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Introduction To Marxist Economics

2015-03-08T12:08:00.001+07:00

Introduction

Today, under the impact of the capitalist crisis, many workers have developed a thirst for economics. They are attempting to understand the forces which dominate their lives. This brief introduction to Marxist economics attempts to provide the class conscious worker not with a complete account of economics, but a guide to the basic laws of motion of capitalist society dominating his existence.

The shallowness of capitalist economics is demonstrated by their inability to understand the crisis affecting their system. Its role is to cover up the exploitation of the working class and to “prove” the superiority of capitalist society. Their quack “theories” and “solutions” are incapable of patching up the rotten and diseased nature of capitalism. Only the transformation of society on socialist lines and the introduction of a planned economy can end the nightmare of unemployment, slump and chaos.

The right wing labour leaders have rejected their old god Keynes, to be replaced by “orthodox” economic solutions: cuts, wage restraint and deflation. The left reformists still cling to the capitalist policies of yesterday (reflation, import controls, etc.), which have been recognised as totally ineffective under capitalism.

Only with a Marxist understanding of capitalist society can the conscious worker cut through the lies and distortion of the capitalist economists and combat their influence within the Labour Movement.

Conditions for capitalism

Today, modern production is concentrated in the hands of giant companies. Unilever, ICI, Fords, British Petroleum, are some examples of the firms which dominate our lives. Although it is true that small businesses do exist, they really represent the production of the past and not the present. Modern production is essentially a mass, large-scale business.

At present, 200 top companies together with 35 banks and finance houses control the British economy, and account for 85 per cent of output. This development has come about over the past few hundred years through ruthless competition, crisis and war. At the time when the classical economists predicted free trade in the future, Marx explained the development of monopoly from competition as the weaker firms went to the wall. Monopoly capitalism grew out of and abolished free competition.

At first sight, it looks as if goods and things are produced mainly for people's needs. Obviously every society has to do this. But under capitalism, goods are not merely produced to satisfy someone's want or need, but primarily for sale. That is the paramount function of capitalist industry.

In the famous words of the ex-chairman of British Leyland, Lord Stokes, “I'm in business to make money, not cars!” This is a perfect expression of the aspirations of the entire capitalist class.

The capitalist process of production requires the existence of certain conditions. Firstly, the existence of a large class of propertyless workers who are obliged to sell themselves piece-meal in order to live. Thus the Tory conception of a “property owning democracy” is an absurdity under capitalism, because if the mass of the population owned sufficient property to be self-sufficient, the capitalists would not find the workers to produce their profits. Secondly, the means of production must be concentrated in the hands of the capitalists. Over the centuries, the peasants and those who owned their own means of subsistence were ruthlessly crushed and their means of life appropriated by the capitalists and landlords. They in turn hire the workers to work these means of production and produce surplus value.

Value and commodities

How does capitalism work? How are workers exploited? Where does profit come from? How are slumps caused?

In order to answer these questions, we first need to learn the key to the mystery: what is value? Having solved this problem, the other answers fall into place. An understanding of value is essential, for an understanding of the economics of capitalist society.

To begin with, all the capitalist firms produce goods or services, or more correctly they produce commodities. That is a good or service produced for sale only. Of course, someone may make something for his or her own personal use. Before capitalism existed, many people had to. But this is not a commodity. Capitalist production is above all the creation and “immense accumulation of commodities”. That is why Marx himself started his investigation of capitalism with an analysis of the character of the commodity itself.

Every commodity has a use-value for people. That means they are useful to someone otherwise they could not be sold. This use-value is limited to the physical properties of the commodity.

They also contain a value. What is it and how can it be shown?

If we leave the use of money out for the time being, commodities, when they are exchanged, fall into certain proportions.

For example:

1 pair of shoes ) 1 watch ) = 10 yards of cloth 3 bottles of whisky ) 1 car tyre )

Each of the items on the left can be exchanged for 10 yards of cloth. They also, in the same amounts, can be exchanged with one another.

This simple example shows that the exchange value of these different commodities expresses something contained in them. But what makes a pair of shoes = 10 yards of cloth? Or 1 watch = 3 bottles of whisky? And so on…

Well, obviously, there must be something common to all. Clearly it is neither weight, colour, nor hardness. Again, it is not because they are useful. Bread after all is worth less than a Roll Royce, yet one is a necessity and the other luxury. So what is the common quality? The only thing in common is they are all products of human labour.

The amount of human labour contained in a commodity is expressed in time: weeks, days, hours, minutes.

To go back to the example: all these commodities can be expressed in terms of their common factor, labour-time.

5 hours (labour) worth of shoes 5 hours (labour) worth of tyres 5 hours (labour) worth of watches 5 hours (labour) worth of whisky 5 hours (labour) worth of cloth

Average labour

If we look at commodities as use-values (their utility), we see them as a “shoe”, “watch”, etc., as products of a particular kind of labour … the labour of the cobbler, watchmaker, etc. But in exchange, commodities are looked at differently. The special character is lost sight of and they appear as so many units of average labour. In exchange we are now comparing the amounts of human labour in general contained in the commodities. All labour, in exchange, is reduced to average simple units of labour.

It is true that the commodity produced by skilled labour contains more value than that produced by unskilled. Therefore in exchange, the units of skilled labour are reduced to so many units of unskilled, simple labour. For example, the ratio of 1 skilled unit = 3 unskilled units, or simply skilled labour is worth three times as much as unskilled.

Explained simply, the value of commodity is determined by the amount of average labour used in its production. (Or how long it takes to produce). But left like this, it appears that the lazy worker produces more values than the most efficient worker!

Let us take the example of a shoemaker who decides to use the outdated methods of the Middle Ages to produce shoes. Using this method, it takes him a whole day to make a pair of shoes. When he tries to sell them on the market, he will find that they will only fetch the same as shoes produced by the better equipped more modern factories.

If these factories produce a pair of shoes in, say half an hour, they will contain less labour (and therefore less value) and will be sold cheaper. This will drive the shoemaker using medieval methods out of business. His labour producing a pair of shoes after half an hour is wasted labour, and unnecessary under modern conditions. On pain of extinction he will be forced to introduce modern techniques and produce shoes at least equal to the necessary time developed by society.

At any given time, using the average labour, machines, methods, etc., all commodities take a particular time to make. This is governed by the level of technique in society. In the words of Marx, all commodities must be produced in a socially necessary time. Any more labour-time spent over and above this will be useless labour, causing costs to rise and making the firm uncompetitive.

So to be more precise, the value of a commodity is determined by the amount of socially necessary labour in the article. Naturally, this labour time is continually changing as new techniques and methods of work are introduced. Competition drives the inefficient to the wall.

Thus we can also understand why precious gems have more value than everyday items. More socially necessary labour time is needed to find, and extract the gems, than the production of ordinary commodities. Their value therefore being considerably higher.

Again a thing can be a use value without having any value, i.e. a useful thing that has had no labour time spent on its production: air, rivers, virgin soil, natural meadows, etc. Therefore labour is not the only source of wealth, i.e. use values, but nature too is a source.

From the above we can see that an increase in productivity will increase the amount of things produced (material wealth), but can reduce the value of the things concerned, i.e. the amount of labour in each commodity is less. Increased productivity therefore results in an increase in wealth. With two coats two people can be clothed, with one coat only one person. Nevertheless, the increase in the quantity of material wealth may correspond with a fall in the magnitude of its value.

Money

As a result of the difficulties in exchange by using the methods of barter, more frequently a common article was used as “money”. Over the centuries one commodity--gold--became singled out to play this role as the “universal equivalent”.

Instead of saying a good is worth so much butter, meat, cloth, etc., it became expressed in terms of gold. The money expression of value is price. Gold was used because of its qualities. It concentrates much value in a small amount, can easily be divided into coins, and is also hard wearing.

As with all commodities, the value of gold itself is determined by the amount of labour-time spent on its production. For example, say it takes 40 hours labour to produce one ounce of gold. Then all the other goods that take the same time to produce are equal to that ounce of gold. Those that take half the time equal half the amount, etc.

One ounce of gold = 40 hours labour 1/2 ounce of gold = 20 hours labour 1/4 ounce of gold = 10 hours of labour Therefore: One car (40 hours labour) = 1 ounce of gold One table (10 hours labour) = 1/4 ounce of gold

Due to the changes in productive technique and the increase in the productivity of labour, all the values of commodities are continually fluctuating, like so many trains in a station pulling in and out at differing times. If you take any train as a standard which is moving off to gauge the movement of others, it would lead to confusion. Only by standing on the firm platform can you judge accurately what is happening. In relation to the changes of all goods, gold acts as the measure. Although the most stable, even this is in constant motion, as no commodity has a totally fixed value.

Prices of commodities

The law of value governs the price of goods. As explained earlier, the value of commodities is equal to the amount of labour contained in it. In theory, the value is equal to its price. Yet, in reality, the price of a commodity tends to be either above or below its real value. This fluctuation is caused by different influences on market price, such as the growth of monopoly. The differences of supply and demand also have a great effect. For instance, there may be a surplus of a commodity in the market, and the price that day may be far below the real value, or if there was a shortage, the price would rise above it. The effects of supply and demand have led bourgeois economists to believe that this law is the sole factor in determining price. What they were unable to explain was that prices always fluctuate around a definite level. What that level is, is not determined by supply and demand, but by the labour time spent in the articles' production. A lorry will always be more expensive than a plastic bucket.

Profits

Some “clever” people have invented the theory that profits arise from buying cheap and selling dear. In Wage, Labour and Capital, Marx explains the nonsense of this argument:

“What a man would certainly win as a seller he would lose as a purchaser. It would not do to say that there are men who are buyers without being sellers or consumers without being producers. What these people pay to the producers, they must first get from them for nothing. If a man first takes your money and afterwards returns that money in buying your commodities you will never enrich yourself by selling your commodities too dear to that same man. This sort of transaction might diminish a loss, but would help in realising a profit”.

Labour power

In obtaining the “factors of production”, the capitalist looks on the “labour market” as just another branch of the general market for commodities. The abilities and energies of the worker are seen as just another commodity. He advertises for so many “hands”.

What we have to be clear about is what the capitalist has bought. The worker has sold not his labour but his ability to work. This Marx calls his labour power.

Labour power is a commodity governed by the same laws as other commodities. Its value is determined by the labour-time necessary for its production. Labour power is the ability of the worker to work. It is “consumed” by the capitalist in the actual labour-process. But this presupposes the existence and health and strength of the worker. The production of labour power therefore means the worker's self-maintenance and the reproduction of his species, to provide new generations of “hands” for the capitalist.

The labour-time necessary for the worker's maintenance is the labour-time it takes to produce the means of subsistence for him and his family: food, clothing, fuel, etc. The amount of this varies in different countries, different climates, and different historical periods. What is adequate subsistence for a labourer in Calcutta would not be adequate for a Welsh miner. What was adequate for a Welsh miner fifty years ago would not be for a Midlands car worker today. Into this question, unlike the value of other commodities, there enters a historical and even moral element. Nevertheless, in any given country, at any particular stage of historical development, the “standard of living” is known. (Incidentally, it is precisely the creation of new needs which is the spur to all kinds of human progress).

Not cheated!

Apart from the daily reproduction of his labour power, and the reproduction of the species, at a certain stage in the development of capitalist technique, a certain amount has to be provided for the education of the workers in order to fit them for the conditions of modern industry and raise their productivity.

Unlike most commodities, labour power is paid for only after it has been consumed. The workers thus philanthropically extend credit to their employers! (weeks in hand, petty cheating and bankruptcy, leading to loss of wages).

Despite this, the worker has not been cheated. He has arrived at an agreement of his own free will. As with all other commodities, equivalent values are exchanged: the worker's commodity, labour power, is sold to the boss at the “going rate”. Everybody is satisfied. And if the worker is not, then he is free to leave and find work elsewhere � if he can�

The sale of labour power poses a problem. If “nobody is cheated”, if the worker receives the full value of his commodity, where does exploitation come from? Where does the capitalist make his profits? The answer is that the worker sells the capitalist not his labour (which is realised in the work process), but his labour power--his ability to work.

Having purchased this as a commodity, the capitalist is free to use it as he pleases. As Marx explained: “From the instant he steps into the work shop, the use-value of his labour power, and therefore also its use, which is labour, belongs to the capitalist”.

Surplus value

We will see from the following example that the capitalist purchases labour power because it is the only commodity which can produce new values above and beyond its own value.

Let us take a worker who is employed to spin cotton into yarn. He gets paid £1 per hour and works an 8 hour day.

After 4 hours he had produced 100lbs of yarn at a total vale of £20. This value of £20 is made up from the following:

Raw materials £11 (cotton, spindle, power) Depreciation £1 (wear and tear) New value £8

The new value created is sufficient to pay the workers' wages for the full 8 hours. At this point the capitalist has covered all his costs (including his total wage bill). But as yet no surplus value (profit) has been produced.

During the next 4 hours another 100lbs of yarn is produced valued again at £20. And again £8 of new value is created, but this time the wages have already been covered. Therefore this new value (£8) is surplus value. From this comes rent (to the landlord), interest (to the moneylender) and profit (to the industrialist). Thus surplus value or profit, in the words of Marx, is the unpaid labour of the working class.

The working day

The secret of the production of surplus value is that the worker continues to work longer after he has produced the value necessary to reproduce the value of his labour power (his wages). “The fact that half a day's labour is necessary to keep the labourer alive does not in any way prevent him from working a full day.” (Marx).

The worker has sold his commodity and cannot complain about the way he is used, any more than the tailor can sell a suit and then demand that his customer must not wear it as often as he likes. The working day is therefore so organised as to give the maximum benefits from the labour power he has bought. In this lay the secret of the transformation of money into capital.

Constant capital

In production itself, machines and raw materials lose their use value, they become burnt up and become absorbed into the new product. They transfer their value into the new commodity.

This is clear in relation to raw materials (wood, metal, dyes, fuel, etc.) which are wholly consumed in the process of production, only to reappear in the properties of the article produced.

Machines on the other hand, do not disappear in the same way. But they do deteriorate in the course of production, thus dying a protracted death. The exact moment when a machine is finally declared redundant is no more possible to fix with exactitude than the exact moment of a person's death. But just as the insurance company, on the basis of the theory of averages, makes very accurate (and profitable) calculations concerning the life-span of men and women, so the capitalist know by experience and calculation roughly how long a machine will last.

The depreciation of machinery, its daily loss of use value, is calculated on this basis and added on to the cost of the article produced. Thus, the means of production add to the commodity their own value in proportion as the deterioration of its use value unfolds. The means of production, therefore, cannot transfer to the commodity more than that value which they themselves lose in the process of production. It is thus called constant capital.

Variable capital

While the means of production add no new value to the commodities produced, but only deteriorate, the labour of the worker not only preserves, but adds new value to his product by merely working. If the process of work were to stop at that moment when the worker had produced articles to the value of his own labour power, e.g. in 4 hours (£8) this is the only bit of new value created.

But the work process does not stop there. This would only cover the expenses of the capitalist in hiring the workmen. The capitalist does not hire workers for charity but for profit. Having “freely” entered into a contract with the capitalist, the worker must labour on, producing extra value and beyond that sum agreed on as his wage.

The means of production on the one hand, and labour power on the other--the “factors of production” of bourgeois economics--represent the different forms assumed by the original capital in the second phase of the cycle:

MONEY COMMODITY MONEY

(purchase) (production) (sale)

Capitalist economists treat these factors as equal. Marxism distinguishes between that part of capital which does not undergo any change of value in the process of production (machines, tools, raw materials) and that part represented by labour power which creates new value. The first part of capital called constant capital, and the latter variable capital. The total value of a commodity is made up from constant capital, variable capital and surplus value, i.e. C + V + S.

Necessary and surplus labour

The labour performed by the working class can be divided up into two parts:

(1) Necessary Labour: This is the part of the labour process which is needed to cover the cost of wages.
(2) Surplus Labour: This is the extra labour performed in addition to labour, which produces the profits.

To increase his profits, the capitalist is constantly attempting to reduce his wages bill. He does this by attempting to (1) lengthen the working day, introduce new shift patterns, etc., (2) increase productivity to cover wages more quickly, (3) resist wage rises or attempt to cut them.

Rate of surplus value

Since the whole purpose of capitalist production is to extract surplus value from the labour of the working class, the proportion between variable capital (wages) and the surplus value (profits) is of the greatest importance. One is expanding or contracting at the expense of the other. This struggle over the surplus constitutes the class struggle. What concerns the capitalist is not so much the amount of surplus value produced but the rate of surplus value. For every pound he lays out in capital he expects a big return. The rate of surplus value is the rate of exploitation of labour by capital. It may be defined as S/V or surplus labour/necessary labour, (it is the same thing expressed in a different way), where V = Variable capital, S = Surplus value. For example in a small plant, total capital of £500 is divided between Constant (£410) and Variable (£90). Through the process of production the value of the commodities have increased by £90 surplus: (C+V) + S or (410 + £90) + £90 surplus. The total new value is £590.

It is the variable capital that is the living labour, i.e. it produces the new value of surplus value. So the relative increase in the value produced by variable capital gives us the rate of surplus value S/V = £90/£90 =100% rate of surplus value.

The rate of profit

Under the pressure of competition at home and abroad, the capitalist is compelled to constantly revolutionise the means of production and to increase productivity. The need to expand compels him to spend a larger and larger proportion of his capital on machinery and raw materials and less on labour power, thus diminishing the proportion of variable capital to constant capital. Side by side with automation goes the concentration of capital, the liquidation of the smaller concerns and the domination of the economy by giant monopolies. This constitutes a change in the technical composition of capital.

But since it is the variable capital (labour power) alone which is the source of surplus value (profit), the bigger amounts invested in constant capital results in the tendency for the rate of profit to fall, although with new investments profits can increase enormously they do not rise proportionately to the much greater capital outlay.

For example, take a small capitalist with a total capital of £150 made up of Constant Capital (£50) and Variable (£100). He employs 10 men at £10 per day making tables and chairs. After one day work they produce £250 in total value:

Total Capital : The wages paid = £100

The constant capital = £50

Surplus value = £100

The rate of surplus value can be calculated: S/V = £100/£100 = 100%. The rate of profit is calculated as the ratio between total capital and surplus value: Surplus Value/Total capital or £100/£150 = 66.66 % rate of profit. As the amount of constant capital is increased, so the rate of profit falls. In the same example given the same rate of surplus value we increase the constant capital from £50 to £100. The rate of profit = Surplus value/Total capital = £100/£200 = 50%. Again if we increase the constant capital to £200, all other things being equal, Surplus Value/Total Capital = £100/£300 = 33.33 % rate of profit. And lastly constant capital is increased to £300, the rate of profit would be £100/£400 = 25%.

This increase in constant capital expresses in Marxist terms a higher organic composition of capital, and is a progressive development of the productive forces. The tendency is therefore built into the very nature of the capitalist mode of production, and has been one of the major problems facing the capitalist class in the post-war period. The mass of surplus value increases, but in proportion to the increased size of constant capital it results in a falling rate of profit. The capitalists have continually attempted to overcome this contradiction by the increased exploitation of the working class, to increase the mass of surplus value and therefore the rate of profit, by means other than investment. They do this in a number of ways by raising the intensity of exploitation, increasing the speed of the machinery and the lengthening of the working day. Another method to restore the rate of profit is to cut the real wages of the workers below their real value. The very laws of capitalism gives rise to enormous contradictions. The capitalists' constant striving for profits gives the impetus for investment, but new technology forces more workers on the scrap heap. Yet paradoxically the only source of profit is from the labour of the working class.

Export of capital

The highest stage of capitalism--imperialism--is marked by the enormous export of capital. In their search for increased rates of profit, the capitalists are forced to invest huge sums of money abroad in countries of low composition of capital. Eventually, the whole world, as Marx and Engels explain in the Communist Manifesto becomes dominated by the capitalist mode of production.

One of the major contradictions of capitalism is the obvious problem that the working class as consumers have to buy back what they have produced. But as they do not receive the full value of their labour, they have not the resources to do this. The capitalists solve this contradiction by taking the surplus and reinvesting it in developing the productive further. Also they seek to sell the remaining surplus on the world market in competition with the capitalists of all the other different countries. But there are also limits to this as all the capitalists of the world are playing the same game. In addition, the capitalists resort to credit, via the banking system, to provide the necessary cash for the mass of the population to buy the goods. But this also has its limits as the credit eventually has to be paid back, with interest.

That explains why periodically, the booms are followed in regular succession by periods of slump. The feverish struggle for markets end up in a crisis of overproduction for capitalism. The destructiveness of the crisis, which are met with the wholesale writing-off of accumulated capital, are a sufficient indication of the impasse of capitalist society.

All the factors that led to the world upswing after the war have prepared the way for downswing and crisis. The characteristic of this new epoch is the organic crisis that capitalism now faces. At some stage the working class will be faced with a 1929-type slump if capitalism is not eradicated. Only by overthrowing the anarchy of capitalist production can humanity prevent the chaos, wastage and barbarism of capitalism. Only by eliminating private property of the means of production, can society escape the laws of motion of capitalism and develop and blossom in a planned and rational way. The mighty forces of production, built by class society, can abolish once and for all the criminal scandal of so-called overproduction in a world of want and starvation. Eradicating the contradiction of the development of the productive forces and the nation state and private ownership, will provide the basis for an international plan of production.

Using the powers of science and technology, the whole of the planet could be transformed in the space of a decade. The socialist transformation of society remains the most urgent and burning task facing the world's working class. Marxism provides the weapon and understanding to weld together this mighty army for the establishment of a socialist Britain, a socialist Europe, and the basis for the World Federation of Socialist States.

Introduction To Historical Materialsm

2015-03-08T12:01:00.001+07:00

When one looks at history, it appears to be a mass of contradictions. Events are lost in a maze of revolutions, wars, periods of progress and of decline. Conflicts of classes and nations swirl around in the chaos of social development. How is it possible to understand and explain these events, when it appears that they have no rational basis?

From the beginning, human beings have sought to discover the laws which govern their existence. Theories ranging from supernatural guidance to the leadership of “Great Men” have attempted in one way or another, at one time or another to provide such an explanation. Some believe that as people act independently of each other, theories of human development are utterly worthless!

For almost 2,000 years the ideas of Genesis dominated the outlook of Western Europe. Those who attempted to undermine this concept were branded as disciples of the Devil. It is only in very recent times that the “heretical” view of history, evolution, has been generally accepted although even then in a one-sided fashion.

For the capitalist class and their functionaries in the universities, schools and places of learning, history has to be taught in an academic and biased fashion with absolutely no relevance to the present day. They continue to peddle the myth that classes and private property have always existed in a bid to justify the “eternal” nature of capitalist exploitation and the economic anarchy inherent within it. Volumes and volumes have been written by leading academics and professors to disprove the writings of Marxism and above all its Materialist Conception of History.

Marxists attach enormous importance to the study of history; not for its own sake but so as to study the great lessons it contains. Without that understanding of the development of events, it is not possible to foresee future perspectives. Lenin, for example, prepared the Bolshevik Party for the October 1917 Revolution by a meticulous analysis of the experience of the Paris Commune and the events in Russia of 1905 and February 1917.

It is precisely in this sense that we study and learn from history. Marxism is the science of perspectives, using its method of Dialectical Materialism to unravel the complex processes of historical development.

Marxist philosophy examines things not as static entities but in their development, movement and life. Historical events are seen as processes. Evolution, however, is not simply the movement from the lower to the higher. Life and society develop in a contradictory way, through “spirals not in a straight line; a development by leaps, catastrophes, and revolutions; breaks in continuity; the transformation of quantity into quality; inner impulses towards development, imparted by the contradiction and conflict of the various forces and tendencies.” (Lenin.)

Engels expressed dialectics as being “the great basic thought that the world is not to be comprehended as a complex of ready-made things, but as a complex of processes, in which the things apparently stable no less than their mind images in our heads, the concepts, go through an uninterrupted change of coming into being and passing away.” (Anti-Duhring).

This method is also materialist in outlook. Ideas, theories, party programmes, etc., do not fall from the sky but always reflect the material world and material interests. As Marx explained, “the mode of production of material life conditioned the social, political and intellectual life processes in general. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but on the contrary their social being that determines their consciousness”.

Using this method, Marx was able to indicate:

“the way to an all-embracing and comprehensive study of the process of the rise, development, and decline of socio-economic systems. People make their own history but what determines the motives of people, of the mass of people—i.e., what is the sum total of all these clashes in the mass of human societies? What are the objective conditions of production of material life that form the basis of all man's historical activity? What is the law of development of these conditions? To all these Marx drew attention and indicated the way to a scientific study of history as a single process which, with all its immense variety and contradictoriness, is governed by definite laws.”. (Lenin, Karl Marx - A Brief Biographical Sketch With an Exposition of Marxism)

Primitive Communism

Early humans evolved some three million years ago out of a highly evolved species of ape. Slowly primitive “humans” moved away from the forests and into the plains; a transition which was accompanied by an improvement in the flexibility and dexterity of the hand. The posture of the body became more erect. Whereas other animals had different organs for defence (cutting digging, shovelling and coats for warmth), humans had none of these. To survive they had to develop their only resources which were their hands and brain. Through trial and error, humans learned various skills, which had to be handed down from one generation to another. Communication through speech became a vital necessity. As Engels explained, “mastery over nature began with the development of the hand, with labour, and widened man's horizon at every new advance”. Men and women were social animals forced to band together and co-operate in order to survive. Unlike the rest of the animal kingdom, they developed the ability to generalise and think abstractly. Labour begins with the making of tools. With these tools, humans change their surrounding to meet their needs. “The animal merely uses its environment,” says Engels, “and brings about changes in it simply by his presence; Man by his changes makes it serve his ends, masters it. This is the final, essential distinction between Man and other animals, and once again it is labour that brings about this distinction.”

