A Citizen of the World (1976)

From the Summer 1976 issue of The Western Socialist

Mr. Gilbert McClatchie, author and lecturer on Socialist theory, died in London on Tuesday at the age of 87. For over 30 years editor of the Socialist Standard, he was an authority on the historical basis of Marxism. His latest work, Historical Materialism, was published in 1975 by The Socialist Party of Great Britain. He was also the author of The Communist Manifesto and the Last 100 Years, which was written in 1948 on the one-hundredth anniversary of the original, and is now a collectors’ item.

For many years he ran a bookshop behind Baker Street and he accumulated what is probably the only comprehensive private library in the United Kingdom of eighteenth and nineteenth century works on political economy and sociology. Even at the age of 80 he was still lecturing throughout America and Canada. He was a critic of certain aspects of Marxian theory and was anything but an unquestioning disciple. The SPGB, which he joined in 1910, nominated him as parliamentary candidate for Paddington North in the 1950s.

He was an Irishman, but a severe critic and opponent of the Irish Nationalists of the 1916 Easter period, with whom he was on personal terms, including James Connolly and most of the old members of Sinn Fein. A man of mild temper, infinite patience and intellectual integrity, he was the exact opposite of what passes these days as a revolutionary. His contribution to an understanding of the contemporary problems facing society was useful and will endure.

Reprint of news item from the London Times.

Lenin . . . Reviewed (1976)

Book Review from the Fall 1976 issue of the Western Socialist

Lenin as Philosopher by Anton Pannekoek, Merlin Press, 11 Fitzroy Square, London, W.l.

The Russian State proclaims as its official ideology “dialectical materialism.” Their views, however, have nothing in common with those of the man who first used the term, Joseph Dietzgen. The basic text of Russian State philosophy is Lenin’s Materialism and Empirio-Criticism, a diatribe written in 1908. Thirty years later Anton Pannekoek, a Dutch Marxist and astronomer of world renown, wrote a criticism of Lenin’s work under the title Lenin as Philosopher, his own 1948 English translation of which has now been re-published by Merlin Press.

There are, argues Pannekoek, two types of materialism: middle-class materialism and historical materialism. Middle-class materialism was the view embraced by the rising bourgeoisie when they were fighting the landed aristocracy for control of political power. Religion was an important ideological support for their opponents and the bourgeoisie used the findings of the natural science of the time to undermine religious superstitions. Nineteenth Century natural science had a mechanical materialist view of the world: reality was seen as being composed of tiny particles of physical matter, whose movement was governed by natural laws to discover which was the task of science; consciousness was seen as a purely biological phenomenon, for which a physical-chemical explanation would ultimately be found.

Historical materialism, on the other hand, says Pannekoek, is based on the study of society and social change. Consciousness clearly has a biological aspect, but in origin and content it is a social product. For Marx and Engels, ideas arose from society. Dietzgen dealt with a different aspect: how the experiences of our senses were translated into ideas. Dietzgen's materialism was dialectical: the material world was the ever-changing world of observed phenomena, whether tangible or not, considered as a single whole. Human beings, alone amongst animals, are capable of abstract thought, i.e, of delaying and planning their response to the stimuli of their external environment.

Abstract thought is done with mental concepts, which the mind constructs out of the real world of phenomena as experienced by the senses by distinguishing and naming parts of it. Everything that is the subject of abstract thought is a mental construction, including what we regard as physical objects. This is because reality is ever-changing and exists only as a whole. A table, as the group of phenomena given that name, does not exist separately on its own; it exists only as a part of the whole world of phenomena.

This dialectical view is well explained by Pannekoek.

Of course for our everyday life we need to assume that the things we use have a separate existence, but dialectical materialism teaches that what will do for everyday life will not do as an adequate scientific understanding.

Not only are tables and chairs abstractions from the world of reality, but so are atoms and physical matter. The world of phenomena is not really composed of tiny particles of physical matters; this is just one possible way of describing various physical phenomena experienced by the senses. This does not invalidate materialism at all since “matter” for dialectical materialism is something different:

  "If . . . matter is taken as the name for the philosophical concept denoting objective reality, it embraces far more than physical matter. Then we come to the view repeatedly expressed in former chapters, where the material world was spoken of as the name for the entire observed reality. This is the meaning of the word materia, matter in Historical Materialism, the designation of all that is really existing in the world, ‘including mind and fancies’ as Dietzgen said” (p. 83).

