Re: Reasons for the restoration of capitalism in the USSR
Posted: Sat Jun 24, 2023 11:40 am
About the brochure "The Reasons for the Restoration of Capitalism in the USSR"
No. 6/82.VI.2023
The brochure by A. Redin “ The Reasons for the Restoration of Capitalism in the USSR ” , published in 2018, is a summary of the theoretical developments that were presented on the pages of the Proryv magazine, mainly in articles authored by V. Podguzov.
In short, this work is required reading for any novice Marxist - it is a good help in studying and systematizing knowledge in the field, primarily the theory of building communism. More details about the pamphlet will be discussed below, but to begin with, it is worth saying a few words about the views that are in circulation in the left movement on the problem of the restoration of capitalism in the USSR.
How does the positivist approach to the study of history differ from the scientific, that is, Marxist, approach? Where a Marxist aims to reveal the essence through his comprehensive study on the basis of diamatic methodology, the positivist will prefer to confine himself to a dry description of the facts of the process under consideration, absolutizing them and other particulars, ignoring at the same time the need to identify the general. Unfortunately, when attempting to establish the causes of the restoration of capitalism in the Soviet Union, the majority of Russian-speaking leftists prefer to confine themselves to the descriptive side of the study. The most common example of such a limited description is the release of certain aspects of the economic history of the USSR (the so-called Kosygin reform, the abolition of the MTS, Gorbachev's "reforms", etc.). ) for the cause of the defeat of the Soviet working class. Trotskyism, with its concepts of bureaucratic degeneration, has not disappeared anywhere in the left movement. There are even eccentrics who are trying to smuggle into the left space the Menshevik ideas crushed by Lenin about the unpreparedness of Russia at the beginning of the 20th century for socialist transformations. No matter how much the opinions of the left differ about the reasons for the rollback of our society back to capitalism, these opinions are united by the fact that they were developed with insufficient methodological consistency.
In order not to lose this consistency in the study, it is necessary to first understand the essence of such a category as “cause”. This is the opening of Redin's pamphlet. Standing firmly on the foundation of the Marxist method, the author considers the cause as an integral part of its dialectical unity with its opposite, that is, with the effect. Such a view makes it possible to avoid erroneous judgments that pass off the petty-bourgeois nature of the masses, market mechanisms of cost accounting, and other prerequisites and conditions for the restoration of capitalism as its cause. And it is precisely the absence of such a view among the majority of the left that leads to the fact that the cause of this or that phenomenon is searched for among a large number of events preceding the phenomenon through the use of philistine "common sense".
From a presentation of the diamatics of cause and effect, the author proceeds to a presentation of the diamatics of objective and subjective in the life of society, since without understanding it it is impossible to understand formational theory in general and the process of transition from capitalism to communism in particular. Anti-Marxist propaganda in every possible way replicates the myth of Marxism as vulgar economic determinism. Again, the views of many leftists who have a schematic understanding of historical materialism serve as grounds for this kind of propaganda. The schematic nature of their understanding is expressed primarily in the reduction of social processes to automatism, in the separation of society from the specific individuals in which this society manifests itself. An example of this kind of schematism is the opinion that
In fact, the successful building of communism is the conscious activity of people carried out in strict accordance with the objectively existing laws of expanded social reproduction, and therefore the success of communist construction directly depends on the degree to which the vanguard of the working class has assimilated the laws of development of society, on the ability to organize their work in accordance with these laws, from the conformity of the subject of social transformations to the requirements of objective reality—this is precisely the identity of subject and object. Accordingly, the failure of the cause of the working class in the Soviet Union can be explained by the discrepancy between the subjective factor in the person of the CPSU and the laws of building communism.
Before turning to a direct statement of the reasons for the restoration of capitalism in the country of the Soviets, Redin makes a critical review of the most popular concepts in the left environment that explain the defeat suffered by the Soviet people. Of particular interest in this section is a short but capacious essay on the history of Soviet planning, given in connection with the analysis of the idea of Kosygin's reforms as the reason for the restoration of capitalism in the USSR. The author's view of the economic history of the USSR is an example of a scientific, and therefore dialectical, view of the lower phase of communism (socialism) as a process of struggle of communist relations with the rudiments of past formations, as a process of movement from formal socialization to actual socialization. Since, after the working class took power, the relations characteristic of exploitative formations do not disappear immediately and all at once, the communists have to take into account their presence; in the case of our country, this accounting was, among other things, the forced use of market mechanisms in the form of self-financing.