The economic forms were very simple. Humans, were very rare animals, and they roamed around in groups in search of food. This nomadic life was completely dominated with food gathering. Archaeologists call this period the old stone age. Henry Morgan, an early anthropologist, termed the period savagery. Then and for many thousands of years to come, private property did not exist. Everything that was made, collected, or produced was considered common property.

Between 10,000 and 12,000 years ago, a new higher period emerged known as the new stone age or Barbarism. Instead of roaming for food, advances were made in cultivating crops and domesticating animals. Men and women became free to settle in a particular place and as a result new tools were fashioned to assist the new work, and a food producing economy was created. Stable tribes and communities arose at this time. Even today, for a variety of reasons, many tribes in Africa, the South Pacific and South America exist at this stage of Barbarism.

Yet with the birth of the permanent settlement, private dwellings did not come into being; on the contrary, the large ones that were built were for common use. In this period, no private family existed. The children belonged to the entire tribe.

In the stage of primitive communism (savagery and barbarism, each being a lower and higher stage respectively), no private property, classes, privileged elites, police or special coercive apparatus (the state) existed. The tribes themselves were divided into social units called clans or gentes (singular gens). These, in fact, were very large family groups, which traced their descent from the female line alone. This is what is termed a matriarchal society. How else could it be when it was impossible to identify the real father of a child? It was forbidden for a man to cohabit with a woman from his own clan or gens, thus the tribes were made up from a coalition of clans. At certain times, a form of group marriage existed between the clans themselves.

This classless form of society was extremely democratic in its character. Everyone would participate in a general assembly to decide the important issues as they occurred, and their chiefs and officers would be elected for particular purposes. As Engels pointed out in his book, The Origins of the Family, Private Property and the State:

“How wonderful this gentle constitution is in all its natural simplicity! No soldiers, gendarmes and policemen, no nobility, kings, regents, prefects or judges, no prisons, no law-suits, and still affairs run smoothly. All quarrels and disputes are settled by the entire community involved in them, either the Gens or the tribe or the various Gentes amongst themselves. Only in very rare cases the blood revenge is threatened as an extreme measure. Our capital punishment is simply a civilised form of it, afflicted with all the advantages and drawbacks of civilisation … the communistic household is shared by a number of families, the land belongs to the tribe, only the gardens are temporarily assigned to the households … There cannot be any poor and destitute--the communistic households and the Gentes know their duties towards the aged, sick and disabled. All are free and equal--the women included. There is no room yet for slaves, nor for the subjection of foreign tribes”.

To the narrow philistine, who sees private property as a sacred god, these societies are looked upon with contempt. To the tribespeople, private property is completely alien. “The Indians,” explains the historian Heckewelder, “think that the great spirit has made the earth, and all that it contains, for the common good of mankind, when he stocked the country and gave them plenty of game, it was not for the good of the few, but of all. Everything is given in common to the sons of men. Whatever liveth on the land, whatever groweth out of the earth, and all that is in the rivers and waters was given jointly to all, and everyone is entitled to his share”.

Common tribal property came under growing strain from the development with the private family, with private houses growing up alongside the communal dwellings. As time went on Common Land became later divided up to form the collective property of each family. The Matriarchal family gave way to the Patriarchal (male dominated) form, which became essential to the maintenance of the collective property.

This “family”, however, must not be looked up on as similar to that of today. As Paul Lafargue says, “the family was not reduced to its last and simplest expression, as it is in our day, where it is composed of three indispensable elements: the father, the mother and the offspring; it consisted of the father, the recognised head of the family; of the legitimate wife, and his concubines, living under the same roof; of his children, his younger brothers, with their wives and children, and his unmarried sisters: such a family comprised many members”.

The growth of private property in the later stages of primitive communism is regarded by Marxists as elements of the new society within the old. Eventually the qualitative accumulation of these new elements led to the qualitative break up of the old society.

With the growth of new means of production, particularly in agriculture, the question arose who should own them? The possession of tools, weapons, new metals, but above all the means to make them, enabled a family to rise above the terrible life and death struggle with the force of nature.

Then with the further development (trade developed at first between the different communities) of the productive forces, inequality began to appear within society. This had a profound effect upon the Old Order. For the first time, men and women were able to produce a surplus above and beyond his own needs, resulting in a revolutionary leap forward for humanity.

In the past, where war broke out between two tribes, it was uneconomic to take captives as slaves. After all, a captive would only have been able to produce sufficient food for himself. No surplus was produced. The only use for a captive, given the shortage of food, was as a source of meat. This was the economic foundation of cannibalism.

But once a surplus was produced, it became economically viable to keep a slave who was forced to work for his master. The surplus obtained from a growing number of slaves was then appropriated by the new class of slave owners. But how were the slaves to be controlled and forced to work? The old tribes had no police force or means of coercion. Every individual was free and was a warrior.

The production of a surplus product smashed the old forms of society, enabling classes to crystallise. The existence of these classes required an apparatus of force to subject one class by another. Rich and poor, landowner and tenant, creditor and debtor all made their appearance in society. The clans which were social units of originally blood relations, began to disintegrate. The rich of different clans had more in common with each other than they had with the poor of their own clan.

Slave Society

Despite all the horrors which accompanied it, the emergence of class society was enormously progressive in further developing society. For the first time since humans evolved from the ape, a section of society was freed from the labour of eking out an existence. Those who were freed from work could now devote their time to science, philosophy and culture. Class society brought with it priests, clerks, officials and specialised craftsmen. The historical justification and function of the new ruling class was to develop the productive forces and take society forward. It was at this stage that civilisation first emerged.

Special institutions were now created to protect the interests of the ruling class. Special armed bodies of men, with their gaols, courts, executioners, etc., as well as new laws were all needed to protect private property of the slave owner. The state together with its appendages came into being and the freedom and equality of the old gentile system fell into ruins. New ideas and morals developed to justify the new social and economic order.

By the 7th century B.C. the tribal aristocracy of Greece had become a ruling class of well-endowed slave owning landlords. According to the Ancient Greek philosopher, Aristotle, the majority of the population of Attica had been enslaved by this time.

With the growth of the city-states, the increase in the division of labour greatly accelerated. Not only between town and country, but between branches of trade and finance, merchant and usurer; new crafts sprung up together with a growing band of artists catering for the tastes and culture of the upper class.

The drive of the city-states for more and more slaves, resulted in continuous war. In the war against Macedonia by the Romans in 169 B.C., 70 cities in Epirus alone were sacked and 150,000 of their inhabitants sold as slaves. The slave economy was extremely wasteful and needed for its survival a continuous supply of slaves to replace those who had been injured or died. However the natural reproduction amongst slaves was very slow owing to the harshness of their lot, thus the only real method of replenishment was by conquest.

Although the slave was much less productive than the free peasant on the land, the low cost of his maintenance made slavery far more profitable. The ruination of the free peasants led to large numbers fleeing to the town forming the de-classed lumpenproletariat of the slave societies. The latter relied upon the charity of the upper classes, who provided them with circuses for their amusement.

It was in this period that the revolutionary Christian movement emerged. Originally a group of primitive Communist sects with a deep hatred of the conquering Romans and their rich lackeys, they won much support from the poor and oppressed. These early Christian revolutionaries were prepared to use violent means to overthrow the upper classes and bring about “Heaven on Earth”. They were therefore hounded by the authorities and were ruthlessly executed for treason against the Emperor. Later, Christianity was raised to the position of state religion after being purged of its class hatred. The ruling class used it as a weapon to dupe and pacify the lower classes into accepting their earthly lot and to encourage their illusions in a better life after death.

The greater the surpluses the slave-owners obtained from the exploitation of the slaves, the greater became their extravagance, brilliance, arrogance and idleness. As more and more wars had to be waged to increase the slave population by conquest, the Roman Empire overstretched itself. Wars cannot be fought without soldiers and the best soldiers were the peasants. They were rapidly disappearing and thus had to be replaced by highly paid foreign mercenaries. The age of the “cheap slave” came to a rapid end bringing with it the decline of the slave empires.

Despite the various slave rebellions--the most famous being led by Spartacus--the slave did not prove to be a revolutionary class that could take society forward. As Marx was to point out, the class struggle would end “either in a revolutionary reconstruction of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes”. Karl Kautsky, the German Marxist, explained that “the great migrations, the flooding of the Roman Empire by the swarms of savage Germans did not mean the premature destruction of a flourishing high culture, but merely the conclusion of a dying civilisation and the formation of the basis for a new upswing of civilisation”.

The mighty slave civilisations had produced an enormous leap forward for society. One is amazed at the cultural achievements of Ancient Egypt and Babylon. The Greeks and Romans developed scientific knowledge to tremendous heights. Hero, the philosopher, had discovered the basic principles of the steam engine. The contributions of Archimedes, Pythagoras and Euclid advanced mathematics to the stage where the beginnings of mechanical engineering would have been possible. Nevertheless, slave society had reached its limits and internal decay and external factors were to bring it to destruction.

The Rise of Feudalism

“The last centuries of the declining Roman Empire and its conquest by the Barbarians destroyed a number of productive forces: agriculture had declined, industry had decayed for want of a market, trade had died out or had been violently suspended, the rural population and urban population had decreased.” (Karl Marx, The German Ideology.)

Over the centuries, the barbarian masses overran Europe; in the East, the Goths, Germans and Huns; in the North and West, the Scandinavian; in the South, the Arabs. In their conquest of territories they proceeded to ransack the towns, and settle down in the countryside, where they lived by means of primitive agriculture.

In these communities, they elected their village chiefs, however, as time passed by, chiefs were always chosen from the same family. The head of the privileged family, through succession, became the natural chief. The villages were at constant war with their neighbours, resulting in conquered lands being divided up with the greater share accruing to the chief. He thus became the most powerful and propertied man in the community. In times of strife, he would guarantee the protection of those under him while in turn they were duty bound to grant military service to him. These peasants were later able to forgo their military service for a tribute in some form or another.

The authority of these village lords was extended into the surrounding countryside. The lord “owed justice, aid, and protection to his vassals, and these, in their turn, owed fidelity and homage to their lord”. (Lafargue, The Evolution of Property.) Wars and conquests served to crystallise these feudal relationships. The lords and barons together with their men-at-arms formed a new social hierarchy, sustained by the labour provided by their vassals. As Lafargue expressed it:

“So soon as the authority of the feudal nobility was constituted, it became in its turn, a source of trouble to the country whose defence it had been charged with. The barons, in order to enlarge their territories and thereby extend their power, carried on continual warfare among themselves, only interrupted now and again by a short truce necessitated by the tillage of the fields … The vanquished, when not killed outright or utterly despoiled, became the vassals of the conqueror, who seized upon a portion of their lands and vassals. The petty barons disappeared for the benefit of the great ones, who became potent feudatories, and established ducal courts at which the lords in vassalage were bound to attend”.

As feudal relations matured, the majority of farm land in Europe became divided into areas known as manors, each manor possessing its own lord and officials whose task was to manage the estate. The arable land was divided into two parts, about a third of it belonged to the lord (called a Demesne), while the rest was divided amongst his vassals. Pastures, wood and meadows were used as Common Land--a survival in fact from the days of Primitive Communism. Agriculture was to make great strides forward with the introduction of the three field system. The vassals share of the land, however, was further divided up into separate strips scattered throughout the fields which meant a massive drain on productivity.

The social structure which developed under Feudalism, gave rise to new classes and groups. The social framework resembled a pyramid structure, headed by the king, aristocracy, the great churchmen and bishops. Under them were the privileged barons, dukes, counts and knights. On the bottom rungs of the social order were the freeman, serfs (Bordars, Cotters, Villeins), and slaves.

Unlike today, where the main body of wealth is created in the factories the land produced nearly all of social requirement. So land became the most important possession of the Feudal system. The more land one held, the more powerful one became. The ruling class ruled by their virtual monopoly of land to which the serfs were tied. Theoretically, the King owned all the land but in reality areas and domains were granted to dukes, who in turn granted tenancy to counts, who would have many vassals under him granted tenancy of much smaller parcels of land. All had to provide services to their superiors in guaranteeing men-at-arms, payment of rent, etc.

Unlike the slave who owned nothing, the serf was a tenant of the lord. Unlike the slave, the serf has a vested interest in his plot of land. He had more rights than the slave: he could not be sold (neither could his family), providing some security, although the degree of serfdom and obligations varied. In return for this land and “rights”, the serf was forced to work for the lord of the manor for certain periods of the week, without pay. Other services were demanded of him (Boon Days) at harvest time, and whenever the lord needed assistance. The lords' needs came first. The serf could not leave the land, had to have the lords' permission if his children were to marry outside his demesne. Taxes were imposed on a serf's inheritance and female heirs to land had to get the permission of their overlord.

The new organisation of society based on landed property gave rise to a further development of the productive forces. This time the surplus value created by the serf's labour was appropriated by the aristocratic lay and ecclesiastical ruling class.

In the words of the historian Meilly: “It is an economic maxim that productiveness increases in proportion as the freer constitution of society insures the workers an absolutely larger and more secure portion of the product of their labour. In other words, freer social forms have the direct effect of stimulating production.”

As the new classes crystallised, new forms of state apparatus also came into existence to preserve the feudal property forms. The new morality and ideology that arose from these forms cemented social relationships. The Church, which became more and more powerful, provided the spiritual foundations of the new order and with it the Popes became more powerful than King or Emperor, with churchlands extending to between a third and a half of the land in Christendom. The tithe that is collected amounted to a 10 per cent tax on all income, goods, etc.

In general the feudal state remained centrally weak until the rise of the absolute monarchies of the 16th century. As a result, continual baronial wars shook the outlying provinces where robber barons built up their power and prestige, threatening the position of the central monarch. The struggle of the central monarch to subdue the regions is a characteristic feature of the period. The eventual defeat of these provincial lords, with their constant strife and war, enabled trade to develop to a higher level.

Trade was at a low level. The land, in fact, produced practically everything. It was a “natural” economy geared towards self-sufficiency. However, with the launching of the crusades, the expeditions to the Holy Land, new needs arose, and the merchants who supplied these needs, began to establish huge fairs in France, Belgium, England, Germany and Italy. These periodic fairs played an essential part in the growth of European trade, and helped to establish a strong class of rich merchants. Money relations began to erode the straight jacket of feudal society.

Hand in hand with the development of trade, went the growth of the towns. The merchant class that arose in the town clashed with the traditional standards and restrictions of feudalism.

The Church, for instance, considered the practice of usury as a sin, using the threat of excommunication against those who promoted it.

In his very good book, Man's Worldly Goods, Leo Huberinan explains the nature of the conflict:

“The whole atmosphere of feudalism was one of confinement, whereas the whole atmosphere of merchant activity in the town was one of freedom. Town land belonged to feudal lords, bishops, nobles, kings. These feudal lords at first looked upon their town land in no different light from that in which they looked on the other land … All these forms (feudal dues, taxes, services) were feudal, based on the ownership of the soil. And all these forms had changed as far the towns were concerned. Feudal regulations and feudal justice were fixed by custom and difficult to alter. But trade by its very nature is active, changing, and impatient of barriers. It could not fit into the rigid feudal frame.”

Therefore old relationships had to be challenged and changed. The towns began to demand their freedom and independence, and gradually town charters were conceded, some by agreement, others by force.

Trade itself gave rise to new forms of wealth. No longer was land the sole source of power and privilege, as money acquired in trading assumed a much greater importance. In the towns was born the wealthy merchant oligarchy which controlled and regulated the small scale individual production, through the guild system. With the further division of labour, Craft Guilds were established comprising the guild master, apprentices and journeymen. As more and more wealth was created through production the guild masters (employers of labour) came into sharp conflict with their journeymen (workers). By the 15th century, actual journeymen's unions were formed to protect their interests.

The introduction of the money economy (which had only a very limited character in slave society) slowly undermined the basis of the feudal system. Its laws and customs were modified to correspond with the new development. As serfs ran away to the towns to make their fortunes, money values began to transcend the old relationships, Labour dues being replaced by rented property. The impact of the Black Death, in the mid-14th century, greatly accelerated the process. Historians have estimated between 30 and 50 per cent of the population of England, Germany, the Low Countries, and France were wiped out by the Great Plague. This in turn resulted in the chronic shortage of labour, which forced many landowners to introduce wage labour to overcome their difficulties.

The Rise of the Absolute Monarch

The nation-state as we know it today did not always exist. Peoples' allegiances at this time belonged not to the nation but to the lord, the town, the locality, or the guild. People considered themselves not French, English, etc., but people of a town or city. Every Christian was a member of the Roman Catholic Church, which in turn ruled over Christendom, and thus was the greatest power of all.

With the growth of wealth in the towns, a capitalist class began to arise which demanded conditions suitable for the unhindered development of trade and commerce. They wanted order and security. The struggle for independence of the towns from their feudal overlords, the continuous battles between local barons, the pillaging that followed, all gave rise to the need for a central authority, a nation state.

The conflict between the central monarch and the great barons (a struggle between two sections of the ruling class) ended with a victory for the king. He was supported by the merchants and middle class, who provided the money to raise the armies he required. The emergence of the nation state together with the centralised monarchy ushered in a great economic advance. For their support, the monarch granted certain monopolies and privileges to sections of the middle class and the next stage was set for the clash between the national monarch and the interests of the international church.

The late 15th century saw the beginning of the voyages of discovery. Men such as Columbus and Vasco Da Gama were financed by rich merchants to seek new areas of exploitation and “spread the Word of God”. Joint stock companies were established to promote the financing of greater exploitation, for plunder and profit.

With the massive profits from the voyages, many merchants and financiers became the real centres of power and wealth. Nobles, aristocrats and monarchs became debtors to the rich merchants. One banking family, the Fuggors, were even able to decide who was to be made Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire!

The new economic developments were giving rise to a capitalist formation. The basis of the feudal economy had begun to disintegrate with the growth in power and wealth of the rising bourgeoisie. New values, ideas, philosophies, and morals evolved out of the new relationships. The old ruling class stubbornly resisted the changes.

As Marx explained:

“At a certain stage of development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relation of production or--this merely expresses the same thing in legal terms--with the property relations within the framework of which they have operated hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an era of social revolution”. Later on, Marx adds: “No social order is ever destroyed before all the productive forces for which it is sufficient have been developed, and new superior relations of production never replace older ones before the material conditions for their existence have matured within the framework of the old society.”

The old society has been undermined during the previous period. Probably one of the greatest challenges to the old order was the attack on Catholicism. In this period, the Church was not just a religious institution but the chief bulwark of the social order. Apart from being a powerful landowner, it collected a tithe from everyone, had its courts and special privileges, controlled education and shaped the political and moral outlook of the people. As Charles I once said: “People are governed by the pulpit more than the sword in times of peace.” The Church censored books, and used the threat of excommunication against dissenters. It is said that this was a very religious period but this is wildly exaggerated by historians. Rather than people actually living according to the precepts of the Bible, religion was rather used to justify the Old Order. Everything, including political thought, was expressed in religious terms. Those who wished to undermine the system, had to first challenge the monopoly of Catholicism.

In the early 16th century, the absolute monarchies came into conflict with the Catholic Church themselves. The Protestant Reformation ushered in by Luther, supplied the weapons in the struggle against Papal power. In England, Henry VIII broke with Catholicism and raided the wealth of the monasteries, which was dissipated in expensive European and Irish wars.

The Capitalist Revolution

The Puritanism of the Calvin variety suited the outlook and morality of the rising middle class in town and country with its emphasis on self-reliance and personal success. The middle class was now set to rise quickly after adapting to the inflation rampant between 1540-1640, in which prices rose by more than fourfold and came increasingly into conflict with the old ruling class.

In England, the struggle between the new bourgeoisie and the old order took the form of the civil war. The New Model Army of Oliver Cromwell led the middle class into the armed struggle against the King and Old Order. In 1649, the King was beheaded and a capitalist republic declared. Cromwell, resting for support on the army, established himself as the head of a Bonapartist military dictatorship. The elements of left-wing democracy and its proponents (the levellers and diggers), who threatened capitalist property rights, had to be mercilessly quashed. From then on the regime rested on a narrow social basis--the armed forces. The capitalist regime under these critical crises circumstances reduced itself in the Bonapartist fashion to the rule of one man.

The feudal structures were dismantled together with the House of Lords and monarchy. The old ruling class had been defeated, and the lower classes kept in their place. The struggle of the Parliamentarians against the King has been seen by historians and even by some contemporaries as a struggle against tyranny and for religious liberty but as Marx commented:

“Just as one does not judge an individual by what he thinks about himself, so one cannot judge such a period of transformation by its consciousness, but on the contrary, this consciousness must be explained from the contradiction of material life, from the conflict existing between the social forces of production and the relations of production”.

Leon Trotsky, one of the leaders of the Russian Revolution, once noted: “Revolutions have always in history been followed by counter-revolutions. Counter-revolutions have always thrown society back, but never as far back as the starting point of the revolution”. So it was in 1660 and 1689, where the big bourgeoisie hurriedly made a compromise with the “bourgeois” elements of the aristocracy. The monarchy and House of Lords were restored although from then on they could never play the same role as their predecessors, on the contrary, they became part and parcel of the capitalist state. The bourgeois men of property concerned themselves with their future, and of keeping the lower orders in their place with their power carefully checked.

One hundred years later, the French Capitalist revolution was carried through to completion without any compromise being struck. The French Revolution, like its English counter-part, began with a split in the ruling class. The King and his ministers clashed over a scheme to avoid state bankruptcy, with the Parliament (which represented the nobility, higher clergy, the court clique, etc.). The latter's appeal against the government tyranny took on unforeseen flesh and rioting broke out in the streets of the towns and cities. It brought to a head all the simmering discontent of the middle class and lower orders against the regime. “The revolt of the nobility was,” explains George Rude, “perhaps, a curtain-raiser rather than a revolution which, by associating the middle and lower classes in common action against King and aristocracy, was unique in contemporary Europe.” Despite the attempts at reform from above, they were insufficient to prevent revolution from below.

As in all popular revolutions the masses burst onto the scene of history. The most self-sacrificing came to the fore, and pushed the revolution far to the left. Between 1789 and 1793 the old feudal regime and aristocracy had been completely swept away. The regime was headed by the revolutionary middle class, the Jacobins, who were supported and pushed by the plebeian masses made up of wage-earners and small craftsmen. A shift to the right occurred in 1794 with the government of the Directory coming to power. This in its turn gave way to a new political counter-revolution, which brought to power the law and order type regime of Napoleon Bonaparte. Nevertheless, the old order had been broken, and the new bourgeois property rights were to remain intact. The shift of political power was not accompanied by a social change backwards, i.e., it did not bring a return to the feudal order but was a political change brought about through the struggles of different sections of the capitalist class itself.

The Triumph of Capitalism

The great Bourgeois revolutions cleared the path for Capitalism. The agrarian changes ensured the growth of capitalist agriculture, where the old feudal estates had been broken up and distributed to the peasants. In England, the conversion of a section of the aristocracy before the revolution prepared the way for the ruination of the peasantry itself. Governments now, instead of acting as a brake on trade and industry, actually championed its cause.

Through robbery, enclosure and plunder and competition, the means of production became concentrated into fewer and fewer hands. The ruination of the peasantry provided a pool of labour-power in the towns and cities. The class structure became more simplified. On the one hand were the capitalists and on the other the propertyless proletarians. All that these workers possessed was their ability to work. The only way they could remain alive was to sell their labour-power to the capitalists in return for wages. In the process of production, the proletarian produces more value than he receives in wages, the surplus value being expropriated by the capitalists. In its search for profit, amidst competition from rivals, the capitalist class is forced to introduce new methods of production, in this way Capitalism has, historically, played a progressive role continually revolutionising the productive forces.

Its export of commodities and then Capital leads the capitalist class to create “a world after its own image”. The productive forces, technique and science gradually outgrew the nation state which protected it.