Mach and Avenarius, who Lenin attacked in his book, also held that physical matter was an abstraction, but they regarded this as a refutation of materialism. Their views were shared by a number of German Social Democrat Revisionists and even by some of Lenin’s Bolsheviks. In order to preserve the ideological unity of his party, Lenin set out to refute these ideas, but — and this is the burden of Pannekoek’s criticism of him — from the point of view of bourgeois rather than dialectical materialism. In Materialism and Empirio-Criticism Lenin defends the view that the world is composed of particles of physical matter and claims that any departure from this position opens the door to religious ideas. In fact, as Pannekoek points out, just like the rising bourgeoisie in its early days Lenin insisted on a militant atheism, even suggesting that the main battle in the field of ideas is between materialism and religion (rather than between capitalist ideas and socialist ideas).

Pannekoek explains that it was no coincidence that Lenin should have been a proponent of bourgeois materialism. For the anti-Tsarist revolutionaries of Russia were faced with the same task as Western bourgeois revolutionaries a century earlier: to overthrow a reactionary landed ruling class, propped up by Church and religion, so as to pave the way for industrialisation. In Russia the bourgeoisie was very weak so that the task of carrying out Russia’s bourgeois revolution fell to another group, the intelligentsia. Organized in a vanguard party of professional revolutionaries and armed with the ideology of militant atheism, a section of the Intelligentsia did seize power in Russia in 1917, eventually evolving into a new ruling class on the basis of state capitalism:

  “The Russian economic system is state capitalism, there called state socialism or even communism, with production directed by a state bureaucracy under the leadership of the Communist Party. The State officials, forming the new ruling class, have the disposal over the product, hence over the surplus value, whereas the workers receive wages only, thus forming an exploited class” (p. 102).

Pannekoek goes further: “The 
alleged Marxism of Lenin and the bolshevlst party,” he writes, “is nothing but a legend.” Leninism, he says further, is “a theory of middle-class revolution, Installing a new ruling class.”

Pannekoek, incidentally, knew of the world socialist movement and was, despite important disagreements, sympathetically disposed towards us. The Western Socialist recounts, in their obituary of him in 1960, how in 1938 when he was in Boston to receive an honorary degree in connection with the tercentenary of Harvard University, Pannekoek found some time to address a party meeting and talk to Socialists. He also contributed two articles to The Western Socialist after the war (“Public Ownership and Common Ownership” in November 1947 and “Strikes” in January 1948). From these it can be seen where his views differed from ours.

Although both Pannekoek and Socialists insist on the need for the working class to organize democratically, without leaders, in order to establish Socialism, Pannekoek was a lifelong anti- parliamentarlst and said the workers should do this through “workers councils.” We, on the other hand, have always urged that the workers should organize democratically into a socialist political party using the vote to gain political power (see Socialist Standard, May 1942 for a criticism of Pannekoek’s views on this).

Pannekoek’s Lenin as Philosopher has a place on the bookshelf of every Socialist, not just for its criticism of Leninism but also for its clear account of dialectical materialism.

Adam Buick

Lenin vs. Marx (1976)

From the Spring 1976 issue of the Western Socialist

 This is one of a series of articles that appeared in the Lance, published by the Student Media, University of Windsor in Windsor, Ont., Canada.

It seems that for the past while I have been criticized for not backing up some of my claims with references to the works of Marx, Engels and Lenin. This week, however, I plan to show how Lenin directly distorted Marxian scientific socialism.

Marx and Engels made it quite clear that “No social order ever disappears before all the productive forces for which there is room within it have developed; and new higher relations of production never appear before the material conditions of their existence have matured in the womb of the old society.” (Preface to Critque of Political Economy).

Compare this to the Leninist theory that socialism can be built in backward countries such as the Russia of 1917. Engels himself wrote in 1893 that France (already an industrialized country) had not “reached the point which would have made the transition to socialism possible.” (Preface to Italian edition of the Communist Manifesto). So how could backward Russia which was just developing capitalism proceed to socialism?

Lenin, later, had to admit that “The development of the productive forces of Russia has not attained the level that makes socialism possible.  . . . They keep harping on this incontrovertible proposition” . . . (Our Revolution). Thus he was to look to countries such as India and China to assure the victory of socialism. Quite a contradiction. If Russia was too backward for socialism, then how were India and China, which were even more backward, to remedy the situation?

