Letters

Dictatorship

I respect and appreciate Tony Clark’s response (July 13) to my letter (July 6). Tony is very clear and explicit that he is opposed to Marxism, seeing it as completely antithetical to the sort of socialism he is in favour of. Given, as Tony kindly says, I am writing from a Marxist perspective, it is clear there are going to be fundamental differences in philosophy and approach between Tony and, I suspect, the great majority of readers of this paper.

Marxism proceeds from the basis that society is divided into classes and people belong to various classes, according to their economic position in society and their relationship to the main means of production and distribution - although obviously ideology, culture, etc also play significant roles.

If you fail to understand the division of society into antagonistic classes, it is not surprising if you then get terribly confused over concepts like ‘dictatorship’ or ‘democracy’, as these do not exist separately from classes, and are not able to see that - as well as being opposite concepts - they are also interrelated and interdependent: different aspects of the same basic essence, in this case, class power and class rule.

Is the United Kingdom today a dictatorship or a democracy? Certainly, we have a well-established parliamentary system, there are relatively free and open general elections every four or five years, and we have a number of important democratic rights - won through many hard years of working class and popular struggle - such as free speech and the rights to strike, demonstrate, publish, organise, stand in elections, etc.

People will instantly understand, especially in the present context, that these are not absolute rights - you either have them or not - but relative: ie, they exist to some degree, but the content of them is constantly changing and subject to the balance of forces between the popular will and the state.

Members of the working class and working people more generally - the majority of the UK population - do not have any real control over their lives. They are subject to powerful economic forces, which ultimately meet the needs of the small minority who collectively own the means of production and distribution - and whose needs and interests are diametrically opposed to those of the working class.

So you could say the UK is a mix of dictatorship and democracy, but this is terribly confusing and means very little. Marxists would argue that the most important fact is that we live in a capitalist, class-divided society, where the minority capitalist class is the ruling class, and rules through a combination of formal democracy, consent, passive acquiescence, ideology, coercion and downright repressive measures.

The capitalist class exercises power mainly through its domination of the state apparatus, in order to try and ensure society continues to operate in its interests. Power is the capacity to make things happen - to construct, as well as to oppress. Those who exercise power feel empowered, as it is in their interests. It is ‘democracy’ for the capitalist class. Those subject to capitalist class rule (the majority of us) will feel that power exercised against our will, against our interests. If we say it is democracy for the capitalist class, it is not completely unreasonable to say this is dictatorship against the working class.

Marx, Engels and Lenin used the term ‘dictatorship’ simply to mean the rule of one class over another or others. Tony tries to develop some terrible conspiracy theory of how Marx was hijacked by Blanqui and the whole of socialism was diverted into a dead end of ‘dictatorship’, as opposed to a ‘democratic’ socialism. In my letter, I showed that class rule was at the heart of the original Communist manifesto, so no ‘hijacking’.

Yes, Marx, Engels and Lenin made a number of frankly blood-curdling statements about what might happen to the capitalist class if they resisted the socialist revolution and the establishment of socialism, but they said far more about the democratic essence of their concepts of socialism. Engels indeed famously equated the “ultra-democratic” Paris Commune with the “dictatorship of the proletariat”: ie, two sides of the same coin.

Was the USSR a dictatorship or democracy? From a class perspective, the question is nonsensical. Tony seemed last week to regard it as a dictatorship (because some enemies of Soviet power were shot or otherwise repressed), yet in other letters he has described the 1936 constitution as ultra-democratic and Stalin as some sort of ultra-democrat in apparently wanting to massively democratise Soviet society! No confusion here ...

In any socialist revolution, including in the USSR, the working class establishes its own state power and class rule in its interests. It is therefore ‘democratic’ for the working class and ‘dictatorial’ for the overthrown classes and those who seek to undermine and reverse the new socialist order. Hence the famous slogan of Lenin and the Bolsheviks: “the democratic dictatorship of the working class and peasantry” - which confuses Tony terribly because he does not recognise the class division of societies and the class essence of state power.

Specifically for the USSR, working class state power was established in one (exceptionally large and rich in human and material resources) country in a world dominated by viciously hostile imperialism and capitalism, so the working class state power had a major international dimension as well.

For clarity, my own view is the USSR was certainly a socialist society where the working class had established its political and economic rule, and where the state acted in the interests of the working class and majority working people. But, certainly, a great deal more could have and should have been done to genuinely democratise Soviet society to really empower working people, so that the state really acted at the behest of working people rather than just on its behalf.