Imperialism

The period from 1870 to 1900 saw the division of the world amongst the main powers. In 1870 one-tenth of Africa had been divided up; by 1900 some nine-tenths of the “Dark Continent” were in the hands of Britain, France or one of the other European Empires. By 1914 this process of world division had been completed, and capitalism entered its highest stage of Imperialism. Huge trusts and monopolies had grown out of the earlier period of competition. “The state had more and more fused with the monopolies and financial institutions and acted increasingly in their interest. Production in this epoch is accompanied by the export of capital itself.” (Lenin)

The imperialist stage brings with it the threat of world war, in the struggle for new markets, etc. Due to the carving up of the world and the tremendous growth in production, markets can now only be obtained by a new re-division of the world which inevitably leads to conflict on a world scale. World war indicates the contradictions between the private ownership of the means of production on the one hand and the nation state on the other. But unlike previous societies Capitalism has furnished the material pre-requisites for the new socialist order that can guarantee plenty for all.

The proletariat is the only consistent revolutionary class capable of carrying through to a conclusion the Socialist Revolution. This stems from its particular place in social production. The working class is disciplined in the factories and forced to co-operate in the productive process. It organises itself into large trade unions and then into its own independent party. Marxism, as opposed to all other theories, provides it with a clear ideology and tasks in its mission to overthrow Capitalism. The Bolshevik Party, led by Lenin and Trotsky, provided a living model to the workers of the world.

The peasantry and the middle classes are incapable of playing a leading role, due to their social position. The peasantry is scattered in the countryside, and have no real conception of unity or internationalism. These middle layers of society follow either the bourgeoisie or the proletariat.

The peasantry have been in fact, the classical tool of Bonapartism--a regime based on the armed forces, balancing between the classes. In the epoch of imperialism and the decay of monopoly capitalism, if the working class fails to win the middle layers to its Socialist banner, they will be driven into the arms of reaction.

The Law of Uneven and Combined Development

From a progressive social system, Capitalism has now become a fetter upon production and the further development of humanity. Marx believed that the proletariat would come to power first in the advanced capitalist countries of Britain, Germany, and France. However, with the emergence of Imperialism, Capitalism, in the words of Lenin, “broke at its weakest link” in backward Russia.

Society does not develop in a straight line, but according to its laws of uneven and combined development. The uneven growth of society on the world scale is constantly cut across by the introduction of new products and ideas from different social systems. The backwardness of semi-feudal Russia was supplemented by the most modern techniques of production in its cities, due to the enormous amount of foreign capital from France and Britain. The new industrial proletariat which had recently come into being accepted the most advanced ideas of the working class: Marxism.

In many of the under-developed countries the festering sores of much needed land reform, autocracy, national oppression, and economic stagnation, have resulted in enormous discontent. The tasks of the bourgeois democratic revolution, which would have laid the basis for capitalist development, have either only been partially carried out or not at all.

In these countries the Capitalist class has come on the scene too late to play a similar role as its revolutionary counter-part of the 17th and 18th century. As in Russia before 1917, they are too weak and tied by a thousand strings--through marriage and mortgage--to the land owners and imperialists. They both now acquire a common hatred of the emerging proletariat. The nationalist capitalist class prefers to cling to the old order rather than appeal to the lower classes to carry through the anti-feudal revolution.

The only class capable of carrying out the revolution is the proletariat by uniting around itself the poorer sections of the peasantry. Once the working class comes to power as in October 1917, it is then able to give the land to the peasants, expel the imperialists and unify the country. However, the proletariat would not stop at these measures but would then proceed to the socialist tasks: nationalisation of the basic industries, land, and financial institutions.

The Russian Revolution was the greatest event in the whole of human history. For the first time the working class took power, swept out the Capitalists, landlords and gangsters and organised a “democratic workers' state”. It was to be the beginning of the international socialist revolution and fully confirmed the theory of Permanent Revolution.

Unfortunately, the betrayal of the socialist revolution in Germany, and other countries, led to the isolation of the revolution in a backward, devastated country. The destruction of the War, mass illiteracy, civil war, exhaustion, placed terrible strains upon the weak working class, and contributed to the degeneration of the revolution. It was these objective conditions which encouraged the growth of bureaucratism in the state, trade unions and the Party. Stalin rose to power on the back of this new bureaucratic caste. The individual in history represents not himself, but the interests of a group, caste or class in society.

Stalinism and its monstrous dictatorship grew not from the Bolshevik Party or socialist revolution, but out of the isolation and material backwardness of Russia. It destroyed the workers' democracy in order to preserve its privileges and power.

The Stalinist regime nevertheless rested on the new property forms of nationalised industry and the plan of production. The Soviets (Workers' Councils) and workers democracy were crushed in the Stalinist political counter-revolution. Only by a new political revolution could the Russian working class have restored the workers' democracy which existed under Lenin and Trotsky. This would not mean a return to capitalism, but an end to the privileged bureaucratic elite, as the masses themselves become involved in the running of society and the state.

The Socialist Transformation

The socialist transformation ushers in a new and higher form of society by breaking the fetters on the development of the productive forces. The obstacle of private property and the nation state are swept away, allowing the socialised property to be planned in the interests of the majority.

The Socialist Revolution cannot be confined to one country, but puts the world revolution on the order of the day. The world economy and the world division of labour created by capitalism demands an international solution. A Socialist United States of Europe would prepare the ground for a World Federation of Socialist States, and the international planning of production. This in turn would provide the basis for the “planned and harmonious production of goods for the satisfaction of human wants”.

One of the first tasks of the victorious working class would be the destruction of the old state machine. In all class societies the state came into existence as “an organ of class rule, an organ for the oppression of one class by another”. This raises the question, does the working class need a state? The anarchists reply no. But they fail to understand that some form of force is required to keep the old landowners, bankers and capitalists in their place. The proletariat therefore has to construct a new type of state to represent its interests. In a workers' state, the majority are holding a tiny minority of ex-capitalists in check and therefore the massive bureaucratic state of the past is not needed. This “Dictatorship of the Proletariat” or Workers' Democracy, as Trotsky preferred to call it, vastly broadened and extended the highest forms of bourgeois democracy.

Bourgeois democracy was defined by Marx as the workers deciding every five years which section of the ruling class would misrepresent their interests in Parliament. Everyone could say what they liked, provided that the boards of the monopolies could actually decide what was to be done.

The new workers state would extend democracy from the political to the economic sphere with the nationalisation of the major monopolies. New organs of power, such as the Soviets in Russia, based on the armed people, constitute “working bodies, executive and legislative at the same time”. Bureaucracy would be replaced by the involvement of the masses in the running of the state and society. In order to prevent the growth of officialdom, the proletariat of Paris in 1871 and of Russia in 1917 introduced the following measures:

(1) Election of all officials, with the right to recall. (2) No standing army, but an armed people. (3) No official to receive more than a skilled worker. (4) Positions in the state to be rotated amongst the people.

With the reduction of the working week, the masses are given the opportunity to involve themselves in the state, and obtain the key to culture, science and art. For as Engels once said, if art, science and government remain the preserve of the minority, they will use and abuse this position in their own interest, as was the case in the Stalinist countries.

The state arose historically with the emergence of class society. Thus, from its very inception, the workers' state begins to wither away, as classes themselves dissolve within society. This is why Engels characterised the proletarian state as a “semi-state”.

“Under socialism much of 'primitive' democracy will inevitably be revived, since, for the first time in the history of civilised society, the mass of the people will rise to taking anindependent part, not only in voting and elections, but also in the everyday administration of the state. Under Socialism all will govern in turn and will soon become accustomed to no one governing”. (Lenin, State and Revolution.)

In this lower stage of Socialism as Marx called it, one sees society, “just as itemerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect, economically, morally and intellectually, still stamped with the birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it comes”. (Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme.) Although the exploitation of man by man has been ended, production has not yet reached a high enough level to completely eradicate inequality or class differences. People still have to follow the principle: “He who does not work shall not eat”. The state, despite its transitory character, remains the guardian of inequality.

Socialism, the Classless Society

Yet with huge strides forward in production, based on the most advanced science and conscious planning, humanity enters the higher realms of real society. Classes and the state will have completely withered away, as society now adopts the slogan “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs”. The antitheses of town and country, and mental and physical labour disappear with the further revolution in the productive forces. In the words of Lenin, “the narrow horizon of bourgeois law”, which compels one to calculate with the heartlessness of a Shylock whether one has not worked half an hour more than somebody else, whether one is getting less pay than somebody else--this narrow horizon will then be left behind. There will then be no need for society, in distributing the products, to regulate the quantity to be received by each; each will take freely according to his needs.

The barbarous nature of class society would have ended once and for all. The prehistory of humankind would have been completed. The productive forces built up over thousands of years of class rule now laid the basis for classless society where the state and division of labour were rendered superfluous. Humanity sets itself the task of conquering nature, and opens up the tremendous wonders of science and technology. In the words of Engels, “the government of persons is replaced by the administration of things”.

And Trotsky pointed out that, “Once he has done with the anarchic forces of his own society man will set to work on himself, in the pestle and retort of the chemist. For the first time mankind will regard itself as raw material, or at best as a physical and psychic semi-finished product. Socialism will mean a leap from the realm of necessity into the realm of freedom in this sense also, that the man of today, with all his contradictions and lack of harmony, will open the road for a new and happier race”. (Leon Trotsky, In Defence of October.)

Written by Rob Sewell
and Alan WoodsWednesday, 15 March 2000

The Method Of Marxism ' An Introduction To Dialectical Materialism '

2015-03-08T11:53:00.001+07:00

What is a Philosophy?

At each stage in human history, men and women have worked out some sort of picture of the world and their place in it. They develop a Philosophy. The pieces they use to make up this picture have been obtained by observing nature and through generalising their day to day experiences.

Some people believe they have no need of such a philosophy or world outlook. Yet in practise everyone has a philosophy, even if it is not consciously worked out. People who live by rule of thumb or “common sense” and think they are doing without theory, in practice think in the traditional way. Marx once said that the dominant ideas of society are those of the ruling class. To maintain and justify its rule, the capitalist class makes use of every available means to distort the consciousness of the worker. The school, church, TV, and press are used to foster the ideology of the ruling class and indoctrinate the worker into accepting their system as the most natural permanent form of society. In the absence of a conscious socialist philosophy, they accept unconsciously the capitalist one.

At each point in class society, the rising revolutionary class, aiming to change society, have to fight for a new world outlook and have to attack the old philosophy, which, being based on the old order, justified and defended it.

Idealism and Materialism

Throughout the history of philosophy we find two camps, the Idealist and the Materialist. The common idea of “Idealism” (i.e. honesty, uprightness in the pursuit of ideals) and “Materialism” (i.e. base, greedy, money-grabbing egoism) has nothing to do with philosophical idealism and philosophical materialism.

Many great thinkers of the past were Idealists, notably Plato and Hegel. This school of thought looks upon nature and history as a reflection of ideas or spirit. The theory that men and women and every material thing was created by a divine Spirit, is a basic concept of idealism. This outlook is expressed in a number of ways, yet its basis is that ideas govern the development of the material world. History is explained as a history of thought. People's actions are seen as resulting from abstract thoughts, and not from their material needs. Hegel went one step further, being a consistent idealist, and turned thoughts into an independent “Idea” existing outside of the brain and independent of the material world. The latter was merely a reflection of this Idea. Religion is part and parcel of philosophical idealism.

The Materialist thinkers on the other hand, have maintained that the material world is real and that nature or matter is primary. The mind or ideas are a product of the brain. The brain, and therefore ideas, arose at a certain stage in the development of living matter. The basic corner-stones of Materialism are as follows:

The material world, known to us by our senses and explored by science, is real. The development of the world is due to its own natural laws, without any recourse to the supernatural.

There is only one world, the material one. Thought is a product of matter (the brain) without which there can be no separate ideas. Therefore minds or ideas cannot exist in isolation apart from matter. General ideas are only reflections of the material world. “To me,” wrote Marx, “the idea is nothing else than the material world reflected in the human mind, and translated into forms of thought.” And further, “Social being determines consciousness”

.The Idealists conceive of consciousness, of thought, as something external, and opposed to matter, to nature. This opposition is something entirely false and artificial. There is a close correlation between the laws of thought and the laws of nature, because the former follow and reflect the latter. Thought cannot derive its categories from itself, but only from the external world. Even the most seemingly abstract thoughts are in fact derived from the observation of the material world.

Even an apparently abstract science like pure mathematics has, in the last analysis, been derived from material reality, and is not spun from the brain. The school-child secretly counts his material fingers under a material desk before solving an abstract arithmetical problem. In so doing, he is re-creating the origins of mathematics itself. We base ourselves upon the decimal system because we have ten fingers. The Roman numerals were originally based on the representation of fingers.

According to Lenin, “this is materialism: matter acting on our sense organs produces sensation. Sensations depend upon the brain, nerves, retina, etc., i.e., matter is primary. Sensation, thought, consciousness are the supreme product of matter”.

People are a part of nature, who develop their ideas in interaction with the rest of the world. Mental processes are real enough, but they are not something absolute, outside nature. They should be studied in their material and social circumstances in which they arise. “The phantoms formed in the human brain,” stated Marx, “are … necessarily, sublimates of their material life-process.” Later he concluded, “morality, religion, metaphysics, all the rest of ideology and their corresponding forms of consciousness, thus no longer retain the semblance of independence. They have no history, no development, but men, developing their material production and their material intercourses, alter along with this their real existence their thinking and the product of their thinking. Life is not determined by consciousness, but consciousness by life.”

The Origins of Materialism

“The original home of all modern materialism,” wrote Engels, “from the seventeenth century onwards, is England.” At this time, the old feudal aristocracy and monarchy were being challenged by the newly emerged middle classes. The bastion of feudalism was the Roman Catholic church, which provided the divine justification for the monarchy and feudal institutions. This, therefore, had to be undermined before feudalism could be overthrown. The rising bourgeoisie challenged the old ideas and divine concepts that the old order was based upon.

“Parallel with the rise of the middle classes went on the great revival of science; astronomy, mechanics, physics, anatomy, physiology, were again cultivated. And the bourgeoisie for the development of its industrial production, required a science which ascertained the physical properties of natural objects and the modes of action of the forces of Nature. Now up to then science had but been the humble handmaid of the church, had not been allowed to overstep the limits set by faith, and for that reason had been no science at all. [In the 17th century, Galileo demonstrated the truth of Copernicus' theory that the earth and planets revolved around the Sun. The professors of the day ridiculed these ideas and used the power of the Index and the Inquisition against Galileo to force him to recant his views. RS] (Science rebelled against the church; the bourgeoisie could not do without science, and therefore, had to join in the rebellion.)” (F. Engels.)It was at this time that Francis Bacon (1561-1626) developed his revolutionary ideas of materialism. According to him the senses were infallible and the source of all knowledge. All science was based upon experience, and consisted in subjecting the data to a rational method of investigation; induction, analysis, comparison, observation and experiment. It was, however, left to Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) to continue and develop Bacon's materialism into a system. He realised that ideas and concepts were only a reflection of the material world, and that “it is impossible to separate thought from matter that thinks”. Later, the English thinker John Locke (1632-1704) provided proof of this materialism.

The materialist school of philosophy passed from England to France, to be taken up and developed further by Rene Descartes (1596-1650) and his followers. These French materialists did not limit themselves to criticisms of religion, but extended them to all institutions and ideas. They challenged these things in the name of Reason, and gave ammunition to the developing bourgeoisie in their struggle with the monarchy. The birth of the great French Bourgeois Revolution of 1789-93 took as its creed materialist philosophy. Unlike the English Revolution in the mid-17th century, its French counter-part completely destroyed the old feudal order. As Engels later pointed out: “We know today that this kingdom of reason was nothing more than the idealised kingdom of the bourgeoisie.”

The defect, however, of this materialism from Bacon onwards was its rigid, mechanical interpretation of Nature. Not accidentally, the English school of materialist philosophy flourished in the 18th century, when the discoveries of Isaac Newton made “mechanics” the most advanced and important science. In the words of Engels: “The specific limitation of this materialism lay in its inability to comprehend the universe as a process, as matter undergoing uninterrupted historical development.”

The French Revolution had a profound effect upon the civilised world, similar to the Russian Revolution of 1917. It revolutionised thinking in every field, politics, philosophy, science and art. The ferment of ideas emerging from this bourgeois democratic revolution ushered in advances in natural science, geology, botany, chemistry as well as political economy.It was in this period that a criticism was made of the mechanical approach of the materialists. A German philosopher, Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), made the first breakthrough in the old mechanistic ways with his discovery that the Earth and the solar system had come into being, and had not existed eternally. The same also applies to geography, geology, plants and animals. This revolutionary idea of Kant was comprehensively developed by another brilliant German thinker, George Hegel (1770-1831). Hegel was a philosophical idealist, believing that the world could be explained as a manifestation or reflection of a “Universal Mind” or “Idea”, i.e., some form of God.

Hegel looked upon the world not as an active participant in society and human history, but as a philosopher, contemplating events from afar. He set himself up as a measuring rod of the world, interpreting history according to his prejudices as the history of thought, the world as the world of ideas, an Ideal World. Thus for Hegel, problems and contradictions were posed not in real terms but in terms of thought, and could therefore find their solution only in terms of thought. Instead of contradictions in society being solved by the actions of men and women, by the class struggle, they instead find their solution in the philosopher's head, in the Absolute Idea!

Nevertheless, Hegel recognised the errors and shortcomings of the old mechanistic outlook. He also pointed out the inadequacies of formal logic and set about the creation of a new world outlook which could explain the contradictions of change and movement. (See below).

Although Hegel rediscovered and analysed the laws of motion and change, his idealism placed everything on its head. It was the struggle and criticism of the Young Hegelians, led by Ludwig Feuerbach (1804-1872), which tried to correct and place philosophy back on its feet. Yet even Feuerbach--“the under half of him was materialist, the upper half idealist” (Engels)--was not able to fully purge Hegelianism of its idealist outlook. This work was left to Marx and Engels, who were able to rescue the dialectical method from its mystical shell. Hegelian dialectics were fused with modern materialism to produce the revolutionary understanding of dialectical materialism.

What are Dialectics ?

We have seen that modern materialism is the concept that matter is primary and the mind or ideas are the product of the brain. But what is dialectical thinking or dialectics?

“Dialectics is nothing more than the science of the general laws of motion and development of nature, human society and thought.” (Engels, Anti-Dühring.)

The dialectical method of thinking already had a long existence before Marx and Engels developed it scientifically as a means of understanding the evolution of human society.

The ancient Greeks produced some great dialectical thinkers, including Plato, Zenon and Aristotle. As early as 500 B.C., Heraclitus advanced the idea that “everything is and is not, for everything is in flux, is constantly changing, constantly coming into being and passing away”. And further, “all things flow, all change. It is impossible to enter twice into one and the same stream”. This statement already contains the fundamental conception of dialectics that everything in nature is in a constant state of change, and that this change unfolds through a series of contradictions.

...the great basic thought that the world is not to be comprehended as a complex of ready made things, but as a complex of processes, in which things apparently stable, no less than their mental images in our heads, concepts go through an uninterrupted change of coming into being and passing away.” (Engels, Anti-Dühring,)

“For dialectical philosophy nothing is final, absolute, sacred. It reveals the transitory character of everything and in everything: nothing can endure before it except the uninterrupted process of becoming and of passing away, of endless ascendancy from the lower to the higher. And dialectical philosophy is nothing more than the mere reflection of this process in the thinking brain.” (Ibid.)

Dialectics and Metaphysics

The Greek Philosophers brilliantly anticipated the later development of dialectics as of other sciences. But they could not themselves carry this anticipation to its logical conclusion owing to the low development of the means of production, and the lack of adequate information about the detailed workings of the universe. Their ideas gave a more-or-less correct general picture, but they were often more in the nature of inspired guesses than scientifically worked out theories. In order to carry human thought further, it was necessary to abandon these old methods to arrive at a general understanding of the universe, and concentrate on the smaller, more mundane tasks of collecting, sorting out and labelling a host of individual facts, of testing particular theories by experiment, of defining, etc.

This empirical, experimental, factual approach provided an enormous boost to human thought and science. Investigations into the workings of nature could now be carried out scientifically, analysing each particular problem and testing each conclusion. But in the process, the old ability to deal with things in their connection, not separately, in their movement, not statically, in their life not in their death, was lost. The narrow, empirical mode of thought which consequently arose is termed the “Metaphysical” approach. It still dominates modern capitalist philosophy and science. In politics it is reflected in Harold Wilson's famous “pragmatism” (“if it works, it must be right”) and the constant appeals to “the Facts”.

But facts do not select themselves. They have to be chosen by individuals. The order and sequence in which they are arranged, and the conclusions drawn from them depend upon the preconceived notions of the individual. Thus such appeals for “the Facts”, which are supposed to convey the impression of scientific impartiality, are usually just a smokescreen to conceal the prejudices of the speaker.

Dialectics deals not only with facts, but with facts in their connection, i.e. processes, not only with isolated ideas, but with laws, not only with the particular, but with the general.

Dialectical thinking stands in the same relationship to metaphysics as a motion picture to a still photograph. The one does not contradict the other, but compliments it. However, the truer, more complete approximation of reality is contained in the movie.

For everyday purposes and simple calculations, metaphysical thought, or “common sense”, suffices. But it has its limitations, and beyond these the application of “common sense” turns truth into its opposite. The fundamental shortcoming of this type of thinking is its inability to conceive of motion and development, and its rejection of all contradiction. However, movement and change imply contradiction.

“To the metaphysician things and their mental reflexes, ideas, are isolated, are to be considered one after the other and apart from each other, are objects of investigation, fixed, rigid, given once and for all. He thinks in absolutely irreconcilable antithesis … For him a thing either exists or does not exist: a thing cannot at the same time be itself and something else. Positive and negative absolutely exclude one another: cause and effect stand in rigid antithesis one to the other.” (Anti-Dühring, p. 34.)

For everyday purposes, for instance, it is possible to say with a degree of certainty whether an individual, plant or animal is alive or dead. But in reality the question is not so simple, as legal cases on abortion and the “rights of the foetus” indicate. At what point precisely does human life begin? At what point does it end? Death, also is not a simple event but a protracted process, as Heraclitus understood: “It is the same thing in us that is living and dead, asleep and awake, young and old; each changes place and becomes the other. We step and we do not step into the same stream: we are and are not.”

Trotsky, in his ABC of Materialist Dialectics characterised the dialectic as “a science of the forms of our thinking insofar as it is not limited to the daily problems of life but attempts to arrive at an understanding of more complicated and drawn-out processes.”

He compared dialectics and formal logic (metaphysics) to higher and lower mathematics. It was Aristotle who first developed the laws of formal logic, and his system of logic has been accepted ever since by the metaphysicians as the only possible method of scientific thinking.

“The Aristotelian logic of the simple syllogism is accepted as an axiom for a multitude of practical human activities and elementary generalisations. The postulate starts from the proposition that 'A' = 'A'. But in reality 'A' is not equal to 'A'. This is quite easy to prove if we observe these two letters under a lens--they are quite different from each other. But, one can object, the question is not of the size or form of the letters, since they are only symbols for equal quantities, for instance, a pound of sugar. The objection is beside the point--in reality a pound of sugar is never equal to a pound of sugar--a more delicate scale will always disclose a difference. Again one can object; but a pound of sugar is equal to itself. Neither is this true--all bodies change uninterruptedly in size, weight, colour, etc. They are never equal to themselves. A sophist will respond that a pound of sugar is equal to itself 'at any given moment'. Aside from the extremely dubious practical value of the 'axiom' it does not withstand theoretical criticism, either. How should we really conceive the word 'moment' a purely mathematical abstraction, that is a zero of time? But everything exists in time: and existence itself is an uninterrupted process of transformation: time is subsequently a fundamental element of existence. Thus the axiom 'A' is equal to itself if it does not change, that is, if it does not exist.

“At first glance it could seem that these 'subtleties' are useless. In reality they are of decisive significance. The axiom 'A equals A' appears on the one hand to be the point of departure for all knowledge on the other hand the point of departure for all errors in our knowledge. To make use of the axiom 'A equals A' with impunity is possible only within certain limits. When quantitative changes in 'A' are negligible for the task at hand, then we can presume that 'A equals A'. This is, for example, the manner in which a buyer and a seller both consider a pound of sugar. We consider the Sun's temperature likewise. Until recently we considered the buying power of the dollar in the same way. But quantitative changes beyond certain limits become qualitative. A pound of sugar subjected to the action of water or Kerosene cease to be a pound of sugar. A dollar in the embraces of a president ceases to be a dollar. To determine the right moment, the critical point where quantity changes to quality is one of the most important and difficult tasks in all spheres of knowledge, including sociology.” (Trotsky, ABC of Materialist Dialectic)

Hegel

The old dialectical method of reasoning, which had fallen into disuse from medieval times on, was revived in the early 19th century by the great German philosopher G.W.F. Hegel, (1770-1831). Hegel, one of the most encyclopaedic minds of his time, subjected the forms of formal logic to a detailed criticism, and demonstrated their limitations and one-sidedness. Hegel produced the first really comprehensive analysis of the laws of dialectics, which served as a basis upon which Marx and Engels later developed their theory of dialectical materialism. Lenin characterised Hegelian dialectics as “the most comprehensive, the most right in content and the most profound doctrine of development”. In comparison with this, every other formulation was “one-sided and poor in content, and distorting and mutilating the real course of development (which often proceeds in leaps, catastrophes and revolutions) in nature and society”. (Lenin, Karl Marx.)

