Anti-Bolsheviks (2021)

Book Review from the August 2021 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Council Communist Reader. Radical Reprint, 2021

The articles in this collection – by Paul Mattick Snr, Herman Gorter, Karl Korsch, Otto Rühle and Anton Pannekoek – have long been available elsewhere.

They called themselves Communists as they agreed with Lenin’s break with pre-WW1 Social Democracy when he changed the name of his party in 1918 from RSDLP to Communist Party; some initially joined the Communist Party in their country. They had regarded what happened in Russia in November 1917 as what it purported to be – a workers’ revolution in which workers, organised in soviets (the Russian word for ‘council’), had assumed control of society. Within a few years they realised that this had not been the case but continued to call themselves Council Communists as opposed to Bolshevik-sponsored ‘Party’ or ‘State’ Communists.

Their basic position was that workers should abandon the parliamentary Social Democratic parties and trade unions and organise themselves in work-based councils both to wage the day-to-day class struggle and to overthrow capitalism. They became very anti-party and anti-parliament, which made them similar to Syndicalists except that they situated themselves in the Marxist tradition.

They were what Mattick Snr called ‘Anti-Bolshevik Marxists’ (among which we can be included), regarding Russia under the Bolsheviks (Trotsky as well as Stalin) as state capitalism and opposing Lenin’s vanguard party concept. They weren’t always clear on the implications of a post-capitalist, communist society, some of them drawing up elaborate schemes for labour-time accounting and labour-money (not included here).

Annoyingly, Paul Mattick Jnr repeatedly refers in his introduction to the German Social Democrats who took political control in Germany immediately after the end of WW1 as ‘socialists’. He must surely know they weren’t.

Adam Buick

Forgings from the Furnance (continued) (1939)

From the October 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

Below are some further quotations, selected from the writings of Marx and reproduced in Otto Rühle’s work, “Karl Marx.” A first selection was published in the September Socialist Standard.

“The social principles of Christianity have now had eighteen hundred years for their development, and do not need any further development at the hands of Prussian consistorial councillors. The social principles of Christianity find justification for the slavery of classical days, extol mediaeval serfdom, and are ready, in case of need, to defend the oppression of the proletariat—somewhat shamefacedly perhaps. The social principles of Christianity declare that all infamies will be spiritually compensated in heaven, the assertion being made a justification for the continuance of these infamies on earth. According to the social principles of Christianity, all the misdeeds wrought by the oppressors on the oppressed are either a just punishment for original sin and other sins, or else are trials which the Lord, in His wisdom, sends to afflict the redeemed. The social principles of Christianity preach cowardice, self-contempt, abasement, subjection, humility, in a word, all the qualities of the mob; whereas, for the proletariat which does not wish to allow itself to be treated as a mob, courage, self-esteem, pride, and independence are far more necessary than bread. The social principles of Christianity are obsequious, but the proletariat is revolutionary.”

” . . . . Upon what title do you Jews ground your claim for emancipation ? On your religion ? It is the mortal foe of the State religion. As citizens ? In Germany there are no citizens. As human beings ? You are not human beings any more than those to whom you are appealing. The conflict in which a man is involved between his position as one who professes a particular religion and as one endowed with citizenship in a State (wherein he is related to his fellow men,inasmuch as he and they are all members of a community) reduces itself to the secular cleavage between the political State and civil society. Not until the concrete individual human being takes back into himself the abstract citizen of the State and, as an individual human being, has become a member of the species in his empirical life, in his individual relations; not until the human being has recognised and organised his own forces as social forces, so that social force is no longer severed from itself in the form of political force—not until then will human emancipation be completed.”

“After the failure of the revolution of 1848 all party organisations and party journals of the working classes were, on the Continent, crushed by the iron hand of force; the most advanced sons of labour fled in despair to the Transatlantic Republic: and the short-lived dreams of emancipation vanished before an epoch of industrial fever, moral marasm, and political reaction. The defeat of the Continental working classes, partly owed to the diplomacy of the English Government, acting then as now in fraternal solidarity with the Cabinet of St. Petersburg, soon spread its contagious effects to this side of the Channel. .While the rout of their Continental brethren unmanned the English working classes, and broke their faith in their own cause, it restored to the landlord and the money-lord their somewhat shaken confidence. They insolently withdrew concessions already advertised. The discoveries of new gold lands led to an immense exodus, leaving an irreparable void in the ranks of the British proletariat. Others of its formerly active members were caught by the temporary bribe of greater work and wages, and turned into ‘political blacks.’ All the efforts made at keeping up or remodelling the Chartist movement failed signally, the Press organs of the working class died one by one of the apathy of the masses and, in point of fact, never before seemed the English working class so thoroughly reconciled to a state of political nullity.” (These things) …”have taught the working class the duty to master themselves the mysteries of international politics: to watch the diplomatic acts of their respective Governments; to counteract them, if necessary, by all means in their power; when unable to prevent, to combine in simultaneous denunciations, and to vindicate the simple laws of morals and justice which ought to govern the relations of private individuals, as the rules paramount of the intercourse of nations. The fight for such a foreign policy forms part of the general struggle for the emancipation of the working classes.”

“Historical evolution is on your side,” he shouted to the proletariat. “Capitalism brought into being by the laws of historical evolution will be destroyed by the inexorable working of these same laws. The bourgeoisie, the business manager of the capitalist system, appeared on the stage of history with that system, and will make its exit when that system walks off the stage. You proletarians keep capitalism going by your labour, and maintain the whole of bourgeoisie society by the fruits of your industry. But Socialism will be a necessary organic outcome of capitalism, the essence of the latter being implied in the essence of the former. With the end of capitalism comes the beginning of Socialism as a logical consequence. You proletarians, as a class, being the incorporators of the forces and tendencies which will do away with capitalism, must necessarily make an end of, the bourgeoisie. You merely need as a class, to fulfil the evolution which your mission calls on you to fulfil. All you need is to will! History makes this as easy as possible for you. You need not hatch out any new ideas, make any plans, discover a future state. You need not dogmatically anticipate the world.’ You need merely put your hands to the task that is awaiting you. The means by which you will do it are to be found in the unceasing, purposive, consistent fighting of the class struggle, whose crown will be the victory of the social revolution.”

The be-all and end-all of all propaganda, therefore, is to generate in the minds of the class to which we belong “The will to be free.”

Blogger's Notes:

Otto Rühle's biography of Marx received a rather caustic review in the pages of the Socialist Standard over two issues in 1929:

October 1929 - 'Another Life of Marx: Queues at Truth '

December 1929 - 'Another Life of Marx - Part 2'

Rear View: Trump the Saviour (2019)

The Rear View Column from the March 2019 issue of the Socialist Standard

Trump the Saviour

Given that we the people have elected the likes of Viktor Orban, Rodrigo Duterte, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Daniel Ortega, the fundamentalist Islamic Salvation Front, even Adolf Hitler, it’s little wonder that some people have turned to prayer. Well, for many Christians, including Sarah Sanders, the White House Press Secretary, those prayers have been answered and we have been blessed with Donald Trump. ‘I think God calls all of us to fill different roles at different times and I think that He wanted Donald Trump to become president. And that’s why he’s there. And I think he has done a tremendous job in supporting a lot of the things that people of faith really care about’ (cnsnews.com, 31 January). One contributor to the site, MJ, went so far as to state: ‘I definitely agree that God chose Donald Trump to be our president! The devil and hordes of his demons have done everything they know to try and hinder and stop him from accomplishing God’s purposes, yet he remains in office. Why? Because he has given his life to God and desires to restore Christian values to our nation to make it great again. Bless him, Lord!’

Cortez the Redeemer

The religious Left is no better. In a commentary titled ‘The Biblical Values of Ocasio-Cortez’s Democratic Socialism’ (sojo.net, 31 January) we are informed ‘The Bible envisions a just and equitable social order. As King explained, “God never intended for some of his children to live in inordinate superfluous wealth while others live in abject, deadening poverty.” Democratic socialism seeks to build a more humane society, not by force or compulsion, but by way of the age-old democratic practice of “one person, one vote.” For this reason, democratic socialist policies can only move forward if the American people understand their value and vote for them.’ Surprisingly, there is a kernel of truth here: genuine socialism can only come about through majority understanding. But, religion, be it of the Left or Right, supports the status quo. Quotations from the Bible are offered in support of healthcare for all, a fair wage and a minimum one for all, as well as fair treatment of workers. The real message is, however, you’ll get pie in the sky when you die!

