Re: [Marxism] Eating is not over-consumption

[Waistline2@xxxxxxx]

In a message dated 4/23/2009 9:17:41 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, 
_shmage@xxxxxxxxxxxxx (mailto:shmage@xxxxxxxxxxxx)  writes:
 
On Apr 23, 2009, at 8:50 PM, Mark Lause asked:
 
>   Will the state wither on its own after the abolition of  capitalism?<
 

<<< Lenin (in *State and Revolution*) answered that  question:  The state  
starts to wither away at the precise instant  the proletariat seizes  
power.  The abolition of capitalism is a  long historical process that  
proceeds, pari passu, with the withering  away of the state.  The state  
completes its withering away at the  moment when capitalism is  
completely abolished. >>> 
 

Shane Mage
 
Comment 
 
The idea that the state or any historical phenomena, rooted in and  
expressing the long history of property and class, can start  . . .  begin?  . 
. . 
to wither (a quantitative measure?) on the basic of a  "precise instance" of 
political insurrection - political revolution, is  theoretically incorrect. 
At least in my reading of Marx, inasmuch as Marx tends  to stay away from 
"precise instance" formulations. 
 
Further, the idea that the state completes its withering away when  
capitalism is completely abolished, rather than the concept of the value  
relation 
being uprooted and consigned to history, demand providing supporting  
theoretical evidence to support a concept of "precise instance"  and the  
meaning 
of "capitalism completely abolished." 
 
Chapter 5 of State and Revolution is called "The economic basis of the  
withering away of the state."  The title would suggest a concept of "state  
development" - "withering away" at somewhat at odds with the concept that "The  
state  starts to wither away at the precise instant the proletariat seizes  
power."  What would seem to change - "wither," is the form of the state, as 
 it has thus far existed. 
 
Chapter 5 also suggests that property relations and the value relation, as  
they merge and evolve in unity and strife needs consideration.  

The fact of the matter - supporting by historical documents, is  that Lenin 
signed a December 20, 1917 decree creating the Cheka, the first of a  
succession of Soviet state security organizations. This form of the state,  
dubbed the "Red Terror," by Lenin was quickly enlarged during his tenure as  
paramount leader, and further enlarged and institutionalized under the Stalin  
regime. 

Even the concept of the armed workers as a new form -  expression, of the 
state power meant its enlargement and merging - if you will,  of its power 
within the population. At least this was the case in the second  decade of the 
past century. 

The withering away of the state is a  concept wedded to the existence of 
classes moving in antagonism and  contradiction. Communism - in its economic 
dimensions, abolishes the former.  Human being mediate the latter. The state 
withers away as we have known it as an  expression of the irreconcilability 
of class antagonism.  


WL 

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