Hegel's View of things was that of “A development that seemingly repeats the stages already passed, but repeats them differently, on a higher basis (negation of the negation), a development, so to speak, in spirals, not in a straight line; a development by leaps, catastrophes, revolutions; breaks in continuity; the transformations of quantity into quality; the inner impulses of development, imparted by the contradictions and conflict of the various forces and tendencies acting on a given body, or within a given phenomenon, or within a given society: the interdependence and the closest, indissoluble connection of all sides of every phenomenon (while history constantly discloses ever new sides), a connection that provides a uniform, a law-governed, universal process of motion, such are some of the features of dialectics as a richer (than the ordinary) doctrine of development.” (Ibid.)

“This new German philosophy culminated in the Hegelian system. In this system--and herein is its great merit--for the first time the whole world, natural, historical, intellectual, is represented as a process, i.e., as in constant motion, change, transformation, development; and the attempt is made to trace out the internal connection that makes a continuous whole of all this movement and development. From this point of view the history of mankind no longer appeared as a wild whirl of senseless deeds of violence, as equally condemnable at the judgement-seat of mature philosophic reason, and which are best forgotten as quickly as possible, but as the process of evolution of man himself. It was now the task of the intellect to follow the gradual march of this process through all its devious ways and to trace out the inner laws running through all its apparently accidental phenomena.” (Engels, Anti-Dühring, p. 37.)Hegel brilliantly posed the problem, but was prevented from solving it by his idealist preconceptions. It was, in Engels' words “a colossal miscarriage”. Despite its mystical side, Hegel's philosophy already explained the most important laws of dialectics: Quantity and quality, the interpenetration of opposites and negation of the negation.

Quantity and Quality

“In spite of all gradualness, the transition from one form of motion to another always remains a leap, a decisive change”. (Engels, Anti-Dühring.)The idea of change and evolution is now generally accepted, but the forms by which changes occur in nature and society have only been explained by Marxian dialectics. The common view of evolution as a peaceful, smooth and uninterrupted development is both one-sided and false. In politics it is the “gradualist” theory of social change--the basic theoretical plank of reformism.

Hegel developed the idea of a “nodal line of measure relations”--in which at a definite nodal point, the purely quantitative increase or decrease gives rise to a qualitative leap: for example in the case of heated water, where boiling point and freezing point are the nodes at which under normal pressure the leap into a new state of aggregation takes place, and where consequently quantity is transformed into quality.” (Engels, Anti-Dühring.)

Thus, in the example cited, the transformation of water from a liquid to vapour or solid ice do not occur by a gradual congealing or dissipation, but suddenly at a particular temperature (0°C, 100°C). The cumulative effect of numerous changes of the speed of the molecules eventually produces a change of state--quantity into quality.

Examples may be produced at will, from all the branches of science, from sociology and even from everyday life (e.g., the point at which the addition of salt changes the soup from something palatable to something undrinkable).

The Hegelian nodal line of measurement and the law of the transition of quantity into quality and vice-versa are of crucial importance not only to science (where, like other dialectical laws, they are used unconsciously by scientists who are not conscious dialecticians) but above all in an analysis of history, society and the movement of the working class.

The Interpenetration of Opposites

Just as “common sense” metaphysics seeks to eliminate contradiction from thought and revolution from evolution, it also tries to prove that all opposing ideas and forces are mutually exclusive. However, “we find upon closer examination that the two poles of an antithesis, positive and negative, e.g., are as inseparable as they are opposed, and that despite all their opposition they mutually interpenetrate. And we find, in like manner that cause and effect are conception to individual cases, but as soon as we consider the individual cases in their general connection with the universe as a whole, they run into each other, and they become confounded when we contemplate that universal action and interaction in which causes and effects are eternally changing places, so that what is effect here and now will be cause there and then and vice-versa”. (Engels, Anti-Dühring, p. 36.)

Dialectics is the science of inter-connections, in contrast to metaphysics which treats phenomena as separate and isolated. Dialectics seeks to uncover the countless threads, transition, cause and effect which bind together the universe. The first task of a dialectical analysis is therefore to trace the “Necessary connection, the objective connection of all the aspects, forces, tendencies etc., of the given sphere of phenomena”. (Lenin, Philosophical Notebooks, p. 97.)

Dialectics approaches a given phenomenon from the point of view of itsdevelopment, its own movement and life; how it arises and how it passes away; it also considers the internal contradictory tendencies and sides of this thing.

Motion is the mode of existence of the entire material universe. Energy and matter are inseparable. Furthermore, motion is not imparted “from without”, but the manifestation of the internal tensions that are inseparable not only from life, but from all forms of matter. Development and change takes place through internal contradictions. Thus dialectical analysis begins by laying bare by empirical investigation the inner contradictions which give rise to development and change.

From the dialectical standpoint all “polar opposites” are one-sided and inadequate, including the contradiction between “truth and error”. Marxism does not accept the existence of any “Eternal Truths”. All “truths” and “errors” are relative. What is true in one time and context becomes false in another: truth and error pass into each other.

Thus the progress of knowledge and science does not proceed from the mere negation of “incorrect theories”. All theories are relative, grasping one side of reality. Initially they are assumed to have universal validity and application. They are “true”. But at a certain point, deficiencies in the theory are noticed; they are not applicable to all circumstances, exceptions to the rule are found. These have to be explained, and at a certain point, new theories are developed which can account for the exceptions. But the new theories not only “negate” the old, but incorporate them in a new form.

We can exclude contradictions only by regarding objects as lifeless, at rest and individually juxtaposed, i.e. metaphysically. But as soon as we consider things in their motion and change, in their life, their mutual interdependence and interaction, we come up against a series of contradictions.

Motion itself is a contradiction between being in the same place and somewhere else at the same time.

Life, equally, is a contradiction that “a being is at each moment itself and yet something else”. (Engels, Anti-Dühring, p. 167.)

Living structures constantly absorb substances from the environment, assimilate them and simultaneously other parts of the body decay, disintegrate and are expelled. Constant transformations occur also in the world of organic nature; e.g., a rock which disintegrated under the pressure of the elements. Everything is therefore constantly itself and something else at one and the same time. Thus, the desire to eliminate contradictions is the desire to eliminate reality.

Negation of the negation

Engels characterises this as “an extremely general and for this reason extremely far-reaching and important law of development of nature, history and thought; a law which … holds good in the animal and plant kingdoms, in geology, in mathematics, in history and philosophy”. (Ibid., p. 193.)

This law, the workings of which were observed in nature long before it was written down, was first clearly elaborated by Hegel, who gives a whole series of concrete examples which are reiterated in Anti-Dühring. (Ibid., pp. 186-190.)

The law of the negation of the negation deals with the nature of development through a series of contradictions, which appear to annul, or negate a previous fact, theory, or form of existence, only to be later negated in its turn. Motion, change and development thus moves through an uninterrupted series of negations.

However, negation in the dialectical sense does not signify a mere annulment or obliteration whereby the earlier stage is both overcome and preserved at the same time. Negation, in this sense, is both a positive and a negative act.

Hegel gives a simple example in his book, The Phenomenology of the Mind: “The bud disappears when the blossom breaks through, and we might say that the former is refuted by the latter; in the same way when the fruit comes the blossom may be explained to be a false form of the plant's existence, for the fruit appears as its true nature in place of the blossom. These stages are not merely differentiated, they supplement one another as being incomparable with one another. But the ceaseless activity of their own inherent nature makes them at the same time moments of an organic unity, where they do not merely contradict one another, but where one is as necessary as the other; and this equal necessity of all moments constitutes alone and thereby the life of the whole.”

In this process of endless self-annulment, the disappearance of certain forms and the emergence of others, a pattern frequently emerges which seem to be a repetition of forms, events and theories already surpassed. Thus, it is a commonplace that “history repeats itself”. Reactionary bourgeois historians have thus tried to prove that history itself is merely a meaningless repetition, proceeding in a never-ending circle.

Dialectics, on the contrary, discerns within these seeming repetitions an actual … development from lower to higher, an evolution in which the same forms may repeat themselves, but on a higher level, enriched by previous developments.

This can be seen most clearly from the process of development of human ideas. Hegel already showed how philosophy developed through a series of contradictions; one school of thought negating another, but simultaneously absorbing the older theories into its own system of thought.

Similarly with the development of science. The alchemists of the Middle Ages were motivated for the search for the “Philosophers' Stone” which could turn base metal into gold. Owing to the low level of the productive forces and the lack of scientific technique, these early attempts at the “transmutation” of the elements was in reality a utopian fantasy. However, in the process of these vain attempts, the alchemists actually discovered a whole series of valuable facts about chemicals and experimental apparatus which later provided the basis of modern chemistry.

With the rise of capitalism, industry and technique, chemistry becomes a science which rejected the early “crazy” notions of the transmutation of the elements which was thus negated. However, all that was valuable and scientific in the discoveries of alchemy were preserved in the new chemistry, which maintained that the elements were “immutable” and could not be transformed one into another.

The 20th century has seen the revolutionising of science and technique with the discovery of nuclear physics, by means of which one element can actually be transformed into another. In fact, it would be theoretically possible to turn lead into gold, in modern times, but the process would be too expensive to be justified economically. Thus this particular process seems to have turned full circle:

(a) transmutation of elements (b) non transmutation of elements (c) transmutation of elements

But the repetition is only apparent. In reality, modern science, which in one sense has returned to an idea of the ancient alchemists, includes within itself all the enormous discoveries of the 19th century and 18th century science. Thus, one generation stands on the shoulders of another. Ideas which have apparently been “disproved” or “negated” make their re-appearance, but on a higher level, enriched by the previous experiences and discoveries.

Dialectics bases itself upon determinism: the thought that nothing in nature, society or thought is accidental; that seeming “accidents” arise only as the result of a deeper necessity.

Superficial historians have written that the First World War was “caused” by the assassination of a Crown Prince at Sarajevo. To a Marxist this event was an historical accident, in the sense that this chance event served as the pretext, or catalyst, for the world conflict which had already been made inevitable by the economic, political and military contradictions of imperialism. If the assassin had missed, or if the Crown Prince had never been born, the war would still have taken place, on some other diplomatic pretext. Necessity would have expressed itself through a different “accident”.

Everything which exists, exists of necessity. But, equally, everything which exists is doomed to perish, to be transformed into something else. Thus what is “necessary” in one time and place becomes “unnecessary” in another. Everything begets its opposite which is destined to overcome and negate it. This is true of individual living things as much as societies.Every type of human society exists because it is necessary at the given time when it arises: “No special order ever disappears before all the productive forces for which there is room in it, have been developed: and new higher relations of production never appear before the material conditions of their existence have matured in the womb of the old society. Therefore mankind always takes up only such problems as it can solve, since, looking at the matter more closely, we will always find that the problem itself arises only when the material conditions necessary for its solution already exist or at least are in the process of formation”. (Marx, Critique of Political Economy.)

Similarly capitalism was originally a necessary and progressive stage in human society. However, like slavery, primitive communism and feudalism (see section 2), capitalism has long since ceased to represent a necessary and progressive social system. It has foundered upon the deep contradictions inherent in it, and is doomed to be overcome by the rising forces of socialism, represented by the modem proletariat. Private ownership of the means of production and the nation state, the basic features of capitalist society, which originally marked a great step forward, now serve only to fetter and undermine the productive forces and threaten all the gains made in centuries of human development.

The Marxist philosophy is therefore essentially a guide to action: “Philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is, however, to change it”. (Marx, Theses on Feuerbach.)

The victory of socialism will mark a new and qualitatively different stage of human history. To be more accurate it will mark the end of the prehistory of the human race, and start a real history.

However on the other hand, socialism marks a return to the earliest form of human society--tribal communism--but on a much higher level, which stands upon all the enormous gains of thousands of years of class society. The economy of superabundance, will be made possible by the application of socialist planning to the industry, science and technique established by capitalism, on a world scale. This in turn will once and for all make redundant the division of labour, the difference between mental and manual labour, between town and countryside, and the wasteful and barbaric class struggle and enable the human race at least to set its resources to the conquest of nature: to use Engels' famous phrase, “Mankind's leap from the realms of necessity to the Realm of Freedom”.

Slavery, in its day, represented an enormous leap forward over barbarism. It was a necessary stage in the development of productive forces, culture and human society. As Hegel put it: “It is not so much from slavery as through slavery that man becomes free”.

Capitalism is now a thoroughly decrepit, degenerate social system, which must be overthrown and replaced by its opposite, Socialism, if human culture is to survive. Marxism is determinist, but not fatalist, because the working out of contradictions in society can only be achieved by men and women consciously striving for the transformation of society. This struggle of the classes is not pre-determined. Who succeeds depends on many factors, and a rising, progressive class has many advantages over the old, decrepit force of reaction. But ultimately, the result must depend upon which side has the stronger will, the greater organisation and the most skilful and resolute leadership.

Written by Rob Sewell
and Alan WoodsWednesday, 15 March 2000

What is Marxism?

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We are reproducing a slightly edited version of What is Marxism? by Rob Sewell and Alan Woods, last published in 1983 to celebrate the centenary of the death of Karl Marx. The three articles on the fundamental aspects of Marxism, Marxist Economics, Dialectical Materialism and Historical Materialism were originally published separately in the 1970s. These articles are a good, brief introduction to the basic methods of Marxism and can serve as a first approach to the ideas developed by Marx and Engels.

1983 Introduction

Marxism, or Scientific Socialism, is the name given to the body of ideas first worked out by Karl Marx (1818-1883) and Friedrich Engels (1820-1895). In their totality, these ideas provide a fully worked-out theoretical basis for the struggle of the working class to attain a higher form of human society--socialism.

While the conceptions of Marxism have been subsequently developed and enriched by the historical experience of the working class itself, the fundamental ideas remain unshaken, providing a firm foundation for the Labour Movement today. Neither before, nor since the lifetime of Marx and Engels have any superior, more truthful or scientific theories been advanced to explain the movement of society and the role of the working class in that movement. A knowledge of Marxism therefore equips the proletariat theoretically for the great historic task of the Socialist transformation of Society.

It is this fact which explains the constant and bitter attacks on all aspects of Marxism which have been delivered by every conceivable defender of the existing social order--from the Tory to the Fabian, from the Jesuit priest to the University professor. From the very spleen of these attacks, to the fact that they have to be kept up continuously despite the fact that every single one of the pundits in turn claims to have “finally disposed” of Marxism, the thinking member of the Labour Movement can deduce two facts. First, that the defenders of capitalism recognise in Marxism the most dangerous challenge to their system, and thereby also instantly confess the truth in it, despite all their attempts to “disprove” it. Second, that far from disappearing under the heap of abuse, quack “exposures”, and flagrant distortions, the theories of Marx and Engels are steadily gaining ground, particularly within the active layers of the Labour Movement, as increasing numbers of workers, under the impact of the crisis of capitalism, strive to discover the real meaning of the forces which shape their lives, in order to be able to consciously influence and determine their own destiny.

The theories of Marxism provide the thinking worker with such an understanding--a thread which is capable of leading him through the confused labyrinth of events, of the complex processes of society, of economics, of the struggle of classes, of politics. Armed with this sword the worker can cut the Gordian knot which binds him to the mightiest obstacle in the way of the advancement of himself and his class--ignorance.

It is to keep this knot firmly in place that the hired representatives of the ruling class struggle with might and main to discredit Marxism in the eyes of the working class. It is the duty of every serious worker of the Labour Movement to conquer for himself or herself the theories of Marx and Engels, as an essential prerequisite for the conquest of society by the working people.

Yet there are obstacles in the path of the worker's struggle for theory and understanding far more intractable than the scribblings of priests and professors. A man or woman who is obliged to toil long hours in industry, who has not had the benefit of a decent education and consequently lacks the habit of reading, finds great difficulty in absorbing some of the more complex ideas, especially at the outset. Yet it was for workers that Marx and Engels wrote, and not for “clever” students and middle class people. “Every beginning is difficult” no matter what science we are talking about. Marxism is a science and therefore makes heavy demands upon the beginner. But every worker who is active in the trade unions or Labour Party knows that nothing is worthwhile if attained without a degree of struggle and sacrifice. It is the activists in the Labour Movement at whom the present pamphlet is aimed. To the active worker who is prepared to persevere, one promise can be made: once the initial effort is made to come to grips with unfamiliar and new ideas, the theories of Marxism will be found to be basically straight-forward and simple. Moreover--and this should be emphasised--the worker who acquires by patient effort an understanding of Marxism will turn out to be a better theoretician than most students, just because he can grasp the ideas not merely in the abstract, but concretely, as applied to his own life and work.

All exploiting classes attempt to morally justify their class rule by portraying them, as the highest, most natural form of social development, deliberately concealing the system of exploitation by disguising and distorting the truth. The present day capitalist class, through their professional hirelings and hangers on, have elaborately evolved a whole new philosophy and morality to justify their ruling position in society.

The working class, on the contrary, has no material interest in distorting the truth, and sets itself the task of laying bare the realities of capitalism in order to consciously prepare for its emancipation. Far from seeking a special position for itself, the working class has the aim of abolishing capitalism and with it all class distinctions and privileges. To do so it must reject the outlook of the capitalists, and seek for itself a new Marxist method of understanding.

The Marxist method provides a richer, fuller, more comprehensive view of society and life in general, and clears away the veil of mysticism in understanding human and social development. Marxist philosophy explains that the driving force of history is neither “Great Men” nor the super-natural, but stems from the development of the productive forces (industry, science, technique, etc.) themselves. It is economics, in the last analysis, that determines the conditions of life, the habits and consciousness of human beings.

Each new re-organisation of society--be it slavery, feudalism or capitalism--has ushered in an enormous development of the productive forces which in turn gave men and women greater powers over nature. As soon as a social system proves unable to develop these forces of production, then that society enters an epoch of revolution. However, in the case of the change from capitalism to socialism, the process is not automatic but requires the conscious intervention of the working class to carry through this task of history. Failure to do so in the long run would pave the way for the advent of reaction and eventual world war.

Capitalism has once again entered a new world economic crisis resulting in mass unemployment on the lines of the 1930s. The quack theories of capitalist economists have proved utterly incapable of preventing recessions, which has driven the ruling class to ditch Keynesianism and re-adopt the old measures of “sound finance”, of monetarism. Rather than rescue the situation this latter programme has served to deepen and prolong the crisis!

Only Marxism has been able to expose the contradictions of Capitalism which result periodically in depression and slump. Capitalism has now completely exhausted its historical role in developing the productive basis of society. Hemmed in by the nation state and private ownership, the productive forces are systematically destroyed in the face of the mass overproduction of commodities and capital.

As Marx himself explained: “In these crises there breaks out an epidemic that in all earlier epochs, would have seemed an absurdity--the epidemic of overproduction.

“Society suddenly finds itself put back into a state of monetary barbarism; it appears as if a famine, a universal war of destruction has cut off the supply of every means of subsistence; industry and commerce seem to be destroyed. And why? Because there is too much civilisation, too much means of subsistence, too much industry, too much commerce. The productive forces at the disposal of society no longer tend to further the development of the conditions of Bourgeois property; on the contrary they have become too powerful for these conditions by which they are fettered, and so as soon as they overcome these fetters, they bring disorder into the whole of Bourgeois society, endanger the existence of Bourgeois property.”

The present pamphlet brings together for the first time the three supplements of the South Wales Bulletin of Marxist Studies (first published in the 1970s) as a small contribution to the increasing thirst for the ideas of Marxism. It is also fitting that the issue of the pamphlet coincides with the centenary of Karl Marx's death, on 14 March 1883, the co-founder with Engels, of scientific socialism.

This pamphlet however is not intended to provide a complete exposition of Marxism, but to assist the worker-student in his approach to the subject by giving a rough outline of some basic ideas, plus a selected reading list with which he may continue his studies. Marx and Engels themselves wrote many brief pamphlets and shorter explanatory works aimed at popularising their theories among the working class, and these provide the basis of the suggested reading list.

The study of Marxism falls under three main headings, corresponding broadly to philosophy, social history and economics, or, to give them their correct names, Dialectical Materialism, Historical Materialism and the Labour Theory of Value. These are the famous “three component parts of Marxism” of which Lenin wrote.

Written by Rob Sewell
and Alan WoodsWednesday, 15 March 2000

The Indonesian Workers And The 'Spirit Of Reformasi'

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Mass strikes of public transportation drivers started on Monday, January 6, in a number of Indonesian cities. Street protests continue against the IMF sponsored cuts in subsidies which have provoked a price hike. Although still relatively small these protests could become more massive in the coming days. Particularly important is the call for a nation-wide strike for Thursday January 9 (today) by a front of 23 different trade unions which could halt industry in many parts of the country.

Introduction

As we publish this article which was written at the end of last year there have been important new developments in Indonesia. Mass strikes of public transportation drivers started on Monday in a number of cities. Street protests continue against the IMF sponsored cuts in subsidies which have provoked a price hike. The price of some gasoline products increased by 22%, of electricity by 15% and telephone charges by 6%. This simultaneous price hike has had the effect of uniting all the different sections of workers, peasants, fishermen, students, street sellers, housewives etc. Even the bosses' organisations have come out against those price hikes because they fear - correctly - that the workers in the factories will demand that their wages be adapted to the new increase in the cost of living. Although still relatively small these protests could become more massive in the coming days. Particularly important is the call for a nation-wide strike for Thursday January 9 (today) by a front of 23 different trade unions which could halt industry in many parts of the country. These recent developments confirm the analysis we developed in the article below. We explained that there would be a succession of qualitative changes in the working class movement of Indonesia over the coming period. (January 9, 2003)

MayDay 2003

Once again we have reached the end of yet another tumultuous year for Indonesia. Time has come to focus on one of the most under-reported and neglected aspects of the multiple crisis of the country: the labour struggle. The Bali massacre in October has catapulted Indonesia to the frontline of world news only to present the country as being in the grips of Islamic fundamentalist groups.

This is a deliberate attempt to obscure the upsurge of the working class movement since the fall of Suharto. The development of the unions and the growing number of demonstrations and strikes, although in very difficult conditions, is the most palpable evidence of the profound changes in the social psychology of the masses. Despite inevitable ups and downs this trend has not stopped.

One example will serve to illustrates this. A labour researcher from Central Java recently confessed his surprise to me about a little conflict in his village, a strike in a handicraft factory where mostly old women are employed. "If you want to find the most exploited among the exploited just drop by one of those factories" he told me. "Mostly uneducated and illiterate, those women also live in fear of superstitious beliefs unscrupulously exploited by the owner of the factory. That man also happens to be the local kyai or Islamic cleric in the village. Local villagers have a great respect and fear for such people. And then suddenly without any apparent reason came the strike. Those old Javanese women refused to work. They sat down in silence, bowing their head, whispering to each other and demanded a wage increase from their miserable monthly 100.000 rupiahs (or US$ 9 to 10). The kyai came and started to shout at them and threatened them. But to no avail. From silent whispering the women started to lift their heads and looked straight at this little powerless man gesticulating amidst his striking workforce and they smiled. They started to raise their voice, which according to Javanese tradition is a very rude thing to do, especially when it comes from old women speaking to a Muslim cleric."

"This is the real spirit of reformasi!" he exclaimed. "It is not dead. Yet on the campuses the democratic movement seems out of breath, but amongst the workers and the peasants it is still going strong." The 'spirit of reformasi' about which so many army generals, bourgeois politicians and investors complain is a profound process of awakening of the masses where they are slowly becoming aware of their own power and are abandoning their old beliefs and adopting new ones. It would be more correct to speak about a 'spirit of revolusi', an early and still immature revolutionary spirit which is being shaped.

Indeed the mole of the revolution continues to dig its way into the consciousness of the masses. Starting in the universities it has moved on to all the layers that make up the 'people': from the workers in industry protesting against factory closures to plantations workers demanding a better status, from construction workers refusing to become casual daily labourers to teachers protesting about delayed pay, from the street sellers in Palembang refusing to be ousted from the marketplace to bus drivers striking for higher wages, to the sugar peasants mobilising against the foreign import of cheap sugar. "Every day there is a demonstration or a strike" complains the editorial of the Indonesian paper Kompas.

Faced with a never ending crisis the poor, the workers and the peasants have no choice but to struggle. Of the 80 million or so workers a half are unemployed or underemployed. The textile sector is being strangled. Especially the footwear industry is in bad shape. According to the State Investment Coordinating Agency, investment figures are continuing their plunge downwards. Investment during the first eight months of 2002 fell by US$2.25 billion, or almost 40% compared with the same period in 2001.

Indonesia is also the only country reported by the United Nations Conference of Trade and Development (UNCTAD) to have suffered a flight of capital every year since 1998. In 2001, $3.2 billion left the country, almost the same figure as the $3.55 billion of new investment planned, though not yet realised, for 2002. Despite official GDP growth forecasts of 3,8 to 4% this year, it is no exaggeration to say that productive investment has continued to collapse.

The Megawati government has added to the misery of the workers by withdrawing rice subsidies from hundreds of thousands of poor families and by recurrent price hikes for electricity, fuel and telephone bills.