Worship Me or Die

‘Christianity is virtually outlawed in North Korea, where dictator Kim Jong Un is the subject of a personality cult that treats him like a god. The possession of Bibles, open religious services and any attempt to build underground church networks could mean torture, lengthy prison terms or execution’ (cruxnow.com, 1 February). If you have ever seen North Korea from the heavens, thanks to a satellite image and technology developed by the 99 percent, the contrast with the South is astonishing. Schopenhauer wrote that ‘religions are like glow worms; they shine only when it is dark’. Atheism, whether state sponsored or not, is ultimately another blind alley. So the fight continues on two fronts, to replace religion and supersede atheism through socialist understanding.

No Gods, no Masters

Marx (1847): ‘The social principles of Christianity have had eighteen centuries in which to develop, and have no need to undergo further development at the hands of Prussian consistorial councillors. The social principles of Christianity justified the slavery of classical days; they glorified mediaeval serfdom; and they are able when needs must to defend the oppression of the proletariat, though with a somewhat crestfallen air. The social principles of Christianity proclaim the need for the existence of a ruling class and a subjugated class, being content to express the pious hope that the former will deal philanthropically with the latter. The social principles of Christianity assume that there will be compensation in heaven for all the infamies committed on earth, and thereby justify the persistence of these infamies here below. The social principles of Christianity explain that the atrocities perpetrated by the oppressors on the oppressed are either just punishments for original and other sins, or else trials which the Lord in His wisdom ordains for the Redeemed. The social principles of Christianity preach cowardice, self-contempt, abasement, submission, humility, in a word, all the qualities of the canaille; and the proletariat which will not allow itself to be treated as canaille, needs courage, self-confidence, pride, a sense of personal dignity and independence, even more than it needs daily bread. The social principles of Christianity are lick-spittle, whereas the proletariat is revolutionary. So much for the social principles of Christianity’ (Otto Rühle, Karl Marx: His Life and Works, 1929).

Was Russia Ever Socialist . . ? (2017)

From the October 2017 issue of the Socialist Standard

We examine the Socialist Party’s reaction to the Bolshevik coup d’état and recall the analysis of Soviet Russia the Party pioneered.

The apparent triumph of the Bolsheviks in the backward Russia of 1917 sent the Marxist movement into turmoil. Moreover, previously impotent political organisations across Europe and North America showed themselves to be more impressed by the sudden and unexpected success of revolutionaries in the midst of bloody world war, than concerned for the event’s potential impact on core elements of Marxist theory as they had always previously been understood. Contrary to legend, the Socialist Party was initially affected by this feeling like other radical parties, praising the Bolshevik’s successful attempts to remove Russia from the bloodbath that was the First World War.

As for what was happening in Russia at a deeper level, the Socialist Party was more sceptical. Indeed, what focused our attention above all were the lavish claims made on the Bolsheviks’ behalf by their supporters in Britain about ‘Red October’ (early November in the Western calendar). The first detailed analysis of the Russian situation, written by Jack Fitzgerald, appeared in the August 1918 Socialist Standard under the heading ‘The Revolution in Russia – Where It Fails’. It tackled the claims of the (then) Socialist Labour Party in Britain by outlining why the Bolshevik takeover could not really lead to the establishment of socialism in Russia. The article asked:

  ‘Is this huge mass of people, numbering about 160,000,000 and spread over eight and a half millions of square miles, ready for socialism? Are the hunters of the North, the struggling peasant proprietors of the South, the agricultural wage-slaves of the Central Provinces, and the industrial wage-slaves of the towns convinced of the necessity, and equipped with the knowledge requisite, for the establishment of the social ownership of the means of life?
  Unless a mental revolution such as the world has never seen before has taken place, or an economic change has occurred immensely more rapidly than history has ever recorded, the answer is ‘No!’ … What justification is there, then, in terming the upheaval in Russia a Socialist Revolution? None whatever beyond the fact that the leaders in the November movement claim to be Marxian Socialists.’

In fact, over time the Socialist Party went on to identify as many as five key reasons why the establishment of socialism in Russia by the Bolsheviks was impossible:

• First, as indicated by Fitzgerald, the mass socialist consciousness needed before a successful socialist revolution could take place was noticeably absent in Russia, as elsewhere. Fitzgerald seized on a remark by Litvinoff which suggested that the Bolsheviks did not really know the views of the entire working class when they seized control, only some sections of it such as the factory workers of Petrograd.

• Second, it was not even the case that the working class was in a numerical majority in Russia, a society dominated by its peasant economy. How could a majority socialist revolution be carried out when the workers were still in a minority and when the largest social class were the largely illiterate peasantry? While illiteracy did not entirely preclude the spread of socialist understanding, it certainly made it more difficult. In any event, the peasants had long shown themselves more interested in ridding themselves of the heavy tax burden on land, and increasing the size of their plots, than in demanding common ownership.

• Third, socialism could not exist in an economically backward country where the means of production was not sufficiently developed to support a socialist system of distribution.

• Fourth, and crucially, it was not possible to construct socialism in one country alone, given the nature of capitalism as a world system with a world-wide division of labour. Isolated ‘socialism in one country’ would be doomed to failure, no matter how honourable the intentions of the revolutionaries involved.

• The fifth reason advanced for the non-socialist nature of Bolshevik Russia went to the very root of our political differences with Bolshevism: socialism could not be achieved by following leaders (enlightened or otherwise).

State capitalism

In the absence of world socialist revolution, there could realistically only be one road forward for semi-feudal Russia – the capitalist road. With the virtual elimination of the small Russian bourgeoisie, it would be necessary for the Bolsheviks to develop industry through the state ownership of enterprises and the forced accumulation of capital. In The Impending Catastrophe and How to Combat It, written before the revolution, Lenin had envisaged just such an approach to the Russian crisis. According to this document, Lenin saw that immediate measures required included nationalisation of the existing banks and the formation of a single state bank, together with the nationalisation of all insurance companies, the nationalisation of the monopolies and all other key industrial concerns. The Socialist Standard took the opportunity to again cast doubt on the supposed general applicability of Bolshevik actions in Russia – in this instance, the development of ‘state capitalism’ as a precondition for the establishment of socialism:

   ‘If we are to copy Bolshevik policy in other countries we should have to demand State Capitalism, which is not a step towards Socialism in advanced capitalist countries. The fact remains, as Lenin is driven to confess, that we do not have to learn from Russia, but Russia has to learn from lands where large scale production is dominant’ (‘A Socialist View of Bolshevist Policy’, July 1920).

As we took great pains to point out to our pro-Bolshevik opponents, Lenin admitted that the social formation in Soviet Russia was essentially state-capitalist, albeit under the guidance and control of a so-called ‘proletarian state’ guided by a vanguard party of professional revolutionaries. For Lenin, the nature of the revolutionary polity in such circumstances was the crucial determinant of the type of social system in existence. Without what Lenin termed ‘revolutionary democracy’, state capitalist monopoly would remain state capitalism. With workers’ control of production and control of the proletarian state by the vanguard party of the working class, however, socialism would be a reality. According to The Impending Catastrophe and How To Combat It, socialism was merely ‘state-capitalist monopoly made to serve the interests of the whole people’.

More than twenty years after the Bolshevik seizure of power, we remained unconvinced that state capitalism was really socialism even if presided over by those who proclaimed themselves socialist:

  ‘… the chief characteristics of Capitalism [in Russia] have not disappeared and are not in the process of disappearing. Goods are not produced for use but for sale to those who have the money to buy, as in other countries. The workers are not members of a social system in which the means of wealth production are socially owned and controlled, but are wage-earners in the employ of the State or of semi-State concerns, etc. The Russian State concerns are no more ‘socially owned’ than is the British Post Office or the Central Electricity Board, or any private company… The Bolshevik attempt to usher in Socialism by ‘legal enactments’ and by ‘bold leaps’ before the economic conditions were ripe, and before the mass of the population desired Socialism, has been a total failure. In course of time that failure will become obvious to the workers inside and outside Russia’ (Questions of the Day, 1942).

Capitalism, based on the separation of the producers from the means of production had not been abolished, nor could it have been. Production still took place as a system of exchange involving the circulation of capital. Capital expanded consequent on the exploitation of wage labour, and articles of wealth were still being produced for sale on the market with a view to the realisation of surplus value. Indeed, much of the Party’s early analysis of the economic basis of the Soviet system reflected a desire to demonstrate the similarities between Russian state capitalism and the British private enterprise-based capitalism the Party was most familiar with.

Who are the capitalist class?

