Illegal and totally unprovoked, invasion of sovereign democratic state of Yemen. Oh wait these are not white europeans. Necessary intervention to prevent spread of antisemitic terrorist rogue state. /s
The burden of proof lies with the claim. Why would a movement work if presented with different material conditions? If we depart on the claim that bolsheviks faced different material conditions than movements today and back then in germany for example, which is what i think, then we disagree on premise.
it addresses the comparison to brain, which in any sense of an argument is very weak.
"go find the proof" is not an argument. The famines of tsar were not repeated by bolshevik policies until stalin took over. Theres my proof.
we agreed on many matters. We deviated from the topic which i would sum up as: you do not see mensheviks as marxists because they wanted bourgeois revolution before a socialist one. I have no issue with that, since i see it as making them even more marxist.
The proof was referring to trying to apply same means of revolution to a different system. Revolution agains preindustrialized feudalism doesnt prove the methods success agains developed capitalism.
The history of capitalism was not attacked by me though, i pointed out hoe insane drawing equality between the hierarchies and organization of production between feudalism and caputalism is.
yes and again capitalisn is not feudalism.
I agree the nature tells us lots of different things. And when one starts to pick seemingly related concepts he will find whatever he wants. Did you know that fascist believe that they are just intepreting biology? Same with colonialists. Thats why they are not a serious argument. Unless we talk of something innate to humans that would prevent certain specific behavior.
Yeah no. Basic logic here. When was the other famine there? After tsar before stalin? Any proof? There have been years with bad yields, but because the feudal system was still not completely destroyed, it was quite adapted to the conditions. This one is on the collectivization. Yeah i know about the aid. Im not implying thay they wanted people to starve. im showing how efficient central planning can be. I also found taugers work and debate. The aid is pragmatic, and is unrelated to the point of efficiency of central planing vs decentralized system. Im not just talking about ukraine, also volga region for example.
Well again you provide no historical proof against a industrialized capitalist system. Trying to argue that it will work the same is the opposite of mhistorical materialism.
Ok here I dont know where to begin. Well lets beginwoth capitalism. Why was the bourgeois revolution so violent precisely against feudal lords. If the structure is the same why were their estates privatized in sich a manner? Why did feudalist system not develop industries? Why is marxs critique not applied to feudalism also, when they could be used interchangebly. You use some wording that yannis has used and try to claim that pretty much all marxists and even most economists dont understand what they talk about.
i agree with the scaling argument. Thats why the soviets and factory committees were founded, so that they could be what controlls the production as informed and effective as possible. Yes these hierarchies evolve in ant colonies for example. You know the workers do what they must and will die if the colony chooses so. I must admit that i fail to see the relevancy. A worst social darwinist could use such an argument.
Yet weirdly enough, despite the scapegoat of kulaks, the worst year of the famine coincided with the worst yield. And the famine was most pronounced in the argricultural regions. Note that this would not have happened if the regional soviets were in control, because they would know the yield. Centralization is effective, just not when it comes to knowing information that is decentralized. Then it becomes incredibly uninformed. Again note that this has nothing to do with workers controlling their production. Giving away more grain than you produce was an example of how marxist these policies and organization were.
Some were, many werent. Actually the most populous ones, the largest ones, were definitely not.
Again without proof. Counterexamples: during the 1930s crisis the unions in us were incredibly strong, 1960s and i guess crises in general.
Yes it was a revolution against a preindustrial and mostly feudal monarchy. It baffles me how you want to infer something about how this would work against a late capitalist industrialized system.
The point of capitalist development is relevant to a historical materialist. I hope that we will agree that the hierarchy of owbership is radically different under feudal monarchy and developed industrialized capitalism. The means of production were in the hands of the state controlled by the party, controlled by the central committee or politburo. I would prefer if they were not only in the hands of the workers, but also in their control. I dont think that the workers appreciated under stalins decision for example that they had to give out more grain than they produced. Means of production were truly only in their hands, not control.
Well lets not forget western history. A materialist may expect this consciousness during crises and unions to rise in numbers. 1960s for example. In the us very large part of the population simply democratically and actively opposed in no small part their current material conditions and chose to not adhere to the capitalist line. Yes the fbi crushed many of these movements, but they very much emerged democrstically, from the material conditions. Assault the workforce, you will get dissent.
I partially agree, but this is common to all marxists, that this dissent needs to be organized, but in my view theres little need for the specific form of a vanguard party.
So you regard the situation in russia after 1905 or maybe even before as comparable to what either today capitalism is, or back then was? I think that first of all since russia back then was not even industrialized for any future revolutions we are essentially forced to accept marxs framework. We are not overthrowing monarchy. Also russia back then was so incredibly disorganized and non resilient that modern comparison in developed countries is very difficult. And when you say that bolshevism proved itself as good at overthrowing capitalism, my point is partially also that it wasnt exactly much capitalist like, what russia was back then. Otherwise there would be barely any difference between mensheviks and bolsheviks, since the bourgeois revolution wouldbt be needed.
Korea and vietnam would be simmilar, china as far as industrialization goes.
i dont think that we are going to be overthrowing weak poorly managed monarchies. I think that the revolution against capitalism in future will be more simmilar to marxs writing. But i also think that after that the framework of material conditions will be understood even by regular workers.