Faced with mounting social defiance, many of the local governments have increased minimum wages although still below the real inflation rate. The increase in labour conflicts really worries the international bourgeois. Via the IMF and their respective national chambers of commerce in Indonesia they have been putting on the pressure to get two new labour bills passed which would curtail the collective strength of the workers and their unions, but would also limit the already weak safeguards against the bosses. This is what the Japanese and South Korean Chambers of Commerce have also been doing, while at the same time threatening to massively withdraw their investment. The closure of the Sony factory in the capital Jakarta is the latest example of this blackmail.

The new labour laws will result in:

1. Eliminating job security through legalising and lengthening the labour contract systems.

2. Releasing the Indonesian government from responsibility to safeguard workers' rights. The government will no longer be involved in the resolution of conflicts between workers and employers. Instead it will authorise employers to resolve the problem as they see fit. As workers are in a far weaker bargaining position in relation to the employers this will mean that the employers will win and the exploitation and repression of the workers will continue.

3. Abolishing workers' right to strike - a basic right and means of struggle for workers - making it a criminal act. Workers who go on strike may be jailed for six months and fined 10-50 million rupiahs.

4. Reduce labour issues to "industrial problems" and ignore the broader questions. Worker's problems are not just based upon the day-to-day problems in the work-place but are closely linked to government policy and pressure from the international financial institutions. Workers will be forced to adhere to government policy.

5. Prevent trade unions from defending workers rights. Trade unions will no longer be authorised to defend workers and legal cases will instead be defended by lawyers.

6. Eliminate maternal and menstruation leave which are a basic right of workers.

7. Discriminate against trainees who will only receive 80 per cent of a full wage while producing the same amount of goods and working for the same length of time as regular workers.

The threat of the implementation of these labour laws has introduced a new dynamic to the workers' struggle in Indonesia. It has resulted in the formation of a front of some 20 organisations, mostly unions, under the umbrella of a Workers' Front Against Oppression, or KAPB. This front succeeded in organising the biggest national and coordinated labour protest since 1965 in mid September. Although still small compared with the level of mobilisation of South Korean, Philippino and South African workers, it represents a turning point. Even more important is the fact that these workers' protests were jointly scheduled with major peasant protests against the fall of the local sugar price, which was the result of the liberalisation measures imposed by the IMF and WTO and the very cheap foreign imports.

Joint workers' and peasants' protests mark a new stage in the development of this vital unity between all the oppressed layers in Indonesia. Up to now the increase in workers' protest had mainly a local character and did not reach beyond the immediate problems. Dissatisfaction lacked a national and political focus that could raise the struggles to a new level.

Interestingly the government's response was to postpone the imposition of those new bills with the intention of reviewing some articles in the light of the bosses' and unions' criticisms. The Megawati government senses that it is dangerous to confront the workers directly in such a way. On the other hand there is growing pressure from foreign investors (from Japan and South Korea in particular) to radically strip the workers of their 'overprotective social legislation'. The remarkable thing is that the government is thus failing to satisfy either the bosses or the unions. By doing so Megawati is being cautious in not creating a national focus for the latent dissatisfaction that exists among the workers.

It does not need much in Indonesia to set the whole country on fire again. Crises at all levels of society continue to accumulate. Bourgeois rule, or its legitimacy, is being challenged by the escalation of scandals in the judiciary, in parliament and among the military. The social breakdown of the country is making life more and more intolerable. The recent power cuts in Jakarta, putting the whole of this city of 10 million people in the dark, combined with the terrible water shortages, are corroding ordinary people's trust in the oligarchy. Very few people hold the 'elite', as Indonesians call them, in any esteem.

During the 1970s, the 1980s and a large part of the 1990s, capitalist rule in Indonesia was corrupt, exploitative and brutal but it went hand in hand with so-called 'progress' (job creation, large-scale public works etc). Now the continued rule of the capitalist oligarchy is not only feeding more corruption but it is undermining the basic conditions of civilised life.

This year has seen the workers movement - although still very divided and small - reach a new stage of development through coordinated action on a level not seen for decades. Moreover, the workers have demonstrated an extraordinary resilience at this stage of the revolution where it seemed to have lost its momentum. These are some of the conditions which will give the Indonesian working class the capacity to rise to new levels in the next period.

December 21, 2002

Marxism in Indonesia - Preface to the New Indonesian Edition of Reason in Revolt

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In his preface to the recently published Indonesian edition of Reason in Revolt, Alan Woods points out that the intense anti-Islamic propaganda in the West is merely a “crude ideological cover for the pretensions and arrogance of imperialism and especially US imperialism, which seeks to dominate the entire world and subject it to its pitiless exploitation”. In answer to all this what is needed is that the rational, scientific outlook of Marxism should become the viewpoint of the labour movement in all countries.

I have been asked to write a short introduction for Indonesian readers, “especially considering that some parts of the book will be considered heresy by the ever religious, superstitious Indonesians.” I do not know why the Indonesians should be considered as more religious or superstitious than any other people. In any case, the publication of Reason in Revolt in Indonesia – a key country in Asia – is something that deserves a wholehearted welcome.

When people in the West talk about religious fundamentalism, superstition and extremism, they usually refer to Islam. In reality, the intense propaganda against Islam is only a crude ideological cover for the pretensions and arrogance of imperialism and especially US imperialism, which seeks to dominate the entire world and subject it to its pitiless exploitation.

There are plenty of very religious and superstitious people in the most developed capitalist nation on earth, the United States of America. Despite all its colossal scientific and technological advances, in the philosophical sense, the USA is the most backward country in the world. This backwardness finds its most extreme expression in the outlook of the leading circles.

If it were possible to open the head of President Bush and look into his brain we would find a heap of all the undigested prejudices and superstitions of the last two thousand years. The same is true for the clique that surrounds him in the White House. This gang of rabid reactionaries faithfully express the views of the conservative trend known as the religious right.

These hypocrites bring the blessings of western civilization to the people of Iraq and Afghanistan in the form of high explosive shells, and then calmly sit down to pray to the “God of Peace”. It was of people like this that the celebrated Scottish poet and revolutionary democrat Robert Burns wrote:

Ye hypocrites! Are these your pranks?
To murder men and give God thanks.
Desist for shame. Proceed no further!
God won’t accept your thanks for murther.

Nor would it be correct to say that my book is “heretical”. A book can only stand accused of heresy when it expresses a particular interpretation of religion. Thus, for orthodox Sunnis, the Shia interpretation of Islam is considered to be heretical, just as Catholic Christians consider the Protestant interpretation of Christianity to be heretical.

However, Reason in Revolt is a book about science and philosophy, not religion. It is not intended as a thorough analysis of religion, which would be a separate subject. It can be as profitably read by a believer as by a non-believer, by a Christian or a Moslem, a Sunni or a Shia. I hope that everyone will find something to agree with as well as to disagree with.

Reason in Revolt deals with the affairs of this world, not the next, since that is a subject neither of the authors is very well qualified to speak about. We are quite happy to leave that to the mullahs and preachers who believe in it. The real subject of this book is a criticism of the existing capitalist society and its ruling ideology. We believe that the capitalist system is in a terminal crisis, and that the decay of the system threatens culture and civilization – possibly even the future of humanity itself.

The symptoms of decay are present everywhere: the economic crisis that condemns millions to unemployment. That is very clear in Indonesia, where unemployment weighs particularly heavily on the shoulders of the youth. Every year a large number of students are condemned to stagnate in forced inactivity instead of putting their skills and talents at the disposal of society as doctors, nurses, teachers and engineers. Is it any wonder that some of these young people are drawn to desperate measures? The blame for this should not be put at the door of religion and superstition but rather on a bankrupt socio-economic system that produces, as Lenin said, “hell on earth”.

The authors of the present work firmly believe that socialism offers the only way out for Indonesia and the rest of the world. Capitalism is a gigantic dead end that must be overcome before any real advance is possible. We believe that in order to bring about the overthrow of a diseased, corrupt and unjust system, the first thing that is necessary is a scientific understanding of the world we live in. And this can only be provided by Marxism.

Marxism is first of all a scientific philosophy, known as dialectical materialism. This is a method that provides us with the necessary tools to analyse and understand the world in which we live. Only if we base ourselves on such an understanding can we change the world. Merely to react to the injustices of capitalism by blind acts of violence leads us nowhere.

The Indonesian working class has a great tradition of revolutionary struggle. It played the leading role in the struggle against Dutch imperialism and built impressive organizations. The PKI, with three million members, was the biggest Communist Party in the world outside the eastern Bloc. It could have taken power, but was let down by the policies of its Stalinist leadership.

The destruction of the PKI was one of the most monstrous acts perpetrated in the history of imperialism. I remember those terrible events of 1965 very well. In fact, I wrote about them at the time. Nobody knows how many people were murdered in an orgy of reaction orchestrated by the CIA and the forces of militaristic reaction, but the figure was not less than one million. This was the work of the “forces of democracy and civilization” in Indonesia!

The real purpose of this bloodbath was to make Indonesia safe for capitalism. The corrupt dictatorship that was erected on the bones of a million Indonesian workers, students and peasants lasted for decades, but it solved none of the problems of Indonesian society. It created new and unbearable contradictions that led to a new revolutionary upheaval and the downfall of the brutal Suharto dictatorship. The students and youth played a very courageous role and were a shining example to the whole world.

New possibilities opened up before the people of Indonesia. But these possibilities have been wasted. In the absence of a genuine revolutionary leadership, capitalism was left in place, and the old corrupt ruling classes were allowed to keep their power, wealth and privileges. As a result, the mass of people is no better off now than before. Is it any wonder that sections of the youth turn in despair to the desperate resort of fundamentalism and individual terrorism?

But these methods cannot succeed in overthrowing capitalism and its ally imperialism. That can only be done by a mass organised movement of the workers and their natural allies, the poor masses of town and village, the revolutionary youth and intelligentsia and the oppressed nationalities. And such a movement, if it is to succeed, will need to be armed with the revolutionary ideology of Marxism.

There are signs that sections of the workers and youth are beginning to realise this. Some time ago I was approached by a group calling themselves “Islamic Marxists” – young people who, without abandoning their allegiance to Islam, wanted to study the works of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky. Needless to say, I gave them every encouragement.

Some years ago I presented Reason in Revolt in Pakistan – a devoutly Islamic country. I spoke at big meetings of hundreds of people. Most were practicing Moslems, but they were also mainly poor workers, peasants and trade unionists. Very often there were mullahs present at these meetings, listening attentively to what I had to say and more than one of these later expressed their admiration for what I had to say. The message of consistent anti-capitalism and anti-imperialism was what most impressed them. Probably they did not expect a European to express himself in such terms.

The capitalist system has committed terrible crimes against the entire world, and no more so than in the Middle East, Asia and Central Asia. There is a growing spirit of revolt against the crimes of imperialism and capitalism. Because these crimes are perpetrated mainly by the “Christian” West, an idea has sprung up that this a “war of two civilizations”, a war between East and West, between Christianity and Islam. This is entirely false.

The present worldwide war is a war between rich and poor, between exploiters and exploited, between robbers and those who are robbed. Even before the criminal war against Iraq was announced, millions of people demonstrated on the streets of London, Rome, Madrid and New York against the war. The people of Spain later rose up against their government and forced the withdrawal of Spanish troops from Iraq. At this moment there is a growing anti-war sentiment in the USA itself.

These forces are the allies of the oppressed peoples of Asia, not their enemies. To present the whole of the western world as a single reactionary bloc is a foolish and false idea, which, if it were true, would doom the revolutionary movement to impotence everywhere. Fortunately, it is not true. As time passes, as the smoke from the battlefields rises and people look at each other’s faces, they will begin to recognise who is a friend and who a foe.

Reason in Revolt was written at a time when the world revolutionary movement was in retreat. The collapse of the Soviet Union created a mood of pessimism and despair. The defenders of capitalism launched a ferocious ideological counteroffensive against the ideas of socialism and Marxism. They promised us a future of peace, prosperity and democracy thanks to the wonders of the free market economy.

A decade has passed since then and a decade is not such a long time in the scales of history. Not one stone upon another now remains of these comforting illusions. Everywhere there are wars, unemployment, poverty and hunger. And everywhere a new spirit of revolt is arising, not just in Asia and Latin America but also in Europe and the USA itself. The tide is turning, as we knew it must do. And people are looking for ideas that can explain what is happening in the world. The ideas of Marxism are enjoying a renaissance. Support for these ideas is growing stronger by the day.

The great Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky once said that revolution is the locomotive of history. That is truer of the present epoch than any other period in human history. The masses learn from their experience. The masses in Indonesia have had many bitter experiences in recent years. The movement has been through many ups and downs. But through all these twists and turns of history, the masses are learning. Starting with the most advanced elements of the workers and students, they will come to understand the need for a genuine revolutionary ideology, programme and method.

The present ferment that is affecting the intellectual life of all countries will sooner or later produce positive results. The collapse of the moral authority of Marxism in the last period has meant that a layer of the youth in the Middle East and Asia who in the past would have been attracted to Marxism have instead been attracted to such things as religious fundamentalism and terrorism. But to the degree that they begin to understand the limitations of these false alternatives, they will move beyond them and seek more viable alternatives.

In the end what is required is a rational and scientific theory. That is what is offered by Reason in Revolt. If it helps even a small number of workers and youth to understand the philosophical basis of Marxism, it will have been worthwhile. The experience of history shows that even a small handful can make a big difference, once the objective situation changes, as it must. The important thing is to make a start.

London, July 2005

Ebook - Naar de 'Republiek Indonesia' Menuju Republik Indonesia - Tan Malaka (1925)

2015-03-08T11:29:00.001+07:00

Sumber: Yayasan Massa, terbitan tahun 1987
Kontributor: Diketik oleh Abdul, ejaan diedit oleh Ted Sprague (Juni 2007)

First General Strike In 50 Years

2015-03-08T11:20:00.001+07:00

Tomorrow, October 3, will witness an important event in the history of the labour movement in Indonesia. For the first time in 50 years, Indonesian workers will carry out a national general strike which will involve an estimated 2 million workers in 21 different cities. Three demands serve as the basis of this general strike: increases in the official minimum wage, an end to all outsourcing arrangements, and universal national health care for all.

This general strike is not something that falls from the sky. It is the culmination of the radicalization process in the workers movement for the past one year. Radical actions of hundreds of thousands of workers who have gone on strike and blockaded industrial areas and major highways; the leadership of the workers in the movement against the fuel price increase this March that forced the government to back down; the largest May Day rally with 160,000 workers on the streets, followed by the formation of the MPBI (Council of Indonesians Workers and Labourers) that united 5 million workers; all these form a continuing process that leads to this general strike.

Workers have also started to fight for demands that go beyond the confines of their factories, from workers in Gresik, an industrial area in East Java, who fought for free education for the people to all-Indonesia workers’ actions against a fuel price increase this year. Workers’ struggles have gone beyond “day-to-day demands in the factory” to “day-to-day demands of the wider masses”. This in turn will touch on the questions of politics and power. To win “day-to-day demands in the factory”, it is normally enough for workers to strike in the said factory to press the boss. However, to win “day-to-day demands of the wider masses” (free healthcare, free education, etc.), the struggle has to be brought to a wider political stage. It is here that the question of state power is posed, where economic struggle is linked to political struggle. It is also here that workers find their leadership role in the struggle for the general well-being of the masses.

The Indonesian working class has gone through a number of important phases in the past 50 years, ones which are filled with ebbs and flows, advances and retreats:

Period of Glory (late 50s to early 60s)

The labour movement is at its peak in the late 50s and early 60s, with SOBSI as the largest workers’ federation at that moment, claiming a membership of 3 million workers, even more than any federation or confederation today.

Defeat (1965)

In 1965 the labour movement suffered its biggest defeat, destroyed physically and ideologically in the hands of the New Order regime.

Rebirth (mid 1980s)

The shift in the Indonesian economy from oil-gas exports to manufacturing in the mid-1980s created a new layer of proletariat. This new proletariat, thrown into the factories in their thousands, was one of the forces that shook the Soeharto regime. The number of recorded strikes in the 1990s increased significantly, from 61 in 1990 to 300 in 1994.

Reformasi (1998)

The 1998 Reformasi Movement, even if it didn’t bring about a fundamental change, opened the democratic gateway for the workers. Independent trade unions mushroomed in the aftermath of 1998. Meanwhile, SPSI workers, awakened by the Reformasi, also started to shake this New Order trade union. (The SPSI, the state sponsored union and the arm of the regime in the workplaces, was until 1998 the only recognised workers’ organisation.) The stranglehold of the SPSI was weakened and splits took place. In this period, workers were re-learning their long-lost fighting traditions.

This general strike will be the next phase in the history of the Indonesian labour movement, a turning point whereby the working class becomes a real political force that is not only recognized and respected by the wider masses but also feared by the ruling class. Workers with their national strike, for the first time will enter the national political arena. In the eyes of the toiling masses, they will no longer just be “tens or hundreds of workers in factories demanding wage increases”, but they will be seen as the Indonesian working class who fought for the welfare of the whole people of Indonesia. In the period of Reformasi, this position was held by the students who became an extension of the voice of the people. Today workers will start claiming their historical role as the class that leads the struggle of the whole of the oppressed masses.

The complete victory of capital over labour during the Soeharto dictatorial regime made the Indonesian capitalist class somewhat arrogant. For the past 50 years since the destruction of the labour movement, they have never felt seriously threatened by the working class. They even believe themselves that there is no longer any such thing as the working class, that there are no longer classes in society, in other words a “bourgeois classless society” has been attained. This national general strike will wake the capitalists up from their sweet dream and make them learn to fear once more the might of the working class.

One thing that has to be noted by all revolutionaries is the fact that this general strike has been initiated by the MPBI, which can be generally described as a reformist or even yellow trade union. This emphasizes once again the fact that when the workers move they will use whatever organizations they have in their hands, regardless of how reformist or even corrupt their organization or the majority of their leaders are. The bulk of the workers are still in these reformist organizations. It is therefore the task of revolutionaries to orientate to these organizations. Attempts to isolate oneself in red trade unions will only separate the revolutionaries and their ideas from the wider layer of workers.

Statements of support from many red trade unions for this general strike, and even the involvement of some of them, are a correct step. This step has to be deepened and should not stop here. The task of the most advanced workers is to orientate toward workers whose consciousness is lagging behind, no matter where they are. We have to be able to work in any workers’ organizations, from the reddest ones to the reactionary ones if need be. There shouldn’t be obstacle in principle raised against working in reformist workers’ organizations.

This first general strike will not immediately bring about successes. Like a baby who is learning to stand for the first time, it will fall numerous times. But we know that at the end of the day the baby will stand, and then walk, run, and jump. Also when the baby stands up for the first time, the world will look very different to him/her. This general strike will shake the consciousness of a wide layer of workers. They will start seeing beyond their factory gates, that out there are millions of workers whose fate and interests are the same as theirs. They will start seeing themselves as a class for itself. They will start seeing themselves as the class that can – and must – lead the struggle of the whole oppressed people.

The Indonesian working class has begun to stand up and walk upright with confidence. Those who in the past denied the revolutionary potential of the workers are now faced with hard facts. They can no longer close their eyes to the might of the working class. And for those who will still continue to deny the role of the working class after this general strike, we will leave them to the dustbin of history as the workers move forward toward their historical task: the overthrown of capitalism and the building of socialism.

Revolution And Counter - Revolution in Indonesia (1965)

2015-03-08T11:11:00.001+07:00

Confused reports of Officers' plots, coups and countercoups which filtered through to the Western press a week ago were the first indication of a major revolutionary upheaval in Indonesia. The recent events unfolded against a now familiar background of social and economic crisis in a backward country. The regime of Sukarno - despite the superficial appearance of stability - has been exposed as rotten to the core.
Confused reports of Officers' plots, coups and countercoups which filtered through to the Western press a week ago were the first indication of a major revolutionary upheaval in Indonesia.
The recent events unfolded against a now familiar background of social and economic crisis in a backward country. The regime of Sukarno - despite the superficial appearance of stability - has been exposed as rotten to the core. The analysis of the Indonesian events provides us with an object lessen in the fate of Bonapartism - bourgeois and proletarian.

Bonapartism and Bankruptcy

Since the end of the war, all the countries of the so-called "third world" have passed through a period of uninterrupted social convulsions,as the result of the growing gap in the terms of trade with the
advanced capitalist countries. The Indonesian economy is a model of bankruptcy.
At one time, Indonesia was a rice-surplus area; now it has to import 150,000 tons of rice every year. The once flourishing tin and rubber export industries have dwindled away. Only oil remains as an-imported earner of dollars.
The Indonesian economy is heavily in debt to the world banking community, especially to US bankers, Each year, the budget deficit doubles, The expected figures for this year is around 1,000 billion rupiahs. The value of the rupiah has sunk to a hundredth of its legal value , as the result of the chronic inflation which in the past six years has caused the cost of living to increase by 2,000 %.
In spite of this catastrophic economic collapse, the State spends 1,000 million US dollars a year on arms. i.e. 75% of the budget. The Bonapartist regime is riddled with corruption. In the midst of mass privation, low wages and a huge housing problem,Sukarno and his elite live like kings. Sukarno occupies a white mansion - formally the residence of the Dutch governor -surrounded by sumptuous furniture and expensive works of art. "Its three splendid state-rooms are museum-like in scope and feeling. Each is lavishly draped, carpeted and furnished. Each is hung with a fragment of Sukarno's extensive collection ofheroic
canvasses." Under his direction, huge sums have been lavished on prestige buildings like the Hotel Indonesia in Djakarta where,to quote the Sunday Times, "Three million people, mostly poor, live .... in low buildings ...mostly falling apart."
Indonesia boasts one of the most inept and useless of all parasitic cliques. "We are not facing economic difficulties" Sukarnoblithely protests. "The Indonesian people are faring well, reasonably well. Just compare us with India or some other countries. We have a new variety of rice that will give twice as much production as normal rice. It is quite an achievement forour own research centre. I wrote a poem about it, I was so happy. But it is untranslatable."
Unfortunately, Sukarno's creditors do not seem to have developed a taste for untranslatable poetry as a substitute for economic progress. They expected the economy to improve after the transfer of West New Guinea to Indonesia in 1963. To no avail. The World Bank attempted to lure Sukarno into deflation by an offer of additional loans to the tune of 142 million pounds. Instead of taking up the offer, Sukarno proceededto burn the British Embassy in Djakarta and declare war on Malaysia - a
move which cut off a further 200 million dollars worth of foreign trade. The US. was concerned. In reply to repeated American demands to shore up the economy, Sukarno announced to the world; "Economics bores me." To the very last, he maintained that in twenty years, Indonesia would be "the richest country in the world".
Faith may be able to move mountains but it had no effect in moving the Indonesian economy out of the red. The poverty and hardships of the masses led to an extraordinarily rapid growth of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI). With the economy sliding downhill fast, Sukarno was forced to nationalise increasing numbers of foreign enterprises. To do this, he was obliged to leanon the support of the PKI - a process which did not go unnoticed in Washington..

Menshevik policy of the PKI

The whole lesson of the post-war period is that the elementary tasks of the bourgeois (democratic) revolution in backward countries cannot besolved on the basis of capitalist property relations. The weak bourgeoisies of the ex-colonial countries are too inextricably bound up with international finance capital to carry the nationalist revolution
through to the end. Nor can they compete with their advanced industrial competitors for world markets. As a result, there is a constant deterioration of their economic status vis-a-vis the advanced capitalistcountries.
The ruining of the economies of backward countries creates conditionsof acute and permanent social crisis. On the one hand the old self-contained peasant society is steadily under-mined, on the other, the capitalist class is unable to put across its forms on the whole of society. The rise of military police states all over the "third world" is merely a surface expression of the inability of the colonial bourgeoisie to solve the problems of their own revolution. Only by the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat, in alliance with the poorpeasants, can the backward countries begin to solve their economic and.social problems.
Nowhere in the "Third World" has the workers' movement made suchrapid strides in the last decade as in Indonesia. The PKI, which hadvirtually ceased to exist after the abortive coup of 1948, has grown into the third largest Communist Party in the world -only the Chineseand Russian Parties being larger. Its total paid up membership is three million, It commands the support of ten million trade unionists and organised peasants. Most important of all, it claims the allegiance of 4O% of the Indonesian army. Politically, it is aligned with Peking in the Sino-Soviet dispute, and maintains close contact with the Chinese Stalinists. A revolutionary combination, one might think. But one would be wrong, . The policy of the PKI is one of blatant class collaboration.Since the 1948 fiasco, the PKI leadership has attempted to prove its own impotence by ingratiating itself with Sukarno. All traces of revolutionary ideology have been systematically deleted from the Party Programme. Thus the 1962 Programme and Constitution of the PKI outlined the Party's task as the establishment of a "people's democratic state". And what might this queer specimen be? Socialism? Capitalism? Workers' State? The Programme goes on to clarify the class content of this "peoples' democratic state". It would be a "democracy of a new type",based, not upon the working class, but on a bloc of workers and peasants with a strange and motley collection of "Allies" . This latter-day popular front would include "the urban petty bourgeoisie, the intellectuals, the national bourgeoisie (! ), the advanced aristocratic elements (!!), and patriotic elements in general (!!!).
From such confusion, it, is difficult to extract any positive conclusion concerning the class nature of the "people democratic state" since the above is simply a list of all classes and strata of present day bourgeois Indonesia. One might therefore justly conclude that the "revolutionary" Peking -oriented Programme of the PKI is the maintenanceof the status quo !

