Comments for Read by reds http://readbyreds.wordpress.com Sharing our ideas on what we read Sun, 27 Jul 2008 08:20:05 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=MU Comment on A People’s Tragedy by 1925 guns http://readbyreds.wordpress.com/2007/09/30/a-peoples-tragedy/#comment-23 1925 guns Mon, 21 Jul 2008 09:07:24 +0000 http://readbyreds.wordpress.com/2007/09/30/a-peoples-tragedy/#comment-23 <strong>1925 guns...</strong> How do you come up with so much material to blog with?... 1925 guns…

How do you come up with so much material to blog with?…

]]> Comment on Before Stalinism (part 2) by victorserge http://readbyreds.wordpress.com/2007/09/08/before-stalinism-part-2/#comment-22 victorserge Thu, 31 Jan 2008 21:22:51 +0000 http://readbyreds.wordpress.com/2007/09/10/before-stalinism-part-2/#comment-22 I think the perspective of this review is entirely too "orthodox." Is it not relevant that, as Farber notes, "there is no evidence indicating that Lenin or any of the mainstream Bolshevik leaders lamented the loss of workers' control or of democracy in the soviets, or at least referred to these losses as a retreat, as Lenin declared with the replacement of War Communism by NEP in 1921" [Before Stalinism, p. 44]? Is it not relevant that the Bolsheviks had been disbanding soviets elected with non-Bolshevik majorities from the spring of 1918: ie, before the civil war started? Is this mere "sneering"? I'm sorry, comrades, but we can't just keep on with the myth that Lenin and Trotsky were merely sincere socialist democrats under a great deal of stress. There was ALWAYS an authoritarian/substitutionist side to Lenin's thought and eventually Lenin's politics became effectively Blanquist, however Marxist he may have thought himself. Hal Draper, Third Camp Marxism's best writer, writes in one of his last books about how Lenin inherited the party-dictatorship notion of the dictatorship of the proletariat from Plekhanov [The ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ from Marx to Lenin, New York, 1987]. Using the civil war as an excuse for, as Lenin put it, authority that is "unlimited, outside the law, and based on force in the most direct sense of the word" just won't cut it anymore. I think the perspective of this review is entirely too “orthodox.” Is it not relevant that, as Farber notes, “there is no evidence indicating that Lenin or any of the mainstream Bolshevik leaders lamented the loss of workers’ control or of democracy in the soviets, or at least referred to these losses as a retreat, as Lenin declared with the replacement of War Communism by NEP in 1921″ [Before Stalinism, p. 44]? Is it not relevant that the Bolsheviks had been disbanding soviets elected with non-Bolshevik majorities from the spring of 1918: ie, before the civil war started? Is this mere “sneering”?

I’m sorry, comrades, but we can’t just keep on with the myth that Lenin and Trotsky were merely sincere socialist democrats under a great deal of stress. There was ALWAYS an authoritarian/substitutionist side to Lenin’s thought and eventually Lenin’s politics became effectively Blanquist, however Marxist he may have thought himself. Hal Draper, Third Camp Marxism’s best writer, writes in one of his last books about how Lenin inherited the party-dictatorship notion of the dictatorship of the proletariat from Plekhanov [The ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ from Marx to Lenin, New York, 1987]. Using the civil war as an excuse for, as Lenin put it, authority that is “unlimited, outside the law, and based on force in the most direct sense of the word” just won’t cut it anymore.

]]> Comment on The God Delusion by macjanet http://readbyreds.wordpress.com/2007/09/10/hello-world/#comment-5 macjanet Fri, 02 Nov 2007 08:48:44 +0000 #comment-5 I agree that it is more helpful to distinguish god and religion, but even more helpful to distinguish faith from church. The acceptance of the power and influence of church/religious leaders is the barrier to critical thinking. I agree that it is more helpful to distinguish god and religion, but even more helpful to distinguish faith from church. The acceptance of the power and influence of church/religious leaders is the barrier to critical thinking.

