18.06.2008
In defence of Stalin
Tony Clark explains his 'Stalinism with an ecological twist'
Mike Macnair has suggested that I want to repeat Soviet-style bureaucratic socialism and writes: “… it would be helpful if comrade Clark is willing to give a fuller account of his views, which are a variant form of those widely held on the far left” (‘Trying Stalinism again’ Weekly WorkerMay 29).
Below I will concisely put forward my views, conscious that when people write about history they relate it as much as create it according to their own political preferences. With this in mind, I will do as much relating as needed, and eliminate, as far as possible, any tendency to create what I wish had taken place.
Background to Russian Revolution
For most classical Marxists, socialism was not possible in a society which was socially backward from the standpoint of the development of the productive forces and the political education of the revolutionary class. This was certainly the view of leading Russian Marxists such as Plekhanov, Lenin and Martov. It was also the view of Trotsky. Stalin, by all accounts, must have shared the same view as well, which probably explains his temporary dithering and alliance with Kamenev in giving partial support to the provisional government on his return from Siberian exile. In other words, Stalin subscribed to the classical Marxist view that socialism was the outcome of an advanced industry and a generally educated population.
Lenin’s tactics for the revolution were concerned with forming an alliance between the working class and the Russian peasantry, the latter forming perhaps 80% of the population. This combined force would support the most radical capitalist revolution in which the peasants would benefit from land distribution and the working class from a democratic regime - a situation which favoured the development of the class struggle in the direction of socialism. The Mensheviks also wanted a capitalist democracy in which there would be some land distribution from above and where the working class would gain the space to struggle for socialism, or so they claimed. They, however, imagined this state of affairs being brought about by an alliance between the working class and the conservative bourgeoisie.
Trotsky introduced a new line of argument, which represented a break from Marxism, because he took the novel position that working class dictatorship can, or should be, established in a socially backward society. In his view, the coming revolution, led by the working class, would not stop at the bourgeois democratic stage, but would proceed to the socialist stage - ie, the dictatorship of the proletariat, which would move towards socialism in Russia, while fomenting revolution abroad.
The view that the dictatorship of the proletariat can and should be established in a backward country found little support on the Marxist left and absolutely none with the Mensheviks. This abandonment of Marxism for what was rightly considered to be left adventurism excluded Trotsky from mainstream Marxist opinion, dogmatically upheld by the Mensheviks and more creatively applied by Lenin.
Revolution in practice
In reflecting on the various theories about the Russian Revolution put forward by the different protagonists, we need to see them in the revolution’s own light. It occurred during the first world imperialist war - an event which transformed the theoretical presuppositions of Lenin completely, turning everything upside down.
On returning to Russia, Trotsky, with no political party behind him, began negotiations to join the Bolshevik Party. There was a ‘convergence’ between Lenin and Trotsky. To understand how this convergence took place we need to understand the nature of Lenin’s Marxism. Lenin had previously argued that the revolution would lead to the establishment of a ‘democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry’, which would oversee a radical completion of the democratic revolution. In his 1917 April theses he suggested that the workers’ and peasants’ soviets represented such a dictatorship.
Before the Bolsheviks won majorities in the urban soviets, Lenin became increasingly convinced that Europe was “pregnant with revolution”. On returning to Russia, and in view of the developing European revolutionary situation, he concluded that it would be absurd doctrinairism to now limit the Russian Revolution to the bourgeois stage.
Lenin moved towards the dictatorship of the proletariat because of the increasingly revolutionary situation in Europe and internal conditions in Russia. In the light of this situation, Lenin saw no problems in letting Trotsky into the Bolshevik Party. Contrary to what many leftists are taught, Lenin did not go over to establishing working class dictatorship in a backward country because he agreed with Trotsky’s permanent revolution theory, but rather because he based himself on theimminence of the European revolution and the internal conditions in Russia. He thought that under these conditions not to go beyond the capitalist limits of the Russian Revolution would mean siding with dogmatic Marxism against dialectics.
Lenin was right: Europe was on the verge of revolution, particularly in Germany, the most important of the advanced countries in this respect. Unfortunately, social democracy betrayed the German revolution. Lenin and the Bolsheviks had to fight a civil war to remain in power. At the end of the civil war, the emergency measures of war communism were abandoned in favour of a new economic policy (NEP), entailing a mixed economy. In 1923, the revolutionary tide began to recede, the Russian Revolution became isolated and by January 1924 Lenin was dead.
The retreating post-war revolutionary tide and the increasing demoralisation of the working class, combined with a restive peasantry, led to a new debate in the party about the way forward for the revolution. One group around Trotsky sought to place major emphasis on the world revolution,although the revolution was in retreat. The other group, around Stalin, basing itself on the retreat of the revolution, sought to place the emphasis on building socialism in one country - a process which would require the transitional economy of the new economic policy. Trotsky, who had previously, dogmatically, advocated working class dictatorship in a backward country, now came out against the theory of socialism in one country.
