitalists, it was bad, the workers weren't in control etc etc.....

Your definition of a workers state as post-capitalist and progressive does not stand up. These 'workers states' had to be defended by the state from workers!! So my argument has, so far, gone no further than to state that such a repressive undemocratic system where workers are brutalised subjects cannot be called a workers state

But it's not a workers state is it, it's a degenerated workers state. A central and vital part of a workers state is a planned economy, and this still existed and this gain could be taken back by the workers, rather than just going back to capitalism.

Either capitalism would be restored through violent counter-revolution or the workers would overthrow the bureaucracy within a few years!

Really so why did Trotsky still believe in the theory of DWSs when the stalinist bureaucracy had been in power for about 15 years....

Furthermore Trotsky's definition would not have accepted that such 'degenerated' workers states could be exported by force without the ivolvement of workers.

It's far more complicated than that. The concessions given in Eastern Europe were due to the bureaucracy being under pressure from the workers.

Workers did not lift a finger to defend the workers states because they did not recognise them as such. Stupid bloody workers don't know what's good for 'em, eh!

A crap argument. If a nationalised industry is privatised and the majority of workers support this, would socialists then call them stupid? Is it any wonder after decades of oppression that workers wanted to go towards capitalism, that doesn't make it a gain though. Look at ex DWSs now ffs!

As said though it is strange that the SWP will fight against a privatisation of a single nationalised industry but be ambivalent about a whole planned economy.

Presumably you are happy to accept that the Stalinist bureaucracies extracted surplus value from the workers and that the bureaucracy controlled the surplus. In other words that the wealth produced by workers was stolen from them? (In a workers state?!)

But even in a workers state there may be times when surplus labour (sorry I should have used that phrase, not surplus value, getting my surplusses mixed up!!!) is used to produce arms at the detriment of workers living standards. But the fact is that under stalinist regimes there was no profit. The basic tenants of capitalist economics did not exist.

Indeed there may be times in workers states at the beginning where there are differential rates of pay, would this mean it ceased to be a workers state? Do you think that workers states won't have to "compete" with the imperialists?

Indeed by your defintion the Bolsheviks never created a workers state.

Your round about way of showing that the USSR produced "profits" just doesn't add up. Bureaucratic privaliges are clearly different from the profits of the ruling classes under capitalism. Generalised commodity production didn't continue. Commodities weren't produced for sale on a market. Capital didn't circulate. There was no free market in labour. It wasn't capitalist.

 

[cockneyrebel]

.....

There was no stock market.
There were no profits.
There were no capital markets.
There were no capitalists.
There was no labour market.
Capital didn't circulate.
There was no accumulation of capital.
There was no surplus value - but surplus labour.
Production decision were based not on profitability, but made by central planners according to the dictats of the bureaucracy.
The capitalist states - the USA and so on denounced it as communist and wanted to destroy its basis of production - which they did in 1990.
Production then collapsed as the law of value - production according to socially necessary labour time - for profits - was introduced.
How much more proof do you want?
More to the point how do you prove production was based on commodities? There is simply no evidence for it, for a very straightforward reason, it wasn't.
Surplus labour - not surplus value - was extracted from the working class by the bureaucracy, that's pretty obvious isn't it?
The reason the bureaucracy weren't a class was because their theft of surplus labour was illegitimate. They served no necessary role in production. That's why the theory of bureaucratic collectivism is wrong. Though it has more going for it than state capitalism, which simply ignores the facts.
the majority of the working class dependend on wage labour. They would under a socialist state as well.

 

[Groucho]

You ignored my question about your understanding of the term surplus value. You then discuss the fact that a workers state may need to produce arms (presumably for defence) and that this production would come from 'surplus value'. I worry that in your workers state a 'benevolent' dictatorship who understand the needs of the workers (better than they do) would extract this surplus from the workers to produce arms to 'compete' with the imperialists (possibly on their terms?). The reason I worry about this is because bottom line is that for you a progressive workers state, albeit a 'degenerated' one does not require the consent of the workers.