]]> Comment on Before Stalinism (part 2) by dlandmj http://readbyreds.wordpress.com/2007/09/08/before-stalinism-part-2/#comment-4 dlandmj Mon, 24 Sep 2007 08:23:29 +0000 http://readbyreds.wordpress.com/2007/09/10/before-stalinism-part-2/#comment-4 In a sense, perhaps, Farber is not radical enough in his critical review of the emergency measures that the Bolsheviks took. There is a strong case, in hindsight, that the whole business of "war communism" would have been better not undertaken. It is a much stronger case than Farber's one, that "war communism" would have been undertaken more "softly", and quickly followed - in the terrible famine-and-exhaustion year of 1921 - by a sedate political liberalisation, if only the Bolsheviks had had the democratic sentiments in which he finds them lacking. Writing some fifteen years later, in Revolution Betrayed, Trotsky's judgement was: "Military communism was, in essence, the systematic regimentation of consumption in a besieged fortress... However... the Soviet government hoped and strove... from 'military communism'... gradually... to arrive at genuine communism... "Reality, however, came into increasing conflict with the programme of 'war communism'... Terrible hunger... collapse of the productive forces... at the very edge of the abyss... "The utopian hopes of the epoch of military communism came in later for a cruel, and in many respects just, criticism. The theoretical mistake of the ruling party remains inexplicable, however, only if you leave out of account the fact that all calculations at the time were based on the hope of an early victory of the revolution in the West... "It can be said with certainty, however, that even in that happy event it would still have been necessary to renounce the direct state distribution of products in favour of the methods of commerce..." By "the theoretical mistake", Trotsky means the idea that "military communism" could lead gradually into real communism. But he pointedly does not assert that the actual war-communist measures were correct even though the theoretical commentary was wrong. "War communism" was not motivated by a disregard for democracy. On the contrary, it was motivated by "the hope of an early victory of the revolution in the West", and the conviction that if that early victory did not come the Russian workers' government was doomed anyway. At the start the Bolsheviks did not foresee the length and extreme brutality of the civil war - note Lenin's pleased comment in February 1918 that the civil war was over! - and once they were embroiled in it, renouncing direct requisitions from the countryside must have seemed as implausible as stopping to build and mount a bicycle halfway through a desperate foot-race for one's life. At the start of the civil war, no-one foresaw how long and how cruelly they would be making requisitions. At the most desperate point of the civil war, in autumn 1919, probably it would have been impossible to manage without at least some requisitions. Soon after that intense crisis passed, in early 1920, Trotsky proposed a proto-NEP. We can understand why the Bolshevik majority turned him down, and why he did not persist. But surely, with hindsight, he was right. Despite everything, NEP did better than requisitions even in 1921, the year of greatest economic collapse. If NEP had been adopted from the start, then no doubt some food otherwise requisitioned would have been lacking. But a smaller Red Army would have been needed, too. It would have had fewer desertions. Fewer forces would have to have been used for the requisitioning. Fewer townsfolk would have fled into the bureaucracy as the only place to find a secure livelihood, and the bureaucracy would have been less swollen. The habits of brusque command and rapid resort to violence, unquestionably bred into the Bolsheviks by the tremendous pressures of the civil war, would have been less ingrained. Who would have seen clearer in the maelstrom? Who wouldn't have thought it unacceptably risky to replace the apparently sure methods of requisition by the chances of trade? Who could have combined such cold calculation with the immense, heroic emotional mobilisation required to see through the civil war? Since we are given the advantages of hindsight, we should use it; but without sneering at the Bolsheviks who did not have and could not have those advantages. In a sense, perhaps, Farber is not radical enough in his critical review of the emergency measures that the Bolsheviks took.
There is a strong case, in hindsight, that the whole business of “war communism” would have been better not undertaken.
It is a much stronger case than Farber’s one, that “war communism” would have been undertaken more “softly”, and quickly followed - in the terrible famine-and-exhaustion year of 1921 - by a sedate political liberalisation, if only the Bolsheviks had had the democratic sentiments in which he finds them lacking.
