Conspectus of the Social Revolution

Paris 1848

Preface

In my last analysis of the social revolution, I was an immature marxist, my analyses were half measures of the materialist method of marx, and now considering my political development as a marxist my views have changed. My purpose here is to provide a conspectus of the social revolution, to use Marx's method and his thought to the full, completely independent of the mechanical materialism.

Submitted by McCune on March 20, 2026

What is the social revolution?

For what even is the social revolution? The social revolution is the revolt of the proletariat against bourgeois credit. But before I can explain this, what even is bourgeois credit? As Marx says in the class struggles in France, that private credit/bourgeois credit is based on bourgeois production and its full range of social relations of production, bourgeois credit/private credit thus represent the capitalist mode of production and all its relations of production that correspond to the social relations of bourgeois production and society, it thus represents capitalist social order. Therefore the socialist revolution can only thus be the revolt of the proletariat against bourgeois credit/private credit, as in the words of marx "The revolt of the proletariat is the abolition of bourgeois credit, for it signifies the abolition of bourgeois production and its order."-(karl marx, The Class Struggles in France, 1848 to 1850 Part I The Defeat of June, 1848) and if, thus, it’s the abolition of the capitalist mode of production and its social order, the social revolution thus must and will by its very nature as the social revolution, strike upon the deposit of the world market and thus upon all the laws and relations of the world market. If the social revolution does not strike upon the world market and all of its parasitic relations of production that correspond to the remaining bourgeois nations and all of the laws of the capitalist mode of production, it will disarm itself, its task, that being the revolutionary transformation of the world i.e the abolition of capitalism and the establishment of a co-operative society. If the revolting proletariat do not wage a revolutionary war which will strike on the foundations of capitalism it will transform its task into survival within capitalism, within the world market, and thus the reproduction of capitalist relations of production, the reproduction of wage-labor, the reestablishment of public and private credit. Thus the social revolution either must destroy capitalism and its relations of production or reproduce the economic slavery of the proletariat. The radical social revolution is thus the proletarian revolt against bourgeois credit, the revolt against the whole of bourgeois society.

Classes and the social revolution

Only the revolutionary class within the present mode of production, within the present epoch, can lead and create a socialist revolution. In our epoch the revolutionary class is the industrial proletariat. The industrial proletariat, which was produced out of the capitalist relations of production in the industrial revolution, was created to be a slave for the bourgeoisie. The development of the industrial proletariat is conditioned by the industrial bourgeoisie, as the industrial bourgeoisie, and only under the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, can the modern means of production be created, thus that being the conditions in which the economic enslavement of the proletariat can develop. These conditions produce the reproduction of the proletariat as a class can acquire. And with this development of the capitalist mode of production and the horrid conditions of the enslavement of the working class, create revolutionary interests that are embodied in the proletariat. These revolutionary interests of the proletariat develop into the abolition of capitalism and all its relations of production. The proletariat only developed these revolutionary interests, that are then embodied into that class, because the industrial bourgeoisie created the material reality for the development of these interests and ideas. As any materialist would know, ideas are nothing but the material reality translated into human thought. During the revolutionary struggle against the bourgeoisie, the proletariat will find the material means and substance for its revolutionary activity, for its emancipation. The industrial bourgeoisie unknowingly produces the means for which the industrial proletariat can achieve its revolutionary liberation. But the proletariat is not the only class in which the bourgeoisie exploit, the peasantry is another class the bourgeoisie exploit. But the peasantry is incapable of taking the revolutionary initiative, incapable of being a revolutionary class. As for the reason why is that the peasantry is a class that capital as gripped into a class slave that fully supports the exploitation of itself, as the peasantry by its material activity, seeks to turn itself into either one a landlord or two into a petty-bourgeois proprietor. Therefore the peasantry will oppose and hinder the workers revolution. But how does the proletariat liberate and win the peasantry over to its side? For the proletariat to liberate the peasantry can only come though, in the words of Marx, “anticapitalist proletarian government” as only though this government shall the proletariat organize itself to abolish all classes and its economic basis, thus liberating the peasantry. But how will the proletariat win the peasantry over? Marx perfectly says “i.e. where the peasant exists in the mass as private proprietor, where he even forms a more or less considerable majority, as in all states of the west European continent, where he has not disappeared and been replaced by the agricultural wage-labourer, as in England, the following cases apply: either he hinders each workers' revolution, makes a wreck of it, as he has formerly done in France, or the proletariat (for the peasant proprietor does not belong to the proletariat, and even where his condition is proletarian, he believes himself not to) must as government take measures through which the peasant finds his condition immediately improved, so as to win him for the revolution; measures which will at least provide the possibility of easing the transition from private ownership of land to collective ownership, so that the peasant arrives at this of his own accord, from economic reasons. It must not hit the peasant over the head, as it would e.g. by proclaiming the abolition of the right of inheritance or the abolition of his property. The latter is only possible where the capitalist tenant farmer has forced out the peasants, and where the true cultivator is just as good a proletarian, a wage-labourer, as is the town worker, and so has immediately, not just indirectly, the very same interests as him. Still less should small-holding property be strengthened, by the enlargement of the peasant allotment simply through peasant annexation of the larger estates, as in Bakunin's revolutionary campaign.”-(Karl Marx, Conspectus of Bakunin's Statism and Anarchy)

