RE: [Marxism] Chavez embraces socialism (but not the old kind)

[Steve Gabosch <sgabosch@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 01:18 AM 2/27/2005 Mark Lause wrote, replying to me:
> Of these eight points you ennumerate, numbers 1 through 6 are essentially
> different ways of saying the same thing.  That is, they are all aspects of
> a resolution of dual power.

(1)  I don't think they are just different ways of saying the same
thing.  Resolving dual power in favor of the workers and farmers is a
necessary but insufficient description of a socialist revolution.  A number
of other essential characteristics of the dictatorship of the proletariat
need to be spelled out, and some are on my list.  Each of these points
indicates necessary lessons from working class revolutionary history.  Each
points to essential features of a socialist revolution and differentiates a
workers and farmers government from failed strategies for taking
power.  Continuing to follow the numbering I used ...

(2)  Claiming that a workers and farmers government is the *first*
governmental form to appear in in a successful anticapitalist revolution
defines - in qualitative terms - *when* it appears in the resolution of
dual power (this fomulation leaves open the possibility of a period when
there is no government).  In doing so, it differentiates this kind of
government from many others that attempt to resolve such situations - but
in doing so, are actually a capitalist government which invariably defeats
the revolutionary upsurge and maintains capitalism.

(3) Arguing that a workers and farmers government is based on revolutionary
mass mobilizations differentiates it from efforts to make a revolution by
organizing a coup by overthrowing a bourgeois government with isolated acts
of violence with a perhaps supportive but passive population.

(4) Explaining that a workers and farmers government is both independent of
the bourgeoisie but also rests upon a capitalist system - a capitalist
state - points to its highly contradictory nature.  While there is no
longer dual power at the level of government, this duality becomes even
sharper throughout life in the social system, with the workers and farmers
government attempting to represent the objective interests of the
proletariat but also presiding over and managing the civil and economic
structure of a capitalist society.  The class struggle in fact begins to
sharpen and heighten in qualitatively new ways under a workers and farmers
government as the question of the abolition of capitalism itself now rises
to the fore.  This help understand the inevitable pressure on such a
government to expropriate the bourgeoisie and form a workers state, as Cuba
did under Castro, or be defeated by capitalist and imperialist reaction, as
Nicaragua was under Ortega.

(5)  Understanding that the workers and farmers government is the most
powerful tool of class struggle - (excepting of course the ultimate
instrument of working class struggle, a full-fledged workers state) - helps
to reveal the need to understand and organize all struggles, including and
especially those of the labor unions, in terms of that objective.  It also
helps to understand that the struggles of oppressed nationalities may very
well take the form of fighting for their own governments (and not
necessarily workers and farmers governments) - and that supporting these
struggles for self-determination strengthens the cause for a workers and
farmers government, which is a powerful enough tool of class struggle to
help oppressed nationalities win their struggles for emancipation.

(6)  The centrality of gaining control of the armed forces and basing it on
the mobilizations of the toiling masses cannot be emphasized
enough.  Usually - actually, I think one can argue always - this means
totally dismantling the previous military and creating a new one.  And the
reason is no secret - the bourgeois military and police forces are the
usual sources of counterrevolution.  Here, we can contrast Cuba and Chile.


Mark continues:
> No. 7, requiring a program of expropriation excludes some models of the
> "dictatorship of the proletariat" acknowledged by Marx himself, ie., the
> Paris Commune.

On the Paris Commune, which lasted about 6 weeks (give or take), I think a
strong case can be made that a number of the actions of the Parisian
proletariat were objectively heading exactly in the direction of
expropriating the bourgeoisie.  In saying, as I did, "carrying out a
program of expropriating the bourgeoisie," this formulation allows for the
possibility the program is not entirely consciously understood.  It is the
deeds, not the words, that ultimately count.


Mark says:
> No. 8, leaving the process of expropriation open as to time, seems both
> unnecessary and a real potential loophole.

But this is what history teaches us.  To try to create a meaningful
quantitative formula or schema for how many weeks, months or years it
should take would be impossible.  This is where David McDonald's points
about how no two revolutions unfold in the same way are very
important.  Each case is concrete and unique.  However, a time comes, as it
did in 1960 in Cuba, and in 1918 in Russia, that nationalizations and other
forms of expropriation become a life or death matter for the survival of
the revolution.  Defining this tipping point in qualitative terms, such as
a rising capitalist reaction and the pressures of imperialist hostility, is
one thing, but trying to quantify it is another.


Mark explains:
> I'm suspicious of "models" allegedly based on history.  They are always
> put forward as accurately describing reality, if we'd only ignore the ways
> in which they don't.

In my opinion, this particular point Mark makes is really about the problem
of having confidence - revolutionary confidence - that working people can
make revolutions, and whether we can learn and generalize from our
victories and defeats in the world class struggle and make a world
socialist revolution.  I believe we can.

In solidarity,
~ Steve Gabosch


Mark quoted:
> > Steve Gabosch said:
> > There are more, but for consideration in this discussion, here are eight
> > features of a workers and farmers government that I think we can
> > generalize from historical experience:
> >
> > 1.  It resolves a situation of dual power in favor of the workers and
> > farmers.
> > 2.  It is the first form of government that can be expected to appear as
> > the result of a successful anticapitalist revolution.
> > 3.  It comes into being as a result of massive revolutionary
> > mobilizations and upheavals.
> > 4.  It is independent of the bourgeoisie even though it stands on
> > capitalist economic relations.
> > 5.  It is the most powerful instrument the working class can wield short
> > of a full-fledged workers state.
> > 6.  It has full control of an army based on the revolutionary
> > mobilizations of the workers and the oppressed.
> > 7.  It carries out a program of expropriating the bourgeoisie in the
> > direction of establishing a workers state.
> > 8.  There is no a priori time limit to how long the transition from a
> > capitalist system to a workers state will take under a workers and
> > farmers government.


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