Gradualism and
revolution
TO
MANY, the word 'revolution' conjures up visions of barricades and
public executions. All it means is a complete change, without any
implication as to how that change is to come about. The Socialist Party
of Great Britain stands for a revolution in the basis of society, a
complete change from class to common ownership of the means of
production and distribution: this social revolution to be carried out
democratically by the use of political power. It is possible for a
majority of socialist workers to win power through democratic
institutions, by use of the ballot and Parliament, for the purpose of
carrying out the socialist revolution. Thus we stand for democratic
revolutionary political action.
In the past, and to a much
smaller extent today, others who claimed to stand for Socialism
advocated what they thought was an alternative method: by working,
under capitalism, to induce the government to enact reform measures
favourable to workers. They stood for reformist political action which
they hoped would gradually transform capitalism into Socialism without
the need for class-conscious workers' political action: this policy was
called gradualism.
In Britain the leading gradualist thinkers
were in the Fabian Society formed in 1884. The Fabians held that by
'permeating' the civil service and the working class and 'middle class'
organisations they could gradually change society. Their real aim was
State capitalism in which they saw themselves as the most suitable top
administrators. Gradualism, as expounded by the Fabians and adopted by
the Labour Party, has always been the dominant reformist theory in
Britain. Labour leaders here have always rejected Marx and never even
claimed to be revolutionary.
The situation was different on the
Continent a=d especi¬ally in Germany, where there were large
parties,
supported by millions of workers, claiming to be Marxist and to stand
for a revolutionary policy. The German Social Democratic Party was the
largest and most influential of these parties; but at the turn of the
century it was rent by a controversy over gradualism which became known
as Revisionism.
Edward Bernstein, a close friend of Engels,
spent many years in exile in London and it has been suggested that he
was greatly influenced by the Fabians. He attacked the main tenets of
Marxism and called upon the Social Democratic Party to recognise that
they were in reality only a reform party. He suggested that they be
honest with themselves and drop their ultimate commitment to the
capture of power for Socialism and instead concentrate on getting
reforms within capitalism by working through Parliament, the
co-operatives, the trade unions and local councils, and even by
co-operating with non-socialist parties.
Bernstein and his
supporters were answered and refuted by the arguments of men like Karl
Kautsky who had a better grasp of Marx's writings and who did a great
deal to popularise them. The German Social Democratic Party turned down
Bernstein's suggestions but the decision meant nothing as far as the
party's practical policy was concerned. They retained their paper
commitment to the socialist revolution but continued their day-to-day
reformist practices. For it was on the basis of reforms not Socialism
that their mass support amongst the German workers rested. In time, as
their attitude to the first world war was dramatically to show, they
became bogged down in reformist politics and prisoners of their
non-socialist and patriotic supporters so that they lost all claim to
be called a socialist party. Even opponents of revisionism such as
Kautsky were ready to defend the idea that a socialist party could
engage in reform politics. Like the gradualists, they also had some odd
\iews about Socialism, equating it with nationalisation by a democratic
state and holding that the wages system and buying and selling were
quite compatible with the common ownership of the means of production.
Their ultimate aim, like that of the Fabians, was State capitalism —
not Socialism.
The question of reform and revolution was
discussed not only in Germany but throughout Europe and America. In the
English-speaking world, parties with Socialism supposedly as their aim
had failed to attract mass support even for reforms. This had the
advantage of allowing them the chance to look at the question in an
objective manner since they did not have to worry so much how their
answer might offend their non-socialist supporters. One important view
to emerge was that the way to avoid the dangers of reformism was for a
socialist party to seek support for Socialism alone and not to campaign
for so-called immediate demands within capitalism. This view was held
by some members of the Socialist Party of Canada, the Socialist Party
of America and the Socialist Labour Party of America. In Britain it was
advocated within the Social Democratic Federation by a group which in
1904 left to set up the Socialist Party of Great Britain.
That a
socialist party should not advocate reforms has always been the policy
of the Socialist Party of Great Britain. This is not to say that
reforms can never bring any benefit to the workers. Some can and do,
while many are futile or harmful. But a socialist party which advocates
reforms would attract the support of people interested more in these
reforms than in Socialism. In these circumstances the party would be
dragged into compromise with capitalism and so in the end become merely
another reform party even if it still proclaimed Socialism as its
ultimate aim. As Socialism can only be set up when a majority of
workers understand and want it, a socialist party must build up support
for this aim alone. Support gained on any other basis is quite useless,
even harmful.
Despite the existence there of large Social
Democratic parties, Europe was both socially and politically less
advanced than Britain (where capitalism had long eliminated the peasant
class) and North America (which had never known feudalism). In Europe
significant remnants d feudalism survived; the workers were only a
minority amidst a population if peasants, artisans and small traders;
many still thought of revolution in terms of a band of conspirators
setting up barricades in a bid to seize important civic buildings much
as had happened in France in 1830, in many other European cities in
1848 and in Italy in the 1860s.
This tradition put many of the
European opponents of reformism on the wrong track. They mistakenly
argued that it was parliamentary politics that had led the Social
Democratic parties astray and that political power for Socialism could
only be won through an armed uprising. Thus the reform and revolution
controversy tended to resolve itself into Parliament versus
insurrection, in which both sides assumed that parliamentary action
must be reformist.
As capitalism developed, insurrection as a
way to political power became more and more obviously outmoded. The
advocates of parliamentary action, even though reformists, were able
effectively to refute the advocates of armed uprisings. Later many of
these, especially under the influence of Bolshevism, went from bad to
worse and agitated for minority coups of the kind opposed by Marx and
Engels as far back as 1848. The European opponents of reformism thus
ended up in a blind alley.
The Socialist Party of Great
Britain's contribution to socialist theory lies in having worked out a
satisfactory solution to the problem of reform and revolution based on
the revolutionary use of democratic institutions, including Parliament,
to achieve Socialism. Parliament had only been used by the Social
Democrats to get reforms and it was assumed that this was the only
purpose for which it could be used. Our contribution was to point out
that this was a false conclusion and that there was no reason why
Parliament could not be used by a class-conscious socialist majority to
win power for the socialist revolution.
The two futile policies
of insurrection and reformism can be avoided by building up a socialist
party composed of and supported by convinced socialists only. When a
majority of workers are socialist-minded and organised, they can use
their votes to elect to Parliament and the local councils delegates
pledged to use political power for the one revolutionary act of
dispossessing the capitalist class by converting the meaas of
production and distribution into the property of the wbole community |
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