Re:On being the right size (1928)
by vidarh on Monday October 14, 2013 @06:45AM
(#6546456)
It is an argument against a very specific form of socialism as implemented by marxist-leninists. Already by the end of the 1800's there was a wide schism between left communists/liberalist marxists, anarchist communists, Luxembourgist/Spartakists and a number of other anti-authoritarian communist ideologies on one hand, and Leninists on the other about the role of the state in the socialist transition phase, where the left communists and liberalist marxists have consistently been against the idea of a vanguard party (the leninist party model) and against the idea of a strong state.
"Left communism" is generally defined by being "to the left of Leninism" (EDIT: And many left communists does not consider Leninism a socialist ideology at all), though it is worth pointing out that Leninism in itself is not necessarily authoritarian. The left communist criticism of Leninism initially focused on the (as it turned out) well founded risk that having a vanguard party following a nearly military discipline and that was not intended to include regular people in the party decision making provided a massive potential threat if it were to be abused (as it of course ended up being - it was the ultimate cultist echo-chamber combined with a fair number of power hungry people mixed in with the idealists).
Most socialists have always been against this model, and most communists were arguably also against the leninist model until at least 1920 or so. After the April 1917 revolution, the Bolsheviks was a small-ish minority group even in Russia, next to the Mensheviks, Socialist-Revolutionaries, Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, most of whome were left communists, other forms of socialist revolutionaries, and some reformists.
After the Bolshevik coup (the October Revolution - I don't like calling it a revolution, as it only had the support of a relatively small minority - it succeeded only because the Bolshevik support was largely concentrated in a few of the big cities, giving them the ability to cease control of the still weakened government apparatus), the Leninist model gained a lot of undeserved support, and cemented its position thanks to the combination of the perceived successes of the Bolsheviks (even some fairly right wing writers came back from the Soviet Union impressed with progress in things like electrification and got caught up in it), the civil war and the capitalist countries support for the Whites, which made it easy for the Bolsheviks to excuse pretty much anything they wanted to do by claiming they were fighting foreign funded anti-Russian/anti-Soviet counter-revolutionaries, and where the anti-Bolshevik fervour in the Western press made it impossible for socialists to trust them - even when they were right about the later excesses especially under Stalin.
Left communism was still widespread enough by 1920, with left communist groups in several instances still participating in demonstrations and small scale attempted revolts and armed attacks, to make Lenin publish a pamphlet ridiculing it ("Left Communism: An Infantile Disorder"). A number of prominent left communists who had tried to remain with the Bolsheviks and try to influence the party, and many more outside it, eventually lost their lives over it as especially Stalin dialled up the terror to get full control and left communism was seen as a considerable threat.
Also note that while Haldane later became skeptical about the Soviet Union, when he wrote this article, he was well on his way to becoming a Marxist-Leninist, arguably a Stalinist. As late as 1962 he reiterated his admiration for Stalin....
Anyway, though we agree that the Marxist-Leninist/Stalinist idea of socialism was fundamentally broken, what you describe is a specific type of socialism that is quite far from the mainstream today. Most socialists are social democrats. Within social democratic parties you do find some support for co-ops, but as limited tendencies (e.g. in the UK, the Co-operative Party is in permanent alliance of some sort with the Labour Party). Within most revolutionary socialist organisations finding support for the coop movement is relatively rare, as it is seen as too limited. You do find quite a lot (to the extent you can talk of "a lot" in organisations of this size...) of support for left communist ideologies like council communism and market communism though, which share characteristics similar to those you describe.
"Left communism" is generally defined by being "to the left of Leninism" (EDIT: And many left communists does not consider Leninism a socialist ideology at all), though it is worth pointing out that Leninism in itself is not necessarily authoritarian. The left communist criticism of Leninism initially focused on the (as it turned out) well founded risk that having a vanguard party following a nearly military discipline and that was not intended to include regular people in the party decision making provided a massive potential threat if it were to be abused (as it of course ended up being - it was the ultimate cultist echo-chamber combined with a fair number of power hungry people mixed in with the idealists).
Most socialists have always been against this model, and most communists were arguably also against the leninist model until at least 1920 or so. After the April 1917 revolution, the Bolsheviks was a small-ish minority group even in Russia, next to the Mensheviks, Socialist-Revolutionaries, Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, most of whome were left communists, other forms of socialist revolutionaries, and some reformists.
After the Bolshevik coup (the October Revolution - I don't like calling it a revolution, as it only had the support of a relatively small minority - it succeeded only because the Bolshevik support was largely concentrated in a few of the big cities, giving them the ability to cease control of the still weakened government apparatus), the Leninist model gained a lot of undeserved support, and cemented its position thanks to the combination of the perceived successes of the Bolsheviks (even some fairly right wing writers came back from the Soviet Union impressed with progress in things like electrification and got caught up in it), the civil war and the capitalist countries support for the Whites, which made it easy for the Bolsheviks to excuse pretty much anything they wanted to do by claiming they were fighting foreign funded anti-Russian/anti-Soviet counter-revolutionaries, and where the anti-Bolshevik fervour in the Western press made it impossible for socialists to trust them - even when they were right about the later excesses especially under Stalin.
Left communism was still widespread enough by 1920, with left communist groups in several instances still participating in demonstrations and small scale attempted revolts and armed attacks, to make Lenin publish a pamphlet ridiculing it ("Left Communism: An Infantile Disorder"). A number of prominent left communists who had tried to remain with the Bolsheviks and try to influence the party, and many more outside it, eventually lost their lives over it as especially Stalin dialled up the terror to get full control and left communism was seen as a considerable threat.
Also note that while Haldane later became skeptical about the Soviet Union, when he wrote this article, he was well on his way to becoming a Marxist-Leninist, arguably a Stalinist. As late as 1962 he reiterated his admiration for Stalin....
Anyway, though we agree that the Marxist-Leninist/Stalinist idea of socialism was fundamentally broken, what you describe is a specific type of socialism that is quite far from the mainstream today. Most socialists are social democrats. Within social democratic parties you do find some support for co-ops, but as limited tendencies (e.g. in the UK, the Co-operative Party is in permanent alliance of some sort with the Labour Party). Within most revolutionary socialist organisations finding support for the coop movement is relatively rare, as it is seen as too limited. You do find quite a lot (to the extent you can talk of "a lot" in organisations of this size...) of support for left communist ideologies like council communism and market communism though, which share characteristics similar to those you describe.