it also encourages dogmatism and, honestly, just not reading shit. even the most, basic introductory text like Principles of Communism should disabuse someone of the idea that "Dengism" or "state capitalism" is something entirely unlike Marxism (see: section 17) if taken seriously, yet these debates go on and on. the communism button hasn't been pressed so the revolution is betrayed and it's just capitalism.
essentially every narrative of such and such socialist state betraying the revolution, from whatever tendency, ultimately boils down to a refusal to consider socialism as a transition that will necessarily have traces of capitalism for a long time. and the history of capitalism as a whole should show that is the case for every mode of production. Endless back and forth about whether revolutionary states are Socialist or State Capitalist or Dgnerated Worker's States or Bureaucratic Collectivism or whatever label are exactly as useless to me as trying to pinpoint exactly in what moment capitalism stopped being feudalism or if mercantilism is or isn't fully capitalist. Capitalism transitioned gradually out of feudalism, had revolutions to conquer political power like socialism had and will have, and remnants of feudalism remained well into the 20th century in many parts of the world. There is historical value in trying to identify proximate causes of capitalism (e.g. primitive accumulation through enclosure in England, as Marx identified), but trying to find some hard line in time for when this mode of production stops and this new one starts seems fundamentally misguided. England in 1700 had many, many holdovers from feudalism (hell, in 2022 it still has literal aristocrats with hereditary government positions!) but in retrospect it's clear that it was on the capitalist road, that capitalism was developing further and further. The question shouldn't be "Are they really socialist?" it should be "Are they building socialism?".
i have nothing to add, just want to say it's a fantastic comment. i've been thinking about this a lot recently and i don't understand why some marxists have such an unscientific idea of what a socialist transition looks like. you can't implement communism by decree, the same way no mode of production was instated this way.
I think the history of the USSR as the first ever successful proletarian revolution plays a really big part in everyone’s perception of socialism and communism, whether they’re communist or liberal or whatever else, and even what the words themselves mean.
There are entire tendencies that are essentially defined by being unlike the USSR or unlike it after a certain point. Leftcoms after the soviets are integrated with the party state (so basically immediately lol), Trotskyists after 1928, “anti-revisionists” like Hoxhaism and Maoism after 1956-1960. Not to get too sectarian in here, I’m not even saying those positions are necessarily wrong (Khrushchev really did suck!), but the history of the USSR and splits from it has led to a form of dogmatism that is opposed to presence of markets and/or bourgeois elements in basically all circumstances. The party state is seen as becoming bourgeois in some way and the economy is seen as insufficiently communist. Economic dogmatism can come from severe critique of the USSR.
But, it can also come from too uncompromising support for its model. USSR made great achievements and its economy could be directed to certain goals powerfully and impressively, but ultimately it grew more and more unwieldy, did not surpass the West, and the project collapsed. The collapse obviously was not only because of that underperformance but it is absolutely a part that we shouldn't ignore just because we are sympathetic to the USSR and its model.
I've come to agree with John Ross's view that the Chinese econony is fully in line with Marxism and that the Soviet economy was essentially a left-deviation from classical Marxism adopted out of the necessity of fighting World War 2. After all, even the USA basically did central planning and a wave of nationalization to be able to win that war. There were very real, immediate reasons to prioritize heavy industry above all else and have the state direct almost every aspect of production, but just because an economy is good at industrializing quickly and winning a conventional war of colossal proportions doesnt mean it is sustainable or efficient.
And that is where the most impressive Soviet growth was, was that preparation for war by massive industrialization. The 60s, 70s, and 80s never matched the Stalin era's leaps towards catching up the West. Chinese economic growth, by contrast, is consistently superior to the West over decades and is rapidly developing the productive forces and gradually socializing them, as Marx envisioned would be part of the transition to communism.
I think the political conditions of AES has necessarily affected their ideology and approach to the econony. The PRC did not at all start in an ideal position and also had to fight fascism in its fetal state before '49, but compared to the USSR and especially after reproachment with the US, has been able to follow a more "normal", gradual path of development. Reproachment and the resulting loosened grip of imperialism gave it breathing room that the USSR never had, and its economy since has not been forced to adapt urgently to massive impending destruction like WW2 or the Cold War. Compare USSR military spending of as much as 20% of national income in the late 80s to China's 2.45% of GDP in 1989. The conditions of imperialism made siege socialism a necessity for most AES, and in those conditions, allowing the presence of a market sector is (perhaps entirely correctly) viewed as dangerous, too open to imperialist infiltration and politically unviable even if the benefits to development are recognized.