In order for Lenin’s followers to claim that socialism could be built in one country, and a backward country at that, then they would have to reject the total concept of historical materialism, one of the cornerstones of Marxian thought.

To Marx, the socialist revolution could only be “the self-conscious, independent movement of the immense majority in the interest of the immense majority.” — (Communist Manifesto). And what did Lenin say? He stated that the workers can only be led by a group of skilled professional revolutionaries. Why? Because “the working class exclusively by its own efforts is able to develop only trade-union consciousness . . . ” — (What is to be Done?) Marx knew that only a politically conscious majority of workers can build socialism — “So that the masses may understand what is to be done, long and persistent work is required.” — (Class Struggles in France). Whereas Lenin followed a different view — “If socialism can only be realised when the intellectual development of all the people permits it, then we shall not see socialism for at least five hundred years.” — (reported by John Reed).

On question of the role of the State to Marx: the “destruction of the State machine” (Eighteenth Brumaire) meant the “destruction of the bureaucratic and military machine" (letter to Kugelmann). The State is “an evil inherited by the proletariat” and “whose worse sides the proletariat . . .  will have at the earliest possible moment to lop off . . .” (Civil War in France).

This is a far cry from Lenin’s distortion when he wrote that “Marx’s idea is that the working class must breakup, smash, the ‘ready-made state machinery’ and not confine itself to laying hold of it.” — (State and Revolution). Now which shall it be — lop off the military and bureaucracy or smash the state altogether?

And what of the much talked about “dictatorship of the proletariat”?

This was elaborated on by Engels who did not see the dictatorship as a form of government, but rather as the social structure of state power. Obviously Lenin did not share this view.

In fact, Engels saw the democratic republic as “the specific form of the dictatorship of the proletariat” (Critique of the draft of the Erfurt program) . Whereas to Lenin the “Democratic Republic comes nearest the dictatorship of the proletariat” — (State and Revolution).

Marx and Engels saw the dictatorship as being based on universal suffrage, democratic from top to bottom. Quite different from Lenin’s view “that Soviet Socialist Democracy is in no way inconsistent with the rule and dictatorship of one person" — (Economic Construction).

Lenin, to enforce his theories, claimed that Marx made a distinction between socialism and communism when in fact neither Marx nor Engels ever made such a distinction. Marx and Engels made it clear that the state was only necessary in a class society of inequality. What happened to Russia? The state is not withering away. In fact, it is stronger than ever.

This article is not long enough to go into all the areas of Leninist distortion. We must realise that the distortions made by Lenin inevitably resulted in Stalinist terror. Terror and violence are not recognized by socialists.

Len Wallace

A Starvation Society (1976)

From the Spring 1976 issue of the Western Socialist

 This is one of a series of articles that appeared in the Lance, published by the Student Media, University of Windsor in Windsor, Ont., Canada.

World hunger — over-population — poverty. That's what we hear now. Each year there are sixty million deaths in the world, thirty to forty million have to be attributed to malnutrition. In other words, 80,000 to 110,000 die from malnutrition every day. It's no accident. The problem could be solved.

It's hard to believe, but people are actually starving in Canada and the United States. Food prices go up. The politicians tell us there is a food shortage. Don't believe them.

Some Statistics
Take Canada for example. In 1972 the federal government used $2.25 million to pay farmers to slaughter more than a million laying hens — the objective? — to make eggs scarce and force prices up. In 1969 the government, using the Lower Inventory for Tomorrow program (LIFT), paid farmers not to grow wheat and discouraged them from switching to other crops. As a result, the Dept, of Agriculture claimed that the program cut wheat acreage in 1970-71 by 45 per cent. Seven million acres of land, land which could have produced food, were deliberately left fallow.

This isn't uncommon. The 1969 Task Force on Agriculture recommended a ten year cut back in wheat production. Just recently the Canadian Marketing Agency confirmed that 28 million eggs were destroyed due to improper storage.

And this isn't only happening in Canada, but in the United States and Europe. In 1972, the government of England planned the slaughter of up to 2 million laying hens in order to solve the surplus of eggs on the market. A “surplus” of eggs? My, my, how interesting. Cattle were slaughtered because of an acute shortage of fodder. Why the shortage? — well, the government did all it could to encourage beef production, but they made the stupid blunder of forgetting to encourage a corresponding production of hay. Such are the fine workings of the system.


