Equating Fascism With Socialism
May 2 2006 12:58
One of the more ridiculous trends I've seen in economic debates lately is when some hardcore capitalists take on a revisionist stance and try to re-paint Adolph Hitler and Benenito Mussolini as "left-wing socialists". It's an obvious ploy by corporate powers to try to hide the fact that modern-day Western Neoliberal capitalism is VERY similar to Fascism in Germany and Italy in the 1920's and 1930's.
What's really sad is the obvious lies and unbelievable leaps in logic required to take this stance, and the frightning ease some people swallow it with.
Here's an example of a website that tries to repaint the ultimate right-wing capitalist dictator as some sort of "friend" of Stalin:
http://www.namyth.com/?pg=conservativepunk
Quote:
One of the first and most obvious differences between free market Capitalism and Fascism are unions. Unions in a Fascist state are compulsory arms of the state, registration is required and the dictates of labor are made by the state, which is said to represent labor interests. Hitler and Mussolini both used unions to dictate production and bully businessmen. Mostly this meant commanding strikes and keeping the dues payment to the Fascist/Nazi parties steady. As a closed market, unions are a method the state uses to manipulate the means of production (an effect of a Socialist entity). In a free market, unions are non-compulsory, and only when given special government privileges do they begin to resemble their Fascist counterparts.
This is a blatant and prenicious lie that is oft-repeated in many conservative and libertarian capitalist circles.
The real truth is:
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0930-25.htm
Quote:
Business tightened its grip on the state in both Italy and Germany by means of intricate webs of cartels and business associations. These associations exercised a very high degree of control over the businesses of their members. They frequently controlled pricing, supply and the licensing of patented technology. These associations were private, but were entirely legal. Neither Germany nor Italy had effective antitrust laws, and the proliferation of business associations was generally encouraged by government. This was an era eerily like our own, insofar as economists and businessmen constantly clamored for self-regulation in business. By the mid 1920’s, however, self-regulation had become self-imposed regimentation. By means of monopoly and cartel, the businessmen had wrought for themselves a “command and control” economy which effectively replaced the free market.-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hitler also destroyed organized labor by making strikes illegal. Notwithstanding the socialist terms in which he appealed to the masses, Hitler’s labor policy was the dream come true of the industrial cartels that supported him. Nazi law gave total control over wages and working conditions to the employer. Compulsory (slave) labor was the crowning achievement of Nazi labor relations. Along with millions of people, organized labor died in the concentration camps. The camps were not only the most depraved of all human achievements, they were a part and parcel of Nazi economic policy. Hitler’s untermenschen, largely Jews, Poles and Russians, supplied slave labor to German industry. Surely this was a capitalist bonanza. In another bitter irony, the gates over many of the camps bore a sign that read “Arbeit Macht Frei” – “work shall set you free”. I do not know if this was black humor or propaganda, but it is emblematic of the deception that lies at the heart of fascism.
It's a sad day for sure when people try to re-paint Hitler of all people as some sort of "friend of the proletariat". As corrupt American politician Huey Long once said when asked if America would ever see fascism, “Yes, but we will call it anti-fascism”.
May 2 2006 14:36
#2
private property and the private ownership of the means of production existed in Germany and Italy. It did not in Russia.
May 2 2006 14:43
#3
Yes, and?
May 2 2006 16:05
#4
Hi
Quote:
It's an obvious ploy by corporate powers to try to hide the fact that modern-day Western Neoliberal capitalism is VERY similar to Fascism in Germany and Italy in the 1920's and 1930's.
Not to mention how similar it is to US/Soviet state-capitalism and European Social Democratic capitalism since 1945.
Quote:
1) were Hitler and Mussolini socialists or class enemies?
Yes.
Quote:
2) which was Stalin?
Both of them.
Quote:
private property and the private ownership of the means of production existed in Germany and Italy. It did not in Russia.
The Communist Party’s bureaucracy owned the means of production as privately as any organisation in “modern Capitalist” countries.
Love
LR
May 2 2006 16:43
#5
whats the difference between a soviet bureacrat running an industry and the complete unity of "private industry" and the state under fascism? Its more a question of 'style' and euphemism than a real difference.
May 2 2006 17:55
#6
Quote:
The Communist Party’s bureaucracy owned the means of production as privately as any organisation in “modern Capitalist” countries.
Well, it was still a capitalist country. But all property was in the hands of the state, which was subsequently controlled by the bureaucracy. This is different to private individuals/shareholders owning a private company.
