CB later added: >> This is not a Marxist way to understand it. This represents the kind of thing that drove Marx to say that he wasn't a Marxist. "This is not a Marxist way to understand it." That's not an argument for anything. The content of this sentence is equivalent to saying "I disagree with you and I'm right."
^^^^^ CB: Well, I claim Marx's famous joke for my statements here, too. What I'm saying is that u are not using "democracy" or "democratic" in the way Marx and Engels use it. Now , as we all agreed, Marx is not God and Engels is not the Holy Ghost. They might have a definition of "democratic" that isn't the best necessarily. But here we have a number of people who admire and respect their ideas. So, I'm just arguing that I have their meaning better than u. Of course , u might be correct, and I wrong. But the "culture" of email lists is to argue our different positions. And it is cumbersome to repeat that I'm making my argument. I just make the argument and phrase as if I'm correct. ^^^^^ >> Plus, it is not >> accurate that there was _no_ "consent" from the workers. The idea >> that there was no mass popularity of the decisions and actions of the >> CPSU is ridiculous. I thought that I had already answered this. ^^^^^ CB: This is what I said when I had misread what u said above. ^^^^^ To be stable, _all_ class systems have to have "mass popularity" (legitimacy). If not, the producers try to overthrow the system -- or the system is so busy using force to suppress the opposition that (almost) no surplus-labor is done. Force is never sufficient to maintain a class system. ^^^^ CB: Ok. I misunderstood, but what I said did reply to something , even if it was a strawperson. And I agree with the above. But doesn't the above imply "some" democracy in the USSR ? It problematic to talk of "democracy" in terms of quantity of it, but... ^^^^^^^ The Catholic religion helped legitimate feudalism in the serf's eyes, as did the pomp and circumstance of the lords' ceremonies. Patriotism, individualism, the fear of job loss, propaganda, etc., legitimate capitalism. The old USSR used patriotism, rhetoric about "socialism," "progress," etc. to legitimate their system, along with stuff about technocrats' superiority and fear of the US. Likely, the abolition of bureaucratic socialism also had some legitimacy, since by 1989 it was very clear that the Soviet system did not work very well, even by its own standards, while events like the lost war in Afghanistan and Chernobyl encouraged this fact to be more obvious. ^^^^^^^ CB: Main thing is that the SU was not all bad things or even mostly bad things. And that it was some significant actually existing socialism. It was not all fake socialism such that socialism should be put in quotes everytime what occurred through the history of the SU is referred to. Much of its failure must be attributed to the horrendous military assaults of imperialism on it, not to the shortcomings of the CP . It was a first historical effort to build socialism, and its history should not lead one to believe that it is impossible to have socialism or that a socialist society is inherently unviable. It's history should lead one to the opposite conclusion. That if we can get rid of or substantially curb capitalism and imperialism, and win a socialist state in major capitalist countries that can fend off imperialist military assault, we can have it. ^^^^^ In the end, whether or not it was seen as legitimate, the workers were not consulted when the power elite decided to abolish top-down state planning and the like and to bring in capitalism. There was no vote and no petitions. The CP had gained class power at some point during the 1920s (or earlier) and, after several decades, used it to make a lot of their leaders rich in a capitalist way. (Mafia and "black" marketeers also won, big time.) ^^^^^^ CB: I agreed with the first part. I wouldn't link the earlier CP with the CP at the end as u do here. -- Jim Devine "All science would be superfluous if the form of appearance of things directly coincided with their essence." -- KM _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
