From: Ben Seattle [icd@communism.org] To: marxism@lists.panix.com Cc: George Goldstein [gg@gn.apc.org] Subject: Re: Political rights under workers' rule Date: Wed, 1 Jul 1998 04:04:41 -0700 Hi George, First, I would like to thank you for your response. I appreciate your calm tone and believe it will help to attract attention to this topic in a way that is productive. George: ======= > Your discussion on the "rights of workers to use the > internet under the future 'dictatorship of the > proletariat'", seems strange. Ben: ==== What will eventually seem strange, I believe, is that such discussion ever seemed strange. George: ======= > ... you talk of a 'modern stable society', future > socialism, the transition period to communism, in > which not only remnants of bourgeois ideas exist, > but also it seems considerable commercial use of > the net and significant bourgeois resources. Ben: ==== Yes. The workers' state will not be able to immediately expropriate all of the capitalist corporations, if only because it will take a considerable period of time for workers to learn how to run the economy without reliance on capitalist methods. In the meantime, a considerable section of the economy will likely be run by capitalists (or former capitalists) who have experience in making things run smoothly. The workers' state will permit this because it will need a functioning economy. But at the same time the workers' state will need to restrict the ability of these bourgeoisie (or former bourgeoisie) to use the resources at their command to restore bourgeois class rule. That is the whole point of the "D of P". George: ======= > This surely cannot be a stable world. Ben: ==== In my view, it will be more than "stable enough". George: ======= > The coming world revolution ... will not happen evenly, > but patchily, and this time such is the development of > the productive forces, the possibility of socialism is > more than over-ripe. As such, from the beginning the > bourgeoisie in many countries will find, after the > first revolution, no choice but to impose immediate > bonapartist rule which in ma[n]y places will quickly > move into fascism. It is not 1917. > As such, phone and internet communications will not be > in one united camp, but separated, and all 'left' talk > under capitalism will quickly be forced underground. Ben: ==== You are raising a number of important and interesting points. What is most important to see, in my view, is that, as time goes on, it is going to become increasingly difficult for the bourgeoisie (in a modern, developed country) to impose measures of fascist repression for anything more than very short periods of time. Fascist repression involves (and requires) the near-total control of news and information. This is going to increasingly become *impossible*. The reason that this will become impossible is *not* merely technical (ie: the incorrect notion that it becomes physically impossible to shut down the internet, etc). Rather, the reason is that shutting down the internet would so badly cripple the economy--that the political crisis would only *accelerate*. This may not be so obvious today. But I believe it will become increasingly obvious. The internet will become the heart of the economy of every country and region on earth. For the bourgeoisie of any modern country to shut it down-- would be like holding its breadth--something that could only be done for a relatively short period of time during which it hopes to somehow decapitate revolutionary leadership and overcome a revolutionary crisis. In a connected world with an active online population--this becomes increasingly difficult. In such a revolutionary crisis, the bourgeosie could certainly kill a lot of people. But in so doing it would only be pouring gasoline on a fire and hastening the day of its overthrow. Nor, would it be possible to somehow "filter" the net (of either revolutionary or foreign ideas) without shutting it down. I don't have the time to go into this--but such ideas by frightened bourgeois are not realistic. One case in point here is China. Currently, China is attempting to keep its internal net free of the ideas of dissidents or other "troublemakers" who dare to point out the hypocrisy and corruption in the ruling circles and criticize the growing gap between the rich and the poor. But this "firewall of China" will certainly collapse. I once met a Chinese technical worker, quite familiar with computers (TCP/IP and all that) and told him that I could not see how the Chinese government could possibly keep the internet closed for more than 20 years. He responded by telling me that they will have to open it up within *ten* years. I hope he is right. But the point is that whether it is ten or twenty years--the long-term trend is that it will become increasingly impossible for *any* government to restrict the flow of information to and from its citizens. George: ======= > From this small e-mail of yours, it seems you are trying > too hard to predict the future world (something the likes of > Marx, Engels, Lenin, Luxembourg, Trotsky, never spent too > much time on simply because it was beyond their brilliant > reach) Ben: ==== The advantage we have over the people you mention (some more brilliant than others ;-) is that we live at a later time--and all the factors involved have had time to mature so that the tendencies of development can be more clearly seen even by people who are not brilliant. We are closer to the overthrow of bourgeois rule on a world scale--than anyone before--and certain important features of the system of workers' rule can be more clearly seen now than earlier. It becomes important, necessary and (at this point) decisive to clarify certain issues because otherwise the future system of workers' rule becomes essentially unthinkable--something that cannot even be *imagined* in any realistic sense--because the conditions of its existence involve imposing on modern society measures that were only appropriate 80 years ago for a backward peasant country with a ruined economy. And without the central unifying goal of workers' rule, the goal of overthrowing bourgeois rule also becomes unthinkable --and we are left with no communist movement worthy of the name--only a motley collection of grouplets that can barely speak to each other and which consider the "D of P" to be a religious icon to be worshipped with *no real connection* to practical activity (which inevitably degenerates into reformism or sectarianism or both). Workers, under workers' rule, will have access to the internet. This must be clearly said. If someone wants to say that the head of the workers' government is corrupt and deserves to be hung--they will say so. Such people will find an audience only if there is truth to what they say. A future workers' state will rest on the support of the vast majority and will not need to be so afraid of such criticism that it would feel a need to repress it. (What it *would* repress, and repress most decisively, however, would be such expressions that were backed by *bourgeois resources* such as paid labor.) The future workers state will require and *rely upon* the unfettered expression of the workers. *This* will be the powerful weapon that will oppose and win against bourgeois ideology in millions and billions of encounters large and small. George: ======= > ... perhaps we should discuss how we utilise the internet > now to enhance and build class struggle, build a new world > party of socialist revolution in these very dangerous time > we live in. Ben: ==== Well, a couple of points. We should not get carried away by the danger. I suspect that a lot of the "apocalyptic thinking" that dominates discussion of the kind of revolutionary crisis that will lead to the mobilization of millions of workers-- originates in frustration over the failure of workers to swallow theory which is bankrupt. "When things get bad enough --when the workers are desperate enough--*then* they will listen to us" goes this line of thinking. Many of us have heard this line of thinking in one form or another. I think this line of thinking should be opposed because it blinds us to the revolutionary potential which exists in front of our noses. Yes, George, I agree that we should discuss how to use the internet to build a communist organization that strikes terror into the hearts of the bourgeoisie. They will see the dogs of hell unleashed--but we will be taking to millions the idea that it is necessary and inevitable that we storm heaven. I believe such communist organization will eventually coalesce around efforts to create an electronic news service for the working class. I think we should talk about such a thing and discuss ideas for how such projects will be organized. Control of the "news" will be a weak link in the system of bourgeois control of the thinking and ideology of the masses. It is our responsibilty to exploit this weak link to the max. If we do not--then these tasks will eventaully be taken up by others who have deeper insight concerning what is decisive and are more dedicated to the proletariat. But I do *not* agree (if this is what you are proposing) that we should drop discussion of the democratic rights of workers in a future workers' state. This is the decisive question that must be understood before a communist movement can emerge that would be capable of overcoming the existing theoretical crisis and mobilizing millions of workers. George: ======= > Oh, and why do you end with: > > > Unfortunately, with very few exceptions, the most > > esteemed and expert "marxists" on these lists will > > not touch this topic with a ten foot pole. Well, with all due respect to everyone, that has been my experience. Ben Seattle -- www.Leninism.org ---- 1.Jul.98 -- 4 am ----//-// (More discussion of this topic can be found at my site in chapter 8 of "How to Build the Party of the Future")