From a Marxist standpoint, Trotsky was wrong in theoretically advocating working class dictatorship in a backward country, while Lenin was right to go beyond the bourgeois revolution based on the imminence of the European revolution. After the betrayal of the German revolution by social democracy and the consequent isolation of the Russian Revolution, the Bolsheviks could either relinquish power or retain power. If they chose to retain power, this could only be in the name of building socialism in one country via a mixed economy.
Stalin turned to Lenin’s writings and found that the latter had previously argued: “Uneven economic and political development is an absolute law of capitalism, hence, the victory of socialism is possible first in several or even in one capitalist country alone” (VI Lenin CW Vol 21, Moscow 1977, p342).
Here was Lenin’s theory of the world revolutionary process in a nutshell, and Stalin felt justified in using it to support his political line. I would argue that without holding up the goal of socialism in one county the revolution would have completely collapsed, having lost its historical justification. The Trotskyist idea of the working class taking power in one country to spur on world revolution without being able to build socialism in their own country, is nothing but leftwing adventurism. Alternatively, socialism in one country not only served the purpose of countering the increasing demoralisation of the working class and Communist Party by restoring legitimacy to the revolution within the context of its decline in other countries, but it was also possible according to Lenin.
By using Lenin’s argument concerning the world revolutionary process, Stalin was able to isolate Trotsky, who was increasingly seen as a troublemaker in party ranks. No matter how optimistic Trotsky was about world revolution, whose echoes were becoming fainter every day after 1923, Stalin was able to convince others in the communist leadership that Trotsky’s views, although sounding ‘revolutionary’ on the world arena, could only cause defeat and demoralisation within the Soviet working class. I would argue that Stalin’s arguments won over the majority in the international communist movement.
Where for Stalin’s faction building socialism in one country served the interest of the world revolution, Trotsky argued that this essentially Leninist theory represented the outlook of aconservative Soviet bureaucracy which no longer wanted to support the project of world revolution. But Trotsky never convincingly explained why Lenin’s theory was counterrevolutionary or why conservatives in the party and state bureaucracy would support the building of socialism in one country while opposing the revolution in other countries.
The Stalinist faction used the slogan of socialism in one country to galvanise the working class and communists in a struggle for modernisation, which would lay the foundation for socialism and inspire the international working class to take on their own conservative bourgeoisie. By 1927, the party had lost its patience with Trotsky and he was expelled from the party, not because of his views, but after openly flouting party discipline and leading, or at least encouraging, anti-government demonstrations in a period of rising tensions between the Soviet regime and imperialism.
The Trotskyist opposition had fought for a policy of industrialisation and collectivisation from the early 1920s onwards, but Stalin held on to the mixed economy of NEP, which lasted from 1921 to 1928. One view is that the peasants withholding grain from the urban population to get an increase in prices forced Stalin’s hands - in other words, socialisation and the collectivisation drive was not consciously planned, but rather was a reaction to a perceived threat to the regime. The other view is that, since the Soviet regime needed to strengthen itself in the countryside, arguably it could not have pursued collectivisation earlier.
In any case, the peasant problem, a more confident regime and the threatening noises being made by the leaders of capitalism conspired to put an end to NEP. A period of modernisation was set in motion, which turned the Soviet Union into an industrial power strong enough to play the leading, or at least decisive, role in the defeat of fascism.
Soviet regime in the Stalin period
During the 1926 British general strike, Soviet Stalinists mobilised the workers to raise money for the miners. About £1 million was collected - a huge sum in those days - which the British Labour leaders rejected. But, according to Trotskyism, ‘Stalinism’ is a counterrevolutionary trend.
Stalinists supported anti-imperialist movements around the world, and the Soviet Stalinists gave financial aid to foreign communist parties; was this all in the name of counterrevolution? Stalin’s supporters in Britain led the struggle to stop the fascists at Cable Street; was this to serve the interest of counterrevolution? The Soviet Stalinists gave material assistance to the republican side in the Spanish civil war - hardly the actions of a conservative regime.
The greatest defeats experienced by the working class in the period of Stalin were those in China in 1927 and in Germany, by fascism, in 1933. I would argue that, although opportunist mistakes played a role in China, and communist sectarianism made it easier for social democracy to betray the working class in Germany, this was hardly a reason to write off the communist movement, as Trotsky was to do. Above all, these defeats are a warning about trying to direct world revolution from an international centre.
Trotsky not only claimed that Lenin’s theory of socialism in one country was the counterrevolutionary ideology of a conservative Soviet bureaucracy, but he went further, arguing that the Stalinists were the greatest counterrevolutionary agency of imperialism in the working class, through and through a counterrevolutionary role which Lenin had previously assigned to social democracy. Trotskyism fails to explain why pro-Soviet Stalinists were more counterrevolutionary than the pro-imperialist social democracy.
