A Reply to Tony Clark
Tony Clark's comments on my article Chinese Communist Critiques of Communist Society is rather puzzling because he does not seem to grasp the essence of the critique of the process of socialist transformation that Mao Tse-tung and his comrades were beginning to develop, a critique that I tried to outline in this article.
The position that Mao and the so-called "Gang of Four" had arrived at was that unless there is a continuous, conscious class struggle to bring about the revolutionary transformation of every aspect of society then the transition to communism will not succeed and there will be a reversion to capitalism. Both the material basis and the ideological superstructure must be revolutionised by means of the conscious struggle of the masses. Increasingly, as the process of socialist transformation advances it must be the proletariat itself and its allies, e.g. peasants, who are the initiators and instigators of revolutionary change in society. It cannot be done on their behalf, by proxy, by a communist party that simply acts in what it perceives to be the interests of the masses instead of exercising communist political leadership by stimulating and arousing the masses to conscious, organised revolutionary action. This is, somewhat belatedly, what Mao and his comrades tried to do in China from 1966 onwards.
An important part of the Maoist theory of socialist transformation is repudiation of what came to be known in China as the "theory of productive forces." This is the view that in an economically backward society where a popular revolution has brought the communist party to power the main factor determining the success of socialist transformation is whether or not technologically advanced means of production can be acquired and widely applied to economic development. It is certainly true that the socialist transformation of society will not be possible unless advanced forces of production are developed and applied to improving the material conditions of life of the masses. Even so, what is crucial is within what type of relations of production the productive forces are developed. The development of technologically sophisticated forces of production can certainly take place within a framework of capitalist relations of production. For progress towards communism to be made the forces of production have to be developed within the context of a conscious, revolutionary struggle to transform the relations of production whereby the masses increasingly do actually exercise real, collective control over the productive process. Common ownership of the means of production has to become a de facto living reality as opposed to a de jure legal formality. From the standpoint of Marxism this is essential because a basic postulate of our analysis of society is that the class that really controls the means of production exercises power in society as a whole.
In the Soviet Union with the commencement of the First Five Year Plan in 1928 industry and commerce were taken into state ownership and agriculture was rapidly collectivised. Production and investment were planned and coordinated by a central planning commission (Gosplan). Production units - factories, state farms, collective farms, etc. - were organised according to a system of " one man management", i.e. factory and farm directors were appointed by Gosplan and the administrative structure of these organisations had essentially the same authoritarian, hierarchical structure as enterprises in capitalist countries. The way in which it was to be determined that the economy functioned in the interests of the workers and peasants was through the structures of the Soviets and the Communist Party. These would ensure that economic managers would not serve their own self-interest and abuse and exploit the masses. These political structures were supposed to give workers and peasants indirect control over the operation of the means of production.
What came into existence here was a contradiction between a proletarian state apparatus and bourgeois economic relationships. In its early stages the principal aspect of this contradiction was the proletarian state but this contradiction was inherently antagonistic and sooner or later would necessarily would be resolved one way or the other. Either the bourgeois economic relationships would be transformed to conform with the character of the proletarian state or the state apparatus would become progressively bourgeoisified so as to conform with the untransformed capitalist relations of production. In reality, the system of economic administration set up in 1928 remained essentially unchanged throughout the rest of the period of the Soviet regime right up until 1991.
We Marxists hold that "social being determines social consciousness". It is a person's objective position in society that primarily determines their conduct and not their subjective consciousness that determines the character of their behaviour. Thus if a person who is quite consciously a committed communist is appointed as a factory director within a network of economic relations which is essentially the same as those in a capitalist enterprise then sooner or later this person will begin to think like, develop the same outlook as the manager of a capitalist enterprise in a bourgeois society. Surely, we have seen this process at work in our own bourgeois society? Most of us have experienced colleagues who aspire to be promoted to a managerial position. Many of these people say that when they occupy such positions they will not behave in an oppressive and exploitative way towards their subordinates. They'll be different and when they say this most of them are sincere. What, of course, happens is that sooner or later the person in the managing role is presented with a dilemma: either on orders from above he acts against the interests of his subordinates or he refuses to do so and thus is dismissed. Subject to these sort of pressures, it is not long before the manager starts to embrace bourgeois, managerial ideology. Social being determines social consciousness.
In the Soviet Union in the 1930's managers were subject to very tight control from state and Party structures and faced serious penalties for failing to achieve targets. This encouraged them to put heavy pressures on workers who could complain to Party committees if they felt mistreated. The only problem was that this was the same political apparatus that was encouraging their managers to treat them in this way. The workers and peasants were not in a position to exercise their creativity and initiative. Rather they were expected to do as they were told by the managers. In time, with the waning of the revolutionary political enthusiasm of the early years of industrialisation and collectivisation, this encouraged a rather passive, disengaged attitude towards their work - rather like that found among workers in the capitalist countries. Again, social being determines social consciousness.
This is where a new type of bourgeoisie, a state bourgeoisie, originated. The untransformed relations of production determined that those people - many of them consciously committed communists - occupying managerial and administrative positions would come to develop an essentially revisionist outlook; socialist in form but capitalist in content. It was this failure to progressively revolutionise the relations of production that doomed the system to capitalist restoration and, ironically, by the 1980's the inability to further develop the forces of production which had grown so spectacularly back in the 1930's.
In his Introduction, Tony Clark seems to attribute the eventual failure of socialism in the Soviet Union to "bureaucracy". This critique is essentially the same as the one put forward by Trotskyites and anarchists. It is certainly not a Marxist critique despite the quotes from Lenin that Tony gives. The term 'bureaucracy' is a very emotive one carrying all sorts of negative connotations. In particular, most people view it as a bad thing per se. Perhaps it would be better to use a more neutral term such as 'administrative structure' or something similar. One thing is for sure. Any attempt to develop a centrally planned economy and society requires a very large and elaborate administrative apparatus. It is not a question of whether or not there is bureaucracy but what type of bureaucracy. In whose interests does it operate? who controls it? At the outset of the process of socialist transformation it will necessarily be the party and state who set up and control administrative structures but operate them in the interests of the masses. This is unavoidable but what is crucial is whether or not the masses progressively, through revolutionary struggle, themselves take control of and transform this administrative system. Only if this happens will there be progressive movement towards communism.
Tony assumes that all bureaucrats, i.e. administrators, in whatever political and social context are the same, that they act in their own narrow self-interest. By way of contrast, from a Marxist point of view administrators are seen as acting in the interests of those who have power in society.
Harry Powell, August 02.