Table Of ContentSOCIALIST CONSTRUCTION AND MARXIST THEORY
Also by Derek Sayer
MARX'S METHOD
SOCIALIST
CONSTRUCTION
AND MARXIST
THEORY
Bolshevism and its Critique
Philip Corrigan, Harvie Ramsay
and Derek Sayer
© Philip Corrigan, Harvie Ramsay and Derek Sayer 1978
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1978
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be
reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
without permission
First published 1978 by
THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD
London and Basingstoke
Associated companies in Delhi
Dublin Hong Kong Johannesburg Lagos
Melbourne New York Singapore Tokyo
Typeset in Great Britain by
The Bowering Press Ltd Plymouth
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Corrigan, Philip
Socialist construction and Marxist theory
1. Communism - History
1. Title II. Ramsay, Harvie III. Sayer, Derek
355.4'09'034 HX36
ISBN 978-1-349-03133-7 ISBN 978-1-349-03131-3 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-03131-3
This book is sold subject
to the standard conditions
of the Net Book Agreement
Socialist society covers a very long historical period. Classes and class
struggle continue to exist in this society, and the struggle still goes on
between the road of socialism and the road of capitalism. The socialist
revolution on the economic front (in the ownership of the means of
production) is insufficient by itself and cannot be consolidated. There
must also be a thorough socialist revolution on the political and
ideological fronts. Here a very long period of time is needed to decide
'who will win' in the struggle between socialism and capitalism.
Several decades won't do it; success requires anywhere from one to
several centuries. On the question of duration, it is better to prepare
for a longer rather than a shorter period of time. On the question of
effort, it is better to regard the task as difficult rather than easy. It will
be more advantageous and less harmful to think and act in this way.
Anyone who fails to see this or to appreciate it fully will make
tremendous mistakes. During the historical period of socialism it is
necessary to maintain the dictatorship of the proletariat and carry the
socialist revolution through to the end if the restoration of capitalism
is to be prevented, socialist construction carried forward and the
conditions created for the transition to communism.
Mao Tse-tung
Fifteen Theses on Socialist Construction
Contents
Preface IX
Introduction Xl
1 MARX 1
1 Production 1
2 The social forces of production 3
3 The social relations of production 4
4 Class and the State 7
5 Marx's critique 13
6 Bourgeois ideology and working-class consciousness 20
2 BOLSHEVISM AND ITS CRITIQUE 24
1 1917 24
2 Bolshevism 27
3 Socialist construction 47
3 LENIN, TROTSKY, STALIN 53
1 Lenin 53
2T~~ ~
3 Stalin 79
4 MAO 90
1 The important thing is to be good at learning 90
2 Get organised! 93
3 Leaning to one side 96
4 From implicit criticism to inter-Party polemic 98
Bibliographical Appendix 103
5 BOLSHEVISM NOW 105
1 The Bolshevik hegemony 105
2 Bolshevism challenged? 120
6 'NEVER FORGET CLASS STRUGGLE .. .' 145
viii Contents
A RESTATEMENT 155
Marx and Engels on Production, Capitalism and Socialism 155
Notes 163
Bibliography 191
Index 223
Preface
This book is a collective production. Not only does it result from the
combined efforts of its three accredited authors; it also owes much to
many others. Its roots lie in our participation in the Political Economy
Group which Gavin Williams founded in Durham in 1973. It was in
discussions there that we first became aware of the mutual relevance
of our apparently quite disparate individual researches, and gained the
impetus to write a first draft of this book during 1974. We circulated
that draft, both within and outside this Group, and the comment and
criticism we received helped us immensely in writing the revised text
which follows. The result, we believe, is a better book.
At the same time, our revision has involved a good deal of distillation
and some excision. Chapter I, for instance, represents a summary of
arguments which were originally developed over 150 pages. We
attempt to make good such losses in other writings, some of them
already published, others still in preparation. In particular, we are
writing a volume which will be in many ways a sequel to this, extending
our assessment of the theoretical contribution to marxism made by
Mao Tse-tung (For Mao: Essays in Historical Materialism, Macmillan,
forthcoming). In this connection, we would like to make clear that our
discussion in the present volume deals only with the period preceding
Mao's death, though we believe that the analysis we offer provides the
resources for comprehending the struggles in China which have
followed.
Finally, we wish to express our particular thanks to Val Gillespie,
Sheila Ramsay, Teodor Shanin, Tse Kakui, and Gavin Williams, for
their invaluable encouragement, assistance, and criticism throughout.
Derek Sayer would like to acknowledge the help of the Social Science
Research Council, whose award of a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship
has enabled him to work on this project full-time during the last year.
PHILIP CORRIGAN
HARVIE RAMSAY
DEREK SAYER
January 1977
Introduction
At 10.00 a.m. on 7 November 1917, before attending the Second
All-Russia Congress of Soviets at the Smolny Institute in what was then
called Petrograd, Lenin, on behalf of the Petrograd Military Revolu
tionary Committee, issued an appeal 'To the Citizens of Russia'
(Akhapkin, 1970: Document 1),1 This, the first text of Soviet power,
records that
The cause for which the people have fought, namely, the immediate
offer of a democratic peace, the abolition of landed proprietorship,
workers' control over production, and the establishment of Soviet
power - this cause has been secured. Long live the revolution of
workers, soldiers and peasants!
The first session of that Congress of Soviets stretched from 10.40 p.m.
on 7 November until after 5.00 a.m. of the next day. Shortly after
3.00 a.m. on the morning of the 8th news was received of the storming
of the Winter Palace, and the Congress issued an appeal 'To Workers,
Soldiers and Peasants' (ibid., Document 2). During its second session,
which began at 9.00 a.m. on the same day, Decrees on Peace and Land
were adopted, at 10.00 p.m. on the 8th and 2.00 a.m. on the 9th
respectively (ibid., Documents 3 and 4). On 27 November the All
Russia Central Executive Committee elected by that same Congress
promulgated 'Instructions on Workers' Control' (ibid., Document 10).
This book is concerned with the struggles which make such actions
possible and meaningful. It is as well to recall, right at the start, of
whose struggles we are talking. Much in these actions - including the
textual content of the decrees - was a descriptive rather than a
prescriptive commentary on political events. The workers, soldiers and
peasants who were creating the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics had
already established the material situation - regarding peace, land, and
workers' control-that these political decrees and appeals registered,
summarised, and attempted to carry forward to a new generalisation.
This is no mere aside - a dramaturgical obeisance to the fact that the
world (objective and subjective) was changed at the time that these