If we look at the economic policy of the USSR in dynamics, in development, it becomes clear that the problem is not the existence of cost accounting as such, but the absence of actions aimed at eliminating the conditions that make cost accounting necessary. In the Lenin-Stalin years, the top party leadership, using market mechanisms in the economy, realized the need to overcome them as soon as possible, and therefore the movement towards the actual socialization of the means of production was successful, the policy of overcoming value relations was carried out, in the struggle between the communist and non-communist principles, the first was in the lead. In the late Soviet years, on the contrary, with the light hand of market economists, self-financing began to be considered as something taken for granted, and therefore there could no longer be any talk of any policy of building communism.
As can be seen from the history of the so-called Kosygin reforms, such actions in the economic sphere are not the cause of capitalist restoration, but a manifestation of a larger problem - the problem of the incompetence of the party leadership in the field of the theory of building communism and, more broadly, in the field of the theory of Marxism as such. Therefore, to establish the cause of the restoration of capitalism in the USSR means to establish the cause of the theoretically and practically sad situation in which the vanguard of the Soviet working class finds itself. The third section of Redin's pamphlet is dedicated to this task.
Having previously deepened the understanding of opportunism, the author states that the reason for the restoration of capitalism in the Soviet Union was the opportunistic degeneration, first of all, of the leadership of the CPSU. A significant role in this was played by the principle of democratic centralism, the mechanisms of which greatly facilitated the activities of the opportunists. Proceeding from this, it can be understood that the development of organizational principles that would reduce the likelihood of an opportunistic degeneration of the Communist Party is one of the main tasks of modern times for Marxists. This task is now being carried out by the activists of the Proryv magazine and the Proryvist newspaper as part of the development of the theory of scientific centralism.
Scientific centralism, excluding democracy from organizational principles, admits to decision-making only those who have proven in practice their Marxist (and therefore scientific) competence. Scientific centralism does not permit the opposition of practice and theoretical work—the actualization of Marxist theory is one of the components of communist practice. Scientific centralism, finally, is not ready to blindly put up with the illiteracy of the masses of the party—for a bourgeois party, the general illiteracy of the masses of the party is completely normal, while in the communist party the intellectual gap between the leaders and the rank and file, inevitable at first due to capitalist existence, must be overcome as intensively as possible.
Today, everyone who really wants to work for the cause of communism is obliged to actively engage in self-education, while simultaneously carrying out theoretical and organizational work. At this stage, the best, if not the only, way to carry out theoretical and organizational work is to strengthen breakthrough publications. The study of Redin's pamphlet will greatly facilitate the novice Marxist's careful analysis of the victories and defeats of the Soviet working class - an analysis without which theoretical work is now unthinkable.
E. Polovinko
15/06/2023
https://prorivists.org/82_response/
No. 6/82.VI.2023
The brochure by A. Redin “ The Reasons for the Restoration of Capitalism in the USSR ” , published in 2018, is a summary of the theoretical developments that were presented on the pages of the Proryv magazine, mainly in articles authored by V. Podguzov.
In short, this work is required reading for any novice Marxist - it is a good help in studying and systematizing knowledge in the field, primarily the theory of building communism. More details about the pamphlet will be discussed below, but to begin with, it is worth saying a few words about the views that are in circulation in the left movement on the problem of the restoration of capitalism in the USSR.
How does the positivist approach to the study of history differ from the scientific, that is, Marxist, approach? Where a Marxist aims to reveal the essence through his comprehensive study on the basis of diamatic methodology, the positivist will prefer to confine himself to a dry description of the facts of the process under consideration, absolutizing them and other particulars, ignoring at the same time the need to identify the general. Unfortunately, when attempting to establish the causes of the restoration of capitalism in the Soviet Union, the majority of Russian-speaking leftists prefer to confine themselves to the descriptive side of the study. The most common example of such a limited description is the release of certain aspects of the economic history of the USSR (the so-called Kosygin reform, the abolition of the MTS, Gorbachev's "reforms", etc.). ) for the cause of the defeat of the Soviet working class. Trotskyism, with its concepts of bureaucratic degeneration, has not disappeared anywhere in the left movement. There are even eccentrics who are trying to smuggle into the left space the Menshevik ideas crushed by Lenin about the unpreparedness of Russia at the beginning of the 20th century for socialist transformations. No matter how much the opinions of the left differ about the reasons for the rollback of our society back to capitalism, these opinions are united by the fact that they were developed with insufficient methodological consistency.
In order not to lose this consistency in the study, it is necessary to first understand the essence of such a category as “cause”. This is the opening of Redin's pamphlet. Standing firmly on the foundation of the Marxist method, the author considers the cause as an integral part of its dialectical unity with its opposite, that is, with the effect. Such a view makes it possible to avoid erroneous judgments that pass off the petty-bourgeois nature of the masses, market mechanisms of cost accounting, and other prerequisites and conditions for the restoration of capitalism as its cause. And it is precisely the absence of such a view among the majority of the left that leads to the fact that the cause of this or that phenomenon is searched for among a large number of events preceding the phenomenon through the use of philistine "common sense".