The Emancipation of the Worker

The whole point of the radical social revolution is to abolish the capitalist system, which thus emancipates the proletarian class. But what would we consider its emancipation? According to Marx “The emancipation of working classes must be conquered by the working classes themselves; that the struggle for the emancipation of the working classes means not a struggle for class privileges and monopolies, but for equal rights and duties, and the abolition of all class rule”-(Karl Marx, Provisional rules) Marx says further “the permanent protest against the restoration of credit, which is based on the untroubled and uncounted acceptance of classes”-(Karl Marx, Class struggles in France) This is the emancipation of the worker, as if the revolt of the proletariat is the abolition of bourgeois credit which as Marx put it “for it signifies the abolition of bourgeois production and its order."-(ibid) The proletariat can only be emancipated once wage-labor is abolished, which is the basis for capital, for which is the basis of the economic slavery of the worker, it is the basis of capitalism. Once wage-labor is abolished so is capital and its mutual relationship toward capital is abolished. Only through the appropriation of the means of production to the proletariat and the abolition of capitalist social relations that correspond to that relations of production. Only the abolition of the proletariat as a class and the abolition of all other classes and their distinctions can the proletariat be truly free. The proletarian can’t be free if it remains a proletarian, if classes and their economic basis for the production of classes exist.

The Dictatorship of the proletariat

The only way the social revolution can be a successful revolution, is if the proletariat organizes itself into a state in decomposition. That being the dictatorship of the proletariat. Only through the class dictatorship of the proletariat upon which the proletariat can abolish all class distinctions and its economic basis. The class dictatorship of the proletariat only exists when other classes, especially the capitalist class. In the words of Marx “that the class rule of the workers over the strata of the old world whom they have been fighting can only exist as long as the economic basis of class existence is not destroyed”-(Karl Marx, Conceptus of Bakunin's Statism and Anarchy) But what is the corresponding relation to the class dictatorship of the proletariat to the social revolution? The relation is that the class dictatorship of the proletariat is the means to which the proletariat can carry out the tasks of the social revolution. Those tasks being the abolition of classes and the basis of its existence. If classes are abolished then so is the capitalist relations of production and all its social relations, as the capitalist mode of production is the economic, political and social basis of all classes in our present epoch. Once classes are abolished so is capitalism, and upon which a co-operative society can be built on.

Comments

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Submitted by Mair Waring on March 25, 2022

Does anybody have a file of this they could upload? Or a physical copy they could scan or send to an anarchist archive like the Sparrows Nest?

It was originally on his website but now that is down. It was called "The accidental making of an anarchist".

He was involved in the peace, anarchist and syndicalist movements, and I think his memoirs would be very important in terms of radical history.

Steven.

4 years 7 months ago

Submitted by Steven. on March 25, 2022

Do you have the old web address? Could it still be reached on the way back machine?

Fozzie

4 years 7 months ago

Submitted by Fozzie on March 25, 2022

According to this,

https://robertgraham.wordpress.com/2016/10/30/laurens-otter-nuclear-weapons-and-the-permanent-war-economy/

It was here

https://oldredfogey.files.wordpress.com/2016/05/the-accidental-making-of-an-anarchist.pdf

Fozzie

4 years 7 months ago

Submitted by Fozzie on March 25, 2022

Doesn’t seem to be on the archive.org way back machine alas.

Mair Waring

4 years 7 months ago

Submitted by Mair Waring on March 25, 2022

Yeah, I was mainly hoping someone might have the file saved, or have printed a copy off.

Submitted by Steven. on March 25, 2022

Mair Waring wrote: Yeah, I was mainly hoping someone might have the file saved, or have printed a copy off.

This website mentioned it: https://poeticslist.chicagoschoolofpoetics.com/2016/11/the-otter-memoir/
Why don't you send an email or contact the owners of this website to ask if they still have their PDF copy?
Would be great if someone could upload it here to our library if/when we managed to get hold of it

Mair Waring

4 years 5 months ago

Submitted by Mair Waring on May 19, 2022

Thanks Fozzie :)

I originally got it from the CIRA and sent it to Sparrows Nest.

Only mentioning this because while looking for it I found it was purposefully not put on Libcom and that Laurens did not want it on Libcom. I think a link like above is fine, just that is why I have not uploaded it as its own post.

Fozzie

4 years 5 months ago

Submitted by Fozzie on May 19, 2022

Thanks Mair. Did you find out why he didn’t want it here?

Mair Waring

4 years 5 months ago

Submitted by Mair Waring on May 19, 2022

No, sorry. I got the impression that he fell out with quite a few people.

Also this was a long time ago and Libcom may have had a different reputation than what it does now.

Fozzie

4 years 5 months ago

Submitted by Fozzie on May 19, 2022

No worries! If I had to guess it would be the somewhat abrasive discussion forums in the early days, which I think put a lot of people off.

Mair Waring

4 years 5 months ago

Submitted by Mair Waring on May 19, 2022

Yeah. I think he may also have been friendly/involved with the Northern Anarchist Network (which is associated with Northern Voices?). And they seemed to fall out with most of the anarchist movement in the UK.

Submitted by Steven. on May 22, 2022

Mair Waring wrote: No, sorry. I got the impression that he fell out with quite a few people.

Also this was a long time ago and Libcom may have had a different reputation than what it does now.

It's quite possible he didn't like us, but probably worth pointing out that none of us have any idea who he was, and pretty sure none of us have ever had any dealings with him (unless he registered an account here under an assumed name at some point past, but given what people of said about him, that seems doubtful)

Spikymike

4 years 5 months ago

Submitted by Spikymike on May 24, 2022

The long text that Fozzie has linked from the Sparrows nest archive is is a real treasure trove of peoples names from a long period of overlapping left-wing, anarchist and particularly peace activism that those of us who are still around from much of that period will recognise. I only met Laurens for a short time in an earlier (less troublesome) phase of the now defunct Northern Anarchist Network. I remember him as an affable welcoming person even if our respective politics were at some distance. Can't vouch for the accuracy of everything in that document even if it sounds familiar.