Re: Query from a Venezuelan

["Devine, James" <jdevine@xxxxxxx>]

Title: RE: [PEN-L] Query from a Venezuelan

>> Grant writes:
>> In reality I don't really think there is much difference between
>> state socialism and state capitalism, although the former is
>> distinguished by the support of the working class ....

I asked:
>did the Russian working class support the Soviet state in 1936?

Grant:>Maybe not, but what makes you think they didn't? Stalin's worst excesses didn't necessarily have an impact on everyone in the USSR.<

No, but your statement says that the working class did support support the regime. Note also that 1936 preceded the victory against the Nazis, the rise of full employment, and the welfare state, which helped gain working-class support for the CPSU.

I also don't get the bit about >stated intention to abolish
the state, at some point in the future. <

The soviet state didn't do anything about this "stated intention," at least since 1920 or so. It's also best, as Marx & Engels say in THE GERMAN IDEOLOGY, to judge people -- and regimes -- by objective characteristics, not their self-perceptions.

Jim