Over time, while it was clear that state capitalism in Russia (and then its satellites) retained all the essential features of capitalism, there were some apparent differences, even if superficial. One related to who the capitalist class were in Russia, as the system’s supporters often claimed that capitalism could not really exist in Russia as there was no capitalist class in the traditional sense. But in fact, there was a capitalist class of this nature, as the 1940s pamphlet Soviet Millionaires by Reg Bishop showed, and always a private sector running in parallel to the major state-owned institutions and corporations – though it was peripheral. Nevertheless, it was clear that real power and control – including economic decision-making – rested with a powerful group of leading bureaucrats who had privileged lifestyles and high incomes as a result of their position at the top of the Soviet hierarchy.

This controlling class could not merely be equated with the supervisors and managers within capitalism referred to by Marx who received a wage based on the amount needed to produce and reproduce their labour power. On the contrary, this class of bureaucrats in Russia was using its position of control to perform the functions carried out by individual capitalists in earlier phases of capitalism’s development and to command a privileged income derived from surplus value. Though it did not have legal title to the means of production, and was not able to bequeath property, it was clearly a possessing class of the type mentioned in our Declaration of Principles, exercising a ‘monopoly… of the wealth taken from the workers’. This state capitalist class, like the privately owning capitalist class in the West, was privileged in consumption, receiving bloated ‘salaries’ that were not the price of labour power but a portion of the total surplus value created by the working class. They were also privileged because of the multitude of benefits and perks open to them, including access to exclusive consumption outlets such as expensive shops and restaurants from which the working class was physically denied access.

The prevailing view in the Socialist Party was that the nature of a class could not be determined simply by legal forms or even by methods of recruitment (the Soviet possessing class was not recruited via inheritance but by other, more meritocratic, methods that have not been entirely unusual for possessing classes in history). So the Party ultimately concluded that although the state capitalist class did not have legal property titles to the means of production, it nonetheless constituted a capitalist class exercising a collective ownership of the means of production and distribution. What was judged to be of prime importance, therefore, was the social reality of capitalism rather than a particular legal form; the opponents of the theory of state capitalism had never been able to see beyond the latter.

The theory of state capitalism

The Socialist Party of Great Britain was the first political group in Britain, and quite possibly the world, to identify the state capitalist direction taken by Russia under the Communist Party dictatorship, though many others came to the same conclusion over time, if not always for the same reasons. Unlike us, most of these groups stood in the Leninist tradition or at least showed a willingness to identify positive aspects of the Bolshevik takeover that could be applied by the socialist movement elsewhere in the future. In particular, the Leninist conception of socialism as state ownership and direction of the economy under the control of a vanguard party operating through the political medium of workers’ councils was readily accepted by most of these groups. Hence they only later ascribed a ‘state capitalist’ characterisation to Russia when they judged that state ownership no longer coincided with ‘proletarian democracy’ and the power of the soviets. This was essentially the analysis initially put forward by ‘council communists’ such as Otto Rühle who saw in the crushing of the soviets the rise of ‘commissar despotism’ and state capitalism (Rühle himself later realized the inadequacy of this position and came to view nationalisation and state regulation as intrinsically state capitalist). The largest ‘Left Communist’ group in Europe, the German KAPD, developed a similar perspective. It identified capitalism as the private (specifically non-state) ownership of the means of production, and, like the council communist Workers’ Socialist Federation in Britain, praised the Bolsheviks for their construction of socialism in the industrial centres of Russia. Later, the KAPD became critical of the Soviet system with the final crushing of the soviets and the introduction of the New Economic Policy, which it thought heralded a ‘reversion to capitalism’.

Despite the initial excesses of Left Communist and council communist groups who invariably let their early admiration for the Soviet political form dominate their analysis, arguably the worst example of the conflation of socialism with state ownership plus ‘revolutionary democracy’ came from the Trotskyists. Ironically, the Trotskyist theories of state capitalism, being by far the most fragile, are the most well-known. C. L. R. James and Raya Dunayevskaya from the American Socialist Workers’ Party were the first Trotskyists to break with Trotsky himself and identify the state capitalist nature of the USSR though perhaps the most widely known theory was that elaborated by Tony Cliff and circulated as a discussion document within the Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain in the period immediately after the Second World War, before being published as Russia: A Marxist Analysis. Cliff – who was the driving force behind what became the British SWP – said his reasons for breaking with orthodox Trotskyism by identifying the Soviet Union as state capitalist were plain enough:

   ‘When I came to the theory of state capitalism I did not come to it by a long analysis of the law of value in Russia… Nothing of the sort. I came to it by the simple statement that… you cannot have a workers’ state without the workers having power to dictate what happens in society’ (interview with The Leveller, 30 September 1979).

In reality, Cliff had been heavily influenced by fellow Trotskyist Jock Haston about the Socialist Party’s view of state capitalism existing in Russia rather than socialism or a ‘workers’ state’, but Cliff could never break entirely with the perspectives of Lenin and Trotsky. Indeed, Cliff’s analysis was firmly rooted in the idea that the USSR was a form of ‘workers’ state’ before Stalin’s first Five Year Plan of 1928 established the bureaucracy as a new class consuming surplus value. Like all the Trotskyists that have followed him, Cliff did not identify the USSR as a society developing along state capitalist lines from 1917 but only from Stalin’s ascension to power. Under Lenin, Russia was supposedly a society in transition from capitalism to communism, based on working class power. For Cliff, a perceived change of political control led to a fundamental change in economic structure, to what in fact amounted to a ‘reversion to capitalism’. Perhaps surprisingly, those Trotskyists who remained faithful to Trotsky’s own view when in exile of Russia as a ‘degenerated workers’ state’ made some of the most pertinent criticisms of Cliff’s analysis, particularly his conclusion that the economic structure of the Soviet system had changed in 1928 and had assumed a capitalist basis. Foremost among these critics was rival British Trotskyist Ted Grant (founder of what became Militant):

   ‘If Comrade Cliff’s thesis is correct, that state capitalism exists in Russia today, then he cannot avoid the conclusion that state capitalism has been in existence since the Russian Revolution and the function of the revolution itself was to introduce this state capitalist system of society. For despite his tortuous efforts to draw a line between the economic basis of Russia before the year 1928 and after, the economic basis of Russian society has remained unchanged… money, labour power, the existence of the working class, surplus value, etc. are all survivals of the old capitalist system carried over even under the regime of Lenin… the law of value applies and must apply until there is direct access to the products by the producers’ (Against the Theory of State Capitalism, 1949).

This conclusion was certainly rejected by Cliff and all the other Trotskyist state capitalist theorists, though not of course by us.

Today, many council communist, left communist and Trotskyist political groupings identify Soviet Russia, certainly post-Lenin, as having always been essentially state capitalist, and like us, they have applied their analysis of Russian society to other ‘socialist’ countries exhibiting similar features in Asia, Africa and Central America. That we were not alone in identifying the capitalist nature of the USSR does not of course diminish our position as the one organisation which promoted a state capitalist analysis of the events in Russia at the time of their happening, and not merely with the benefit of hindsight. What is more, we have remained one of the few organisations committed to such a critique of the USSR and similar regimes, that has never sought to adopt or promote the Leninist vanguardism which so clearly led to that state capitalist outcome.

Dave Perrin

Next month’s issue will be a special issue on ‘The Aftermath of Leninism’ looking at the surviving Leninist regimes today.

Forgings from the Furnace (1939)

Via the Marxists Internet Archive.

From the September 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

It is interesting to read some of the lesser known writings of Marx, interesting because you often come in contact with material that seems new to you. 

Otto Rühle’s work, “Karl Marx,” contains many quotations from “The Holy Family” and the earlier works of the old revolutionist. 

I selected a few of these that appealed to me; perhaps the readers of the Standard may find it worth their while to peruse them. It would be superfluous to comment. 

We will let the old red speak for himself:

Charles Lestor.

   "We shall not dogmatically anticipate the coming world, but shall begin by discovering the new world through criticism of the old one. . . . We are developing the principles of the new world. We do not say to the world 'cease your struggles, which are foolish, for we will give you the true battle-cry.’ We merely show the world for what it is really fighting, and the world must become self-conscious whether it will or no. Our motto must therefore be: Reform of the consciousness, not by dogmas, but by analyses of the mystical consciousness, of the consciousness which is not fully clarified, whether it be religious or political, ' To make the time fully understand its. struggles and its wishes.'

 “The weapon of criticism cannot replace the criticism of weapons. Physical force must be overthrown by physical force; but theory, too, becomes a physical force as soon as it takes possession of the masses. . . .

