ALB
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Here's the letter our comrades of the World Socialist Party (India) in Calcutta have sent to The Statesman:
Quote:Dear Editor, In the evening of August 23, 2015 in the Sunday Discussion Meeting of our party, the World Socialist Party (India), we read with interest the Saturday Statesman, August 22, 2015 article “Relevance of Marx” written by Professor Gargi Sengupta. It is really heartening to note that a nineteenth century communist revolutionary, Karl Marx, is being revisited by the 21st century mainstream press to find answers to the present-day woes and worries. Hopefully, this signals the beginning of Marx’s media-ride in India too. This happens because, as Marx and Engels themselves observed, “consciousness can sometimes appear further advanced than the contemporary empirical conditions, so that in the struggles of a later epoch one can refer to earlier theoreticians as authorities." – (The German Ideology) “Men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from the past,” wrote Marx in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis BonaparteIn her defensive appreciation of Marx, Gargi Sengupta has rightly claimed that “Marxism enables us to understand the nature of the capitalist crisis,” and also that “Marx believed that human development requires a cooperative society based on common ownership of the means of production.” She has excellently pronounced, “The overall significance of religion may have declined, but the family, the schools, and the capitalist controlled mass media continue to brainwash the working class and prevent them from realizing their true destiny.”Her observation: “From a global perspective, a class-based analysis is still relevant,” holds up one of the basic principles of Marxism. She defends Marx for “making a very fundamental contribution” whereby “He placed human beings and their conscious, purposive activity – human labour – at the centre of his analysis” and also for a “unique contribution” – the role of “class struggle” in “human historical development”. She is right in pointing out that “Marx’s writings still evoke interest across the world. … Marx’s writings can throw light on the problems of our age”. Simply because, as Marx viewed, “The nature of capital remains the same in its developed as in its undeveloped form”; and “Production of surplus value is the absolute law of this mode of production.” – Capital , vol – IActually, Marx is more relevant today than ever before.This said, I would like to comment on a couple of inaccuracies in Professor Sengupta's article. She says, “Marx visualized the remedy in violent revolution followed by decades of civil and international warfare.” This is a half-truth. True, in his early years Marx held a “violent revolution” view. However, eventually and finally he arrived at the following conclusion: “proletariat – organized in a separate political party. That such organization must be pursued by all the means, which the proletariat has at its disposal, including universal suffrage, thus transformed from the instrument of trickery, which it has been up till now into an instrument of emancipation.” – Written on about May 10, 1880, Printed according to L'Égalité, No. 24, June 30, 1880, checked with the text of Le Précurseur. Secondly, in portraying capitalism as only a “private enterprise” system she has missed the yardstick of defining state capitalism – the defining characteristic of which is state ownership and control of the means of production and articles for distribution. As a result she is mistaken in recognizing the erstwhile so-called ‘communist’ dictatorial and despotic state capitalist regimes of Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. How could there be “the eclipse of Communism” when Communism (Socialism the same) has nowhere and never been attempted at all? Just what happened inthese countries was appropriately described in 1918 by Fitzgerald of the Socialist Party of Great Britain: “What justification is there, then, for terming the upheaval in Russia a Socialist Revolution? None whatever beyond the fact that the leaders in the November movement claim to be Marxian Socialists.” –Socialist Standard, Aug 1918jondwhite wrote:what if there was a meme image creates about exposing the anti working class nature of prime minister Cameron or Nigel farage?The front cover of the September Socialist Standard should fit the bill if you can wait a week.
Looks as if the Labour leadership are going for the rigging the election option:http://www.scotsman.com/news/uk/25-000-rogue-voters-in-labour-poll-chaos-1-386604525,000 to be purged! Even after they've voted. That's bound to affect the result.