Yes, a great deal of coercion and repressive measures were used especially in the 1930s against enemies and perceived enemies of Soviet power, but Soviet society was also characterised by very high levels of popular consent and support for the overall system, as demonstrated through the herculean efforts of the Soviet people during and after World War II.

In summary, the ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ simply means the class rule by the (majority) working class - no more, no less. Marxism through its analysis and guide to action provides the working class with the understanding necessary to overthrow the rule of the capitalist class and capitalism, and replace it with the political and economic class rule of the working class: ie, socialism. Tony in all his correspondence, despite his very unique insights and perspectives, has demonstrated no credible alternative to Marxism as a means of actually achieving socialism of any variety.

Andrew Northall
email

Falsification

I read Jack Conrad’s state capitalist/bureaucratic-collectivist articles on the alleged restoration of capitalism in the USSR in 1928 due to the adoption of the first five-year plan with a great sense of frustration and disappointment (‘First plan backgrounds, June 15; ‘First plan realities’, June 22). However, when these were followed by the Lars T Lih’s ‘Back to Nevsky’ supplement on July 6, I had to respond to this Stalinite short-course-type falsification of the history of the Russian Revolution and reject the championing of the right opposition to that revolution by Kamenev, Zinoviev, Stalin and others.

We thought we had made some progress when the championing of “renegade” Karl Kautsky by Ben Lewis and Lih was marginalised due to internal opposition. Lih ridiculously proposes that this virulent opponent of the October revolution was in fact its political architect - see ‘Karl Kautsky as architect of the October revolution’ in Jacobin - while Lewis continues to titillate his establishment academic audience with this nonsense. Of course, Lenin was the architect of the Russian Revolution and Trotsky was his number two, in direct ideological and political opposition to Kautsky - John Rees spells out Kautsky’s backward, mechanical, anti-dialectical ideology from before the 1890s in his book The algebra of revolution.

Lih states: “Of course, all histories of 1917 (and certainly all Bolshevik histories) are highly politicised. But, starting in the mid-1920s, several topics of party history in 1917 became subject to severe distorting pressures that did permanent damage to our understanding [This is complaining that the truth was getting an airing! - GD]. Among these pressures: Trotsky’s 1924 bid to discredit the Bolshevik leadership in 1917 [That would be the right leaders who opposed the revolution!] and the furious response by his former comrades [rightist opponents of the revolution], Kamenev’s and Zinoviev’s move into anti-Stalin opposition in 1925 [who openly admitted their mistakes then]; the Lenin cult [storming the Winter Palace and abolishing the constituent assembly to consolidate the rule of the soviets].

Lih writes about the parts of the April theses that Nevsky (I must admit I had never heard of this ‘great revolutionist’ before) “does not include in his discussion of Bolshevik misgivings, for the simple reason that these parts were not controversial among Bolsheviks”. Another big lie! He continues: “These non-controversial items [which were in fact the most controversial items of the theses!] include the core issues of the time: the war (opposition to the imperialist war, hostility to ‘revolutionary defencism’) and the attitude toward the government (hostility to the “bourgeois” Provisional Government, plus a drive to establish an exclusive worker-peasant vlast - power). I have elsewhere documented what Nevsky takes for granted, although controversial today: Bolshevik leaders such as Kamenev and Stalin had no problem with these core positions, since they had strongly advocated them [in fact they strongly opposed them - the biggest lie!] prior to Lenin’s arrival.”

This is Lenin just after the October revolution:

“And now, at such a moment, when we are in power, we are faced with a split. Zinoviev and Kamenev say that we will not seize power [in the entire country]. I am in no mood to listen to this calmly. I view this as treason. What do they want? Do they want to plunge us into [spontaneous] knife-play? Only the proletariat is able to lead the country.”

The last sentence here is important. It is an outright rejection of the ‘democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry’, which Jack Conrad and Lih falsely assert that Lenin still held. Here Lenin removes all doubt on what he meant in his April theses - defended so well against the rightists in his ‘Letters on tactics’ (April 8-13):

“The person who now speaks only of a ‘revolutionary democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry’ is behind the times. Consequently, he has in effect gone over to the petty bourgeoisie against the proletarian class struggle; that person should be consigned to the archive of ‘Bolshevik’ pre-revolutionary antiques.

“… Indeed, reality shows us both the passing of power into the hands of the bourgeoisie (a ‘completed’ bourgeois-democratic revolution of the usual type) and, side by side with the real government, the existence of a parallel government which represents the ‘revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry’. This ‘second government’ has itself ceded the power to the bourgeoisie, has chained itself to the bourgeois government. Is this reality covered by comrade Kamenev’s old-Bolshevik formula, which says that ‘the bourgeois-democratic revolution is not completed’? It is not. The formula is obsolete. It is no good at all. It is dead. And it is no use trying to revive it.”