Writing some fifteen years later, in Revolution Betrayed, Trotsky’s judgement was:
“Military communism was, in essence, the systematic regimentation of consumption in a besieged fortress… However… the Soviet government hoped and strove… from ‘military communism’… gradually… to arrive at genuine communism…
“Reality, however, came into increasing conflict with the programme of ‘war communism’… Terrible hunger… collapse of the productive forces… at the very edge of the abyss…
“The utopian hopes of the epoch of military communism came in later for a cruel, and in many respects just, criticism. The theoretical mistake of the ruling party remains inexplicable, however, only if you leave out of account the fact that all calculations at the time were based on the hope of an early victory of the revolution in the West…
“It can be said with certainty, however, that even in that happy event it would still have been necessary to renounce the direct state distribution of products in favour of the methods of commerce…”
By “the theoretical mistake”, Trotsky means the idea that “military communism” could lead gradually into real communism. But he pointedly does not assert that the actual war-communist measures were correct even though the theoretical commentary was wrong.
“War communism” was not motivated by a disregard for democracy. On the contrary, it was motivated by “the hope of an early victory of the revolution in the West”, and the conviction that if that early victory did not come the Russian workers’ government was doomed anyway.
At the start the Bolsheviks did not foresee the length and extreme brutality of the civil war - note Lenin’s pleased comment in February 1918 that the civil war was over! - and once they were embroiled in it, renouncing direct requisitions from the countryside must have seemed as implausible as stopping to build and mount a bicycle halfway through a desperate foot-race for one’s life.
At the start of the civil war, no-one foresaw how long and how cruelly they would be making requisitions. At the most desperate point of the civil war, in autumn 1919, probably it would have been impossible to manage without at least some requisitions.
Soon after that intense crisis passed, in early 1920, Trotsky proposed a proto-NEP. We can understand why the Bolshevik majority turned him down, and why he did not persist. But surely, with hindsight, he was right.
Despite everything, NEP did better than requisitions even in 1921, the year of greatest economic collapse. If NEP had been adopted from the start, then no doubt some food otherwise requisitioned would have been lacking.
But a smaller Red Army would have been needed, too. It would have had fewer desertions. Fewer forces would have to have been used for the requisitioning. Fewer townsfolk would have fled into the bureaucracy as the only place to find a secure livelihood, and the bureaucracy would have been less swollen. The habits of brusque command and rapid resort to violence, unquestionably bred into the Bolsheviks by the tremendous pressures of the civil war, would have been less ingrained.
Who would have seen clearer in the maelstrom? Who wouldn’t have thought it unacceptably risky to replace the apparently sure methods of requisition by the chances of trade? Who could have combined such cold calculation with the immense, heroic emotional mobilisation required to see through the civil war?
Since we are given the advantages of hindsight, we should use it; but without sneering at the Bolsheviks who did not have and could not have those advantages.

]]> Comment on Before Stalinism (part 2) by Before Stalinism (part 1) « Read by reds http://readbyreds.wordpress.com/2007/09/08/before-stalinism-part-2/#comment-3 Before Stalinism (part 1) « Read by reds Mon, 10 Sep 2007 08:17:05 +0000 http://readbyreds.wordpress.com/2007/09/10/before-stalinism-part-2/#comment-3 [...] by reds Sharing our ideas on what we read « Before Stalinism (part 2) Le mouvement ouvrier pendant la premiere guerre mondiale [...] [...] by reds Sharing our ideas on what we read « Before Stalinism (part 2) Le mouvement ouvrier pendant la premiere guerre mondiale [...]

]]> Comment on Before Stalinism (part 1) by Before Stalinism (part 2) « Read by reds http://readbyreds.wordpress.com/2007/09/09/before-stalinism-part-1/#comment-2 Before Stalinism (part 2) « Read by reds Mon, 10 Sep 2007 08:15:23 +0000 http://readbyreds.wordpress.com/2007/09/09/before-stalinism-part-1/#comment-2 [...] by reds Sharing our ideas on what we read Before Stalinism (part 1) [...] [...] by reds Sharing our ideas on what we read Before Stalinism (part 1) [...]

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