> Date sent: Tue, 07 Apr 1998 15:14:59 -0400
> Send reply to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> From: Wojtek Sokolowski <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Subject: re:Soviet objectives
> Well, who knows what really was on their minds -- we can forever speculate
> on that. As I recall (I think from Braverman), Lenin was also mesmerized
> by the works of Frederic Winslow Taylor - the quintessential capitalist.
> So who knows which work had a greater influence on his thinking?
The Soviet bureaucracy turned highly cynical about socialist ideals
only later in the 60s and 70s - to that extent I can agree with some
of what you say. But anyone who knows something about Lenin
knows that he was deeply, totally, consciously, intentionally
committed to socialist ideals. Lenin was never "mesmerized" by anyone
except Marx.
His attraction to Taylor was in line with Engels's earlier argument
against the anarchists who thought that one could do away with the
"authoritarianism" inherent in modern industry. (Which is to say that
the anarchists were right in saying that scientific socialism can
never overcome the "despotic" alienation of machine industry. We
now know - after the Bolshevik Revolution - that Bakunin won his
debate with Marx (See "After the Revolution: Marx Debates Bakunin" in
Tucker, The Marx-Engels Reader).
ricardo
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