  “If the proletariat demands the negation of private property, it is only raising to the level of a principle of society that which society has made a principle of the proletariat.

   “Philosophy cannot be realised without the uprising of the proletariat; and the proletariat cannot rise without the realisation of philosophy.

  “Proletariat and wealth are opposites. As such, they form a whole. We are concerned with the definite position which the two assume in the contrast. It does not suffice to describe them as two aspects of one whole.

  “Private property as private property, as wealth, is compelled to maintain its own existence, and therewith the existence of its opposite, the proletariat. It is the positive side of the contrast, private property satisfied with itself. The proletariat on the other hand, is compelled as proletariat to abolish itself, and therewith to abolish private property, the opposite that has determined its own existence, that has made it into a proletariat. It is the negative side of the contrast, its discontent with itself, private property dissolved and dissolving itself. The possessing class and the class of the proletariat represent an identical human self-alienation. But the former class feels itself comfortable and assured in this self-alienation, recognises this alienation as its own power, and possesses in it the semblance of human existence; the latter feels itself annihilated by this alienation, regards in it its own impotence, and perceives in it the reality of an inhuman existence.

  “Beyond question, private property, in its economic movement, advances towards its own dissolution, but only through the development of an independent and unconscious character, which it undergoes without the exercise of its own will, and impelled by the nature of things; only inasmuch as it generates the proletariat as proletariat, creates poverty that is conscious of its own mental and physical poverty, creates dehumanisation that is conscious of itself and therefore abolishes itself. The proletariat fulfils the judgment which private property has brought upon itself by the creation of the proletariat, just as it fulfils the judgment which wage labour has brought upon itself by creating the wealth of others and its own poverty. When the proletariat is victorious, it has not thereby in any way become the absolute aspect of society, for it is only victorious inasmuch as it abolishes itself and its opposite. Then both the proletariat and its conditioning opposite will disappear. . . .

   “We are not concerned, therefore, with what this or that proletarian, or even the proletariat as a whole may regard as an aim. What we are concerned with is, what the proletariat actually is: and what the proletariat will, in accordance with the nature of its own being, be historically compelled to do. Its goal and its historical action are obvious, are irrevocably indicated, in the vital situation of the proletariat, and also in the whole organisation of contemporary bourgeois society. . . .

   “We may distinguish human beings from animals by consciousness, by religion, by anything you please. They themselves begin to distinguish themselves from animals as soon as they begin to produce their own means of subsistence, a step which is necessitated by their own bodily organisation. Inasmuch as human beings produce their own means of subsistence, they indirectly produce their own material life.

   “The necessaries of life are, above all, food, drink, shelter, clothing and a few others. Hence the first historical act is the production of the means for the satisfaction of these needs, the production of material life itself, and thus one historical fact is a fundamental determinant of all history.

As individuals express their lives, so they are. Thus, what they are coincides with what they produce: and not only with what they produce, but with how they produce. Consequently, what individuals are, depends upon the material conditions of production.

   “Social classification and the State are continually proceeding out of the life process of determinate individuals, not, however, of these individuals as they may appear to themselves or others, but as they really are; that is to say, as they work, as they are engaged in material production, as they are active under determinate material limitations, presuppositions and conditions which are independent of their will.

 “Morality, religion, metaphysics, and ideology in general, with their appropriate forms of consciousness, thus forfeit the semblance of independence.

  “They have no history, no evolution of their own. Human beings developing material production and material intercourse, and thus altering the real world that environs them, alter therewith their own thought and the products of their thought. Consciousness does not determine life, but life determines consciousness

    “Once reality has been demonstrated, philosophy as an independent discipline loses its existence.

     Not criticism, but revolution, is the motive force of history."

   “For us, Communism is not a condition of affairs which 'ought’ to be established, not an ‘ideal’ toward which reality has to direct itself. When we speak of Communism we mean the actual movement which makes an end of the present state of affairs. The determinants of this movement arise out of the extant presupposition . . .  ”

   “Economic conditions begin by transforming the masses of the population into (manual wage) workers. The regime of Capital has created for this mass a common situation, joint interests. Thus this mass is already a class confronting capital, though not yet aware of its own position as a class. . . . The interests it defends become class interests. Now, a struggle of class against class is a political struggle.

   “The existence of an oppressed class is the vital condition of every society based upon class oppositions. Consequently, the liberation of the oppressed class necessarily involves the creation of a new society. If the oppressed class is to be able to liberate itself, it must have reached a stage at which the already acquired form of production and the extant social institutions can no longer continue to exist side by side. Of all the instruments of production, the greatest productive force is the revolutionary class itself.

   "The organisation of the revolutionary elements as a class presupposes the existence of all the forces of production which can develop within the womb of the old society . . . "

   “Capital is not only what Adam Smith calls it, the command over labour. Fundamentally, it is the command of unpaid labour. All surplus value, whatever the form into which it may subsequently become crystallized—as profit, land-rent, interest, etc.—is substantially the materialisation of unpaid labour time. The secret of the self-expansion of capital finds its explanation in this, that capital has at its disposal a definite quantity of other people's unpaid labour."

Karl Marx

Another Life of Marx. - Part 2 (1929)

Book Review from the December 1929 issue of the Socialist Standard

(Continued from October.)

I have now given sufficient information to enable the reader to judge of the biased and unreliable nature of Ruhle’s "Life of Marx." The last few pages of the book give us the apparent reason for this attempt to blacken the personal character of Marx. All through the book the writer is endeavouring to show (but without sound evidence) that Marx was a very clever thinker —but allowed his personal feelings to override his judgment. The author is compelled to admit time after time that Marx’s judgments were ultimately sound, as witness quotations given. But he persists all through the book in trying to give the reader this impression of uncertainty. Why? Here is the explanation :—

Marxism, being primarily called upon to stir up the proletarian masses, to make them collect their forces, and to lead them on to the battlefield, must necessarily display itself at the outset in a guise which would encourage optimism; in a guise which, by representing historical evolution as the guarantee of the liberation of mankind, would make the workers believe in their own mission. To gain headway, it must relentlessly clear out of the path all rationalistic and utopian systems of Socialism, and must inexorably proceed on its own course. To-day, when its work is finished, Marxism begins to assume a new aspect. In our own time, not merely can Marxism occasionally recur to the systems of the Utopists and the rationalists; it is directly faced in this direction by the practical demands of the day by the growing claims for positive achievements in the class struggle. (p. 396.) (Italics ours.)

There you have it. Marxism was all right in the past, but now times have changed—Labour rules !—and we can indulge in wars, and all the rest of the reformer’s stock-in-trade. Actually, of course, there has been no change, and practical affairs of the day demand a still stricter adherence to the basic principles taught by Marx unless the workers are to flounder in the morass of Labourism for another century.

Mr. Ruhle, however, in branding Marx as a neurotic, is really making a special plea for himself and his friends. On the last page of the book he writes :—

The main thing was the work which had to be done; the qualities of the doer mattered little. Or, rather, the doer of the work which had to be done, had to be spurred to his task by an impetus such as could only be furnished by the neurosis from which Marx suffered! To-day, we have different problems to solve, and they must be solved by highly qualified persons who have freed themselves from neurosis; must be solved by champions of the class struggle who approach the undertaking with a keen sense of responsibility, an awakened consciousness, and a strongly developed community feeling, (p. 397.)

Now we begin to see light. We must forget Marx’s view, that the workers must accomplish their own emancipation, and put our trust in nice, kind, gentlemanly people like Ruhle and MacDonald, and the rest of the silk-hatted, frock-coated crowd.

It will be observed that I am now suffering from “stomach-ache” and getting personal. Ruhle’s attack on Marx is a fitting reflection of the former’s practical career. A disciple of Alfred Adler, of Vienna, he belonged to the German Social Democratic Party and voted with Liebknecht against the war in 1914. In the German post-war upheaval he took a leading part and was a member of the Council of Workers and Soldiers. Now he is neither in the German S.D.P. nor in the Communist Party, but is a kind of anarchist and has written books on “The Soul of The Proletarian Child,” and similar topics. Hence his kindly feelings towards Lassalle and Bakunin.

In one respect, however, this book can certainly be recommended. It contains voluminous extracts from some of the earlier and less known writings of Marx. These extracts reveal how early Marx obtained a clear grasp of the driving force in history.

Marx’s approach to Socialism was from the philosophical side. His early studies were concerned mainly with law and philosophy. His father wished to make of him a lawyer, but philosophy had a greater appeal at the beginning and ultimately he obtained a degree as Doctor of Philosophy, though he did not make use of it.

