A Future That Works

A Future That Works
NO2aTory/Liberal coalition - Vote with your feet for an alternative to a neo-liberal economy and neo-conservative state Yes2aLeftFront and a Red/Green Left Alliance

Thursday 19 May 2011

Britain’s Road to Socialism, what is to be done?

Lenin like Marx understood that for a socialist transformation of society to succeed it needed to be international and specifically it needed to occur in the advanced capitalist democracies of Europe and Britain. After the Soviet revolution and after the death of Lenin, Joe Stalin adopted a policy of socialism in one country partly as a consequence of the reality that the revolution had failed to spread to Western Europe after the First World War but also as an ideological position. I think the historic evidence shows us that under such hostile conditions surrounded by global capitalism the Soviet Union developed a siege mentality and became very authoritarian an bureaucratic, a more democratic socialist mode such as Yugoslavia couldn’t resist the economic and political pressures of international capitalism, Vietnam and Cuba as well as China are introducing market mechanisms in order that they can compete in a global capitalist world.

If we accept for a moment that the future options for humanity are socialism or as Lenin and Luxemburg put it the barbarism of capitalism. I would argue that globalisation represents the phase of capitalism described by Lenin as its imperialist highest and final stage which would suggest we are in that final phase where we face the barbarism of neo-liberal/neo-conservative global capitalism or I would argue an eco-socialist alternative. If this is the case then it’s the role of the Marxist-Leninist vanguard parties to take the lead in resisting the neo-liberal/neo-conservative agenda of the British state and European super state.

Capitalism has become global and Lenin noted that the advanced states of Europe were amongst the dominate states and supported everything backward. This is the reality again and the only way we will successfully challenge the British and European ruling classes is if we fight as a united front. Otherwise I believe we are retreating from the struggle and looking backwards to the safety of old certainties as they were perceived when the Soviet Union seemed to represent the future for socialism. That’s not the reality today even if it seemed plausible fifty years ago, so the challenge is to face the historical reality of the 21st century and create a broad left front across Europe and Scandinavia against the institutions of the capitalist classes and capitalist state and super state. Any other response is a retreat from the class struggle and therefore not Marxist or Leninist, it may be Stalinist but we know that Stalinism became anti-democratic, bureaucratic and therefore anti-Marxist and anti-Leninist, this isn’t Trotskyism it’s a reassessment of scientific historical-materialist evidence which any Marxist-Leninist has to face or they are not a dialectic-materialist.

7 comments:

  1. This is the only way that Britain can achieve a realistic road to socialism, as part of a European road to socialism. Stuart Holland was proposing something of this sort back in the 1980’s and worked closely with Tony Benn, Eric Heffer and Michael Meacher. As we know Francois Mitterrand tried to achieve a socialist economic model for France and Jacques Delors attempted to create a European social model in the 1980’s and 1990’s so it wouldn’t be easy but I would argue it’s near impossible for Britain to do it alone. So I am saying if we are serious about being more than a resistance movement in permanent retreat in the face of the forces of British, European and global capitalism then we have to take the battle for socialism beyond the borders of Britain. Taking a purely British road to socialism in the political and economic historical material reality of the 21st century is infantile idealism and doesn’t relate to the dialectic-materialist scientific evidence of the global political economy.

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  2. Europe Against Austerity Conference 1st October 2011

    Will the Communist Party be a part of this European fightback?

    ‘‘Communist Party of Britain and the Young Communist League opposed the ELP as it reflected and accepted the structures of the anti-democratic, neoliberal and imperialist EU’’

    (Mick Carty, Acting general secretary, Young Communist League)

    http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/content/view/full/108790


    The TUC ‘‘March for the Alternative’’ represented a renewed working- class consciousness in response to the neo-liberal and neo-conservative attack on the social-democratic compromise achieved by the labour movement after 1945. We see the Keynesian model of welfare capitalism being undone not just by the Tory, Labour and now Tory/Liberal coalition step by step since 1989. Since 2007 the Lisbon Treaty has produced a similar ideological change to the European Union which has now also abandoned the Keynesian model of welfare capitalism and enshrines neo-liberal and neo-conservative economic and political policies through protocols such as 12TFEU which call for strict budgetary discipline.