In all its documents, the PKI goes out of its way to avoid all mention of the dictatorship of the proletariat. Instead, the PKI refers to the "authority" of the "people" - a formula which offends no one. The class collaboration of the PKI attained its most bare faced expression in 1955 when it openly advocated a national coalition, and offered to water down its already insipid programme to a list of entirely non communist aims.
The unutterably philistine mentality of the PKI leadership is revealed in all the pronouncements of its chief "theoretician", Aidit. As always with Stalinism, the "theory" is merely a crude apology for thebetrayals of the leadership. Thus, using the sophist argument of "stages" Aidit puts off the question of the socialist revolution to the far distant future, "When we complete the first stage of our revolution which is now in progress, we can enter into friendly consultation with other progressive elements in our society and, without an armed struggle' lead the country towards socialist revolution. After all, the national capitalists in our country are both weak and disorganised. At present, in our national democratic revolution, we are siding with them and fighting a common battle of expelling foreign economic domination from this soil''.
Aidit ' s argument condemns itself. If the national bourgeoisie is soweak and disorganised, all the more reason to sweep them aside and set up a workers and peasants ' government. As a matter of fact, as Lenin pointed out a hundred times, it is precisely the weakness of the national bourgeoisie that makes them a reactionary stumbling block in the path of the democratic revolution in backward countries. They doubt their ability to control the forces unleashed by a civil war, they equivocate, and finally they are driven into the arms of reaction out of fear of their own working class. For this reason it is entirely reactionary to attempt to separate mechanically the democratic and socialist phases of the revolution in backward countries. Either the democratic revolution ''grows over'' into the dictatorship of the proletariat, or it succumbs to the hammer blows of reaction.
The "Leninist" position of Aidit and co. is in fact identical to thatof the Mensheviks against whom Lenin waged a relentless struggle right up to 1917. The Mensheviks argued that the socialist revolution was out of the Question in Russia, because the bourgeois democratic revolution had yet to take place. Thus, the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat was relegated by them to a distant (and therefore safe) future - fifty, a hundred, or even three hundred years hence, First we complete the "first stage'' then, when this is "completely attained" , we "enter into friendly agreements'' with those who might be interested in the ''second stage''. A very pretty schema.
Events were posed altogether differently by history, which, alas , does not deem it at all necessary to follow the dictates of a Plekhanov or an Aidit. 1n 1905, the Mensheviks were forced with a clear choice: proletarian revolution, or reaction? While the workers struggled with reaction in the streets, Plekhanov gave his reply: "They should not have taken to arms". Aidit today faces his 1905.

Palace Revolution

Bonapartist Government arises out of a social crisis, where no one class, group or party is capable of achieving stable government. The bonapartist dictator directly or indirectly basing himself upon the army, achieves political equilibrium by ''balancing'' the antagonistic interests - playing off one class against another. This is what imparts to the bonapartist dictator his peculiar aura of isolation and individualism; because he represents no particular interest, (other than his own) the illusion is created of a power standing above society and regulating it "in the national interest''. In reality bonapartism always represents defence of the status quo and therefore in the last analysis always comes down on the side of the ruling class.
The delicate balance of forces which is the precondition for bonapartism is bound to he temporary and precarious. Sooner or later equilibrium is destroyed and illusory stability gives way to civil war. Thus, a Bonapartist regime must be considered, monolithic or paternalistic facade notwithstanding , as a regime of transition which is the prelude to the victory of revolution or reaction.
At six am on Thursday 30th September, Radio Djakarta broadcast an announcement that an obscure officer of the palace guard - Lt-Col Untunghad President Sukarno under protective guard, and that loyalist forces had crushed a CIA take-over plot. Within hours, Radio Djakarta issued another statement that President Sukarno was safe and well and that a Communist coup had been crushed by Gen Nasution. The bonapartistillusion was shattered.
Initial reactions in the West were that this was just another power struggle caused by the illness or death of Sukarno. The Times - ever tasteful - thought that he had "ceased to be a factor on the Indonesian political scene''. As it happened, Sukarno was alive, but the Times had
grasped the correlation of' forces admirably. In the whole course of the struggle Sukarno and his Cabinet were pitifully isolated. The government was suspended in mid-air. The real political struggle had passed into the streets.
Little by little the Picture became clearer. We may accept the accusation of a CIA plot and an attempt by the Stalinist middle stream of the officer caste to liquidate the generals and forestall a right wing coup planned for October 5th as an accurate outline of the initial upheaval. Sukarno's illness, his moves against foreign enterprises and his increasing dependence on the PKI, on top of the general bankruptcy of the Indonesian economy would be more than enough to interest the State Department in secret negotiations with the reactionary upper stratum of the officer caste (Gen Nasution is virulently anti-Communist). On the other hand, the army generals would need little persuading to liquidate the hated influence of the PKI and establish open military rule.
As a matter of fact, we have certain proof of at least one previous attempt of the CIA to oust Sukarno. In the late 50s, an anti-Sukarno guerrilla movement developed in Sumatra. The pilot of a rebel plane shot down after bombarding an air-field was a CIA agent called Allen Lawrence Pope. He was sentenced to death, but later reprieved on Sukarno's personal order, "because I did not want to spoil the good relationship between Indonesia and America''.
That a rightist plot existed need not be seriously doubted. The PKI, as we have seen, was quite satisfied with the status quo. On the other hand, it is clear that the so-called ''Revolutionary Council'' of Untungwas a Stalinist front organisation composed of prominent Stalinists, fellow travellers and political non-entities. The ''respectable" members of the Council disowned it immediately Nasution looked like gaining the upper hand. There can be no doubt that the PKI leadership was behind this preventative coup. It has emerged, however, that Sukarno himself knew all about it at least 24 hours in advance, having been informed of the generals' plot by the pro-PKI Air Chief, Dhani. Sukarno was in his palace in Djakarta protected by the palace guard on the night of the coup, but fled to Bogor with the help of Dhani when the fighting got out of hand.
The treachery of the PKI now stands revealed. With three million members, ten million supporters and 40% of the army under its control, its sole concern was to keep the masses out of the struggle - to confine it to a palace revolution.
Instead of publishing full details of the right wing plot, instead ofmobilising the masses in a general strike and appealing to its supporters in the army to disarm their officers and join hands with the workers for the overthrow of the whole rotten regime, they made a secret pact with Sukarno to murder the offending generals. Unfortunately for them Nasution escaped and called out his troops. The palace revolution crumbled at a touch.

The gathering reaction

It is an elementary rule of revolutionary strategy that it is always an advantage if the other side is seen to strike the first blow, thus justifying one's own actions as self-defence. The PKI by its criminal policy, far from keeping the generals out, handed them power on a plate.
The provocative actions of the wretched ''Revolutionary Council" proved an excellent weapon in the hands of Nasution. Moslem reaction was incited. The PKI headquarters in Djakarta was stormed and burned by a mob of several thousand youths, shouting ''Kill Aidit". Mobs roamed the streets, sticking up posters reading "Crush the Communists". A mob outside the American Embassy chanted "Long Live America", A mass rally of 500,000 demanded action against all who participated in the "September 30th Movement". The murder of the six generals and the senseless killing of Nasutian's six year old daughter were used to fan the flames of reaction. The demands forwarded by this demonstration to the government (i.e. to Nasution ) showed that the programme of reactionhas already crystallised.

Dismissal of all Communists and other ministers involved in the September 30th Movement.
Action against the murderers of the six officers.
Banning of all Communist information media and organisations sympathetic to the PKI and the coup Movement.
Banning of the PKI itself.

It will not be long before the reactionary generals - with great reluctance of course - submit to the pressing demands of the mob. The above programme will be implemented.

And what of the PKI? Instead of pursuing a vigorous offensive against reaction which even now, at the 11th hour' could save the party, the leadership remains prostrate before Sukarno. While Communists struggle with the mobs of reaction, the PKI continues to be represented in Sukarno's cabinet, supporting his demagogic appeals for "national unity", a return to the old stability, etc. Ominously, however, Aidit has gone into hiding.
Aidit may hide, but there is no hiding place for the three million Communist workers and peasants who are placed at the mercy of a bloody reaction. In the teeth of all the cowardly appeals of the leadership, the mighty PKI masses are clearly moving into action. The revolt in Central Java has spread to Sumatra, and is still growing. Indonesia has been split asunder. The Daily Telegraph, with some insight, analysed the situation in an editorial of October 12th, entitled
"The civil war in Indonesia" ''It is plain from the events of the past ten days in Indonesia that it is not another palace coup that has rocked Dr Sukarno's Republic, but a spreading civil war. The land of confrontation is confronting itself, The three heads of this dragon, Moslem, nationalist, Communist' are biting at each other, and fighting has spread from Java to Sumatra The long smouldering rivalry offorces over which Dr Sukarno presided for so long has burst into flame.
If the army suspected a Communist coup, it was clearly surprised by its sudden ruthlessness and disorganised by the loss of its six murdered generals. Now it is clear that Dr Sukarno is in Army protection' that he has countenanced its campaigns against the Communist guerrillas and finally abandoned the pretence that his Nassakom or United Front still exists.''
The behaviour of the PKI leadership was craven to the last. To the very last moment before Sukarno switched sides, they identified themselves with him and his demagogic appeals to national unity. More than likely they still do. They behave like a cur that licks its master's hand as he kicks it in the belly.
Where the state power is openly challenged in a civil war, all possibilities of "moderation", of a ''middle way" vanish in thin air. If Sukarno emerges, at the end of the civil war, as the man in charge it cannot be on the same basis as before. He will no longer be a one Man dictator, keeping himself on top by balancing the classes, but as a puppet of the generals. The old order is irrevocably lost. It was both stupid and reactionary of the PKI leaders to appeal for its restoration.
It is by no means certain, however, that the revolt will be crushed. True, the PKI leaders have still not called an insurrection. But the PKI masses are reacting spontaneously to the threat of reaction. Their great numerical strength, and the complete rottenness of Indonesian society may yet bring victory. It is not impossible that the PKI leadership, or a section of that leadership, will realise the futility of attempts to restore the status quo, and support the development of a mass insurrection. If so, then this would certainly take the form of a protracted guerrilla war, the classical weapon of Stalinism in the Colonial Revolution.
More likely, however, the PKI leadership will carry their work of disruption to the bitter and bloody end. Ether they will actively discourage their members from fighting, in a craven and quite utopian effort to conciliate the forces of reaction, or they may temporarily lend their support to a guerrilla war, or even a general strike, not with a view to seizing power, but simply in order to obtain a stronger hand in secret negotiations with Nasution and/or Sukarno.
Whatever the outcome, the disastrous policies of the Stalinist leadership in Indonesia, will certainly have the initial result of causing widespread disillusionment of the masses in that country. A series of defeats of the present revolutionary movement would usher in a whole period of militarist reaction resting on the apathy and bitterness of the PKI masses. Such a defeat would also have a crippling effect on the morale of the workers and peasants of Malaysia. Not for nothing did the Daily Telegraph editorial express evident satisfaction at the chaos in Indonesia. The defeat of the Indonesian proletariat would be the best possible buttress to the crumbling edifice of Malaysia.
Coming at the same time as Peking's treacherous support of reactionary feudal Pakistan in its war with India, the Indonesian experience must serve as a warning to those workers who have been deceived by the "revolutionary'' phrase mongering of Chinese Stalinism. It is significant that the only reaction of the Chinese bureaucracy to the upheavals in Indonesia was a message of "cordial greetings" to Sukarno when he finally emerged from hiding.
All theories, programmes and policies sooner or later find expression In practice. The question of the correctness or otherwise of the Stalinist-Menshevik theory of the Colonial Revolution is not academic but practical. The experience of Stalinist policies in a whole series of revolutions irrefutably proves their counter-revolutionary nature. The programme of revolutionary Marxism is itself no abstract thing but the crystallisation of the experiences of a hundred years of proletarian class struggle. To Marxists the lessons of a defeat are if anything more important than those of victory. The workers can learn by their mistakes, but only if these experiences are patiently analysed and explained by the revolutionary vanguard. The exposure of Stalinism in practice can only be a positive step in the long term revolutionary education of the workers of all countries. It as up to the revolutionaryMarxists in this country painstakingly to explain the lessons of Indonesia to the British labour movement.

Review of “The Act of Killing”

2015-03-08T10:58:00.001+07:00

“In terms of the numbers killed, the anti-PKI massacres in Indonesia rank as one of the worst mass murders of the twentieth century". (CIA study in 1968)

In 1965-66 the right-wing military regime that seized power in Indonesia slaughtered up to one million people, mainly Communist party activists and supporters, in the most brutal manner. The “democratic” West not only did not protest, but in some cases, such as the US government via the CIA, actually handed over to the butchers lists of activists deemed dangerous. Joshua Oppenheimer has produced an amazing documentary/film in which the perpetrators if the butchery speak and re-enact what they did in the 1960s.

“Listen, if we succeed in making this film, It will disprove all the propaganda about the communists being cruel, And show that we were cruel, We are the cruel ones, ha ha ha. (…) “It is not about fear. It’s 40 years ago, so our criminal case has expired. It’s not about fear. It’s about image. The whole society will say: “We always suspected it. They lied about the communists being cruel”. (One of the killers)

Don’t expect to see a conventional historical documentary. Don’t expect a long story of testimonies of the families of the victims of the 1965-1966 massacre of communists in Indonesia. With “The Act of Killing” you are not on familiar ground. Expect something more powerful, more compelling, more disturbing, more horrifying, and more fascinating even. Expect a documentary-fiction which will contribute – more than any other attempt until now – to demolishing the official propaganda about the genocide of one million communists. Expect something which will help to root out the lies and the fear about communism inculcated by systematic violence and terror over different generations. As an activist once told me, this fear of communism was transmitted almost with the mother’s milk. Be prepared to view a story where not the victims but the perpetrators take literally the centre of the stage. In the most astonishing way this film recreates the violence, the torture and the killings of the death squads in Indonesia from October 1965 on. Joshua Oppenheimer, the director of The Act of Killing, has succeeded in something exceptional: winning the confidence of some of the killers and torturers of 1965 and convincing them to enact step by step and in detail, their activities at the original sites, describe their nightmares and to comment on it. The director makes them elaborate a script based on their experience and memories. This becomes then a film within the film. They do this with surprising candour in front of the cameras while dancing, singing and laughing. Instead of killers who deny their acts or who attempt to portray their victims as being guilty for their fate, here they claim openly responsibility for what they did. Worse even, they boast about it. In that sense this documentary does more to incriminate the perpetrators of the 1965-1966 bloodbath than any other documentary has succeeded in doing before. The central figure is Anwar Congo, a young gangster in the 1960’s, heading the traffic of illegal cinema (‘bioskop’) tickets in the city of Medan in North Sumatra. He and his criminal colleagues were fans of the Hollywood productions, dressed like James Dean and even organised a fan club of the actor. When the Communist Party called for a boycott of American movies the income of his lucrative business dropped rapidly. This fuelled his resentment and that of other criminals against the communists. When the military planned the physical annihilation of the PKI, they resorted to the help of those criminals and of the many lumpen elements in the cities. They are also the local leaders of the paramilitary political gang, called Pemuda Pancasila (Pancasila Youth). They become part of what the Indonesian history books describe as the “Patriotic campaign”. It opened the gates to the most base feelings possible in a human being. Using their sick imagination, they explain how they continually invented new ways of torture and assassination. As they had so many people to kill and not enough time to kill them with their own hands they invented quicker ways to death. They also act out in rotation the part of their victims. This leads to astonishing conversations and reflections (see this video). It needs a special effort of imagination to understand the impact this mass massacre had on the consciousness of different generations of Indonesians. This impact was deliberately fed by the Suharto dictatorship and his generals through propaganda and continued repression.

National Trauma

We asked one of leaders of the 1998 uprising which led to the fall of Suharto how his family and he himself felt about the 1965 massacre:

“I do not have direct experience with the mass murder of 1965, since I was born one decade later. But I feel it as a collective trauma. My mom's brother, leader of the Communist Party at village level, was killed in front of my family. Everybody told me the way he was killed when I was a child. It is horror. “My father was almost killed as well, but he survived. There was one night a debate amongst the murderers to discuss whether my father would be killed or not, while he saw with his eyes many people who had already been killed. At the end, he was not killed. But his mental state has remained fragile to this day. He became mentally ill in 1998 when the military was hunted for me. “I think, to put it briefly, that the 1965 mass killing became a collective trauma for almost everyone, not only those who had direct experience but also those who know the story.”

But that fear is crumbling. As new generation has grow up and awoken politically, and interest in communism and the history of the PKI is on the increase. New layers of workers and youth who have not been fed with anti-communist propaganda or lived in an environment where communist taboos were present in all aspects of their life, are now looking for new historical explanations A special attention is given in the documentary to Pemuda Pancasila, a paramilitary youth movement and its relation to the state. Pemuda Pancasila (PP) is a million strong (3 to 5 million) militia composed of gangsters (‘preman’), petty criminals and youth of the informal sector and organised crime (extortion of Chinese traders). Pemuda was an attempt to create a mass organised base for reaction against the youth of the PKI, Pemuda Rakyat (People’s Youth) in the 1960’s. They were particularly active in North Sumatra (Medan and Aceh) in slaughtering communists. It is linked to the party of the dictatorship, Golkar. This movement still exists today as you will be able to see from the documentary. What is their role then today? Jusuf Kalla, the vice president of Indonesia, gives a straightforward answer in a speech shown in the documentary. In front of a meeting of cadres and political supporters of PP he explains:

“The spirit of Pancasila Youth, that some people accuse of being gangsters. Gangsters are people who work outside of the system, not for the government. The word gangster (‘preman’ in Bahasa Indonesia) comes from ‘free men’. This nation needs ‘free men’. If everyone worked for the government, we’d be a nation of bureaucrats. We’d get nothing done. We need gangsters to get things done. Free, private men, who get things done. We need gangsters, who are willing to take risks in business. Use your muscles! Muscles aren’t for beating up people. Although beating people up is sometimes needed. [laughter and applause in the hall].”

On another occasion, at a mass gathering of PP, the chairman of PP, Yapto Soerjosoemarno, delivered a speech in front of thousands of PP members and government officials, and once again highlighted the basis of the PP’s existence:

“All members of Pancasila Youth are heroes, from exterminating the communists, to fighting neo-communists and left-wing extremists, and those wishing to break apart the nation.”

It would be a mistake to think that PP is a militia made of lumpen elements from top to bottom. The leaders of PP are mostly highly educated people, with political and business ties. Yapto is a lawyer who finished his education in the Netherlands. He also owns a number of companies. His father, a retired Major General, is a member of the Javanese nobility. Here we see how gangsterism, militarism, capitalism, and feudalism in Indonesia form a complex interdependent network. PP is a state and private business sponsored private militia of thugs taking over sometimes security issues in cities where the police is ‘ineffective’, a network for organised crime and a political militia used to intimidate opponents or left-wing people in general. They complement the other organs of state repression. Indonesia is rife with militias of all kind. Also active in 1965-66 were Islamic fundamentalist groups killing the “godless atheists”. Although dangerous and a clear threat to the workers and peasant movement and the left in general, they are less impressive once the masses come out on the streets. November 1998 witnessed the second upsurge of the students and the urban masses after the fall of Suharto. His political clone Habibie was put in power to give the impression of change while trying to guarantee the preservation of the system. The rallying cry in the capital Jakarta was then “down with Habibie, the clone of Suharto”. At the highpoint of the mobilisations one million people filled the streets of the city. The army deployed 30,000 soldiers, 16 warships arrived in the harbour including one submarine and one missile launcher. Moreover the regime had deployed 125,000 thugs from all over the island in the city to act as a battering ram against the demonstrators. They failed, as the poor people and the workers from the popular neighbourhoods rose up against them, with machetes, sticks and knives. So after a few days the military (the real masters of the thugs) withdrew them so as not to provoke a greater revolt in the city. This is a good indication of the limits of the engagement of such militias in the class struggle. Nevertheless loosely organised masses on the streets are not enough to confront the right-wing Islamist militias. The steps taken by the metal workers’ union to establish their own “Garda Metal” (Metal Guard) to protect their demonstrations is a good step. It needs to be generalised to other unions and used to protect all left-wing meetings from physical aggression.

Impunity

A question that haunts the documentary is: how was Joshua Oppenheimer able to convince the 1965 killers to speak so freely in front of the camera? Partially it is a question of having won their confidence over a period of seven years. Then there is the feeling of impunity. But this is not necessarily related to the expiration of their criminal cases. More importantly, this feeling of being untouchable is due to their powerful protectors in the state apparatus (governors, newspaper editors, military officers, politicians including at the highest level of the system even today) and their status of national heroes in official history. As you can expect this movie is not being shown at local cinemas in Jakarta, Medan or Surabaya. The “democratic” government does not authorize its circulation. Nevertheless, in the past months, youth across Indonesia have been actively organizing viewings – many of them underground viewings – of the documentary. The enthusiasm with which these youth watched and responded to this documentary is a clear symptom of the changes in the minds of the youth, both students and workers. They are less burdened by the “New Order” propaganda and more sympathetic to communism. The anti-communist fear and taboos are breaking down rapidly. “The Act of Killing” did an immense service towards restoring the historical truth and helping to reconquer the memory of the massacred communists. As another activist told me: “I was really impressed by the scope of the conspiracy behind the massacre of the PKI.” Nevertheless, the documentary leaves out something very important if we want to really understand what happened in 1965-1966. How was it possible that the biggest Communist party outside the Stalinist world was annihilated in this way without significant resistance? The PKI had three million members and 15 to 20 million supporters in its different mass organisations. It was very powerful. The answer does not lie in the detailed preparation of the systematic, almost industrial, scale killings, or in the fact that they were more “cruel” than us (which is always the case), or in the logistic support given by British and US imperialists. Nor was it true that the state was too strong (the PKI commanded a lot of support inside the army not only from ordinary soldiers but also from NCO’s and higher officers, up to 40% of the army was PKI minded). The explanation is not the lack of arms in the hands of the communist members or the absence of organised worker and peasant self-defence groups. The PKI had arms. The answer is political. The PKI and its cadres were politically disarmed in the face of the brutal attack of the state and the gangs at their service. The explanation is to be found in the policies of the PKI leadership itself (for a more thorough analysis of the political reasons read Alan Woods’ article here). The PKI was a Stalinist party whose political strategy was inspired by the “two stage” theory. This “theory” claimed that the working class in countries like Indonesia is not ready for socialism. Its first priority consisted in consolidating capitalism and establishing an alliance with the so-called nationalist bourgeoisie, i.e. the president Sukarno. This alliance, which confused and paralysed the PKI at the moment of truth, was to prove fatal. During the first days and weeks of the beginning of the massacre, the PKI leaders tried to reassure the masses that supported them with the hope that “Bung Karno” (Brother Sukarno) was going to protect them. No protection would be forthcoming. In wars, as in class struggle, numbers are not the only determining factor. The initiative for the offensive, the dedication with which the objectives are fought for are factors which weigh more than numbers. The determination was on the side of the ruthless class enemy. Political vacillation and hesitation was on the side of the leadership of the PKI. “It has seldom happened that a party as large as the PKI has held a class fraction, the ‘national bourgeoisie’, in such high esteem, placed so many hopes upon it and accommodated itself to it, while knowing so little about it,” writes Rex Mortimer in Indonesian Communism under Sukarno - Ideology and Politics 1959-65. We know what the consequences of this submission of the PKI to the so-called national bourgeois were to be. Those lessons have to be learned through the systematic study of genuine Marxism (not its Stalinist caricature) and with the development of real solid cadres rooted in the movement. The Indonesian class struggle will give different opportunities in the future for the working class to take power and overthrow capitalism. The success of the struggle for a socialist Indonesia will be the best homage and revenge for the communists who died almost 50 years ago.

Introduction To The Indonesian Edition Of The Permanent Revolution

2015-03-08T10:52:00.001+07:00

The Permanent Revolution by Leon Trotsky is one of the most important Marxist books of the last century. The International Marxist Tendency is producing an Indonesian edition of this book, scheduled to be published in January. We publish here the introduction written by Alan Woods.

Leon Davidovich Trotski

All theories, programmes and policies sooner or later find expression in practice. The theory of the Permanent Revolution, which is one of the most important developments of Marxist theory, was strikingly confirmed, in a positive sense, by the October Revolution. It has been confirmed in a negative sense on innumerable occasions since then. The most terrible example of this was the massacre of one and a half million Indonesian Communists in 1965.