Obviously it makes no difference to the worker.
rugger: What about profits? Companies like IG Farben made millions during fascism. Nobody made a profit in Russia, did they? (honest question)
May 2 2006 18:03
#7
Hi
Quote:
But all property was in the hands of the state, which was subsequently controlled by the bureaucracy. This is different to private individuals/shareholders owning a private company.
I don’t see how…
Quote:
Obviously it makes no difference to the worker.
Ah that’ll be it. No difference then. Working class autonomy, comrade.
Love
LR
May 2 2006 18:15
#8
I think Mussolini claimed to be a Marxist in his early years.
May 2 2006 18:17
#9
Hi, sorry posting another thing so quick, but...
Quote:
Nobody made a profit in Russia, did they? (honest question)
Hmmm. I think you’re on to something there though…
Quote:
In July 1987, the Supreme Soviet passed the Law on State Enterprise. The law stipulated that state enterprises were free to determine output levels based on demand from consumers and other enterprises. Enterprises had to fulfill state orders, but they could dispose of the remaining output as they saw fit. Enterprises bought inputs from suppliers at negotiated contract prices. Under the law, enterprises became self-financing; that is, they had to cover expenses (wages, taxes, supplies, and debt service) through revenues. No longer was the government to rescue unprofitable enterprises that could face bankruptcy. Finally, the law shifted control over the enterprise operations from ministries to elected workers' collectives.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perestroika
I guess there is a difference between pre-1987 state capitalism and fascism after all.
Love
LR
May 2 2006 18:19
#10
He was a marxist in his early life and indeed was on the left of the PSI (Italaisn socialist party).
I also heard that he even translated some Kropotkin although I tried to find out if that was through and I couldn't find anything. So I guess its not.
May 2 2006 18:21
#11
harris wrote:
I think Mussolini claimed to be a Marxist in his early years.
He was a syndicalist. Also, other leading members of his party were syndicalists. One eventually resigned I believe because of the small role Mussolini gave unions.
May 2 2006 18:24
#12
Aye, mussoliniwas also in the same socialist party as Gramsci back in the day.
Alot of his "proletarian nations" nonsense comes from a reading of lenin.
May 2 2006 19:35
#13
He translated Capital, I believe.
May 2 2006 22:58
#14
Hi
Quote:
Nobody made a profit in Russia, did they? (honest question)
Didn’t the high salaries of the Russian middle class count as “profit”? Their lifestyles were certainly enjoyed at the expense of their social inferiors. As communist party members, are they not the equivalent to share holders in those peculiar state enterprises?
It’s still fair to say that “right wing” regimes are better integrated with the incumbent bourgeoisie. Perhaps the Russian experience was shaped by the resilience of the local aristocracy.
Are the elected workers’ collectives ushered in by Perestroika still in existence, or are they a wikipedia myth?
Love
LR
May 2 2006 23:19
#15
mattkidd12 wrote:
rugger: What about profits? Companies like IG Farben made millions during fascism. Nobody made a profit in Russia, did they? (honest question)
Stuff on that is gone into here. It's pretty long, but so, so fucking good.
May 2 2006 23:55
#16
Isn't this just a continuation of Hayek's theory that the aspiration to socialism leads to fascism?
It's worded more provocatively but its a similar message, one for the ruling class to comfort itself.
May 3 2006 02:10
#17
Lazy Riser wrote:
HiQuote:
Nobody made a profit in Russia, did they? (honest question)Didn’t the high salaries of the Russian middle class count as “profit”? Their lifestyles were certainly enjoyed at the expense of their social inferiors. As communist party members, are they not the equivalent to share holders in those peculiar state enterprises?
It’s still fair to say that “right wing” regimes are better integrated with the incumbent bourgeoisie. Perhaps the Russian experience was shaped by the resilience of the local aristocracy.
Love
LR
I think the only real substantive difference lies in the manner of ownership. As Debord pointed out in TSOTS the bureaucrats in the USSR could never tacitly own anything. To claim ownership would be tantamount to destroying the ruling class itself. Instead in order to control the means of production, they had to agree to the collective ownership of all capital by the bureaucratic class as a whole. Under capitalism, the ruling class is made up of individuals with clearly defined ownership of certain aspects of capital. Thus capital then competes amongst itself as the various economic sectors seek to both dominate the workers and each other. In a state capitalist regime, there is no economic war because this would require clearly delineated ownership of capital instead of collective ownership.
That said, fascism muddies the waters a bit since most industry is concentrated into massive cartels and the industrial oligarchy shrunk to a n elite group.
