Meszaros says that communism concerns control and asks:
> what sort of control? In the past it was assumed that political control would do
It was not political control that was at the heart of Communism but
the control of the means of poduction, short and simple. Communism is
effectively about people controling there own production. In fact, in
the sense he seems to be inferring, political control (i.e. via the
state) is precisely what communism seeks to surplant. The phrase 'the
withering away of the state' as a definition of communism comes to
mind.
> If you look around the world today, most of the former communist
> parties have abandoned the name 'communist'. The original CPGB now
> calls itself the 'Democratic Left'.
Well a small section of reformist members who won control of its
assets do (and some of them may still consider themselves to be
communists regardless of the party name). There was an interesting
article on its collapse posted to the Marxist-Leninist list I'll check
the url if anyone's interested.
> In the former Soviet Union and the east European countries, there
> has been a complete change, a complete abandonment of all
> principles. The former communist leaders of eastern Europe have
> turned themselves into capitalists
It was the captialism forces both within and without the CPs which
brought about these changes not because they changed their minds but
that the economic conditions changed with pressure from Imperialism.
This meant that their own economic interests no longer accorded
with communist priniclples but with the re-introduction of the
capitalist market. The same forces have also arisen in China and
Cuba but for the time being they haven't brought about the same
destruction.
He then goes on to Stalin (ignoring Lenins advocation of the same
point - and I presume even Trotsky!):
> For him, communism meant overtaking the United States in coal, pig
> iron and steel production. How seriously can you take any notion of
> 'communism' which defines the idea in such totally vacuous and
> utterly fetishistic terms. You can double the United States pig iron
> production, and you have not moved one inch in the direction of
> communism.
Communism is exactly about the question of production. Without large
scale production (regardless of its relation to other countries) it
would be impossible to bring about the radical shift necessary from a
largely backwards, peasant-ridden, mostly agricultural society
(as almost all these countries were) into an industrial one. But
perhaps Meszaros' view of communism has more in common with Proudhon
and some anarchists view of small farmholds. A sort of peasant
society without the feudal lords and other classes bothering them.
There can be no move to what Marx's means by communism except in
relation to the improvement of production to provide for all and not
just a few.
The other problem with Meszaros' obsessive attacks on
so-called Stalinist communism is that he does what many do when
attacking these countries and that is to start out by attacking first
a hate-figure like stalin and then the communist parties and then to
slip un-noticed the 'fact' that these countries were Communist. It is
not a mere oversight that the Union of Soviet SOCIALIST Republics was
not the USCR as it made no claim to have attained Communism, the
state had far from withered away (in fact it was quite openly a
dictatorship of the proletariat). They did not claim that one could
build 'communism in one country'. No one was more aware of the then
inability to achieve a move to a communist society than the people in
the Communist Parties.
What they achieved was not communism but what they did show was that
a break from Capitalism in the intense period of Imperialism was no
longer merely a Utopian pipe-dream. Those who condemn these countries
out-of-hand (such a Simon's 100 year old SPGB) have to come to terms
with the fact that their belief in the transition to Communism - if
not a Utopia - has not got off the planning stage. Which after a
century and a half would certainly convince me that Marx was just
wrong or at least so wildly optimistic that we can have no idea how
long capitalism will last. Marxism then slips from a science of the
historical development of human society to quasi-religious belief
that humanity must be liberated one day. For some that is solice
enough.
I could go on but I have to have something to eat. I will be back.
John Walker
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