Is this a dogmatic, ill-informed Lenin, as Jack asserts? This widely testified truth of the course of the Russian Revolution is a myth, Jack tells us, invented by Trotsky in his Lessons of October in 1924, and far too many foolish or ill-intentioned leftists and even uninformed bourgeois academics (like EH Carr presumably) were taken in by him. In fact, so wrong is Trotsky’s take on the revolution that the very opposite is the truth, Jack assured us back in 2017, when he reaches the apogee of his political argumentation:

“Subsequently, Lenin talks of the differences being ‘not very great’, because Kamenev had come round to his viewpoint. Unfair - if anything, Lenin had come round to Kamenev’s viewpoint, at the very least on the peasantry. At the very least he clarified statements that had been hastily written or wrongly informed” (‘Putting the record straight’, November 9 2017).

Oh, well done there! The whole world has got the history of the great revolution upside down and completely wrong. The real leaders were Kamenev, Zinoviev and Stalin and not those bumbling idiots, Lenin and Trotsky, who not only did not understand revolution, but also did not understand the peasantry and Marxism in general, like our sagacious triumvirate.

Jack Conrad told us in 2019: “It is more than ironic then, that with the History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks) - short course (1939), we find Stalin - widely accepted as the main author of this notorious work of truths, half-truths and downright lies - pirating Trotsky’s account of 1917” (‘Marxism versus holy script’, January 10 2019).

He wasn’t “pirating Trotsky’s account of 1917”: he was telling the truth, because it suited his purpose - justifying executing them both in August 1936. And Stalin did tell the truth when convenient. He summarised Trotsky’s role in 1917 in Pravda (November 6 1918). In 1934, before he had consolidated his bloody, totalitarian regime with the great purges, the following quote was still there in his book The October revolution (it did not appear in Stalin’s Works of 1949, of course):

“All the work of practical organisation of the insurrection was conducted under the immediate leadership of the chairman of the Petrograd soviet, Trotsky. It is possible to declare with certainty that the swift passing of the garrison to the side of the soviet and the bold execution of the work of the Military Revolutionary Committee the party owes principally and above all to comrade Trotsky.”

Jack’s arguments continually confuse strategy with tactics - the root of his problem. Lenin’s April theses set the strategic goal of the second - socialist - revolution. Kamenev - followed by Muranov, Stalin and then Zinoviev - led the opposition to this: their strategic goal was a bourgeois revolution led by the working class, which entailed support for the Provisional government. Trotsky had pointed out the flaw with this argument back in 1905; once the working class had taken revolutionary power, it was impossible to expect them to tolerate bourgeois exploitation. This central aspect of his ‘permanent revolution’ theory was fully accepted by Lenin.

Once Lenin had won that month-long argument, then the tactical question was the time of the insurrection when circumstances were right. But even then, as John Rees tells us, “Riazanov and Kamenev had both opposed the insurrection, and felt the lash of Lenin’s terrible tongue.” Lenin proposed the expulsion of Kamenev and Zinoviev.

By 1924 they were repeating the same ‘errors’ committed before the April theses and during the October revolution. Trotsky had to take up the fight against them - much of that work consists in unchallenged quotes from Lenin. To reject Lessons of October is to reject Lenin in the first place - Zinoviev admitted as much during the brief period of the Joint Opposition in 1926-27.

Trotsky recounts in his book, Stalin’s gangsters, Zinoviev stating in 1926: “We say, there can no longer be any doubt now that the main nucleus of the 1923 opposition, as the development of the present ruling faction has shown, correctly warned against the dangers of the departure from the proletarian line, and against the alarming growth of the apparatus regime ... Yes, in the question of suppression by the bureaucratised apparatus, Trotsky proved to be right as against us.

“In this manner, Zinoviev admitted his mistake of 1923 (in waging a struggle against ‘Trotskyism’) and even characterised it as much more dangerous than that of 1917 - when he opposed the October insurrection!.”

This is why Lih so strongly opposes Kamenev’s and Zinoviev’s move into anti-Stalin opposition in late 1925.

Gerry Downing
Socialist Fight

Red police?

Mike Macnair takes issue with the failure of the Socialist Workers Party and Socialist Appeal to raise the demand for replacing the police with a conscript militia (‘Silence on the alternative’, July 13). While in recent years the demand to ‘defund the police’ has arisen from Black Lives Matter protests, Macnair is correct that no immediate alternative is being proposed.