A totally state-directed, state-owned economy is good at war. It was good at fighting World War 2, and it is good at fighting imperialist class war and encirclement. When these states have basically always been in a state of total war with the capitalist world, it makes sense that they would deviate to this defensive model rather than a more classically Marxist one that would develop more quickly and naturally. In contrast, the peculiarities of the Sino-Soviet split and the PRC's relationship with the West have allowed it to take its time and socialize steadily and efficiently.
The USSR could probably have taken a path more like China's in a different political situation. Stalin after World War 2 desired quite close cooperation with the West and to avoid conflict with them as much as possible. That is why he made decisions many of us here view as rather liberal, naive mistakes, like not supporting the Greek communists to abide by his agreement with Britain. That is easy to say in retrospect, but we only view 1945-1948 as the dawn of the Cold War because we know what followed after. Those who were living through it did not, could not conceive of their situation that way. It seemed plausible that socialist states could peacefully coexist and even cooperate with capitalist ones after they had just fought and won the greatest war in human history together. Stalin believed this, socialists and nationalists in the Third World believed this. So many nations during the Cold War tried to be friendly with both the US and the USSR, and they paid steep prices for this.
Had the international situation really been more like these perceptions and aspirations, where imperialist siege could be at least temporarily avoided, other AES states could have taken a route more like China's. I think a lot of them readily would have. One did, in fact, because Yugoslavia had a much better relationship with the West (due to splitting with Stalin, partly over said lack of support for Greek communists), and it had an economy with state, cooperative, and market sectors coexisting. The relationship between intensity of imperialist encirclement and acceptance or unacceptance of a market sector's role in developing the productive forces seems quite strong to me.
explain to me how China is not capitalist. i'm not even saying that if they're capitalist they're just as bad as the US, or that the communist party is actually, ideologically capitalist, but what mode of production are they operating under if thats where Tim Apple gets his iPhones from? what the fuck is Jack Ma even doin if he's not making money from other people's surplus labor value?
I don't really get triggered by people saying capitalism instead of "socialist market economy" or whatever because it seems to be mostly signaling and semantics, but it's probably worth pointing out that not all of China's economy is like that. The commanding heights of the economy (e.g. finance, heavy industry, construction) are controlled more closely by the Party, and surplus value extracted there is spent on social good without passing through the hands of a capitalist first. In the market economy there's also the matter of, like, regulations and worker protections and whatnot that are only possible when capitalists don't run the state as if it's their personal playground, but I'm not sure that's as clear of a point.
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it also encourages dogmatism and, honestly, just not reading shit. even the most, basic introductory text like Principles of Communism should disabuse someone of the idea that "Dengism" or "state capitalism" is something entirely unlike Marxism (see: section 17) if taken seriously, yet these debates go on and on. the communism button hasn't been pressed so the revolution is betrayed and it's just capitalism.
essentially every narrative of such and such socialist state betraying the revolution, from whatever tendency, ultimately boils down to a refusal to consider socialism as a transition that will necessarily have traces of capitalism for a long time. and the history of capitalism as a whole should show that is the case for every mode of production. Endless back and forth about whether revolutionary states are Socialist or State Capitalist or Dgnerated Worker's States or Bureaucratic Collectivism or whatever label are exactly as useless to me as trying to pinpoint exactly in what moment capitalism stopped being feudalism or if mercantilism is or isn't fully capitalist. Capitalism transitioned gradually out of feudalism, had revolutions to conquer political power like socialism had and will have, and remnants of feudalism remained well into the 20th century in many parts of the world. There is historical value in trying to identify proximate causes of capitalism (e.g. primitive accumulation through enclosure in England, as Marx identified), but trying to find some hard line in time for when this mode of production stops and this new one starts seems fundamentally misguided. England in 1700 had many, many holdovers from feudalism (hell, in 2022 it still has literal aristocrats with hereditary government positions!) but in retrospect it's clear that it was on the capitalist road, that capitalism was developing further and further. The question shouldn't be "Are they really socialist?" it should be "Are they building socialism?".
i have nothing to add, just want to say it's a fantastic comment. i've been thinking about this a lot recently and i don't understand why some marxists have such an unscientific idea of what a socialist transition looks like. you can't implement communism by decree, the same way no mode of production was instated this way.
I think the history of the USSR as the first ever successful proletarian revolution plays a really big part in everyone’s perception of socialism and communism, whether they’re communist or liberal or whatever else, and even what the words themselves mean.
There are entire tendencies that are essentially defined by being unlike the USSR or unlike it after a certain point. Leftcoms after the soviets are integrated with the party state (so basically immediately lol), Trotskyists after 1928, “anti-revisionists” like Hoxhaism and Maoism after 1956-1960. Not to get too sectarian in here, I’m not even saying those positions are necessarily wrong (Khrushchev really did suck!), but the history of the USSR and splits from it has led to a form of dogmatism that is opposed to presence of markets and/or bourgeois elements in basically all circumstances. The party state is seen as becoming bourgeois in some way and the economy is seen as insufficiently communist. Economic dogmatism can come from severe critique of the USSR.