Thanks. I notice that Saad-Filho and Pettifor are no longer on it. I wonder why. Also note the addition of Josh Ryan-Collins, one of the authors of the currency crankish Where Does Money Come from? (reviewed in the Socialist Standard in February 2012). I imagine there are others among the signatories who also think commercial banks can create money from thin air. Not sure, though, that Corbyn himself has actually said that (yet). But with friends like this….Perhaps we could send a letter saying Corbyn's economic policy is no more credible than that of everyone else who thinks that governments can control the way capitalism works.
ALB wrote:especially, now that 40 economists are reported to have endorsed Corbyn's economic programmeI've been trying to find out who these are and have only been able to come up with this:https://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/ourkingdom/35-economists-back-corbyn's-policies-as-'sensible'The only names most people will be able to recognise are Steve Keen and Ann Pettifor. We reviewed a book by leftwing Keynesian John Weeks in the April 2004 Socialist Standard and two edited by Alfredo Saad in May and December 2004. Saad describes himself as a Marxist and, as the reviews recognise, explains Marxian economics well. All the stranger then that he doesn't realise that Corbyn's "proposal to fund public investment by the sale of bonds to the Bank of England" (so-called People's QE) is just Keynes in a new package and cannot work to make capitalism operate in the interest of the working class or even to get it to "grow" again. Or perhaps he does and is just agreeing that Corbyn has opened an interesting discussion on economic policy.The media are reporting that Danny Blanchflower has also signed up. The former member of the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee, that is. A bit more of a catch.
This editorial from the September 1965 Socialist Standard might have been more appropriate:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/1960s/1965/no-733-september-1965/editorial-what-runs-labour-governmentespecially, now that 40 economists are reported to have endorsed Corbyn's economic programme, this:
Quote:It is almost a year now since the Labour party formed a government. They felt that thirteen wasted years of Tory rule would give way to an administration that could solve social problems. It has been a year of renewed failure, in which their optimism has been humiliated by their inability to control Capitalism.We do not doubt that the Labour Government really believed they could "get the economy moving". There was to be steady expansion. Out of a four per cent increase in productivity there were going to be more schools, hospitals, roads, pensions. There were going to be more wages. A "planned" incomes policy. A "planned" growth rate. None of these schemes have begun to get off the ground, nor do they show any prospect of doing so.i.e Harold Wilson rather than Clement Attlee warmed up.
I don't think it's that straightforward. The person I met doesn't share the Labour Party's aims and values (he shares ours) and would concede that he was being dishonest when he signed that he did. So I don't think either he or anyone else in this position, including the Tory member of the House of Lords, have a leg to stand on if they asked for their money back.Someone who genuinely did share Labour's aims and values and had supported some other party at the last election because they felt that Labour Party itself had departed from them would be a stronger position, but any court case would have to be a civil action. For just £3. Hardly worth it.But what is happening has blown out of the water JohnD's proposal for open primaries, even by us. What has happened was predictable and will happen again. It's built-in to the scheme. And we are even stricter that people should share our aims and values. Like the Labour Party we would expel (and have expelled) people who publicly vote for another party. Would we let them vote in a primary to decide our candidate?
Isn't this more of a Trotskyoid publication than a Green one? Anyway, they've taken their time. The Green Party here has been advocating this for nearly 30 years now:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/1980s/1988/no-1009-september-1988/green-partys-basic-income-scheme-could-it-workIt is noteworthy though that an organisation like this should be incorporating this reform as one of their "transitional demands".
Of course they can. It's just better to draw attention to our party in the country concerned than to our party here in Britain.
jondwhite wrote:Not New Statesman but The Statesman!I'm all in favour of writing to the press, but, Vin, did you send it to the New Statesman or to the Statesman which is an Indian paper?Might be better to get our Indian comrades to follow this up. I'll email them.