But an obvious question arises about the traditional socialist demand: are there any examples of a conscript-based militia taking over the function of law enforcement? Has the policy been implemented by the proletariat in the course of revolutionary upheavals during the 19th and 20th century?

If not, then perhaps the comrades of the SWP and Socialist Appeal are not unprincipled, but genuinely uncertain. Conscript-based recruitment might disrupt the closed culture of policing, but it would not necessarily eliminate the voluntary aspect of service. Since conscription can be and is resisted for service in armed forces where it exists, shouldn’t we expect to see similar resistance to militia service if introduced? In which case, those who accept being drafted into the militia may be people already likely to seek the job of career police officer.

Ansell Eade
Lincolnshire

Population

Jim Nelson makes some very good points about my support for China’s one-child policy, and my support for the Greens’ call to bring the population of the UK down to 25 million by 2100 (Letters, July 6).

Jim is right when he explains that the education, employment and equality of women is the key to bringing down the population of the world from its current nine billion to just three billion by 2100. However, Jim has no answer to men and women in Nigeria who are “breeding like rabbits”, with the population of Nigeria expected to grow from its current 180 million to 300 million by 2050.

To bring down the population of the UK to just 25 million by 2100 will require the adoption of a one-child policy, together with men and women being paid to be sterilised. I’m sure that there are many women of child-bearing age, especially single mothers in receipt of universal credit, who would jump at the chance of a government grant of £750 if they agreed to be sterilised.

I don’t just talk about people being sterilised - I practise what I preach. When I was 40 I paid a GP £80 to have a vasectomy - it’s the best £80 I’ve ever spent and I wish I’d had it done earlier. Before then, I always used a condom. Thirty-two years ago, a very wise lady told me: “Always use a condom, as some women get pregnant to trap men into a relationship”. It’s a pity that Nigerians don’t know what a condom is.

I have been involved in socialist politics since I was 18, but I have never been so politically isolated as I am today. Being unemployed for the last 31 years hasn’t helped with my political isolation. The defeat of Corbynism has set back the cause of socialism by decades. Hundreds of thousands of Corbyn supporters have become completely demoralised and I am one of them.

Whilst Jim blames capitalism for climate change, capitalism isn’t going to be overthrown any time soon. There is no Bolshevik Party and no mass communist party anywhere on the planet. The best we can do is to build the circulation and readership of the Weekly Worker as a resource which future generations can access when revolutionary opportunities are more prevalent.

John Smithee
Cambridgeshire

Prisons

Scott Evans states in his article: “The discipline of the labouring classes is placed above pure economic logic” (‘Drug war and its failures’, July 13). But that ignores the effect of the prison industrial complex in America and the role played by the private sector.

The increase in the prison population has resulted in economic profit and an increase in the influence of private prison companies, where such a large percentage of the population are either employed in the prison service or incarcerated. Giving long prison sentences for minor drug offences and making profit from their labour is little better than slavery for the poor.

Then there are all the other companies that benefit and the influence of their lobby groups: private construction companies, prison food and medical services, criminal justice lawyers, etc. That is why the private sector should have nothing to do with the criminal justice system.

Roger Day
Gravesend

Zionist scouts

We call upon the chief scout, Bear Grylls, to tell the Scouting Association he leads not to expel volunteers who campaign against Zionist support for Israel.

The Scout Association has expelled me, treasurer of the 150th Craigalmond Scout Group, for being affiliated to the Campaign Against Bogus Antisemitism (CABA). My crime? At the request of the 150th committee, I put up an advert on behalf of the scout group seeking volunteers for our committee, along with my personal landline phone number as a contact for more information.

A Zionist complained that this was the same number as was used on the CABA Facebook page. Although I had never mentioned my politics at the scouts, I was suspended and after one year, with no right to respond, expelled.

I had previously given 10 years service at scout executive meetings, organising finances and payment for youth leader expenses, fundraising at festivals, preparing and submitting accounts for the scout group for its charity registration, claiming gift aid from the tax department, organising meetings, Christmas sing-alongs, etc. I hold the Chief Scout’s Award from Bear Grylls.

I am shocked and upset at my treatment. The scouts appear to be working to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of anti-Semitism, which equates criticism of Israel to anti-Semitism. But Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss of Neturei Karta writes in my support, saying: “Pete is in no way anti-Jewish.”

Please call upon the chief scout to reinstate me (see ‘Don’t let the scouts weaponise antisemitism’ at change.org/scoutsihra) and stop the scouts from witch-hunting anti-racist campaigners for Palestine.

Pete Gregson
Edinburgh