Letter: Rubel and Marx (1982)

Letter to the Editors from the October 1982 issue of the Socialist Standard

Rubel and Marx

I write in response to an article by ALB (Luxemburg) in the June Socialist Standard. He makes several comments that I find difficult to understand.

According to Rubel, says ALB, Marx saw the working class as having an "ethical" or "historical" mission to abolish capitalism. ALB later goes on to say that apart from the word "ethical" Rubel's position is similar to the SPGB’s in that if the working class do not make the conscious choice to abolish capitalism or make this "ethical decision" to do so then capitalism will continue.

I believe ALB to be wrong when he assimilates the words "historical" and "ethical" because the ideas these words represent are not compatible. The "historical" mission of the working class is the materialist understanding of its position as a class in society and the pursuit of its own material advantage through the political struggle with the opposing class. This specifically excludes any ethical or moral considerations which to a materialist are irrelevant to the politics of socialism. And so surely when a socialist speaks of the "conscious choice" for socialism he is most definitely not thinking in the “ethical" way that both Rubel and ALB seem to think.

Andrew Westley, 

Sawston. Cambs.

Reply:

Of course the "conscious choice" of the working class to establish socialism will be based on a recognition that it is in their material interest to do so and not on some abstract moral principle and we never meant to suggest otherwise.

We don’t however want to get into an abstract semantic argument about the relative meanings of the words historical, ethical and moral. Suffice it to say that some people argue that any situation in which there is a choice involves a moral or ethical decision; in other words, they are using these words virtually to mean the same thing as choice. We don’t use these words in this way. Rubel does. But there is no need to make a fetish of mere word-forms where the meaning is the same: that socialism can only be the outcome of a deliberate, conscious choice on the part of the working class, in pursuit, as we said, of their material interests — but a choice nevertheless.

Editors.