While working on the “New Rhenish Gazette,” Marx found his ignorance of economics constantly placing him in difficulties when dealing with questions of the day. When that paper was suppressed he immediately set about making up for the deficiency. In 1843 he did a tremendous amount of reading in history and economics, the first fruits of which was an article in the French and German Year Book entitled ‘‘Introduction to a Critique of the Hegelian Philosophy of Right.” The following extracts give an idea of his early progress towards Socialist knowledge (at the time he was only 25 years old):—

   'Man makes religion; religion does not make man. Religion, indeed, is the self-consciousness and the self-feeling of the man who either has not yet found himself, or else (having found himself) has lost himself once more. But man is not an abstract being, squatting down somewhere outside the world. Man is the world of men, the State, society. This state, this society, produce religion, produce a perverted world consciousness, because they are a perverted world. Religion is the generalised theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compend, its logic in a popular form . . . The fight against religion is, therefore, a direct campaign against the world whose spiritual aroma is religion.
   Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the feelings of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of unspiritual conditions. It is the opium of the people.
  . . . . Thus the criticism of heaven is transformed into a criticism of earth, the criticism of religion into a criticism of law, the criticism of theology into a criticism of politics, (pp. 57 and 58.)

Thus early in his mental development Marx saw in religion an attempt on the part of the oppressed to escape from the troubles that afflicted them in the world of practical affairs. He also saw that the solution lay, not in theological disputations, not in new philosophical views, but in changing the constitution of society:—

    The criticism of religion ends with the doctrine that man is the highest being for man; it ends, that is to say, with the categorical imperative that all conditions must be revolutionised in which man is a debased, an enslaved, an abandoned, a contemptible being . . .  a radical is one who cuts at the roots of things.
    A radical revolution, the general emancipation of mankind, is not a Utopian dream for Germany; what is Utopian is the idea of a partial, an exclusively political revolution, which would leave the pillars of the house standing.
    What, then, are the practical possibilities of German emancipation? Here is the answer. They are to be found in the formation of a class with radical chains, a class of civil society which is not a class of civil society; of an estate which is the dissolution of all estates; of a sphere which is endowed with a universal character by the universality of its sufferings; one which does not lay claim to any particular rights, the reason being that it does not suffer any one specific injustice, but suffers injustice unqualified; one which can no longer put forward a historically grounded title, but only a general human title; one which is not in any sort of one-sided opposition to the consequences, but only in general opposition to the presuppositions of the German political system; and, finally, a sphere which cannot emancipate itself, without emancipating itself from all the other spheres of society—one which, in a word, has been completely deprived of its human privileges, so that it can only regain itself by fully regaining these human privileges. This dissolution of society as a particular estate is—the proletariat.
    If the proletariat herald the dissolution of the world order as hitherto extant, it is merely, thereby, expressing the mystery of its own existence, for it is the actual dissolution of this previous world order. (p. 60.)

In the above extracts we have a remarkably clear foreshadowing of Marx’s final conclusions as embodied in his materialist conception of history and theory of surplus value which together form the foundations of scientific Socialism. And it is a remarkably clear and logical contribution from one so youthful considering the range of the subject and the state of philosophical, historical and economic science at the time he was writing.

I would like to give many more extracts from these earlier works of Marx, but, unfortunately, they would lengthen out this review too much. I must therefore refer anyone who wishes to watch the mental development of Marx to the book itself, in which there is a great deal of useful quotations from these early writings.

There are one or two further points, however, I must mention before concluding.

On page 198 "Hic Rhodus, hic salta!” is translated as "Here is the Rose; dance here!” Surely this really refers to the traveller in one of the ancient classical tales, who, returning home after considerable wanderings, boasted to his friends of his wonderful achievements; among others that while at Rhodes he saw a tremendous statue with gigantic legs spread far apart, and that he had leaped from one of the feet to the other. His friends, already sickened by his tall stories, and wishing to "take down” the boaster, cried, "Here is Rhodes, now leap,” or, in other words— "pretend this is Rhodes, now show us how you can jump.”

On page 199, writing of Engels, Ruhle says he "unselfishly devoted his evenings, year after year, when the day’s work was over, to writing the necessary articles for the 'New York Tribune.’ ” In a review of a previous book on Marx by Ryazanoff we gave our reasons for contesting this view, and we must refer the reader to that review for a full statement. Engels certainly helped Marx by putting his articles into English at a time when Marx had not yet acquired a complete command of English, and he also wrote some of the articles dealing with military matters, but that is all. Ruhle’s appetite for detraction leads him to make these sweeping statements where opportunity offers.

We cannot commend the translators for the bibliography at the end. They seem more concerned with their own translations than with giving the reader a list of Marx’s writings that are accessible to those who can only read English, e.g., "Value, Price and Profit,” "Introduction to the Critique of Political Economy,” "Lord Palmerston,” "The Eastern Question,” “Class Struggles in France,” etc.

Ruhle, in his book, has taken his evidence of Marx’s personal character from those who were his bitter enemies, and who knew comparatively little of Marx’s private life. Let me give the evidence of one who knew Marx for the greater part of his life and one who also suffered greatly and gave the whole of his life work—apart from the time necessary to earn a living—to the struggle for working class freedom. I refer to Frederick Lessner. Liebknecht’s tribute to Marx is well known, but Ruhle is pleased to look upon Liebknecht with the eye of suspicion. No one, however, has yet presumed to throw any mud at Lessner. Here is an extract from his "Recollections of an Old Communist,” with which I very fittingly close this review:—

   Marx was, as are all truly great men, free from conceit, and appreciated every genuine striving, every opinion based on independent thinking . . . as already mentioned, he was always eager to hear the opinion of the simplest working man on the labour movement. Thus he would often come to me in the afternoon, fetch me for a walk, and talk about all sorts of matters. . . . Generally he was an excellent companion, who extremely attracted, one might say, charmed, everybody that came in touch with him. His humour was irrepressible; his laugh a very hearty one. . . .

*****

   Some comrades proposed to erect a monument to him. But no monument could be of finer foundation than his teachings, his actions, and his struggles, which are engraved now into the hearts and heads of millions of workers for ever.

Gilmac.

Another Life of Marx: Queues at Truth. (1929)

Book Review from the October 1929 issue of the Socialist Standard

“Karl Marx,” by Otto Ruhle. Translated by Eden & Cedar Paul. Allen & Unwin, 15s.

This book has been written with a heavy hand. It is a curious mixture of contradictions, bitterness, excellent quotations and “modern” psychology. When a man gets on his hobby horse he is apt to leave the world of reality and ride off into the realm of dreams. The author of this book has a hobby horse and when he gets astride of it his dreams are ugly ones. Such was my view when half-way through the book, but as I read on I began to get suspicious. The blacks in the picture were put in a little too thickly and too often. The last two pages supplied the key, and I have come to the conclusion that the book was written for its last two pages and is, in fact, an apology and an excuse for the actions of German Social Democracy. However, I will deal with this last point later.

Now there are. already a number of Lives and Monographs of Marx in existence, including Liebnecht’s, Spargo's (the photos in which are practically identical with those in this book), Beer's, Ryazanoff's and others. Why then this new one, which, apart from mud spattering and some new quotations, adds nothing to what has already been done?

On page 371 the author sets out his psychological views upon the subject of his biography in the following terms:

   If we translate into psychological terms these principles of the method of historical materialism, we get the following. Man forms his character out of his organic constitution and his social and family position. The biological and social interests that promote his safeguarding find expression (unconsciously) in aims. The main trend of his behaviour arises with reference to these aims. Opinions, conceptions, ideas, manifest themselves as forms of expression of the individual's aim to safeguard his own existence. Decisive for each of us in the formation of character and in the development of trend of behaviour is, in the individualistic epoch, the urge to self-expression as an individuality, an urge dictated by the circumstances of life.
  When, in the light of these guiding principles, we contemplate the man Marx—contemplate him solely as a man, apart from his work—our attention is riveted by three characteristics:—
   First, his persistent ill-health, from which we infer that there was constitutional weakness or organic defect.
   Secondly, his Jewish origin, which he felt as a social stigma.
   Thirdly, his position as a first-born child.

