The Return Of Euro Stalinism

I was watching some of the TUC debates today, and was struck by the extent to which the approaches being pursued amount to a rehashing of those stale, failed, and often reactionary ideas of Euro-Stalinism, put forward in the 1980's that were symbolised by the Alternative Economic Strategy. I was also thinking about the roots of those ideas.

Trotsky argued that Stalinism took on the ideas of Menshevism. But, Menshevism is just another name for Reformism. The social roots of reformism are the Trades Unions whose function is to preserve Capitalism by limiting the workers to simply bargaining within it with a consequent implication that, ultimately, bosses and workers have a shared common interest. The mass unions created by the “New Unionism” at the end of the 19th Century absorbed that ideology from the existing Craft Unions. Marx and Engels analysed the craft unions, and saw in them vestiges of the old Feudal Guild Monopolies. These unions, basing themselves on that craft exclusivity, and the limitations it placed on entrance into these trades – rather like similar restrictions exist today for entrance into the professions – enabled them to secure for themselves enhanced wages and conditions. Given that the Craft Guilds out of which they emerged were based on the idea that their was a progression up to the position of Master, it is not surprising that an ideology of shared interest, and bargaining developed. Moreover, in a period in which Britain itself held a Monopolistic position within the world market, and through its Feudal relations in the Empire, it was possible for the Monopoly Profits so obtained to be shared to a small extent, with such a group of workers who themselves were able to benefit from having their own partial monopoly. They became as Engels described them, an Aristocracy of Labour.

Just as the old feudal monopolies were reactionary, and Capitalist Competition performed a hugely revolutionary role in sweeping them away, so the remnants of them within the Craft Unions was reactionary. The way forward towards Socialism did not, and does not reside in attempts to limit the revolutionary role of competition in driving forward innovation, and to putting in its place modern versions of those old feudal monopolies, restrictions, and regulations that foster reactionary ideas about protectionism of various kinds – and which under current conditions can only enhance the idea of shared common interests with Capital (workers in a private firm are encouraged to see their future as tied to its future, State Employees are encouraged to see their interests as tied to the preservation of that State Monopoly) – but in utilising that revolutionary force in the interests of workers. Workers real enemy is not Competition, but Capital, i.e. their divorce from ownership of the means of production. In the absence of the ability to adequately plan economic relations – which is not likely to arise until well into the first stage of Socialism – then, in reality, Competition remains the most powerful weapon, the most revolutionary tool to be used by workers to drive forward technological development, efficiency, and their own economic and social position. Their interests lie not in attempts to return to those old feudalist restrictions, but in regaining ownership of the means of production.

I was reading an old interview done by Geoff Foote with Tony Benn in 1982, the other day.
Foote, in dealing with the AES and the Corporatism of the Welfare State put to Benn the view that Marx had outlined when he said of English socialists like Thomas Hodgskin, that they “did not like capitalists very much, but wished to retain Capital.” (Capital & Class 17 p19) That seems to be a good description except that much of the Left has its sights badly adjusted so that instead of focussing its fire on the Capitalists, they aim short and hit instead the ranks of the middle classes.

That was what came out in some of the debates I saw today. I was particularly struck by it, in relation to a number of contributions in relation to the idea of a High Pay Commission. I dealt with most of the arguments about why such a proposal is a bad idea for workers in my blog Beware Greeks Bearing Gifts.

“At the moment the talk only seems to surround the high pay of people in top Executive positions. The Labourite Compass Group have been talking about the establishment of a High Pay Commission. Its not clear how the extraordianrily high pay of Pop Stars would be controlled, for example. Would it just mean setting a limit, and then allowing the recording company to make even bigger profits from not having to pay the singers so much? Or would it mean introducing some kind of sliding scale of prices of music so that the more succesful a record, and the more a singer would make from it the lower the price of that song became to reduce the income? Would this High Pay Commission decide how much different footballers were worth, and thereby set the transfer fees accordingly?”

What, in fact, this kind of reactionary nonsense opens up is the possibility, accepted as necessary in the AES, of introducing an Incomes Policy across the whole of the economy. In fact, I had to laugh when listening to a delegate from the University Lecturers making this argument in relation to the difference between the salary of a University Vice Chancellor and an ordinary lecturer. I could not help but put myself in the place of the poor worker slaving away in McDonalds, who would look at the lecturer, and think, “Bloody good idea, but why are you earning so much more than me, shouldn't we reduce your salary too?” That is where this kind of bureaucratic, regulatory approach leads. But, the same kind of protectionist arguments were used in relation to the whole of the debates over the Public Sector. And that is not surprising, because the Public Sector now stands in a similar relation to the rest of the working class that those old craft unions stood, as an aristocracy of labour, to workers in the 19th century. Just as those old Craft Unions benefited from the Monopoly position of Britain, and benefited from their own partial Monopoly position in relation to the supply of labour, so too Public Sector workers benefit from the Monopoly position of the Capitalist State, and benefit from their own partial monopoly position within it, arising from the strength of the Public Sector unions, which is where the vast majority of all unionised workers are to be found.