May 3 2006 08:52
#18
claiming that there is no economic war is a bit misleading becuase while there is no direct competition within the state capitalist nation you can't have capitalism without competition and war. The competition in the USSR was with the Western block. This demonstrates clearly how come state capitalist regimes are so militaristic.
May 3 2006 11:19
#19
Hi
Quote:
The competition in the USSR was with the Western block. This demonstrates clearly how come state capitalist regimes are so militaristic.
Not convinced. The USSR was rife with power struggles between bourgeois factions, it was authentically capitalist in every useful sense, down to the high salaries and enhanced social status of their apparatchiks.
At face value "neoliberalism" is as militaristic as any prior economic model, it depends whose perspective you take.
Love
LR
May 3 2006 11:46
#20
it was thoroughly capitalist, profit is a social construct, an aggregate of the class struggle, as much in qualitive terms as in quantative. The USSR had profit, it was just calculated at a higher, more centralised level.
Profit is surplus value afterall and the USSR certainly hadn't done away with that.
May 3 2006 12:35
#21
I wasn't arguing anything other than that the USSR was completely capitalist. State capitalism is the general style which all countries have adopted since the 1930s onwards. Therefore the fact that neoliberalism is militaristic is not suprising. Neoliberalism and globalisation are not a break with state capitalism but a development inside it.
However i think it is still valid to say that the USSR was more obviously militristic, This was partly down to the fact that as the weaker economy of the two Super powers it was forced to rely on militry might more than economic muscle. However the complete control of the economy by the state also played a role.
There might of been faction fights among sectors of the Soviety bourgeoisie but these weren't as widespread or as directly economic as in Western style capitalism.
May 3 2006 20:57
#22
jaycee wrote:
claiming that there is no economic war is a bit misleading becuase while there is no direct competition within the state capitalist nation you can't have capitalism without competition and war. The competition in the USSR was with the Western block. This demonstrates clearly how come state capitalist regimes are so militaristic.
Yes and no. By economic war I mean economic war, not military war, intra party feuding, intra party purges, assassinations etc. In capitalist societies conflicts amongst the business class are distributed amongst the competing economic sectors. Much like Madison outlined in the federalist papers, capitalist societies stabilize themselves through the heterogenization of the ruling class into distinct economic factions. These factions “duke it out” in the market and in congress via the organs of “representative democracy”
Therefore conflict rarely spills into outright bloodshed (The Civil War and American Revolution are the only two I can think of for the US). In state capitalist regimes capital is owned collectively by the ruling class. Thus all intra class conflict is carried out in the political and military realm via bloody and highly coercive means.
May 3 2006 21:34
#23
i'd be willing to accapt that. But also it depends how you define the bourgeoisie, there are obviously the gangster factions of the bourgeoisie who for various reasons have to often resort to more blatantly violent methods. I think that the Russian bourgeoisie has shown that since the collapse of the USSR they have continued to use more obvious gangster methods.
May 3 2006 21:38
#24
Lazy Riser wrote:
HiQuote:
Nobody made a profit in Russia, did they? (honest question)Didn’t the high salaries of the Russian middle class count as “profit”? Their lifestyles were certainly enjoyed at the expense of their social inferiors. As communist party members, are they not the equivalent to share holders in those peculiar state enterprises?
Well true, but there wasn't specifically a bourgeoisie in russia was there, even though the party elite and enterprise managers became an embryonic bourgeoisie.
Actually out of curiousity does anyone know of anything specific from a left communist or ''soft-leninist'' perspective that goes into any sort of analysis of the class distinctions exisiting in the eastern bloc in say the 50's and 60's because its quite hard to find anything that isn't stalinist or right wing that glosses over any serious in depth study.
May 3 2006 21:47
#25
cantdocartwheels wrote:
Lazy Riser wrote:
HiQuote:
Nobody made a profit in Russia, did they? (honest question)Didn’t the high salaries of the Russian middle class count as “profit”? Their lifestyles were certainly enjoyed at the expense of their social inferiors. As communist party members, are they not the equivalent to share holders in those peculiar state enterprises?
Well true, but there wasn't specifically a bourgeoisie in russia was there, even though the party elite and enterprise managers became an embryonic bourgeoisie.
Actually out of curiousity does anyone know of anything specific from a left communist or ''soft-leninist'' perspective that goes into any sort of analysis of the class distinctions exisiting in the eastern bloc in say the 50's and 60's because its quite hard to find anything that isn't stalinist or right wing that glosses over any serious in depth study.
you'd be wanting the 3 part special on the Soviet Union Jack was biging uo earlier, it is very good, though the fact i read it whilst sipping champagne on a lilo at an Italian villa might just have coloured my opinion.