But, it can also come from too uncompromising support for its model. USSR made great achievements and its economy could be directed to certain goals powerfully and impressively, but ultimately it grew more and more unwieldy, did not surpass the West, and the project collapsed. The collapse obviously was not only because of that underperformance but it is absolutely a part that we shouldn't ignore just because we are sympathetic to the USSR and its model.
I've come to agree with John Ross's view that the Chinese econony is fully in line with Marxism and that the Soviet economy was essentially a left-deviation from classical Marxism adopted out of the necessity of fighting World War 2. After all, even the USA basically did central planning and a wave of nationalization to be able to win that war. There were very real, immediate reasons to prioritize heavy industry above all else and have the state direct almost every aspect of production, but just because an economy is good at industrializing quickly and winning a conventional war of colossal proportions doesnt mean it is sustainable or efficient.
And that is where the most impressive Soviet growth was, was that preparation for war by massive industrialization. The 60s, 70s, and 80s never matched the Stalin era's leaps towards catching up the West. Chinese economic growth, by contrast, is consistently superior to the West over decades and is rapidly developing the productive forces and gradually socializing them, as Marx envisioned would be part of the transition to communism.
I think the political conditions of AES has necessarily affected their ideology and approach to the econony. The PRC did not at all start in an ideal position and also had to fight fascism in its fetal state before '49, but compared to the USSR and especially after reproachment with the US, has been able to follow a more "normal", gradual path of development. Reproachment and the resulting loosened grip of imperialism gave it breathing room that the USSR never had, and its economy since has not been forced to adapt urgently to massive impending destruction like WW2 or the Cold War. Compare USSR military spending of as much as 20% of national income in the late 80s to China's 2.45% of GDP in 1989. The conditions of imperialism made siege socialism a necessity for most AES, and in those conditions, allowing the presence of a market sector is (perhaps entirely correctly) viewed as dangerous, too open to imperialist infiltration and politically unviable even if the benefits to development are recognized.
A totally state-directed, state-owned economy is good at war. It was good at fighting World War 2, and it is good at fighting imperialist class war and encirclement. When these states have basically always been in a state of total war with the capitalist world, it makes sense that they would deviate to this defensive model rather than a more classically Marxist one that would develop more quickly and naturally. In contrast, the peculiarities of the Sino-Soviet split and the PRC's relationship with the West have allowed it to take its time and socialize steadily and efficiently.
The USSR could probably have taken a path more like China's in a different political situation. Stalin after World War 2 desired quite close cooperation with the West and to avoid conflict with them as much as possible. That is why he made decisions many of us here view as rather liberal, naive mistakes, like not supporting the Greek communists to abide by his agreement with Britain. That is easy to say in retrospect, but we only view 1945-1948 as the dawn of the Cold War because we know what followed after. Those who were living through it did not, could not conceive of their situation that way. It seemed plausible that socialist states could peacefully coexist and even cooperate with capitalist ones after they had just fought and won the greatest war in human history together. Stalin believed this, socialists and nationalists in the Third World believed this. So many nations during the Cold War tried to be friendly with both the US and the USSR, and they paid steep prices for this.
Had the international situation really been more like these perceptions and aspirations, where imperialist siege could be at least temporarily avoided, other AES states could have taken a route more like China's. I think a lot of them readily would have. One did, in fact, because Yugoslavia had a much better relationship with the West (due to splitting with Stalin, partly over said lack of support for Greek communists), and it had an economy with state, cooperative, and market sectors coexisting. The relationship between intensity of imperialist encirclement and acceptance or unacceptance of a market sector's role in developing the productive forces seems quite strong to me.
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explain to me how China is not capitalist. i'm not even saying that if they're capitalist they're just as bad as the US, or that the communist party is actually, ideologically capitalist, but what mode of production are they operating under if thats where Tim Apple gets his iPhones from? what the fuck is Jack Ma even doin if he's not making money from other people's surplus labor value?
I don't really get triggered by people saying capitalism instead of "socialist market economy" or whatever because it seems to be mostly signaling and semantics, but it's probably worth pointing out that not all of China's economy is like that. The commanding heights of the economy (e.g. finance, heavy industry, construction) are controlled more closely by the Party, and surplus value extracted there is spent on social good without passing through the hands of a capitalist first. In the market economy there's also the matter of, like, regulations and worker protections and whatnot that are only possible when capitalists don't run the state as if it's their personal playground, but I'm not sure that's as clear of a point.
okay that's a good explanation thank you. i do want to learn more about chinese society at some point it just doesn't seem super relevant rn.
It's worth quantifying this for some perspective, 60% of their entire GDP is state owned.