That old craft unionism based on such monopolies led to reactionary demands to hold back the kinds of changes that eventually led to the deskilling of jobs, and growth of a mass of unskilled workers who formed the backbone of the “New Unionism”. It also led to the support of reactionary, protectionist ideas, because it was clear that the position of those craft workers was directly linked to a continuation of the Empire, and of Britain's privileged position in world trade. I have given a flavour of those debates, and the divisions within the Movement in my blog 1905 – Reform & Revolution, about the TUC Congress that took place in that year here in Stoke, and which took the decisions on setting up the Labour Party. Much of the debate surrounding the Public Sector has that same ideology of protectionism about it that the debates over Import Controls, and the AES had in the 1970's and 1980's.

In his “Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism”, Lenin set out why, although these Monopolies would suffer these kinds of inefficiencies, it was reactionary to try to turn the clock back.

“Kautsky broke with Marxism by advocating in the epoch of finance capital a “reactionary ideal”, “peaceful democracy”, “the mere operation of economic factors”, for objectively this ideal drags us back from monopoly to non-monopoly capitalism, and is a reformist swindle.

Trade with Egypt (or with any other colony or semi-colony) “would have grown more” without military occupation, without imperialism, and without finance capital. What does this mean? That capitalism would have developed more rapidly if free competition had not been restricted by monopolies in general, or by the “connections”, yoke (i.e., also the monopoly) of finance capital, or by the monopolist possession of colonies by certain countries?

Kautsky’s argument can have no other meaning; and this “meaning” is meaningless. Let us assume that free competition, without any sort of monopoly, would have developed capitalism and trade more rapidly. But the more rapidly trade and capitalism develop, the greater is the concentration of production and capital which gives rise to monopoly. And monopolies have already arisen—precisely out of free competition! Even if monopolies have now begun to retard progress, it is not an argument in favour of free competition, which has become impossible after it has given rise to monopoly.

Whichever way one turns Kautsky’s argument, one will find nothing in it except reaction and bourgeois reformism.”

In Capital, Marx said that Competition breeds Monopoly, but in turn Monopoly breeds Competition. What he meant was that the normal process of centralisation and concentration of Capital that arises from competition leads logically to the establishment of ever larger companies that exert a Monopoly position. As Engels elaborates in “Anti-Duhring”, the logic of this process is that Capital becomes concentrated in Trusts, and cartels, and eventually into State Capitalism, which is the biggest Monopoly of all. However, competition itself had arisen because of the limitations, the inefficiencies of the Guild Monopolies, and the same causes would mean that large capitalist Monopolies would suffer similar inefficiencies, which would lead to the development of competition against them – a classic example is the way the Monopoly of IBM was laid low, by a few young blokes working out of a garage who provided IBM with its operating system, and went on to become Microsoft!

So Lenin is absolutely correct in rejecting the reactionary and reformist ideas put forward by Stalinism of things such as an “Anti-Monopoly Alliance”, and the arguments he put forward here, along with those put forward by Engels in Anti-Duhring are the basis of why Marxists oppose privatisation i.e. it is a step backwards to a form of Capitalist property whose day has gone, and whose logic is in any case only a reconstitution of Monopoly and State Capitalism! But, Marxists, again basing themselves on these arguments of Marx, Engels and Lenin most certainly do not commit themselves to a defence of Monopoly or State Capitalism on the basis that it is in some way “better”, more efficient, more equitable, more socialist! And, on that basis there is no reason to argue from a “protectionist” stance FOR Monopoly or State Capitalism. Lenin's objection to Kautsky was the idea that such a return to free competition could be legislated. It is not that concretely, in some instances new more vibrant enterprises might arise that can supplant the old monopolies. And to the extent they can do so it is not in the interests of Marxists to stand in their way. Our job is not to act as arbiter between one form of capitalism and another, but to argue for Socialism, for direct workers ownership of the means of production to both.

And, in fact, it is clear how reactionary these ideas are when they are considered closely. Margaret Thatcher once argued that there was “No such thing as society” by which she meant that there were only self-serving individuals who come into relation with one another in a Smithian sort of way to provide for each other the things they need naturally out of the drive to maximise their own benefits. The Left naturally rejected such an idea, pointing to the fact that even under Capitalism there is considerable evidence of that “Selfish Gene” that Dawkins describes at play, which leads naturally to compassion, co-operation and so on unrelated to any immediate economic motive. We rejected the idea that the only way in which society and production could be organised was on the basis of individualism. Yet, much of the Left's rejection of Cameron's “Big Society” idea has rested on arguments which are essentially an acceptance of that Thatcherite ideology, or else an acceptance of that other mainstay of bourgeois ideology, the idea that Socialism is impossible, because workers will always require some Capitalist, be it private or State, to provide the capital, and to organise production. It is a measure of the extent to which the working-class, and even those who consider themselves “Marxists” remain trapped within bourgeois ideology.