Not magically i think unionization is paramount to the revolution. The evidence could be interpreted as you do. The european nations are indeed good counterexample to marx. Germany before nazis, france in the 1968, partially greece, but there us just invaded. That being said this does not discourage democratic unionization and strikes. They are still effective we just have to adapt so that they remain effective. I think that as the exploitation will increase like now in the us, workers will feel the class struggle and recognize that they cannot remain idle. The organizers then I would prefer to be revolutionary marxists instead of just revolutionaries. Maybe we use the word differently, by marxists here i mean that workers owning the means of prod. is their main goal.
The mensheviks were far more foundational to the soviets. After the revolution the bolsheviks immediately went to centralize the hierarchy and weaken the autonomy of soviets. But yeah even bolsheviks are marxists, so there is a level of respect for the worker. I simply dont believe that they would in future actually push for the policy of workers owning their means of production and being able to be autonomous.
Well with mensheviks they did not want to be the bourgeois though. I dont know how you mean that they would create the capitalist relations. I think they simply saw capitalism as a necessary middle step and opposed bolsheviks in thinking that industrialization should be carried out after the socialist revolution.
In the marxs case capitalism does forge the proletariat through exploitation. The function of capitalist is to produce workers separated from their means of production. He also attributes inevitable centralization to capitalism and, because hes humanist, he goes to imply that when the majority of exploited workers becomes large enough, the system must undergo a revolution. His argument in my view makes sense precisely as a critique of capitalism.
i still disagree with the broad correctness. Here i side with the bolsheviks, because i still prefer their ideas on industrialization to those of stalin. Yeah i take back the comparison to tsar, sorry. I could nitpick about how in specific locations in specific periods I would be right, but overall i still would be wrong. I take that back.
Ok I think i mostly agree. We have deviated from initial topic. When marxists account for history of bolshevism, I still believe that its a certain proof of concept, and some inspiration, but I simply have big issues with how the workers are treated as stupid, i think that grassroot organization is more resilient.
Yeah but the conditions are not an excuse, there were successes and there were terrible policies. Pretending that one is without fault or not open to alternative interpretation is wrong. Mensheviks had issues so did bolsheviks.
Yes that being said its simply weird to call someome paraphrasing marx not marxist.
Well this cuts both ways, both mensheviks and bolsheviks and later stalin were responding to the conditions. Im arguing for a certain specific branch of that response.
no it is absolutely not clear, bukharin very much had plans for the industrialization and his were more consistent with bolsheviks. Stalin definetly called himself marxist. His reign was probably the lowest point of soviet communism. From eliminating any marxist dissent within the party and throrought the society, many times dissent was not even needed for elimination, to the catastrophic effects of the collectivization, which have no equally disastrous soviet policy and lets not forget how the working class, which was the one which threatened world capitalism initially, was completely brought to its knees, being oppressed in the literal sense more than even during the last tzar. True cautionary tale and most of the marxist movements today, at least that i know of, luckily for future of the working class interpret is as such.
That being said we have departed far from the topic of menshevism.
I agree and the fictional system of Lenin would be dysfunctional when mensheviks were predominant by your logic. If we want to use the historical argument we can also claim that stalin completely disregarded main bolshevik ideas during his collectivization. Does this mean that Lenin failed? Because his theory was abandoned in this case?
indeed we partially agree. It is a failure of the movement not the ideas of the individual which from certain point were disregarded. Who the organizers doesnt matter in the exact way you use, their idea which leads the organizing matters. I agree.
he as a hegelian did believe that the contradictions would arise in a capitalist society, socialism would be a reaction to it. The timing of the formation of such movement he did put at the moment when the capitalists lost their purpose. In his words it was something like the capital is increasingly centralized, one capitalist exploits the other. Then he goes on to describe how when the sole purpose of centralization of capital was met, capitalism can die. The collectivization is simply not something put forward by marx. Neither was it a particulalry bolshevist policy. They liked policies like NEP, bukharin was even more capitalist. But I agree that stalins policy was different, it was also different from typical bolshevism.
Well yeah i base this equivalence on marxs capital where he sees centralization of capital as the sole purpose of capitalism as a whole. and no when regarding bolsheviks i do mean capitalist like nep for example. Now i get that the policies are still better than pure capitalism, but they are not marxist.
the argument about stalin is a common one. The first 2 5 year plans indeed brought great successes and benefits to the population. And collectivization like stalins was never a bolshevik policy. Bukharin was far more liked in the party and seen as likely to lead after lenin. I dont know what to say about stalins policies. There are undeniable benefits, costs and we simply dont know what would bukharin bring. Probably not the purges, since his policies would be market bases probably some economic benefits. Sorry for long reply.
We speak of systems not societies. Unless you meant to say that its fiction to think that russians perhaps were able to govern themselves. That in reality the proletariat was so stupid that such thing is only fiction. Very marxist of you.
They abandoned her because they were reformists. She was not. Not her fault. Also mensheviks were the initial organizers not bolsheviks.
yeah and they "failed" in one case, very consistent. By this method trotskys and bukharis also failed
no it was not them doing that part though, thats not even the argument
yeah i suppose i just agree too much with marx and majority of marxists. You know he seems to think that capitalism is necessary to centralise capital and the extreme exploitation of labor at that point gives rise to some socialist movement. See bolsheviks somewhat implicitly agreed and intended to use quite capitalist policies to transform the society into one thats more centralized. Thats in part why they were a rightist deviation from the marxist movement. The way in which stalin then proceeded with the collectivization was not whay was popular between bolsheviks during lenin.
I think for now most objective would be "actions consistent with genocide" and war crimes. That being said most prominent human rights organizations do classify it as genocide. Here i think bias was referring to nonfactual reporting, so translations or what some people dispute bears no value.