Vin wrote:She claims Marx had no solution. Socialism/Communism was the solution.She doesn't claim that Marx had no solution. She writes about no "readymade" solutions to "capitalism's problems". Which can either mean that he offered no solutions within capitalism to capitalism's problems or that he offered no "readymade" solution to capitalism, i.e. offered no blueprint or recipes for the cookshops of the future. Both of which are true.And she does spell out what Marx meant by socialism (see my reply to Robbo) as "the society for which Marx had once struggled."
Vin wrote:To the Editor New Statesman The New Statesman and MarxVin, hopes it's not too late not to send this off. After all, she herself wrote:
Quote:Marx grasped the nature of capitalism and realised that although capitalism has over time changed its forms, its essence remains the same. It is still a system of exploitation and wage labour for those who operate the means of production.robbo203 wrote:No wonder Gupta thinks "Marx offers no readymade solutions to the problems of capitalism"having just said"Marx’s writings still evoke interest across the world despite speculation that his readership would dwindle after the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the eclipse of Communism in East Europe" The implication of course being that "Marx's solution" has been tried and found wanting in these places. I tire of pundits who come up with this old hackneyed bogus line of argument. That suggests to me that Gupta's understanding of Marxism is of the glossy, coffee table magazine type. Pretty superficial and cliched.I think we are all getting the wrong end of the stick here. I don't think this is what Gupta implies. Actually, it's not a bad article. She is right that "Marx offers no readymade solutions to the problems of capitalism". Isn't that what we say, i.e that Marx was no advocating any policies to be implemented within capitalism? At least that's how I interpreted what she's saying.And she gives quite a good outline of what Marx meant by capitalism:
Quote:Marx believed that human development requires a cooperative society based on common ownership of the means of production. Real human development requires production in which people can develop their own activity i.e. socialist production organised by workers. But this implies common ownership of the means of production or what is referred to as social ownership. This is not ownership by groups of workers; rather it implies ownership by society. This involves the total production system which must cater to the needs of society. The community, as a social institution, must identity the needs that must be fulfilled. As we live in a community, we need to produce for others out of a spirit of solidarity. This is the society for which Marx had once struggled.Why do we have this kneejerk reaction of looking a gift horse in the mouth whenever somebody says something that's not all that different from what we do?It reminds me of the reaction of one member to this article by G. A. Cohen which originally appeared in The Listener on 4 September 1986. He wrote complaining that workers sell their labour-power not their labour ! Having said that, the article was reprinted in the journal at the time of our campanion party in the US, the World Socialist Review.
jondwhite wrote:Jeremy Hardy reports he has been barredhttp://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/aug/21/jeremy-hardy-labour-rig-leadership-election-corbynHis crime seems to have been to have called for a vote for Caroline Lucas in Brighton at the general election. As he points out, quite a few Labour supporters will have voted for her. What this shows is the "Labour's aims and values" are simply to elect Labour MPs and councillors, i.e that the Labour Party is just a vote-catching machine (as are of course the other main parties).He's right that this is an attempt to rig the election by barring Corbyn votes. No doubt others will be planning to "vote early and vote often" (as they say in Northern Ireland) for the other candidates.They're keeping in reserve the Stop Corbyn ploy of getting the result declared void in the event of him winning:http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/aug/21/andy-burnham-campaign-hint-challenge-labour-leadership-voteThey are getting really worried and it's instructive (as well as amusing) to watch and see the methods professional politicians are prepared to employ to protect their careers. Actually, it's a lose-lose situation for the professional politicians in the Labour Party. Either Corbyn wins and their careers are in danger or, if he doesn't, the Labour Party will stand exposed as undemocratic and corrupt and that will endanger their careers too. Serve them right.
Actually, while no government or state can control the way the capitalist economy works they can control how the armed forces are deployed. So, a leftwing Labour government under Corbyn would be able to decide not to use them to support the US government's adventures just as the French and German governments did over the invasion of Iraq. Even a Corbyn win as Labour leader could stop the British state bombing Islamic State areas in Syria, so avoiding "collateral damage" to the civilians the ISIS barbarians are oppressing.