    The social-democratic parties of Europe have followed new-labours lead and abandoned the post 1945 compromise adopting the Anglo-American neo-liberal ideology of Thatcherism and Reaganomics. This means we face a two pronged attack on the economic, democratic and social gains achieved during the 20th century. They are not only under attack from the Tory/Liberal coalition government of Britain at Westminster but also from the economic, anti-democratic political and social policy directives from the EU.

    Kate Hudson calls on the British Left to take part in the European Left fightback

    ‘‘As the crisis has escalated it has become clear that those who run the capitalist system are prepared to do anything to protect their interests and to avoid paying for their crisis….. But many people are now recognising the limitations of solely national protest. Voices from across Europe are calling for a convergence of struggles, for fronts of resistance everywhere which will assert the primacy of human need over the demands of finance.’’

    (Kate Hudson Europe Against Austerity)

    http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/content/view/full/108344

    Does the Communist Party want to be taken seriously or not, is it going to engage in the struggle against the neo-liberal and neo-conservative agenda of the British and European capitalist classes and state/super-state or is it abdicating any claim to the title of vanguard party of the working class?

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  3. Call for a European Conference against Austerity, Cuts and Privatisation and in Defence of the Welfare State.

    The hope is that this conference will be a step towards co-ordinating the resistance by agreeing to a European-wide day of action against Austerity, Cuts and Privatisation and in Defence of our Welfare State.

    Tony Benn, President Coalition of Resistance
    Len McCluskey, Unite General Secretary
    Bob Crow, RMT General Secretary
    John McDonnell MP
    Jeremy Corbyn MP
    Caoline Lucas MP
    Jeremy Dear, NUJ General Secretary
    Lindsey German, Convenor Stop the War
    Fred Leplat, Coalition of Resistance
    Hilary Wainwright, Red Pepper
    Ken Loach,
    Imran Khan, the People’s Charter
    Chris Bambery, Secretary Right to Work campaign
    Andrew Burgin, Secretary Coalition of Resistance
    Bill Greenshields, Chair Communist Party of Britain
    Paul Mackney, former UCU General Secretary
    Clare Solomon, President ULU Students Union
    Kate Hudson
    Lee Jasper, BARAC

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  4. The hope is that this conference will be a step towards coordinating
    the resistance by agreeing to a European-wide day of action against Austerity, Cuts and Privatisation and in Defence of our Welfare State.

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  5. Film Director Ken Loach backs the conference

    ‘‘The need to organise against cuts is plain to all. It is equally clear that we need to make links with others facing similar attacks. We must not only speak of internationalism but make it a reality. It is desperately important that this conference is one step on the path of European-wide solidarity action. Good luck’’.

    http://www.europeagainstausterity.org/09/ken-loach-backs-conference-2/

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  6. Socialism in One Country was the theory promoted by Joseph Stalin that socialism could be developed in a single country, even an underdeveloped country such as Russia. This theory stated that revolution need no longer be encouraged in the capitalist countries since Russia could and should achieve socialism alone. Stalinism needs to be rejected as an outmoded dogma and bureaucratic practice which is inadequate for the historical and dialectic material reality of the 21st century. Whilst the CPB and KKE hold on to National Bolshevism they cannot play a truly leading role in the theoretical and practical fightback against neo-liberal economics and the neo-conservative state at the national, European and global level or any viable process of transforming Britain, Greece and Europe from a capitalist to a socialist social system. This theoretical inertia is at the heart of the CPB’s failure to attract and keep new members and whilst the very respectable old comrades hold control of the party through the practices of democratic centralism it will remain on the periphery of the British, European and global class struggle.

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  7. Globalization and the influence of international finance capital has as Lenin argued a hundred years ago means that only an internationalist theoretical approach will achieve lasting social change in practice, the nationalist road for Britain and other European nation states is utopian and unscientific therefore in both theory and practice.

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