The author then proceeds to elaborate his theory, the essence of which is that Marx suffered severely from an "inferiority complex” arising primarily from a bad constitution, and this was the motive that urged him to outstrip everybody and abhor a rival “near the throne.” The "scientific” nature of the author's analysis of Marx may be gathered from the following further quotation (page 376):

If, in the light of these considerations, we turn to examine the personality of Marx, we see the before-mentioned biological, social and family traits in a new and instructive light. But the traits in question are only the elements, the first crude constituents, of a psychological analysis— with which we have to content ourselves, since we lack more detailed materials as regards the life of Marx. Obviously, they do not suffice for an exhaustive analysis. Many of the gaps in our observation will have to be filled in artificially; a schematic construction will have to supplement the defects of observation. Nevertheless, we can get a great deal further than was possible by earlier psychological methods. Even if we do not achieve definitive knowledge, in this respect psychological analysis is no more inadequate than the other sciences, for science has to leave many ultimate problems open.

What all this amounts to, then, is that his view of Marx is guess-work; there are gaps, but these are filled up by assumptions! But if psychological science has not progressed far enough for an accurate analysis, why guess now? What was the urgency of the matter in this special case—particularly as the enemies of the Socialist movement are at their wits end for weapons with which to hinder our progress? And if so much of it is guess-work, why the particular bitterness of the diatribes against Marx by the author? The following are specimens of the author’s estimate of Marx. I have numbered each quotation for convenience in dealing with them:

(1) He (Grun) had wrongfully accused Marx of not protesting with sufficient vigour against expulsion from France, and Marx, who was always too ready to take offence, had therefore conceived an animus against Grun which formed the undertone of a fierce criticism of the latter's attitude towards the problems of Socialism, (p. 98.)
(2) . . . . One day, when Marx insisted upon the rejection of fanciful and over-enthusiastic schemes for universal happiness (passing by the name of Communism), Weitling advocated the cause of the Utopists, the dispute leading to an open breach between him and Marx. Since the latter had an unhappy talent for introducing personal animus into theoretical disputes, the relations between the two men were poisoned henceforward, and they became irreconcilable enemies, (p. 123.)
(3) There is no use blaming a man for his character. All we are to infer from these descriptions is that Marx, despite his thirty years, his extensive achievements and his reputation as a man of learning and a politician, was still what he had been in youth, one fighting to secure recognition, one doubtful as to his prestige. His arrogance, his self-conceit, his dogmatism and disputatiousness and irritability, must reveal themselves to everyone who understands human nature as masks for a lack of self-confidence, under stress of which he was perpetually trying to avert the danger of exposure. He could not listen quietly to an opponent, because he was afraid that his opponent might get the better of him if allowed to continue. He had to shout down every hostile opinion because he was haunted by spectral doubts lest this opinion should gain adherents and leave him unsupported. He tried to discredit his adversaries because he hoped that personal onslaughts would shake the validity of opposing arguments. He could not tolerate rivals because he was perpetually tortured with the dread lest it should become apparent in one way or another that not he, but his rival, was the ablest of the able, the most efficient of the efficient, the most revolutionary of the revolutionists.
   This domineering behaviour was animated by the unconscious conviction that he would be able to overawe the timid among his opponents. When he made fun of the opinions of others, he was trying to fortify the sense of his own superiority. When he crowned himself with anticipatory laurels, he did so in the belief that this would ensure his triumph, and entitle him to wear the laurel crown.
   Only one person would Marx allow to express opinions—Engels. The sole reason for his tolerance in this quarter was that he could rely on being able to use Engels’ remarkable talents for his own purposes as dictator, without Engels expecting any return or thanks, or grant of equality. As long as a collaborator was a willing servant, he could work on the best of terms with Marx. But when this collaborator expressed an opinion of his own, or claimed to assert his own will against that of Marx, the fat was in the fire. , Marx was a typical authoritarian. (p. 158.)

I will forbear quoting more, but there are numerous similar examples through the book. Now for a few remarks on the above.

(1) No evidence is given that Marx had “conceived an animus against Grun.” Surely an historian who claims to be scientific should at least give evidence for his charges? The justification for Marx’s “fierce criticism” is provided by Ruble himself. On the same page he gives the following description of Grun:

Among the “true Socialists,” perhaps the most notable was Karl Grun, a Westphalian. He had been one of Marx’s fellow students, and Moses Hess had made him acquainted with Engels. His socialist career had started from the radical “small-beer Liberalism.” Then he had coquetted with Fourierism for a time, until at length, having got into touch with Hess, he deviated towards early Socialism. All possible varieties of Socialism were jumbled together in his head. Out of borrowed and undigested thoughts from Proudhon, Feuerbach, Hess and Marx, he had brewed the most amazing elixir of happiness, whose formulas were aesthetically tinted and were couched in a feuilleton style. From Paris, writing hastily and irresponsibly, he sent his lucubrations to the German Press, and especially to the “ Triersche Zeitung.’’

(2) Weitlung, another of those towards whom Marx is accused of having a personal animus, is described by Ruhle as follows:

. . .  when Weitling turned up in Brussels, and joined the Workers’ Educational Society there, it became apparent that his development had proceeded no further, and that he had become infected with inordinate vanity, with an undue sense of superiority. He was continually miking about utopias and conspiracies, and imagined himself a prey to the persecution of envious rivals, (p. 122.)

Seemingly a very easy man to fall out with! But perhaps he also had the stomach-ache!

(3) This paragraph by the author is immediately based on the statement of Carl Schurz relating to a meeting he attended when he was 19. Schurz had hardly reached an age to give a dependable judgment. Besides, in harmony with the author’s theory, would it not be necessary to know all about Schurz and the other opponents of Marx to be able to decide whether their judgments were also vitiated by an “ inferiority complex.” In fact, according to this delightful theory, it would appear that one really “knows nothing about nothing," but just goes on guessing!

The paragraph is also similar in essentials to Bakunin’s description of Marx, the value of which may be gauged from the following:

Bakunin honestly endeavoured to be on good terms with Marx [How does Ruhle know?] and to avoid friction. But he could not entertain cordial sentiments for Marx. The two men differed too much in mental structure, in theoretical trend, and in fundamental attitudes towards the revolutionary problem, for this to be possible. Bakunin loved the peasants; detested intellectualism and abstract systems with their dogmatism and intolerance; hated the modern State, industrialism and centralisation; had the most intense dislike for Judaism and all its ways, which he regarded as irritable, loquacious, unduly critical, intriguing, and exploitative, Everything for which he had an instinctive abhorrence, everything which aroused in him spiritual repugnance and antagonism, was for him incorporated in Marx. (p. 280.)

Evidently another very difficult man not to fall out with! But the strangeness of it! In face of the above, Ruhle yet drags in Bakunin as a witness for the prosecution!

At the period Marx was carrying on his work the working-class movement was youthful; it was honeycombed with emissaries of the various governments, whose mission it was to undermine and destroy the movement. Men of all kinds of opinion found their way in and tried to impose their schemes upon the rest. Political job hunters endeavoured to use the movement as means to personal aggrandisement, and Governments were ever ready to buy off dangerous opposition with either money or flattery. Marx plunged into this welter of ignorance, chicanery and egotism and endeavoured to build-up a movement on sound principles with a clear understanding of the necessities of the time. He met with bitter opposition from the earnest as well as from the treacherous. Always surrounded by intrigue, was it any wonder that he was suspicious and occasionally lost patience? Particularly as his suspicions were proved in so many cases to have been well-founded.

It is quite easy for Mr. Ruhle, in these comparatively comfortable times in Germany, to sit back in his chair and see in Marx’s bitterness only the results of stomach-ache, but surely the accumulations of surrounding treachery and pettiness can play upon the strongest nerves until they eventually produce irritability without such irritability having its original source in a feeling of inferiority!

Ruhle complains of Marx’s attitude towards Bakunin and Lassalle. Surely anyone familiar with their actions must agree that, apart from political and economical unsoundness, they lent themselves to suspicion: Bakunin by his underground tactics and Lassalle by his showy methods. The historian of the present has written information in front of him that was not in the hands of those fighting at the time, and if there is to be praising or blaming then it should be accorded with this in mind—unless the author has the stomach-ache!

That Marx had adequate reason for his bitter hostility to Bakunin is surely borne out by the following quotation, when it is remembered that Ruhle is at much pains to show that Bakunin was professing friendship for Marx during that time:

At the Berne Congress of the League of Peace and Freedom. Bakunin had tried to induce the League to adopt a revolutionary programme, and to affiliate to the International. When this attempt failed, he resigned from the League, and. in conjunction with J. P. Becker, founded the International Alliance of the Socialist Democracy, also known as the Alliance of Social Revolutionaries. His aim now was to get this Alliance accepted as part of the International; then, by degrees, to excavate and absorb the International until, at last, the International would be replaced by the Alliance, (p. 283.)