Trotsky first developed this wonderfully profound and important theory as early as 1904. What does the theory state? The permanent revolution, while accepting that the objective tasks facing the Russian workers were those of the bourgeois democratic revolution, nevertheless explained how in a backward country in the epoch of imperialism, the "national bourgeoisie" was incapable of playing a progressive role.

The reason is that the weak bourgeoisie of tsarist Russia was inseparably linked to the feudal landowners on the one hand and to imperialist capital on the other and was therefore completely unable to carry through any of its historical tasks (agrarian reform, the modernization of society, democracy, the national question, etc.). This idea was put to the test the following year in the first Russian Revolution, when the bourgeois Liberals represented by the Kadet Party betrayed the revolution and went over to the autocracy.

There were already historical precedents for this. Even in 1848-9, during the epoch of the bourgeois-democratic revolution in Europe, Marx and Engels mercilessly unmasked the cowardly, counterrevolutionary role of the bourgeoisie, and emphasised the need for the workers to maintain a policy of complete class independence, not only from the bourgeois liberals, but also from the vacillating petty bourgeois democrats. Marx stressed this idea in numerous articles at the time, such as The Bourgeoisie and the Counter-revolution (1848). In fact, it was Marx who originally put forward the idea of the Permanent Revolution at that time. But it was Trotsky who, taking his starting point from Marx, developed the idea into a worked-out theory applicable to present-day conditions.

Leninism and Menshevism

Before the First World War there were intense debates in the Russian Social Democracy about the perspectives for the Russian Revolution. The Mensheviks, who were the opportunist wing of the Russian workers' movement, developed the two-stage theory as their perspective for the Russian revolution. They argued that, since the tasks of the revolution are those of the national democratic bourgeois revolution, the national democratic bourgeoisie must take the leadership of the revolution. They postponed the socialist revolution to a dim and distant future and subordinated the workers to the Liberals. The theory of the Permanent Revolution was the most complete answer to the reformist and class collaborationist position of the Mensheviks.

What was Lenin's position? On the main political question (the relation of the worker's party to the bourgeoisie) he stood close to Trotsky and fought against the Mensheviks' class collaborationism. Lenin agreed with Trotsky that the Russian Liberals could not carry out the bourgeois-democratic revolution, and that this task could only be carried out by the proletariat in alliance with the poor peasantry.

Following in the footsteps of Marx, who had described the bourgeois "democratic party" as "far more dangerous to the workers than the previous liberals", Lenin explained that the Russian bourgeoisie, far from being an ally of the workers, would inevitably side with the counter-revolution: "The bourgeoisie in the mass" he wrote in 1905, "will inevitably turn towards the counter-revolution, and against the people as soon as its narrow, selfish interests are met, as soon as it 'recoils' from consistent democracy (and it is already recoiling from it!)." (Lenin, Collected Works, vol. 9, p. 98.)

What class, in Lenin's view, could lead the bourgeois-democratic revolution? "There remains 'the people', that is, the proletariat and the peasantry. The proletariat alone can be relied on to march on to the end, for it goes far beyond the democratic revolution. That is why the proletariat fights in the forefront for a republic and contemptuously rejects stupid and unworthy advice to take into account the possibility of the bourgeoisie recoiling." (Ibid.)

In all of Lenin's speeches and writings, the counter-revolutionary role of the bourgeois-democratic Liberals is stressed time and time again. However, up until 1917, he did not believe that the Russian workers would come to power before the socialist revolution in the West ‑ a perspective that only Trotsky defended before 1917, when it was fully adopted by Lenin in his April theses.

The October Revolution

The Russian working class ‑ as Trotsky had predicted in 1904 ‑ came to power before the workers of Western Europe. They carried out all the tasks of the bourgeois-democratic revolution, and immediately set about nationalizing industry and passing over to the tasks of the socialist revolution. The bourgeoisie played an openly counterrevolutionary role, but was defeated by the workers in alliance with the poor peasants. Thus, the October Revolution itself triumphantly demonstrated the correctness of the permanent revolution.

Having taken power and expropriated the landlords and capitalists, the Bolsheviks made a revolutionary appeal to the workers of the world to follow their example. Lenin knew very well that without the victory of the revolution in the advanced capitalist countries, especially Germany, the revolution could not survive isolated, especially in a backward country like Russia. What happened subsequently showed that this was absolutely correct. The setting up of the Third (Communist) International, the world party of socialist revolution, was the concrete manifestation of this perspective.

Had the Communist International remained firm on the positions of Lenin and Trotsky, the victory of the world revolution would have been ensured. Unfortunately, the Comintern's formative years coincided with the Stalinist counter-revolution in Russia, which had a disastrous effect on the Communist Parties of the entire world. The Stalinist bureaucracy, having acquired control in the Soviet Union developed a very conservative outlook.

The theory that socialism can be built in one country is an abomination from the standpoint of Marx and Lenin. Initially, this was even recognized by Stalin himself. As late as February 1924, in his Foundations of Leninism, Stalin summed up Lenin's views on the building of socialism in these words:

"The overthrow of the power of the bourgeoisie and the establishment of a proletarian government in one country does not yet guarantee the complete victory of socialism. The main task of socialism - the organization of socialist production - remains ahead. Can this task be accomplished, can the final victory of socialism in one country be attained, without the joint efforts of the proletariat of several advanced countries? No, this is impossible. To overthrow the bourgeoisie the efforts of one country are sufficient - the history of our revolution bears this out. For the final victory of Socialism, for the organization of socialist production, the efforts of one country, particularly of such a peasant country as Russia, are insufficient.For this the efforts of the proletarians of several advanced countries are necessary.

"Such, on the whole, are the characteristic features of the Leninist theory of the proletarian revolution."

There is not the slightest doubt that this passage indeed represented the characteristic features of the Leninist theory of the proletarian revolution, which nobody had ever questioned. Yet before the end of 1924, Stalin's book had been revised, and the exact opposite put in its place. By November 1926, Stalin could assert the following:

"The party always took as its starting point the idea that the victory of socialism in that country, and that task can be accomplished with the forces of a single country."

This represents a fundamental revision of Marxism-Leninism. What it really reflected was the mentality of the bureaucracy, which had had enough of the storm and stress of revolution and sought to get on with the task of "building socialism in Russia". That is to say, they wanted to protect and expand their privileges and not "waste" the resources of the country in pursuing world revolution. On the other hand they feared that revolution in other countries could develop on healthy lines and pose a threat to their own domination in Russia, and therefore, at a certain stage, sought actively to prevent revolution elsewhere.

Instead of pursuing a revolutionary policy based on class independence, as Lenin had always advocated, they proposed an alliance of the Communist Parties with the "national progressive bourgeoisie" (and if there was not one easily at hand, they were quite prepared to invent it) to carry through the democratic revolution, and afterwards, later on, in the far distant future, when the country had developed a fully fledged capitalist economy, fight for socialism. This policy represented a complete break with Leninism and a return to the old discredited position of Menshevism ‑ the theory of the "two stages".

The Permanent Revolution Today

The situation is clearer still today than in 1917. Since the Second World War, all the so-called "third world" has passed through a period of uninterrupted social convulsions. The achievement of formal independence, although welcomed by the Marxists, did not solve the problems of the former colonial nations. As long as they remained on a capitalist basis, no way forward was possible. They remained enslaved to the advanced capitalist countries. Instead of direct military-bureaucratic rule we had indirect domination through the mechanism of the world market and international trade.

The national bourgeoisie in the colonial countries entered into the scene of history too late, when the world had already been divided up between a few imperialist powers. It was not able to play any progressive role and was born completely subordinated to its former colonial masters. As in tsarist Russia, the weak and degenerate bourgeoisie in Asia, Latin America and Africa is too dependent on foreign capital and imperialism, to carry society forward. It is tied with a thousand threads, not only to foreign capital, but with the class of landowners, with which it forms a reactionary bloc that represents a bulwark against progress.

Whatever differences may exist between these elements are insignificant in comparison with the fear that unites them against the masses. Only the proletariat, allied with the poor peasants and urban poor, can solve the problems of society by taking power into its own hands, expropriating the imperialists and the bourgeoisie, and beginning the task of transforming society on socialist lines.

Under present-day conditions, the tasks of the bourgeois (democratic) revolution in backward countries cannot be solved on the basis of capitalist property relations. The weak bourgeoisie of the ex-colonial countries is too inextricably bound up with international finance capital to carry the nationalist revolution through to the end. Nor can they compete with their advanced industrial competitors for world markets. As a result, there is a constant deterioration of their economic status in relation to the advanced capitalist countries.

The ruining of the economies of backward countries creates conditions of acute and permanent social crisis. On the one hand the old self-contained peasant society is steadily undermined, on the other hand, the capitalist class is unable to put across its forms on the whole of society. The rise of military police states all over the "third world" is merely an expression of the inability of the colonial bourgeoisie to solve the problems of their own revolution. Only through the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat, in alliance with the poor peasants, can the backward countries begin to solve their economic and social problems.

By setting itself at the head of the nation, leading the oppressed layers of society (urban and rural petty-bourgeoisie), the proletariat could take power and then carry through the tasks of the bourgeois-democratic revolution (mainly the land reform and the unification and liberation of the country from foreign domination).

However, once having come to power, the proletariat would not stop there but would start to implement socialist measures of expropriation of the capitalists. And as these tasks cannot be solved in one country alone, especially not in a backward country, this would be the beginning of the world revolution. Thus the revolution is "permanent" in two senses: because it starts with the bourgeois tasks and continues with the socialist ones, and because it starts in one country and continues at an international level.

Role of the Communist Parties

The Menshevik-Stalinist theory of two stages has played a criminal role in the development of the revolution in the colonial world. Wherever it has been applied in the colonial world, it has led to one catastrophe after another. In the 1920s, following Stalin's theory of the "bloc of four classes", the young Chinese Communist Party was forced into the ranks of the national bourgeois Kuomintang which then proceeded to liquidate physically the Communist Party, the trade unions and the peasant soviets during the 1925-27 Chinese revolution. The reason why the second Chinese revolution took the form of a peasant war in which the working class remained passive was to a large extent determined by the crushing of the Chinese proletariat as a result of Stalin's policies, which Trotsky characterised as "a malicious caricature of Menshevism."

In Iraq in the 1950s and 1960s, the Communist Parties were mass forces able to call demonstrations of a million people in Baghdad. They could easily have taken power. But instead of pursuing a policy of class independence and leading the workers and peasants to the taking of power, they looked for alliances with the "progressive" bourgeoisie and the "progressive" sections of the army. The latter, having taken power on the backs of the Communist Parties, then proceeded to eliminate them by murdering and jailing their members and leaders. The people of Iraq paid a terrible price with the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein, and all the subsequent horrors of war and foreign occupation.

In Sudan, the same process happened not once but twice. In 1967 the Sudanese Communist Party was able to call a demonstration of two million in Khartoum. But the leaders of the Sudanese Communist Party adopted the policy of a "Patriotic Alliance" with the "progressive" bourgeoisie. What was the result? It was the dictatorship of Nimeiri, the crushing of the Communist Party and the victory of reaction in Sudan, with the most tragic consequences. However, all these catastrophes pale in insignificance when compared with the massacre of the Communists in Indonesia in 1965.

Indonesia

Indonesia was no exception to the general rule. Despite its vast productive potential, it remained poor and backward. At one time, Indonesia was a rice-surplus area; by 1965 it had to import 150,000 tons of rice every year. The once flourishing tin and rubber export industries had dwindled away and the Indonesian economy was heavily in debt to the world banking community, especially to US bankers. Each year, the budget deficit doubled. The figure for this in 1965 was around 1,000 billion Rupiahs. The Rupiah had sunk to a hundredth of its legal value, as the result of the chronic inflation which in the six years prior to the coup caused the cost of living to increase by 2,000 %.

In spite of the economic collapse, the State was spending 75% of the budget on arms (1,000 million US dollars a year). With the economy sliding downhill fast, Sukarno was forced to nationalize increasing numbers of foreign enterprises. To do this, he was obliged to lean on the support of the PKI - a process that did not go unnoticed in Washington.

The Bonapartist regime of Sukarno was riddled with corruption. In the midst of mass privation, low wages and a huge housing problem, Sukarno and his elite lived like kings. Under his direction, huge sums were lavished on prestige buildings like the Hotel Indonesia in Jakarta where, to quote the Sunday Times, "Three million people, mostly poor, live [...] in low buildings [...] mostly falling apart." Sukarno occupied a white mansion - formally the residence of the Dutch governor - surrounded by sumptuous furniture and expensive works of art. "Its three splendid state-rooms are museum-like in scope and feeling. Each is lavishly draped, carpeted and furnished. Each is hung with a fragment of Sukarno's extensive collection of heroic canvasses."

The poverty and hardships of the masses led to an extraordinarily rapid growth of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI). Nowhere in the "Third World" did the workers' movement make such rapid strides in the previous decade as in Indonesia. The PKI, which had virtually ceased to exist after the abortive coup of 1948, became the third largest Communist Party in the world - only the Chinese and Russian Parties being larger.

Menshevik policy of the PKI

The total membership of the PKI was three million. It had the support of ten million trade unionists and organized peasants. Most important of all, it claimed the allegiance of 40 percent of the Indonesian army. The Bolshevik Party in 1917 did not have such a powerful base. In February the Bolsheviks had only 8,000 members in a vast country of 150 million people. Yet in only nine months Lenin and Trotsky led the Bolshevik Party to the conquest of power. By contrast, the PKI, despite its colossal strength, led the Indonesian workers and peasants to a bloody defeat. Why?

In the Sino-Soviet dispute, the PKI was aligned with Peking, and maintained close contact with the Chinese Stalinists. A revolutionary combination, one might think. But one would be wrong. The policy of the PKI was one of blatant class collaboration. The PKI leadership subordinated itself to the "progressive" bourgeois Bonapartist Sukarno. After 1948 all traces of revolutionary ideology were systematically deleted from the Party Programme. Thus the 1962 Programme and Constitution of the PKI outlined the Party's task as the establishment of a "people's democratic state". This had nothing in common with socialism.

This "peoples' democratic state" would be a "democracy of a new type", based, not upon the working class, but on a bloc of workers and peasants with a motley collection of "allies", including "the urban petty bourgeoisie, the intellectuals, the national bourgeoisie (!), the advanced aristocratic elements (!!), and patriotic elements in general (!!!)". From this, it was difficult to extract any positive conclusion concerning the class nature of the "peoples' democratic state" since the above was simply a list of all classes and strata in Indonesia. This meant that the "revolutionary" Peking-oriented Programme of the PKI was simply the maintenance of the status quo.

Instead of the dictatorship of the proletariat, the PKI referred to the "authority" of the "people" - a meaningless formula. In 1955 the PKI advocated a national coalition, and offered to water down its already insipid programme to a list of entirely non-communist aims. The PKI leadership's chief theoretician, Aidit advocated the Menshevik-Stalinist theory of "stages", which postpones the question of the socialist revolution to the far distant future:

"When we complete the first stage of our revolution which is now in progress, we can enter into friendly consultation with other progressive elements in our society and, without an armed struggle' lead the country towards socialist revolution. After all, the national capitalists in our country are both weak and disorganized. At present, in our national democratic revolution, we are siding with them and fighting a common battle of expelling foreign economic domination from this soil''.

Aidit's argument condemns itself. If the national bourgeoisie is so weak and disorganized, all the more reason to sweep them aside and set up a workers and peasants ' government. As a matter of fact, as Lenin pointed out a hundred times, it is precisely the weakness of the national bourgeoisie that makes them a reactionary stumbling block in the path of the democratic revolution in backward countries. They doubt their ability to control the forces unleashed by the national democratic movement itself, they equivocate, and finally they are driven into the arms of reaction out of fear of their own working class. For this reason it is entirely reactionary to attempt to separate mechanically the democratic and socialist phases of the revolution in backward countries. Either the democratic revolution ''grows over'' into the dictatorship of the proletariat, or it succumbs to the hammer blows of reaction.

The so-called "Leninist" position of Aidit and the other PKI leaders was identical to that of the Mensheviks against whom Lenin waged a relentless struggle right up to 1917. The revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat was relegated by them to a distant (and therefore safe) future - fifty, a hundred, or even three hundred years hence, First we complete the "first stage'' then, when this is "completely attained", we "enter into friendly agreements'' with those who might be interested in the ''second stage''. However, events were posed altogether differently by history.

The "September 30^th Movement"

Decades of Menshevik policy of two-stage theory adopted by the leadership of PKI finally destroyed the Party and along with it the whole workers and peasants movement in Indonesia at a stroke. It brought about the physical annihilation of the Communist movement in Indonesia, which at that time was the third largest Communist Party in the world after the Soviet Union and China, and a subsequent sharp shift in the political landscape in Indonesia and throughout Southeast Asia. The event that triggered this catastrophe was the so-called September 30^thMovement in 1965.

Washington was determined to overthrow Sukarno and annihilate the PKI. It regarded the prospect of a Communist government in Indonesia as a doomsday scenario. In a 1965 speech, Richard Nixon justified the bombing of North Vietnam as a means of safeguarding Indonesia's "immense mineral potential." As John Roosa writes in his book Pretext for Mass Murder, the latest historical account of the September 30^th Movement:

"The ground troops that started to arrive in Vietnam in March 1965 would be superfluous if the Communists won a victory in a much larger, more strategic country. A PKI takeover in Indonesia would render the intervention in Vietnam futile [...] McGeorge Bundy, national security adviser to Kennedy and Johnson, has also affirmed that Vietnam was no longer of vital interest ‘at least from the time of the anti-Communist revolution in Indonesia.'"

Sukarno's moves against foreign enterprises, his non-aligned foreign policy (assertively displayed at the 1955 Asia-Africa Conference), his repeated denunciation of Western imperialism, and his increasing dependence on the PKI convinced the State Department to enter into close alliance with reactionary officers like the virulently anti-Communist general Nasution. From 1958 to 1965, the United States trained, funded, advised, and supplied the anti-communist section of the Indonesian army.

However, as declassified U.S. government documents reveal, the right-wing generals realized that they could not stage an old-fashioned coup against Sukarno and the PKI - for Sukarno was too popular and the PKI had mass support. Earlier attempts to break up Indonesia into smaller states ("communist" and "non-communist zones") - on the lines of Korea and Vietnam - failed miserably. If anything they strengthened Sukarno and the PKI because their lines on US imperialism were confirmed in the eyes of the masses.

For these reasons an open coup was not an option in Indonesia. For a right-wing coup to succeed, it would have to be disguised and presented as an effort to "save" President Sukarno. By 1959, the US National Security Council had recognized that any open attack against the PKI had to be "politically justifiable in term of Indonesia self- interest" and the PKI had to be driven "into a position of open opposition to the Indonesian [Sukarno] Government."

In March 1965 Howard Jones, the US Ambassador in Jakarta (1958-1965) told a closed-door meeting of State Department officials in the Philippines: "From our viewpoint, of course, an unsuccessful coup attempt by the PKI might be the most effective development to start a reversal of political trends in Indonesia." The trick was to provoke PKI to undertake a rash action that could serve as a pretext for its suppression.

The trap was laid and the PKI leaders fell for it. The PKI leaders, instead of rousing the masses to fight the reactionaries, attempted to launch a palace coup by murdering the leading right-wing generals. I wrote an article about the events in Indonesia in Perspectives, October 1965, a few weeks after the victory of the counterrevolution. In this article I explained how instead of publishing full details of the right wing plot, instead of mobilizing the masses in a general strike and appealing to its supporters in the army to disarm their officers and join hands with the workers for the overthrow of the whole rotten regime, the PKI leadership entered into a conspiracy to murder the reactionary generals - a conspiracy so secret that other than Aidit none of the PKI CC members were aware of it.

Six generals were killed but Nasution escaped. With Suharto and the rest of the right-wing officers, they called out their troops, unleashed a virulent anti-communist media propaganda, and mobilized students demonstration (partly paid for by the US embassy). The palace revolution collapsed like a house of cards. The false policies of Aidit and the PKI leadership placed three million Communist workers and peasants at the mercy of a bloody reaction. The Daily Telegraph, with some insight, analyzed the situation in an editorial of October 12th, entitled The civil war in Indonesia:

''It is plain from the events of the past ten days in Indonesia that it is not another palace coup that has rocked Dr Sukarno's Republic, but a spreading civil war. The land of confrontation is confronting itself. The three heads of this dragon, Moslem, nationalist, Communist, are biting at each other, and fighting has spread from Java to Sumatra. The long smoldering rivalry of forces over which Dr Sukarno presided for so long has burst into flame. If the army suspected a Communist coup, it was clearly surprised by its sudden ruthlessness and disorganized by the loss of its six murdered generals. Now it is clear that Dr Sukarno is in Army protection, that he has countenanced its campaigns against the Communist guerrillas and finally abandoned the pretence that his Nassakom or United Front still exists.''

The so-called civil war was entirely one-sided. Instead of pursuing a vigorous offensive against reaction which even now, at the 11th hour, could save the Party, the PKI leadership relied upon their alliance with the "progressive bourgeois" Sukarno. While Communists struggled with the mobs of reaction, the PKI continued to be represented in Sukarno's cabinet, supporting his demagogic appeals for "national unity", a return to the old stability, etc. To the bitter end, they clung to Sukarno, but in the whole course of the struggle Sukarno and his Cabinet were impotent.

Tens of thousands of honest militant members of PKI who were confused and disoriented by the lack of leadership from their Party handed themselves over to the reactionaries, believing, as their leaders had told them, that Sukarno would protect them. However, the Bonapartist Sukarno was already reduced to a figurehead and no longer in power. In this way, tens of thousands of PKI members practically handed themselves over to the mobs of reaction like lambs going meekly to the slaughterhouse.

The government was suspended in mid-air. The real political struggle had passed into the streets. Nasution mobilized the forces of Moslem reaction. The PKI headquarters in Jakarta were stormed and burned by a mob of several thousand youths, shouting ''Kill Aidit". Mobs roamed the streets, sticking up posters reading "Crush the Communists". A mob outside the American Embassy chanted "Long Live America". A mass rally of 500,000 demanded action against all who participated in the "September 30th Movement". The result was the massacre of at least one and a half million Communists.

The CIA played an active role in this mass murder. The so-called champions of democracy in Washington, London and Paris fell over themselves in their indecent haste to recognize the regime of butchers. The criminal role of imperialism is very clear. But the imperialists could never have achieved such an easy victory had it not been for the disastrous policies of the PKI leadership. Where the state power is openly challenged in a civil war, all possibilities of "moderation", of a ''middle way" vanish in thin air. But the PKI leadership was not even capable of calling a general strike. They behaved like the Social Democratic and Stalinist leaders in Germany in 1933 - and they paid the same price.

Where the working class is defeated without putting up a fight it has a most demoralizing effect and paralyses the masses for a whole period. The 1965 defeat ushered in a whole period of vicious militarist reaction. It also had a crippling effect on the morale of the workers and peasants of Malaysia. Not for nothing did the Daily Telegraph editorial express evident satisfaction at the counterrevolutionary orgy in Indonesia. As a postscript, the Indonesian experience also served to expose the "revolutionary'' phrase-mongering of the Chinese Stalinists. The only reaction of the Chinese bureaucracy to the upheavals in Indonesia was a message of "cordial greetings" to Sukarno when he finally emerged from hiding.

Lessons of the defeat

The question of the correctness or otherwise of the Stalinist-Menshevik theory on the Colonial Revolution is not academic but practical. The experience of Stalinist policies in a whole series of revolutions irrefutably proves their counter-revolutionary nature. For many decades the working class of the colonial and ex-colonial countries has demonstrated its colossal courage and revolutionary potential. Time and time again it has moved to carry out the revolutionary transformation of society.

In Iraq, Sudan, Iran, Chile, Argentina, India, Pakistan and Indonesia, the workers have shown that they wished to be the masters of society. If they failed, it is not because they could not have succeeded, but because they lacked the indispensable prerequisite for taking power: a truly revolutionary leadership. In every case, they beat their heads against a brick wall because the parties and leaders that they trusted to lead them to the socialist transformation of society became transformed into gigantic obstacles. Napoleon said: "defeated armies learn well". To Marxists the lessons of a defeat are, if anything, more important than those of victory.

The workers can learn by their mistakes, but only if these experiences are patiently analyzed and explained by the revolutionary vanguard. The revolutionary Marxists have a duty to explain the lessons of the events of 1965 in Indonesia to the labour movement.

What was the main difference between Russia in 1917 and Indonesia in 1965? The difference was not in the objective conditions. The objective situation in Indonesia in 1964-65 could not have been more favourable. The masses had defeated Dutch Imperialism. The Communists had the support of the overwhelming majority of the working class and peasantry. But a false policy and perspective were sufficient to bring about the total ruin of the revolution. If the October revolution proves the correctness of the permanent revolution in a positive sense, the Indonesian catastrophe furnishes us with a negative proof in the most terrible way.

The conclusion is inescapable. Without a revolutionary party, the potential power of the proletariat will remain just that ‑ a potential. The relationship between the class and the party is similar to that between steam and a piston box. But even the existence of the party is not enough to ensure success. The party must be led by men and women who are equipped with the necessary understanding of the tasks of the revolution, of tactics, strategy and perspectives, not only the national but also the international tasks.