Inductive reason from facts to theory proves, in my view, that the Soviet regime, when led by Stalin was pro-working class and a generally progressive force in world affairs. The view by Mike that the party and the regime ceased to represent working class interests after the banning of factions in 1921 is the result of one-sided reasoning. This is not to say that I personally support the banning of factions, but I can certainly understand Lenin’s reasoning, given the situation. If Mike were right, how would we explain Lenin’s resolution, ‘On improving the conditions of the workers and needy peasants’, which was supported by the 10th Party Congress? (See VI LeninCW Vol 32, Moscow 1977, p208).
Trotsky is best known for his denunciation of Soviet bureaucracy and calling for its overthrow. However, there are two approaches to choose from. The first is Lenin’s theory that the struggle against bureaucracy was for its withering away, and the second is Trotsky’s line, which calls for a political revolution against the bureaucracy. On this question, Stalin again sided with Lenin.
When Mike deals with bureaucracy, he reverts to the 19th century debate about the dual meaning of this concept. The first is bureaucracy regarded as rule over society by state officials for their own benefit; and the second is state officials as a group regarded as parasites on society. In the first case, according to Mike, bureaucracy can be overthrown, but in the second case he agrees with me that, generally speaking, they cannot be. This distinction between the two types of bureaucracy seems to me to be completely arbitrary.
Related to this question, by the way, is the argument being put forward in some quarters that the essence of socialism is planning; that bureaucracy and planning are incompatible, and due to themalfeasance of the former there was no planning in the Soviet Union and hence no socialism.
Apart from being untrue this argument is also misleading in another sense. The essence of socialism is not planning, because even the bourgeoisie can plan. Arguably, the planning of monopoly capitalism puts Soviet planning in the shade. No, the essence of socialism is production for need, which takes the form of planning. In the absence of the market, production for need implies planning of some sort.
Ideological defeat of socialism
Mike claims that I want to try ‘Stalinism’ again and this is of no use. No doubt there are people who entertain the idea of trying Stalinism again. How they are going to accomplish this feat I do not know. In essence, what is called ‘Stalinism’ was the struggle to modernise a backward peasant society in record time and in the most inauspicious circumstances possible.
Mike argues that it was the economic defeat of socialism which led to its ideological defeat. In my view, this crude form of economic determinism fails to explain the collapse of socialism. By turning to revisionism, the former leaders of socialism began to pursue incorrect economic policies from the 1950s onwards. An incorrect ideology led to incorrect policies, which finally resulted in economic stagnation and collapse.
Khrushchev, for instance, sought unprincipled reconciliation with imperialism, and to be accepted by the latter and get away with his revisionist policies he had to denounce Stalin. Not that I think Stalin or anyone else is above criticism, but this was done to appease imperialism. Revisionism in power seeks to build a capitalist-style consumer society. This fundamental mistake about what socialism is was not the fault of Khrushchev personally, but goes back to the Second International and possibly even earlier.
The ecologically sustainable socialist society
In ‘Trying Stalinism again’, Mike equates ‘Stalinism’ with the kind of austerity preached by some ecologists. But he is indifferent to why some ecologists are preaching austerity. He suggests that I want Stalinism with an ecological twist, and thus he ends up defending consumerism against what he sees as the Stalinist-ecologist convergence.
The first thing to say here is that consumerism is a product of capitalist society, where things are produced for profit instead of need. A socialist society, based on production for need, is therefore against consumerism. Anti-consumerism does not mean denying people goods, as Mike suggests; it means not flooding society with goods to make profits, but producing what people need.
In my previous letter to the Weekly Worker (May 22), I pointed out that, since many people on the left have a consumerist conception of socialism, it is easy to see how revisionism can take hold in certain quarters. This sentence was edited out, but what it means is that there is a link between revisionism and consumerism. Ideologically, the Soviet revisionists went over to a consumerist conception of socialism, always implicit in the old socialist tradition, which led to them wanting to compete with capitalism in the same way that two capitalist firms compete for the market. Having researched the ideas of consumerism, I did not find any which are compatible with socialism - which is a production for need society.
In suggesting that I want to return to what he regards as “Stalinist austerity with an ecological twist”, Mike forgets that most of the austerity imposed on the Soviet Union was by imperialism. With the post-war boom finally coming to an end, and with the world entering the greatest energy crisis in history, as a result of peak oil, together with the environmental threat posed to human life by capitalism, I think it makes more sense to develop an ecological perspective within socialism.
This is far more important than continuing with the old pre-ecological differences of the last century about the relative merits of Stalin, Trotsky and Mao, all of whom, to my knowledge and through no fault of their own, had no ecological conception of socialism. I only exclude Lenin from this trio because his seminal work, What is to be done?, a stricture against opportunistic economism, suggests to me that Lenin would have regarded the ecological issue as central to the revolutionary movement and hence to the future socialist society.
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