A very pretty plan! He aimed at quietly smashing up the International, and yet Ruhle cavils at Marx for his bitterness! Mr. Ruhle is really too well-mannered a gentleman altogether.

(To be continued.)

Gilmac.

Link to Part 2

Fascism, democracy and the war (1986)

From the February 1986 issue of the Socialist Standard

Workers who suffered under the monstrous Mussolini and Hitler dictatorships were clearly worse off than their fellow wage slaves in the so-called democratic countries. It is a popular fiction that Britain and its allies went to war against the fascist nations in 1939 to defeat an evil ideology and save the world for democracy. This is a lie, just as false as those invented to persuade workers to be slaughtered in the trenches in 1914. The fact is that Britain and its allies were motivated by a political and economic desire to protect their long-held interests in the world market against the expansionist aims of the fascist nations which had arrived late on the scene of world imperialism. The claim that a major war was initiated to liberate workers from fascist tyranny sounds very noble, but has little to do with the sordid motives of the capitalist class.

Fascism and the British capitalists

The first fascist state in Europe was Mussolini's Italy. It was established in 1923, long before the British capitalists contemplated going to war to save workers from the fascists. Far from regarding this new type of capitalist government as a deadly threat. Britain's leaders approved of Italian fascism. Winston Churchill told the fascists that

If I had been an Italian, I am sure that I should have been wholeheartedly with you from start to finish in your triumphant struggle . . . (Quoted in The Times, 21 January 1927.)

Churchill took the same attitude to Hitler, stating that if Britain was ever threatened with "communism", he hoped that a man such as Adolf Hitler would be available to lead the nation to safety. Indeed, the capitalist leaders admired Hitler's ability to keep the workers in check; consider the words expressed by Ramsay MacDonald to the National Government's Labour Committee on 6 November 1933:

The secret of the success of the dictatorships is that they have managed somehow or other to make the soul of a nation alive. We may be shocked at what they are doing, but they have certainly awakened something in the hearts of their people which has given them a new vision and a new energy to pursue national affairs. In this country the three parties in co-operation are doing that . . .

So much for the opposition to fascism of Britain's first Labour Prime Minister. He was simply stating the desire of the capitalist class: that workers must accept the needs of the profit system and if the fascists were succeeding in such a task they cannot be condemned. This was well summed up by the Tory, Lord Melchett, who stated that:

I admire Fascism because it is successful in bringing about social peace . . . I have been working for years towards the same peace in the industrial field of England . . . Fascism is tending towards the realisation of my political ideals, namely, to make all classes collaborate loyally.

David Lloyd George, the hero of the modem Liberals, was so impressed by Nazism that he went to visit Hitler in 1936. This visit was arranged by Philip Conwell-Evans. an enthusiast for the fascist cause, who had been a senior figure in the 1929

Labour government. He kept notes on the talks between the Fuhrer and the Liberal and reported that Lloyd George told Hitler that:

. . . public opinion in Great Britain was to an increasing degree showing more and more understanding for Hitler’s position and the one anxiety of British public opinion today was to bring about the closest co-operation between the two countries. (Quoted in Appendix II of Martin Gilbert's The Roots of Appeasement, London 1966.)

On 17 September 1936, Lloyd George had an article published in The Daily Express which was full of enthusiasm for Nazism and referred to Hitler as "a born leader of men". In another article he stated that the Nazis had "effected a remarkable improvement in the working conditions of both men and women" (News Chronicle, 21 September 1936). Two years earlier he had told the House of Commons: "Do not let us be in a hurry to condemn Germany. We shall be welcoming Germany as our friend" (Hansard., 28 November 1934).

As with Hitler, so with the fascist General Franco. The Conservative historian, Maurice Cowling, has written that "most Conservative MPs sympathised with Franco from the start . . . and did not regard Franco as a Fascist . . (The Impact of Hitler, p.266, Cambridge. 1975). Among those who were enthusiastic in their initial support for Franco was Churchill. Numerous examples can be cited to demonstrate the widespread enthusiasm within the British capitalist class for the tactics of the fascist governments. They were seen as models of efficient capitalism and were respected. The idea that capitalism could be managed democratically (which has never much impressed the capitalists) was becoming unfashionable in the 1930s. Typical of this was a speech made by Gordon Selfridge to the American Chamber of Commerce in London; The Times of 22 June 1932 reports him as stating that:

as an American he spoke to fifty representative men in America and did not find one who disagreed with his view that democracy in that great country could not possibly succeed as a system of government . . .  a country should be managed as a great business was managed.

Francis Yeats-Brown, who was the assistant editor of The Spectator between 1926 and 1931, expressed a popular ruling-class sentiment when he wrote that "the hope of order in Europe depends upon the abolition of democracy and the establishment of Corporate States" (10 November 1933).

Not only capitalists, but many workers also, were no longer prepared to place their faith in capitalist democracy. One of the main reasons for this is that the political parties all seemed to be standing for the same system and pursuing policies which led to the same old problems occurring again and again. Who can blame workers for feeling that elections and the other features of democracy are a waste of time if they do not lead to people being better off? It was capitalist politics, particularly the policies of reformism, which brought democracy into disrepute. This sentiment was well expressed by a character in Shaw's play, On The Rocks, written in 1933: he was a Prime Minister who knew that reform policies could make no difference to the working class and he undemocratically concluded:

The people of this country . . .  are sick of twaddle about liberty when they have no liberty . . They are sick of me and sick of you and sick of the whole lot of us. They want to see something done that will give them decent employment . . . They can’t set matters to right themselves, so they want rulers who will discipline them and make them do it instead of making them do the other thing. They are ready to go mad with enthusiasm for any man strong enough to make them do anything, even if it is only Jew baiting, provided it’s something tyrannical, something coercive, something that we all pretend no Englishman will submit to. though we’ve known ever since we gave them the vote that they'd submit to anything.

Shaw, who was as confused as he was condescending, was of the view that Mussolini and the Italian fascists had gone further in the direction of Socialism than the English Labour Party could yet venture if they were in power" (Quoted in Bernard Shaw and Fascism. London 1927). It was not until the late 1930s, when fascist foreign policy began to interfere with the imperial interests of the older capitalist powers, that British capitalist leaders began to use fascism as an ideological stick with which to beat their economic rivals. For example, it is an accepted fact that the British Foreign Office was well aware that German Jews were being subjected to state persecution and many dissidents were being tortured and killed by the fascists years before war was declared. If it was "the menace of fascism" which our bosses were so opposed to why were so many of them praising it until the moment that fascism threatened their economic power?

The Leninist attitude

No small contribution to the anti-democratic atmosphere in Britain in the 1930s was made by the Communist Party of Great Britain. As the main party of organised Leninism, the CP propagated two ideas which were both confused and dangerous. Firstly, it was CP policy between 1928 and 1935 to label all its opponents as "social fascists". The term was attributed to anyone who rejected the claims of the Russian state to be socialist. It was argued that there was no difference between fascist parties and social democratic ones: if they were not Leninists they must be fascists. This view, adopted because it was laid down by the Communist International (Comintern) led to the absurd conclusion on the part of the CP that "bourgeois democracy" was indistinguishable from fascism. Secondly, the CP pointed to Russia as the example of real democracy in action. The Stalinist police state of the 1930s arguably more dictatorial than Russia today - was described as "people’s democracy" and the CP maintained that instead of the limited democracy granted under private capitalism workers should aim to achieve the higher form of democracy of Stalin's Russia. Of course, this "people’s democracy" amounted to state-capitalist dictatorship and was feared by many workers as being no better than fascism. So. the CP added to popular confusion about what democracy means and. in presenting Stalinist dictatorship as real democracy. they led many workers to oppose the idea of democracy.

In 1935 the CP changed its policy and regarded fascism as a threat to the working class. This change was a reflection of Kremlin-dominated Comintern policy: the CP was then, as now. a party whose function was to defend the policies of the Kremlin. In September 1939. when the British capitalists went reluctantly to war with the fascist powers. the CP supported the war and published a pamphlet, written by Harry Pollitt, called How To Win The War. The following month the Comintern informed the British CP of the non-aggression pact which had been made between Russia and Germany and as a result the CP changed its position and opposed the war. Pollitt’s pamphlet was withdrawn from circulation and a new one. written by Palme Dutt. was issued, arguing the opposite of that being put forward a month earlier. Pollitt was forced to apologise for having supported the war. stating that

I recognise that my action in resisting the carrying out of the line of the Communist Party and the Communist International represented an impermissible infraction of our Party’s discipline. I request the Central Committee to give me facilities to prove in deeds that I know how to take my place in the front ranks (Quoted in 1939: The Communist Party and the War, London 1984).