If a workers state produced arms for self defence out of surplus production this is not theft if the workers themselves choose to do this. That is if workers control the surplus - in which case it is not surplus value. The best defence of course will always be to export revolution. This cannot be done by force of arms - that is impossible - the emancipation of the workers has to be the act of the worker themselves. This is fundamental. Freedom, democracy, socialism cannot be imposed upon people by an outside force however well intentioned.

Any Marxist definition of a 'workers state' however 'degenerated' that has no regard for the position of workers is not any kind of Marxism I would recognise.

 

[cockneyrebel]

You ignored my question about your understanding of the term surplus value. You then discuss the fact that a workers state may need to produce arms (presumably for defence) and that this production would come from 'surplus value'.

You ignored my response that I used the term "surplus value" by mistake, I meant to use the term "surplus labour".

The extraction of surplus labour is not the same as surplus value, which rests on the generalised commodity production which didn't exist in the USSR.

Surplus labour has existed in all class societies since the ancient world, including by the Egyptians, I dare say though you wouldn't define the USSR as a slave society.

In terms of the workers not being in control, this is why it is called a DWS, we're kind of going around in circles here. As said Trotsky compared the bureaucracy to fascists in their methods of social control.

But as said the planned economy is still a gain. Something the SWP won't defend, but will defend a nationalised industry.

 

[Groucho]

.....

There is no analysis of any kind in your quoted list. It is just a list. A list of statements of belief and a list of facts, some of which are accurate and some disputable. It is certainly not 'proof'. It reads as a pronouncement of faith, it is not an argument.

Edit because I have just read your post re your mistake on surplus value v surplus labour. Perhaps now you have got distinction my argument will make more sense.

 

[cockneyrebel]

It's not a pronouncement of faith, it shows that DWSs didn't have the basic elements of capitalist economies.

Now as said whether the DWSs were appalling regimes is not the issue, the central issue is the gain of the planned economy.

Edit because I have just read your post re your mistake on surplus value v surplus labour. Perhaps now you have got distinction my argument will make more sense.

Well it was a typo rather than a mistake in terms of my understanding of those terms.....

 

[Isambard]

Any of you lot got any comment on modern Poland, as in what is happening NOW? No? Why am I not surprised?

 

[Groucho]

There was no stock market. This is correct.
There were no profits. There was extraction of surplus value = exploitation of workers
There were no capital markets. Correct
There were no capitalists. That's just like saying 'it was not capitalist' oh yes it was (oh no it wan't, oh yes...)
There was no labour market. There was forced labour. Remember you are arguing that this system was more progressive from the workerspoint of view than western capitalism....
Capital didn't circulate. See capital markets
There was no accumulation of capital. Yes there was! Surplus value was stolen from workers to reinvest in capital, to increase productivity/exploitation - see my earlier post
There was no surplus value - but surplus labour. Yes there was! This is fun...he's behind you! Again, see my earlier post.
Production decision were based not on profitability, but made by central planners according to the dictats of the bureaucracy. And what drove these dictats? Something progressive to do withdefending a 'workers state'? Pure greed as in feudalism - just consumption for the bureaucracy? Or investment in accumulating capital - factories, technology, machines etc to increase productivity to compete...

The capitalist states - the USA and so on denounced it as communist so it must be true! They also declared themselves a democracy and leader of the 'free world' and wanted to destroy its basis of production I thought they wanted to destroy their 'evil empire' - which they did in 1990. If 'they' did, they did so with the help of plenty of workers who were fed up of labouring under their own workers state.
Production then collapsed as the law of value - production according to socially necessary labour time - for profits - was introduced. See above re surplus value.
How much more proof do you want? Some would do it.
More to the point how do you prove production was based on commodities? There is simply no evidence for it, for a very straightforward reason, it wasn't.
Surplus labour - not surplus value - was extracted from the working class by the bureaucracy, that's pretty obvious isn't it?
The reason the bureaucracy weren't a class was because their theft of surplus labour was illegitimate. They served no necessary role in production. This is absolute crap! The capitalist class are illegitimate and their theft of our labour is just that - theft. They serve no useful purpose today. The bureaucracy clearly had distinct and seperate interests from the workers and acted collectively in pursuit of their collective interest. That's why the theory of bureaucratic collectivism is wrong. Though it has more going for it than state capitalism, which simply ignores the facts.
the majority of the working class dependend on wage labour. They would under a socialist state as well. What do you mean by wage labour and how does it differ from wage slavery or doesn't it? We are back to my worry that your definition of socialism is of some kind of benevolent dictatorship. This is utopian. There can be no socialism without workers democracy (and there can no democracy without socialist equality) [End Quotes]

