ALB
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Good point. I don't think "the founders" were that enamoured of Kropotkin though they don't seem to have regarded him as as bad as some other anarchists. Here's a review of his book on the French Revolution which is not entirely hostile (only accusing him of being "idealist"):http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/1910s/1910/no-67-march-1910/kropotkin-french-revolutionIn this review of a book by French syndicalists "Prince Kropotkin" is compared favourably to them:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/1910s/1913/no-107-july-1913/how-we-are-be-saved-syndicalismThe thing about Kropotkin that Party members have liked is his anti-Social Darwinism book Mutual Aid which was favourably reviewed in the American party's journal in 1956 and on the WSPUS's list of books for sale:http://theworldsocialist.blogspot.co.uk/2008/04/paul-matticks-review-of-kropotkins.html
KAZ wrote:Y'see, that's what worries me about the SPGB and the use of Parliament. You're actually admitting here, quite reasonably, that there will be a "Transitional Period". What prevents this from becoming prolonged indefinitely? Perhaps the 'economic circumstances' aren't 'right for socialism'? Will they ever be until we have Star Trek type replicators (ie. never)? What about that 49.9 reoccuring % who didn't "vote for socialism"? Not just the capitalists but their whole brain dead crew. Are they just going to disperse quietly and return to their homes? And more to the point, what about the 50%+1? Are they really going to be fit to take over running their lives? With all the emphais on the electoral won't they still be, as Lenin said, "people as they are now, people who cannot dispense with subordination and control, and foremen and accountants"?Were you ever in the SPGB?
KAZ wrote:"r-r-revolutionary": Any idea where that SPGB meme comes from? Never heard it anywhere else.It don't think it is a "SPGB meme". A meme perhaps but not one we started. A quick search on the internet has turned up two, but there will be more: one by Zizek and this one:
Quote:I say nothing of those “revolutionaries” — save the mark! — who begin the work of organising artels by removing the bells from the churches. Just imaging removing the church bells — how r-r-revolutionary!By Stalin in 1930. See here. He wasn't talking about anarchists, though it's the sort of r-r-revolutionary thing they might do — in fact did do in Spain and more, like shooting the priest too.Since you are now moving in anarchist circles I imagine you will be coming across quite a few r-r-revolutionary windbags
alanjjohnstone wrote:https://libcom.org/library/karl-marx-state.The main article is also related to the other thread on anarchism and an interesting account of Marx and the State.This article is more than interesting. It's a vindication of our interpretation as set out in our pamphlet What's Wrong with Using Parliament?, e.g. when the auhor David Adam says
Quote:Some critics may look at a focus on the Paris Commune as bound to make Marx and Engels look very hostile to the bourgeois state, when in fact their politics were much more ambiguous. Did they not advocate participation in bourgeois elections, and the election of workers’ candidates into parliament? In fact, in certain countries, they even thought that a working class parliamentary majority could be used for a peaceful transition to socialism. For many anarchists, this is the defining aspect of Marx’s political thought, and his supposed authoritarianism is considered proven on this evidence. Leaving aside the question of the relative value of electoral politics, it is worth asking whether there is necessarily any contradiction in advocating the use of bourgeois parliaments while hoping for their eventual replacement by Communal-type organization, in other words whether one can insist on the fullest possible democratization while participating in governmental forms that are less than ideal. The anarchist assumption, of course, is that participation in bourgeois governmental forms can only help sustain such institutions. But the error comes when it is assumed that since Marx advocated such participation, he also believed in keeping the governmental forms of the bourgeois state for the period of proletarian rule.Of course today the "period of proletaran rule", i.e the use of the state by the socialist-minded, democratically-organised workng class majority to abolish class society by dispossesing the capitalist class, could be passed through fairly rapidly. But of course it has to exist for however short a period as that's what political action to establsh socialism involves.
KAZ wrote:Threw stones at the riot police, did a sit in at the local paper and set fire to a dumpster.Yes, there is a bit of a disjoint between their rhetoric and their actions, a common feature of r-r-revolutionarygroups. Bakunin was the same, a comic opera insurrectionist when it came to actully doing something.
The series finished today with Tony Benn, justified as his followers and ideas have now won the leadership of the Labour Party and may get a chance to try to put them into practice. In fact this was no doubt the justification for the whole series. Although there weren't any factual mistakes in this week's episodes their overall effect will be negative from our point of view since they will have reinforced the false impression that the Labour Party has something to do with socialism (which until Corbyn came along people had come to realise was not the case). Unfortunately we can't enforce any copyright on the meaning of the word. Still, the re-introduction of the word in mainstream politics gives us a foot in the door to say what it has, does and should mean.
Yes, but the solution is not for workers to change their eating habits (though they can if they want to) but for them to change the basis of society from class ownership to common ownership of the means of producion so that food is no longer production for profit.
KAZ wrote:'Propaganda of the deed' and 'illegalism' – obviously there were dicks back in the day too.They are still about:http://www.ekathimerini.com/226293/article/ekathimerini/news/anarchists-threaten-escalation-in-violence
I don't smoke myself but you are changing the subject. There are penty of other food faddists in the SPGB — not just vegetarians, nature cure people and partisans of various different diets, fruit juice drinkers, even vegans. People smoke all sorts of things too. So you'd be in good company if you joined. But we don't regard choice of diet as a political matter but as a private one for each member to decide for themselves.
Yes, it does seem to be endemic up there:http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/10202346.Councillors_told_to_play_nice/
When the SPGB was founded a lot of anarchists really were the bomb-throwers they are caricatured as:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/1910s/1911/no-86-october-1911/why-socialists-oppose-anarchismOthers were "individualists":http://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.co.uk/2017/11/the-conflict-between-anarchism-and.htmlIt is not true, eiher, that anarchism is a subset of socialism. Some anarchists do stand for socialism (as a classless, stateless, moneyless, wageless society) but only a minority.
alanjjohnstone wrote:Should we drop the air of respectability and shamelessly go out of our way to shock to make our points?No.
I don't think that was the sort of thing he had in mind but,as set out in the chapter, the survival of law as such with law courts, barristers, police and all, to deal with anti-social behaviour and also civil and procedural disputes. Obviously there will be rules and regulations in socialism so that, to some extent, the argument was about the word "law". The majority view was, and still is, not to use that word in relation to socialism.
The whole on his online book Practical Socialism; Its Principles and Methods (which Impos1904 made a copy of before it was taken down) is now online again. It includes his controversial view on law in socialism (for which he never found majority support in the Party).
Quote:Introduction to Practical Socialism: Its Principles and Methods, 2006 What Socialism Means, 2006 The Myth of Nationalisation, 2006The Conflict between Utopia and Practical Socialism, 2006 Methods of Practical Socialism, 2006 Democratic Organisation, 2006 Socialism and Law, 2006 Organisation of Production, 2006 Information, Planning and Decision Making, 2006 Waste and Destruction, 2006 Advantages of Production Solely For Use, 2006 The Fetishism of Money, 2006 Socialism in the 21st Century, 2006