On 2 September 1939 the CP issued a manifesto stating that "We are in favour of all necessary measures to secure the victory of democracy over fascism ”. (Remember: until 1935 the CP did not distinguish between the two.) Then, on 7 October 1939. after a British CP delegate had returned from Moscow with instructions to oppose the war because Russia had come to terms with Germany. a new manifesto was issued stating that:

The truth about this war must be told. This war is not a war for democracy against Fascism . . . This war is a fight between imperialist powers over profits, colonies and world domination.

The CP had turned its policy on its head because of Russian foreign policy. In fact, its revised policy made more sense: the war was not about ideology and was indeed a fight between economic competitors. In June 1941 the Nazis broke the pact with Russia and Stalin became an ally of Churchill - two great defenders of democracy! Once again, the CP line changed within days and the war was no longer to be opposed, but supported. Indeed, during the war the CP urged workers to place faith in Churchill’s great leadership and was instrumental in strike-breaking in areas where workers’ trade-union action might damage the war effort.

In 1979 the CP History Group held a conference to discuss its war policy and the proceedings have been published as a book: 1939: The Communist Party and the War edited by John Attfield and Stephen Williams. The CP is evidently anxious to explain away this sorry episode in its anti-socialist history but, judging from some of the contributions, it has no option but to admit to the fact that its role has been to echo, in the most unprincipled fashion, the decisions of Kremlin dictators. Monty Johnstone - supposedly a more critical leader within the modem CP - argues (p.24) that Russia was correct to make a pact with the Nazis. Perhaps such a pact was in Russia’s interest, but is it not then necessary for the CP to point out that such an interest could have nothing to do with socialism? The slavish response of CPers to Kremlin policy was summed up by the contribution made by Eric Scott who was secretary of the High Wycombe branch of the CP in 1939: he had supported the CP's September policy and was worried when he heard that it had been changed:

. . .  I thought that this was a betrayal of the anti-fascist fight. I spent a very uncomfortable forty-eight hours scratching my head and thinking it all over, and then I said. "well, if the Soviet Union takes this attitude. I suppose we can’t do anything else but take the same attitude". (pp. 128/9)

This uncritical dogmatism, so characteristic of the British CP. explains how workers who were advocating one view at one moment adopted a completely different one the next. They were victims of their own faith in leadership from Moscow. Again, in the contribution made by the late Lon Elliott:

The Soviet Union had tremendous prestige in the Communist movement, tremendous weight in the Communist International. We all of us felt, perfectly rightly I think, that the defence of the one and only socialist state was an absolutely paramount question at the time—it was the only socialist state. It seems to me . . . that the decision of the Comintern that this was an imperialist war was decisive (pp.68/9)

Apart from the obvious nonsense of referring to Russia as a "socialist state", it is a sure indictment of the willingness of Leninists to be told what to think that a decision made by the Comintern, in response to Russian foreign policy interests, led CPers to decide how to respond to fascism. The CP’s attitude to fascism was that it should only be opposed if Stalinism was threatened — just the same as the policy of the British capitalist class who only opposed fascism when it conflicted with their national interests.

The socialist reponse

Socialists have never been in any doubt as to the crucial importance of democratic methods as a means of achieving socialism. Unlike the parties of the Right and the Left, which contemptuously use the rhetoric of democracy in order to maintain capitalism in one form or another, the Socialist Party has always accepted that a fully democratic system of society can only be brought about by thoroughly democratic tactics. For that reason socialists (while recognising that capitalism will never be fully democratic) have urged workers in countries where they lack democratic rights to obtain them for the sake of building a socialist movement. It was therefore, quite obvious that the socialist response to the fascist dictatorships was one of total opposition, firstly because they were capitalist governments, but additionally because they were anti-democratic. This hostility to fascism was not determined by political opportunism, but by clear socialist principles. In 1850 Engels wrote of the working class that

They must see now that under no circumstances have they any guarantee for bettering their social position unless by universal suffrage, which would enable them to send a majority of working men in the House of Commons (The Ten Hours Question, The Democratic Review, March 1850).

The importance of democracy for socialists was expressed in the June 1939 Socialist Standard:

Under democracy, the workers are allowed to form their own political and economic organisations and within limits, freedom of speech, of assembly, and of the press is permitted as well as the freedom of the electorate choosing between contending political parties.

This was not to say that democracy in itself was enough:

Democracy, in itself, cannot solve a single problem of the working class . . .  As long as the working class supports capitalism and capitalist policies, it will, in the long run. ultimately give its support to that policy best calculated to meet the political and economic needs of capitalism - even though that policy may be fascist.

At the time of the Spanish Civil War some members took the view that democracy had to be fought for that the war was in defence of democratic rights and deserved workers' support. This was the view of A. E. Jacomb, who had been an active founder member of the Party, and by a number of members of then then Islington branch. The vast majority of Party members rejected this attitude, understanding that

If Fascism arose in Britain, with or without war. it could only be because the British capitalists wanted it and the workers supported it or were apathetic (The Socialist Standard, January 1939).

It is not possible to terrorise workers into a respect for democracy: if they are persuaded. as they were in the fascist countries. that democracy is not worth having, then no army will succeed in imposing democracy on them. So while maintaining at all times that "We much prefer a democracy to a dictatorship" (Socialist Standard, January 1941), the Socialist Party opposed the war. pointing out in 1939. as in 1914, that the war was between capitalist rivals and was unworthy of the shedding of working-class blood. On 24 September 1939 the Socialist Party's war manifesto was published and it contained the following sound analysis:

The present conflict is represented in certain quarters as one between "freedom" and "tyranny" and for the rights of small nations.
   The Socialist Party of Great Britain is fully aware of the sufferings of German workers under Nazi rule, and wholeheartedly supports the efforts of workers everywhere to secure democratic rights against the powers of suppression. but the history of the past decades shows the futility of war as a means of safeguarding democracy.

Indeed, the history of the Second World War proved the validity of this contention for, after 1945, when the dictatorships were apparently defeated, the process began whereby more workers in Europe are living under dictatorships today than in 1939.

Fascist dictatorships today

Using the term fascism in its broadest sense, we can see that in 1986 there is no shortage of governments in the world which can be well described as such: the military dictatorships of Central and South America; the one-party states of Africa; the racism of the apartheid regime in South Africa; the centralised tyrannies of the state capitalist countries. including the Russian Empire and China. In relation to the so-called communist countries, it has been stated that:

Russia must be placed first among the new totalitarian states. It was the first to adopt the new state principle. It went furthest in its application. It was the first to establish a constitutional dictatorship, together with the political and terror system which goes with it. Adopting all the features of the total state, it thus became the model for those other countries which were forced to do away with the democratic state system and change to dictatorial rule. Russia was the example for fascism (Otto Rühle. The Struggle Against Fascism Begins With The Struggle Against Bolshevism. 1981. p.5; originally published in 1939).

These days it is popular for those on the Left to attack the openly capitalist tyrannies, such as the monstrous regime in racist South Africa, while making apologies for equally dictatorial governments such as the one in Poland which uses thugs to beat trade unionists with truncheons and incarcerates dissenters in prisons. At the same time the Right wingers are very articulate when it comes to showing the undemocratic nature of the state capitalist countries, which are military and trade rivals of the Western nations but close their eyes to the overtly capitalist tyrannies. Socialists are alone in our total and equal hostility to all dictatorships. We are on the side of the workers in Russia and South Africa, Chile and China against their oppressors. We point out that only class-conscious workers can make full use of democracy but democracy must be obtained in order to build a movement of class-conscious workers.

Like in the 1930s, when the so-called democratic politicians in Britain were not that averse to fascist tactics, we know that the leaders who make a great noise about how democratic they are today could adopt more ruthless and dictatorial methods tomorrow. During the coal strike we saw all too dearly how readily these "Democrats" who rule over us will suspend rights, such as the freedom of movement within Britain, when it is to their advantage in the class war. The fact is that as long as workers follow leaders whose job is to run capitalism we are all the victims of power which is above us: the dictatorship of capital tyrannises us. whether it is wearing the mask of democracy or not.

The way to counter the racist nonsense with which British fascists today poison the minds of workers is not for us to become more capable thugs but to present a clear, practical alternative to the frustration bred by the system. Fascism is part of the messy business of running capitalism; only socialists. with our principled case for social revolution, offer workers a weapon which will blow fascism and capitalism from the face of the earth.

Steve Coleman