It covers Ticktins theory of deformation of value in quite alot of detail, also "Radical Chains" are quite interesting, trying to mix Ticktins objectivism with an autonomist influenced focus on "class struggle", though they discuss it in relation to the west mostly.
I think it would be wrong to see the USSR as fundamentally different to the rest of the world in it's economic relations.
May 3 2006 22:03
#26
i've skim read it, it didn't seem very concrete though since i was more after something detailing what exact priveliges they had and what the specific class differentiations were, more of a description of the ruling class really, but i'll give it another go
Why do you think it shouldn't be seen as different? I think it should, since while its still capitalism the russian ruling classes dominance was based on far more of a social relationship than an economic one.
May 3 2006 22:05
#27
cantdocartwheels wrote:
i've skim read it, it didn't seem very concrete though since i was more after something detailing what exact priveliges they had and what the specific class differentiations were, more of a description of the ruling class really, but i'll give it another goWhy do you think it shouldn't be seen as different? I think it should, since while its still capitalism the russian ruling classes dominance was based on far more of a social relationship than an economic one.
No i wasn't saying they weren't different, I was saying fundamentally different.
And capitalism in the west is a social relationship masquarading as a economic one.
May 3 2006 22:07
#28
cantdocartwheels wrote:
i've skim read it, it didn't seem very concrete though since i was more after something detailing what exact priveliges they had and what the specific class differentiations were, more of a description of the ruling class really, but i'll give it another goWhy do you think it shouldn't be seen as different? I think it should, since while its still capitalism the russian ruling classes dominance was based on far more of a social relationship than an economic one.
Part 4 of the Aufheben article has stuff on that.
I think basically that they got blat instead of money.
May 4 2006 01:16
#29
Hi
cantdocartwheels wrote:
even though the party elite and enterprise managers became an embryonic bourgeoisie.
Hmmm. Well I only used “bourgeoisie” to avoid annoying you, specifically comrade, by saying “middle class”. Either way, they were an authentic, full blown, bourgeoisie in my books.
revol68 wrote:
capitalism in the west is a social relationship masquarading as a economic one.
How is this social relationship manifested and maintained other than through various forms of economic blackmail?
Jack wrote:
I think basically that they got blat instead of money
They got money, Stalin widened wage differentials for “professionals” and it got worse after his death. I’m not buying the Aufheben analysis either…
Quote:
If the USSR was simply a form of capitalism then the crisis theories of capitalism should be in some way applicable to the crisis in the USSR. But attempts to explain the economic problems of the USSR simply in terms of the falling rate and profit, overproduction and crisis etc. have failed to explain the specific features of the economic problems that beset the USSR. The USSR did not experience acute crisis of overproduction but rather problems of systematic waste and chronic economic stagnation, none of which can be explained by the standard theories of capitalist crisis.
This builds on the false premise that the crisis theories of capitalism are applicable at all. The USSR was “simply a form a capitalism” and Marxist analytical tool sets made as bad a job of analysing it as they do to the prevailing version today.
Love
LR
May 4 2006 01:53
#30
jaycee wrote:
i'd be willing to accapt that. But also it depends how you define the bourgeoisie, there are obviously the gangster factions of the bourgeoisie who for various reasons have to often resort to more blatantly violent methods. I think that the Russian bourgeoisie has shown that since the collapse of the USSR they have continued to use more obvious gangster methods.
Yeah my AP comparative Politics teacher had a funny saying about the Russian oligarchs and gangsters. “These guys are just like the robber barons except they’re worse. The robber barons only stole from their workers, these guys steal from everybody.”
Gangster capitalism is something of a variant on primitive accumulation. In developed nations gangster capitalism has been snuffed out in favor of a system of transparent and legal corruption. The gangster model thrives in nations without a developed legal framework and an efficient ruling mystique. Instead they must rely on blunt coercive force and outright terror. Thus they create a very violent and mutually distrustful governmental framework ridden with corruption.
The businesses themselves rarely engage in actual combat though. Organized crime may fight it out amongst each other and they may serve as proxies for big business. Yet the capitalist class itself tends to reserve violence only for the workers, even under gangster models. The Russian oligarchs and their companies never engaged in military conflict. Maybe the odd corporate assassination here or there, but nothing big.
There's two questions:
1) where hitler and mussolini socialists or class enemies?
2) which was stalin?
The problem is that people equate stalin with socialism, and substantively his program was the same as hitler and mussolinis.