You asked if I believed that the Bolsheviks created a workers state at all. I would answer that the Bolsheviks provided a leadership faction within the working class. The working class created a weak fledgling workers state within parts of Russia and governed for a short time in alliance with a mass peasantry and petit bourgeois. Under seige from the beginning elements of state directed capitalism and growth of the petit bourgeois were encouraged of necessity. Starvation undermined the workers democracy and therefore the workers state. The bureaucracy were isolated and, as hopes for international revolution receded, grasped ever more desperate means to stave off reaction. A power struggle within the bureaucracy ended all pretensions to anything progressive and a fully fledged violent counter-revolution was imposed from above by Stalin and his henchmen.

 

[Groucho]

Any of you lot got any comment on modern Poland, as in what is happening NOW? No? Why am I not surprised?

That would be for a different thread - one that was discussing modern Poland. This thread was started to discuss the fact that the SWP supported workers battling against the state in Poland back in 1980/1 when most of the lerft regarded Poland as a socialist utopia or as a workers state of one description (degenerated) or another (deformed).

 

[neprimerimye]

Is there a difference between production of a surplus over and above immediate need, and extraction of surplus value? To say that surplus value would be extracted in a workers state, well that depends on your definition. A surplus produced over and above immediate need that is collectively owned and democratically planned and distributed; is this surplus value ? The extraction of surplus value is usually meant by Marxists to denote the theft of labour from the worker. If workers own the entire fruits of their labour, even if they own this collectively, then is surplus value extracted from their labour?

Presumably you are happy to accept that the Stalinist bureaucracies extracted surplus value from the workers and that the bureaucracy controlled the surplus. In other words that the wealth produced by workers was stolen from them? (In a workers state?!) What do you think the bureaucracy then did with this surplus and why? Did they simply use it to enrich themselves as was the case with feudal aristocracies? Feudal societies stagnated over centuries precisely because production only produced enough to further enrich the rich. Sure it was spent on wars to steal more wealth to enrich the rich even more, but it was not generally invested to increase production.

You don't think the USSR bureaucracy 'invested' to increase future surplus value and productivity of workers? Would this surplus value not then be considered 'profit'? The surplus did not simply 'buy' smart clothes and posh food and decent living standards for the rich did it? It was used to build factories, machines, transport, technology (and bombs) designed to increase production. What was the motor that drove this investment? Competition with the West by any chance? Economically and militarily? So we have 'surplus value' or profit, competition but no workers democracy.

Sure there was no private property but it didn't take long for Communist bureaucrats to make the transition to private capitalists. Didn't even require a transfer of power, or violent overthrow. Why was that?

You can't really rest anargument that workers have a steak in the economy simply by pointing to the absence of private property. Trouble is if you do, you end up defending the very states that crushed the workers in Hungary '56, Poland 80/81 etc.

Surely the production of surplus value is entirely possible in a Workers State? Surely the formation of a Workers State presupposes that the bourgeois mode of production remains in operation within the bounderies of any given Workers State? Such is the position that Marx, Lenin, Trotsky and Cliff argued is it not?

This outrage that a Workers State might extract surplus value from workers also seems rather confused. It might be good enough from an anarchist but coming from a Marxist? If taken seriously it follows that cde Groucho must consider that the state headed by Lenin was not a Workers State! In which case what the heck was it?