From a presentation of the diamatics of cause and effect, the author proceeds to a presentation of the diamatics of objective and subjective in the life of society, since without understanding it it is impossible to understand formational theory in general and the process of transition from capitalism to communism in particular. Anti-Marxist propaganda in every possible way replicates the myth of Marxism as vulgar economic determinism. Again, the views of many leftists who have a schematic understanding of historical materialism serve as grounds for this kind of propaganda. The schematic nature of their understanding is expressed primarily in the reduction of social processes to automatism, in the separation of society from the specific individuals in which this society manifests itself. An example of this kind of schematism is the opinion that
In fact, the successful building of communism is the conscious activity of people carried out in strict accordance with the objectively existing laws of expanded social reproduction, and therefore the success of communist construction directly depends on the degree to which the vanguard of the working class has assimilated the laws of development of society, on the ability to organize their work in accordance with these laws, from the conformity of the subject of social transformations to the requirements of objective reality—this is precisely the identity of subject and object. Accordingly, the failure of the cause of the working class in the Soviet Union can be explained by the discrepancy between the subjective factor in the person of the CPSU and the laws of building communism.
Before turning to a direct statement of the reasons for the restoration of capitalism in the country of the Soviets, Redin makes a critical review of the most popular concepts in the left environment that explain the defeat suffered by the Soviet people. Of particular interest in this section is a short but capacious essay on the history of Soviet planning, given in connection with the analysis of the idea of Kosygin's reforms as the reason for the restoration of capitalism in the USSR. The author's view of the economic history of the USSR is an example of a scientific, and therefore dialectical, view of the lower phase of communism (socialism) as a process of struggle of communist relations with the rudiments of past formations, as a process of movement from formal socialization to actual socialization. Since, after the working class took power, the relations characteristic of exploitative formations do not disappear immediately and all at once, the communists have to take into account their presence; in the case of our country, this accounting was, among other things, the forced use of market mechanisms in the form of self-financing.
If we look at the economic policy of the USSR in dynamics, in development, it becomes clear that the problem is not the existence of cost accounting as such, but the absence of actions aimed at eliminating the conditions that make cost accounting necessary. In the Lenin-Stalin years, the top party leadership, using market mechanisms in the economy, realized the need to overcome them as soon as possible, and therefore the movement towards the actual socialization of the means of production was successful, the policy of overcoming value relations was carried out, in the struggle between the communist and non-communist principles, the first was in the lead. In the late Soviet years, on the contrary, with the light hand of market economists, self-financing began to be considered as something taken for granted, and therefore there could no longer be any talk of any policy of building communism.
As can be seen from the history of the so-called Kosygin reforms, such actions in the economic sphere are not the cause of capitalist restoration, but a manifestation of a larger problem - the problem of the incompetence of the party leadership in the field of the theory of building communism and, more broadly, in the field of the theory of Marxism as such. Therefore, to establish the cause of the restoration of capitalism in the USSR means to establish the cause of the theoretically and practically sad situation in which the vanguard of the Soviet working class finds itself. The third section of Redin's pamphlet is dedicated to this task.
Having previously deepened the understanding of opportunism, the author states that the reason for the restoration of capitalism in the Soviet Union was the opportunistic degeneration, first of all, of the leadership of the CPSU. A significant role in this was played by the principle of democratic centralism, the mechanisms of which greatly facilitated the activities of the opportunists. Proceeding from this, it can be understood that the development of organizational principles that would reduce the likelihood of an opportunistic degeneration of the Communist Party is one of the main tasks of modern times for Marxists. This task is now being carried out by the activists of the Proryv magazine and the Proryvist newspaper as part of the development of the theory of scientific centralism.
Scientific centralism, excluding democracy from organizational principles, admits to decision-making only those who have proven in practice their Marxist (and therefore scientific) competence. Scientific centralism does not permit the opposition of practice and theoretical work—the actualization of Marxist theory is one of the components of communist practice. Scientific centralism, finally, is not ready to blindly put up with the illiteracy of the masses of the party—for a bourgeois party, the general illiteracy of the masses of the party is completely normal, while in the communist party the intellectual gap between the leaders and the rank and file, inevitable at first due to capitalist existence, must be overcome as intensively as possible.
Today, everyone who really wants to work for the cause of communism is obliged to actively engage in self-education, while simultaneously carrying out theoretical and organizational work. At this stage, the best, if not the only, way to carry out theoretical and organizational work is to strengthen breakthrough publications. The study of Redin's pamphlet will greatly facilitate the novice Marxist's careful analysis of the victories and defeats of the Soviet working class - an analysis without which theoretical work is now unthinkable.
E. Polovinko
15/06/2023
https://prorivists.org/82_response/