United Nations sources state that 400 million people are not getting enough food to meet minimum nutritional needs and 75 million are faced with the prospect of death by starvation. Norman Borlaug, the 1970 Nobel Peace Prize winner, stated that in the next few months of this year millions will die from starvation.

The U.S.. with a population of 210 million — the richest country in the world — has at least 40 million living in poverty. How many are starving?

But what do the rich care? One typical example is Eleanor Ritchey, a Quaker State Oil Corp. heiress who left her entire fortune of $4.5 million to her pets — 150 stray and show dogs. My God! Others who can’t afford nutritional meals are forced to feed dog food to their children.

It is contended that two-thirds of the world is starving. If this were true then the world’s population would decrease. Actually, however, starvation really means malnutrition from protein deficiency. And it can be solved.

Food For Profit Only 

Present world production of food could be doubled by applying techniques of extracting protein and sugar from the three-quarters of the plant which is presently thrown away. Scientists estimate that if the sea’s resources were tapped then one acre of its surface could produce twice as much protein-rich food as an acre of pasture.

Then why isn’t it done? — because it isn’t profitable, the cost is too great. That is the root of the problem. The capitalist wants a profit and he will not produce that which costs him money. The only value he sees worth creating is in goods he can sell for his sacred profit — damn anything else — let the world starve — it’s good for business.

Capitalist progress is perverted. If a few people die they can easily be replaced. Such progress. Take the war in Vietnam. Let’s face it. It was good business to kill 56,000 Americans and three and one-quarter-million Vietnamese. American capitalists received millions for the production of napalm. Tons of it was dropped upon thousands, upon thousands, upon thousands of innocents. You see, it had this effect of melting human flesh and misshaping it into inhuman form. Did you ever see the faces of those mutilated children. Did you ever see the smiles on the faces of the capitalists who produced these bombs because “business was never better”?

You can measure how far capitalists who produced these bombs because “business was never better”?

By 1972, approximately 90,000 tons of U.S. chemical warfare agents were used in Vietnam. Crop cultivation sufficient to feed 2 million people for a year was destroyed.

You can measure how far capitalist society has progressed by counting the increasing number of monsters and idiots born because of radioactive fall out, nerve gas, mercury poisoning and nuclear wastes.

Capitalism is Insane

Capitalism is an iron rat. The system is insane. It cannot work efficiently. Damn it — it can't work at all!

Colonialism and imperialism, bred by capitalism, rapes the Third World of resources leaving it underdeveloped. In return these countries are given the benefits of our society — like a brand new Howard Johnson’s or a Burger King to brighten up the place.

We are told that the earth has insufficient land area to service its growing population. The facts are that the present land area of the world could adequately support 12 to 16 billion people. The whole population of the United Kingdom could be rehoused in one county, Devon, with a density of 10 houses per acre and there would still be enough land to spare.

As for depletion of vital minerals from our soil. This is based on the simple model of soil and population, totally disregarding the third factor — human ability to use science and technology to attain certain ends.

Too Many People?

Population control? Our present neo-Malthusians see this as an answer. They take our present social system as being unalterable. To them the only thing that can be changed to solve the problems of world starvation is human sexual behaviour. The argument of these “intellectuals” is that “we can bring the problem under control once we stop the people of the poor nations from breeding like rabbits.” Such logic. They try to give a biological solution to a social problem. The facts are that wherever industry and education have reached high levels, population growth declines.

But get a load of some of the “solutions” to the problem. Richard Bowers, a founder of the Zero Population Growth movement, suggests mass suicide to cut the surplus population. Others suggest that the weak be allowed to die. To these social-Darwinists it is the strong who will survive. Hell — why not mass extermination then. Sure, why not? If the fascists could exterminate six million Jews in the death camps then why not do it again — only this time we won’t discriminate.

Yes, millions will go on starving and will die in the streets and this will keep on as long as this moronic system goes on. As long as the capitalist can worship his god — Mammon — then they won’t listen to the cries of the starving. His god is profit — now the “common whore of mankind”.

Expressions of pity by our smiling politicians and “leaders” for the hungry is bullshit. The corpses will keep piling up and will lay at our very doorstep. It just makes me sick to think we allow it to happen.

Len Wallace