Finally I'm a bit surprised that the comrade denies that private property existed in the Stalinist states. Was it not Engels who argued in Anti-Duhring that state property was but private property masked by the legal form of state ownership? Surely for Marxists what matters is not the legal form of ownership but who controls the use of property?

 

[neprimerimye]

The fact that no profit existeded in DWSs says it all. The central essence of capitalism did not exist. But say state capitalists, it was bad, the workers weren't in control etc etc.....

But it's not a workers state is it, it's a degenerated workers state. A central and vital part of a workers state is a planned economy, and this still existed and this gain could be taken back by the workers, rather than just going back to capitalism.

Really so why did Trotsky still believe in the theory of DWSs when the stalinist bureaucracy had been in power for about 15 years....

As said though it is strange that the SWP will fight against a privatisation of a single nationalised industry but be ambivalent about a whole planned economy.

Your round about way of showing that the USSR produced "profits" just doesn't add up. Bureaucratic privaliges are clearly different from the profits of the ruling classes under capitalism. Generalised commodity production didn't continue. Commodities weren't produced for sale on a market. Capital didn't circulate. There was no free market in labour. It wasn't capitalist.

Curious that you argue that you regard profits as the central essence of capitalism. Marx was of the opinion that the essence of bourgeois society was the accumulation of capital by means of exploiting the proletariat. "Accumulate, accumulate that is their Moses and their prophets".

As for planning why is that central feature of a Workers State? Russia under Lenin and Trotsky did not have a central plan yet it was a Workers State was it not? Post war Japan had and has a central plan with considerable powers to direct how capital is invested and it is not a Workers State as far as i'm aware.

As for Trotsky arguing the idea that Russia was a DWS even in 1940 I suspect it was for two reasons. First he was totally out of toucvh with events in the country having lost all contact with the Left opposition remaining in Russia after 1934. To the point where he does not even mention the famine in the Ukraine in any of his writings I note. Second his understanding of what a Workers State is was wrongly based on a confusion between state property forms and production relations.

Happily I'm not an SWP member but to be fair that group was not ambivalent about the privatisation of the state directed economies in Eastern Europe. It opposed any and all privatisations.

Technically many enterprises in Russia and the other COMECON states did produce profits. There were also markets and free labour was the norm. If free labour was not the norm and workers were in fact unfree then it follows that you shoul not consider them to be workers but slaves. Presumably you were then defending Degenerated Slave States.

 

[cockneyrebel]

Curious that you argue that you regard profits as the central essence of capitalism. Marx was of the opinion that the essence of bourgeois society was the accumulation of capital by means of exploiting the proletariat. "Accumulate, accumulate that is their Moses and their prophets".

But an accumulation of what? Commodities surely? And hand in hand with that goes profit.

A workers state will accumulate, but it won't be in the way that a capitalist state does.

I agree thought that for Groucho, if he is being consistent, he would have to say that there was never a workers state in Russia, but his own definition.

As for planning why is that central feature of a Workers State? Russia under Lenin and Trotsky did not have a central plan yet it was a Workers State was it not? Post war Japan had and has a central plan with considerable powers to direct how capital is invested and it is not a Workers State as far as i'm aware.

Russia under Lenin and Trotsky was moving towards a planned economy and things like the NEC were forced upon the Bolsheviks, not a step forwards. Post war Japan was a real example of state capitalism (like China today), the difference being that the central essence of capitalism was in place.

Happily I'm not an SWP member but to be fair that group was not ambivalent about the privatisation of the state directed economies in Eastern Europe. It opposed any and all privatisations.

Maybe but when it came down to protecting a whole planned economy it didn't see it as important. The USSR was the same as the USA.

Yes there was! Surplus value was stolen from workers to reinvest in capital, to increase productivity/exploitation - see my earlier post

You're confusing surplus labour with surplus value.

And what drove these dictats? Something progressive to do withdefending a 'workers state'? Pure greed as in feudalism

So you think feudalism was capitalism