In order to take power, it is not enough that the workers are prepared to fight. If that were the case, the working class could have taken power in all these countries long ago. It would have been easy, because they were in a far stronger position than the Russian workers in 1917. But they did not take power. Why not? Because the working class needs a party and a leadership. To deny this elementary fact of life is mere childish anarchism. Marx explained long ago that, without organization, the working class is merely raw material for exploitation. Despite its numerical strength and its key role in production, the proletariat cannot transform society unless it becomes a class "in-and-for-itself" with the necessary consciousness, perspectives and understanding.

To wait until the class as a whole possesses the necessary understanding of all that is required to take power and transform society is a utopian proposition which is tantamount to postponing the revolution indefinitely. It is necessary to organise the most advanced layers of the class, to educate the cadres, and imbue them with the perspective of revolution, not only on a national but on an international scale, to integrate them in the masses at every level, and to patiently prepare for the moment when the partial struggles of the masses become combined into a general revolutionary offensive.

The present economic crisis is a symptom that world capitalism has exhausted its potential for progress. And this is only the beginning of a revolutionary process that will unfold over a period of years. If a genuinely Leninist party existed, this could end in a proletarian revolution on classical lines. Despite all the defeats and setbacks, the workers and peasants of Indonesia will inevitably take the road of struggle time after time. The overthrow of Suharto was an indication of this fact. In one Asian country after another the workers, peasants and students will take to the road of struggle, because they have no alternative.

The Indonesian Revolution - which can only be socialist in character - is again on the order of the day. A revolution in Indonesia will shake the whole of Asia and have a profound effect on the workers and peasants of Malaysia, the Philippines, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. The formation of a socialist federation of Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines, will enable the national problem to be solved on an equitable basis. Only on the basis of a socialist planned economy can the immense productive potential of these countries be realized, creating the conditions for transforming the lives of the people.

The prior condition is that the working people take the power into their own hands. The workers and peasants of Indonesia have a marvelous history of struggle. The new generation of workers and youth will rediscover these traditions, arm themselves with the ideas of Marxism and lead the masses to the final victory. They will avenge their murdered martyrs, overthrow their oppressors and set about the task of the socialist reconstruction of society.

London, 17th December 2008

Death Of Monster

2015-03-08T10:33:00.000+07:00

On January 27, 2008 General Soeharto, former dictator of Indonesia, passed away. This man was responsible for the murder of hundreds of thousands of communists in a bloody coup in 1965. The exact number of deaths may never be known, but it is estimated that between half a million and three million leftists, trade unionists and student and peasant activists were slaughtered. Despite these monstrous crimes and his well-documented corruption (he embezzled billions of dollars from the Indonesian people, which have yet to be returned) the old butcher died in his bed, untouched by the law.

Ten years ago, he was swept from power by the movement of the masses that brought his bloody 32-year dictatorial rule to an end.

Soeharto was born in 1921, and started his career as an army officer as early as 1940 under the Dutch military. When the Dutch ignominiously surrendered Indonesia into the hands of the Japanese, he became a member of the colonial army created by the Japanese.

After the proclamation of Indonesian independence in 1945, he joined the newly created Indonesian army, and thus served as a career officer in three different armies in a span of a decade. This was absolutely characteristic of this man, who was a cynic with absolutely no principles, ready to serve whichever master paid him better. If the Communist Party of Indonesia (CPI) had taken power, there is no doubt that he would have served the army under their rule instead of being the head of the army responsible for their massacre.

He was proud of his lack of political principles. One of his army colleagues told a journalist that Soeharto said in 1948, "My politics are at the end of the bayonet." Two decades later the people of Indonesia were to discover just how true that statement was.

After Independence Indonesia was ruled by the Bonapartist Soekarno, who tried to balance between the classes to hold onto power. The Indonesian Communist Party (PCI) was the biggest communist party outside the Soviet Bloc. It had three million members, ten million workers in its trade unions and a similar number of peasants. Moreover it claimed the support of forty percent of the armed forces. This was an infinitely stronger position than the Bolsheviks had in 1917. The CP could have easily taken power, but they had the Stalinist theory of revolution through stages. This led them to support the bourgeois Bonapartist Soekarno, a class collaborationist policy in which they were encouraged by Beijing.

The US imperialists were concerned about the strength of the PCI and plotted to destroy it and overthrow Soekarno in a violent coup. They were intriguing with right wing officers in the Indonesian army for this purpose. The PCI leadership knew all about these preparations. Bu instead of denouncing them publicly and organizing a general strike and insurrection, they attempted to solve the problem by assassinating the right wing generals on September 30^th. This disastrous tactic failed and the initiative passed to Soeharto and the right wing. They mobilized gangs of fanatical Moslems to attack and slaughter the communists all over the country. Hundreds of thousands of workers and peasants were beheaded or hacked to death in this orgy of fascist violence, while the "civilized world" maintained a discrete silence.

It is now well known that this horrific bloodbath was prepared, organized and actively supported by the CIA. Britain also shamefully supported the massacres in Indonesia. The purpose was to make Indonesia "safe from communism" at a time when the USA was engaged in the Vietnam War. It was also a means of handing over the fabulous riches of Indonesia to the big US mining corporations and transnationals. Soeharto's bloody dictatorship, which banned unions and strikes and murdered labour activists, made Indonesia safe for international Capital. They rewarded him by allowing him to take a slice of the huge profits, which he salted away safely in foreign banks for decades.

For 32 years he placed his boot on the neck of the Indonesian people, with the full support of the hypocritical western "democrats". The New Order (Orde Baru) was often praised by the "international community" as a model for democracy in Asia. No attention was paid to the sufferings of the people, the complete lack of democracy and the brutal exploitation of the workers and peasants.

However, when capitalism failed in Indonesia during the Asian economic recession in 1997, the international community conveniently blamed Soeharto for his "excesses" in ruling the country. After all these years when they turned a blind eye to his cold-blooded regime, they suddenly discovered "widespread abuse of human rights". That was because they realised that opposition was growing and that their friend in Jakarta had outlived his usefulness. Now that he is dead, they are all lining up again to praise the dictator, saying that "despite his mistakes", he has brought progress to Indonesia.

All this shows the stinking hypocrisy of the imperialists who sing the praises of democracy when it suits their interests and then support the most bloodthirsty dictatorships.

The reaction of the masses

When he was forced to resign in 1998, many couldn't believe that it had actually happened. The masses came onto the streets and everyone joined in an outburst of spontaneous joy. For decade his iron-fist rule seemed to exclude any possibility of him ever losing power; yet as history has shown time and again, when the masses move no despot can cling to power.

But ten years have passed since he was overthrown, and the mood of the masses has changed. The advent of bourgeois democracy has not been accompanied by any visible improvement in the conditions of the masses. In many respects things are worse now than ten years ago. Therefore the feelings of the masses are divided. Some sections are angry that his crimes of massacres and corruption have never been brought to justice. Other people compare the situation now with the situation then. The comparison is not advantageous to the present.

The problem is that the living conditions of the majority have not improved since the New Order regime. If anything, the extent of exploitation has actually increased under the guise of "democracy". That is logical, since for the ruling class, democracy means freedom to exploit. As a consequence, the neo-liberal agenda has been implemented even more rigorously in recent years. All state companies and properties are being privatised. State subsidies are being abolished. No wonder the masses are tired of the current situation and sceptical of what the 1998 "Reform" ("Reformasi") has brought.

Some in the left have rushed to blame the masses as ignorant and blind. It is true that with the passing of time, memories fade. Many young people have no personal experience of the Soeharto dictatorship and do not know how cruel his regime was. And some people who do remember the old regime conclude that it was a time when life was more bearable, rice and tempe were way cheaper.

Anybody with a realistic understanding of the psychology of the masses will understand this. But one thing is the attitude of the masse, and another, quite different, is the attitude of the professional politicians and self-styled democrats.

True nature of "Democracy" revealed

The day Soeharto passed away, many "pro-democracy" elements rushed with indecent haste to pay tribute to the dead dictator. Amongst them was Gus Dur, former President of Indonesia (1999-2001) and one of the three main reformist leaders (Gus Dur, Megawati, and Amien Rais) during the 1998 movement.

This "democrat" said: "Indonesia has lost its most honourable son". He failed to mention the millions of sons and daughters of Indonesia who perished under his regime. Nor is it clear how a man who shamelessly plundered billions of dollars from his country can be considered honourable. In the summer of 1998, just before he was overthrown, he sent nine billion dollars to banks in Austria. His personal fortune was estimated at $16 billion, but this figure does not include the lavish amounts he donated to members of his wife, six children, half-brother and grandsons.

The family of this "honourable son of the nation" were given monopolies that were a license to print money, for which they usually paid nothing. His wife Tien (popularly known as Madam Ten percent) held, through the Bogasari flour mills, the state monopoly of the import and milling of wheat. His son Tommy controlled the clove trade. His daughter Tutut controlled the toll-roads. Another son, Bambang, held the licence for mobile phones. Other family members were given control of TV networks and other key parts of the economy. So all these "honourable sons and daughters" made their fortunes out of Indonesia, while millions lived in poverty.

Even more disgusting were the comments made by Megawati, the daughter of Soekarno who was overthrown by Soeharto and kept under house arrest until his death. She "genuinely prayed that the soul of Mr. Soeharto be accepted by god's side". It remains to be seen what Soekarno, who is supposedly also in heaven, will have to say to the very man who overthrew him and brought havoc to the nation he founded.

Another "hero of democracy", Amien Rais, a man well known for his showmanship and statesmanship, boasted how they "were enemies once, but now it is all water under the bridge" and "we have to have a big heart." Isn't this a prize example of the most repulsive and nauseating hypocrisy? A people that has been raped, robbed, tortured and murdered is asked to forgive and forget. It is supposed to show a "big heart" towards a heartless monster and criminal!

The whimpering of these pro-democracy elements is a testament to the bankruptcy of "democracy" and reformism. They are all singing in chorus: "Let us forgive him for he has done so many good things for our country!" Soeharto himself never asked for forgiveness because he never recognized his crimes against the Indonesian people, much less showed signs of repentance. He died as he had lived: a hardened cynic and an unreconstructed criminal.

These petty-bourgeois and bourgeois reformists have all shown their true colours. In the name of morality, they try to justify their own political and moral bankruptcy. They cry "forgive thine enemy", hoping that by this means they can hide their inability to bring to justice those responsible for the killings and repression of millions of people.

But how can they ever do this? Their interests have never been the same as those of workers. Their interests are linked to those of the imperialists and foreign capital. They are all supporters of capitalism. Bringing to justice the crimes of Soeharto will bring to light the crimes of capitalism, it will incriminate all the other perpetrators (the whole Indonesian ruling class and their foreign masters) and show to the masses the true horrific nature of capitalism.

All this shows the treacherous nature of reformism. It reveals in its crudest form that there is no such thing as a progressive bourgeoisie or petty bourgeoisie in Indonesia.

A Sobering Perspective for the Left

For the Left the death of Soeharto does not give much to celebrate. Of course, there is a sense of relief that this monster has finally met his death. But any sense of relief is quickly cut short by the reality that the forces of the New Order are still intact. In fact, the New Order elements are becoming more confident since they have regained ground lost in 1998. The current government under Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has even dared to call seven days of national mourning for Soeharto, instructing people to put the national flag at half-mast as a sign of respect. They have even gone as far as proposing to grant Soeharto the status of national hero.

Such actions would not have been possible five or ten years ago. This is a reflection of the fact that the masses are disenchanted with bourgeois democracy, which has not produced any fundamental change in the living condition of the masses. The masses still long for changes but see that the 1998 "Reformasi" has brought nothing to them. To blame the masses and accuse them of not being ready for revolution because a large number of people turned out to mourn for Soeharto shows a complete inability to understand how the masses think and feel.

This should serve as a moment to reflect on the mistakes of the movement and embolden us to fight for socialist revolution. The tasks of democratic reform cannot be separated from the tasks of socialist revolution. In countries like Indonesia, there cannot be any talk of democratic reform in and of itself. The reformist democrats have shown that they are incapable of fulfilling the mandate of the 1998 "Reformasi", which included bringing Soeharto to justice. Only the workers can carry out these democratic reforms, and along with it the socialist tasks of nationalizing the commanding height of the economy under workers' control and ending poverty and oppresion once and for all.

20 Tempat Wisata Di Indonesia Yang Mendunia

2015-03-01T09:17:00.001+07:00

Indonesia adalah negara yang indah. Seluruh orang yang hidup di dalamnya juga pasti tau, tapi tau kah kamu kalo dari ujung timur ke barat Indonesia penuh dengan keindahan alam yang teramat sangat. Seluruh keindahan itu tidak hanya memukau kita tetapi juga orang-orang dari penjuru dunia.

Ini dia 20 keindahan alam Indonesia yang mendunia:

1. Gunung Rinjani, Nusa Tenggara Barat ( Indonesia )

Rinjani memiliki panaroma yang bisa dibilang paling bagus di antara gunung-gunung di Indonesia. Setiap tahunnya (Juni-Agustus) banyak dikunjungi pencinta alam mulai dari penduduk lokal, mahasiswa, pecinta alam. Suhu udara rata-rata sekitar 20°C; terendah 12°C. Angin kencang di puncak biasa terjadi di bulan Agustus. Beruntung akhir Juli ini, angin masih cukup lemah dan cuaca cukup cerah, sehingga pendakian ke puncak bisa dilakukan kapan saja.

2. Pulau Komodo, Nusa Tenggara Timur ( Indonesia )

Taman Nasional Komodo (TN. Komodo) merupakan kawasan yang terdiri dari beberapa pulau dengan perairan lautnya. Pulau-pulau tersebut merupakan habitat satwa komodo (Varanus komodoensis) yaitu reptil purba yang tersisa di bumi. Kondisi alamnya unik, terdapat padang savana yang luas dengan pohon lontarnya (Borassus flabellifer).

3. Kepulauan Raja Ampat, Papua ( Indonesia )

Kepulauan Raja Ampat merupakan kepulauan yang berada di barat pulau Papua di provinsi Papua Barat, tepatnya di bagian kepala burung Papua. Kepulauan ini merupakan tujuan penyelam-penyelam yang tertarik akan keindahan pemandangan bawah lautnya

4. Kawah Ijen, Jawa Timur ( Indonesia )

Kawah Ijen merupakan salah satu gunung berapi atraksi wisata di Indonesia. Kawah Ijen merupakan objek wisata terkenal, yang telah dikenal oleh para wisatawan domestik dan asing karena keindahan alam dan bahari.

5. Puncak Jaya, Papua ( Indonesia )

Indonesia patut berbangga dengan keunikan dan kekayaan alam serta tradisi masayarakatnya. Kali ini, Carstenz Pyramid atau yang bisa disebut dengan puncak jaya, juga berada di Papua. Puncak Carstensz ( Puncak Jaya ) ini merupakan puncak yang tertinggi di Australia dan Oceania.

6. Anak Krakatau, Selat Sunda ( Indonesia )

Krakatau adalah kepulauan vulkanik yang masih aktif dan berada di Selat Sunda antara pulau Jawa dan Sumatra. Nama ini pernah disematkan pada salah satu puncak gunung berapi di sana karena letusan pada tanggal 26-27 Agustus 1883, kemudian sirna. Letusannya sangat dahsyat dan tsunami yang diakibatkannya menewaskan sekitar 36.000 jiwa

7. Gunung Bromo, Jawa Timur ( Indonesia )

Gunung Bromo merupakan gunung berapi yang masih aktif dan paling terkenal sebagai obyek wisata di Jawa Timur. Sebagai sebuah obyek wisata, Gunung Bromo menjadi menarik karena statusnya sebagai gunung berapi yang masih aktif.

8. Kelimutu, Nusa Tenggara Timur ( Indonesia )

Gunung Kelimutu adalah gunung berapi yang terletak di Pulau Flores, Provinsi NTT, Indonesia. Lokasi gunung ini tepatnya di Desa pemo Kecamatan kelimutu, Kabupaten Ende. Gunung ini memiliki tiga buah danau kawah di puncaknya. Danau ini dikenal dengan nama Danau Tiga Warna karena memiliki tiga warna yang berbeda, yaitu merah, biru, dan putih. Walaupun begitu, warna-warna tersebut selalu berubah-ubah seiring dengan perjalanan waktu.

9. Taman Laut Bunaken, Sulawesi Utara ( Indonesia )

Taman laut Bunaken memiliki 20 titik penyelaman (dive spot) dengan kedalaman bervariasi hingga 1.344 meter. Dari 20 titik selam itu, 12 titik selam di antaranya berada di sekitar Pulau Bunaken. Dua belas titik penyelaman inilah yang paling kerap dikunjungi penyelam dan pecinta keindahan pemandangan bawah laut.

Pernah Sebanyak 2.827 orang memecahkan rekor selam dunia dalam suatu upacara peringatan Proklamasi Kemerdekaan RI Ke-64 tahun, bawah air di Pantai Malalayang, Manado,sebagai bagian atraksi “Sail Bunaken” 2009.

10. Danau Toba, Sumatra Utara ( Indonesia )

Danau Toba adalah sebuah danau vulkanik dengan ukuran panjang 100 kilometer dan lebar 30 kilometer (danau volkanik terbesar di dunia). Di tengah danau ini terdapat sebuah pulau vulkanik bernama Pulau Samosir. Danau Toba sejak lama menjadi daerah tujuan wisata penting di Sumatera Utara selain Bukit Lawang dan Nias, menarik wisatawan domestik maupun mancanegara.

11. Taman Nasional Baluran, Jawa Timur ( Indonesia )

Baluran adalah Afrikanya Indonesia, Taman Nasional ini merupakan perwakilan ekosistem hutan yang spesifik kering di Pulau Jawa, terdiri dari tipe vegetasi savana, hutan mangrove, hutan musim, hutan pantai, hutan pegunungan bawah, hutan rawa dan hutan yang selalu hijau sepanjang tahun. Sekitar 40 persen tipe vegetasi savana mendominasi kawasan Taman Nasional Baluran.

12. Pantai Dreamland, Bali ( Indonesia )

Dreamland atau lebih dikenal sebagai Pantai Dreamland merupakan salah satu pantai terindah di Bali selain Pantai Kuta. Pantai yang terletak tidak jauh dari daerah Uluwatu di Pulau Dewata ini sudah sangat terkenal karena keindahannya. Keindahan dan kebersihan pantai menambah daya tarik pengunjung, bukan hanya dari dalam negeri tapi juga turis manca negara.

13. Kerinci, Jambi ( Sumatra Indonesia )

Kerinci boleh bangga dengan keberadaan Danau Gunung Tujuh yang merupakan danau tertinggi di Asia Tenggara. Serta terdapat beberapa danau kecil lainnya dengan keindahan alamnya yang unik. Danau Belibis dengan alam yang masih asli memberikan sentuhan yang berbeda.

14. Green Canyon, Jawa Barat ( Indonesia )

Green Canyon menyimpan pesona luar biasa. Perpaduan antara sungai, lembah hijau, hutan lindung, dan aneka stalaktit-stalakmit. Keindahan berbalut kesunyian, bagai surga yang tersembunyi. Green Canyon mulai dikembangkan pada tahun 1989.

15. Danau Sentani, Papua ( Indonesia )

Danau Sentani di bawah lereng Pegunungan Cycloops yang terbentang antara Kota Jayapura dan Kabupaten Jayapura, Papua. Lanskap Danau Sentani dengan gugusan pulau di tengahnya merupakan salah satu yg terindah di Indonesia.

16. Goa Gong, Jawa Timur ( Indonesia )

Goa Gong diklaim sebagai goa terindah di Asia Tenggara. Di dalam gua ini Anda dapat menyaksikan berbagai macam tonjolan batuan (stalaktit/stalakmit) yang sangat menarik dan proses terjadinya secara alami.

17. Taman Nasional Bantimurung, Sulawesi Selatan (Indonesia)

Taman Nasional Bantimurung mempunyai pemandangan alam yang paling indah. Karena di taman nasional ini, terdapat sumber air yang tidak pernah kering. Sehingga berbagai jenis tanaman dapat bertahan di saat musim kemarau yang panjang.

18. Kep. Belitung, Bangka Belitung ( Indonesia )

Pulau indah, pemandangan unik pantai pasir putih asli dihiasi batu-batu granit yang artistik dan air laut sejernih kristal, dikelilingi oleh ratusan pulau-pulau kecil.

19. Pulau Derawan, Kalimantan Timur (Indonesia )

Di perairan sekitarnya terdapat taman laut dan terkenal sebagai wisata selam (diving) dengan kedalaman sekitar lima meter. Pada batu karang di kedalaman sepuluh meter, terdapat karang yang dikenal sebagai “Blue Trigger Wall”

20. Goa Kalisuci, Jogjakarta ( Indonesia)

Sungai bawah tanah yang mengalir di bawah barisan pegunungan kapur yang bermuara di laut selatan pulau Jawa.Merupakan salah satu dari tiga pusat wisata petualangan cave tubing yang ada di dunia, setelah Meksiko dan Selandia Baru.

Awal Mula Nama " Indonesia "

2015-03-01T08:06:00.003+07:00

Indonesia

Pada zaman purba, kepulauan tanah air disebut dengan aneka nama. Dalam catatan bangsa Tionghoa, kawasan kepulauan tanah air dinamai Nan-hai (Kepulauan Laut Selatan). Berbagai catatan kuno bangsa Indoa, menamai kepulauan ini, Dwipantara (Kepulauan Tanah Seberang).

Sebuah nama yang diturunkan dari kata Sansekerta dwipa (pulau) dan antara (luar, seberang).

Kisah Ramayana karya pujangga Walmiki menceritakan pencarian terhadap Sinta, istri Rama yang diculik Rahwana, sampai ke Suwarnadwipa (Pulau Emas, yaitu Sumatra sekarang) yang terletak di Kepulauan Dwipantara.

Bangsa Arab menyebut tanah air kita Jaza’ir al-Jawi (Kepulauan Jawa). Nama Latin untuk kemenyan adalah benzoe, berasal dari bahasa Arab luban jawi (kemenyan Jawa), sebab para pedagang Arab memperoleh kemenyan dari batang pohon Styrax Sumatrana yang dahulu hanya tumbuh di Sumatera.

Sampai hari ini jemaah haji kita masih sering dipanggil “Jawa” oleh orang Arab. Bahkan orang Indonesia luar Jawa sekalipun. Dalam bahasa Arab juga dikenal Samathrah (Sumatra), Sholibis (Sulawesi), Sundah (Sunda), semua pulau itu dikenal sebagai kulluh Jawi (semuanya Jawa).

Bangsa-bangsa Eropa yang pertama kali datang beranggapan bahwa Asia hanya terdiri dari Arab, Persia, India, dan Tiongkok. Bagi mereka, daerah yang terbentang luas antara Persia dan Tiongkok semuanya adalah “Hindia”. Semenanjung Asia Selatan mereka sebut “Hindia Muka” dan daratan Asia Tenggara dinamai “Hindia Belakang”.

Sedangkan, tanah air memperoleh nama “Kepulauan Hindia” (Indische Archipel, Indian Archipelago, l’Archipel Indien) atau “Hindia Timur” (Oost Indie, East Indies, Indes Orientales). Nama lain yang juga dipakai adalah “Kepulauan Melayu” (Maleische Archipel, Malay Archipelago, l’Archipel Malais).

Pada zaman penjajahan Belanda, nama resmi yang digunakan adalah Nederlandsch-Indie (Hindia Belanda), sedangkan pemerintah pendudukan Jepang 1942-1945 memakai istilah To-Indo (Hindia Timur).

Eduard Douwes Dekker (1820-1887), yang dikenal dengan nama samaran Multatuli, pernah mengusulkan nama yang spesifik untuk menyebutkan kepulauan tanah air kita, yaitu Insulinde, yang artinya juga “Kepulauan Hindia” (Bahasa Latin insula berarti pulau). Nama Insulinde ini kurang populer.

Pada tahun 1920, Ernest Francois Eugene Douwes Dekker (1879-1950), yang dikenal sebagai Dr. Setiabudi (cucu dari adik Multatuli), memperkenalkan suatu nama untuk tanah air kita yang tidak mengandung unsur kata “India”.

Nama itu tiada lain adalah Nusantara, suatu istilah yang telah tenggelam berabad-abad lamanya. Setiabudi mengambil nama itu dari Pararaton, naskah kuno zaman Majapahit yang ditemukan di Bali pada akhir abad ke-19, lalu diterjemahkan oleh JLA. Brandes dan diterbitkan oleh Nicholaas Johannes Krom pada tahun 1920.

Pengertian Nusantara yang diusulkan Setiabudi jauh berbeda dengan pengertian Nusantara zaman Majapahit. Pada masa Majapahit, Nusantara digunakan untuk menyebutkan pulau-pulau di luar Jawa (antara dalam Bahasa Sansekerta artinya luar, seberang) sebagai lawan dari Jawadwipa (Pulau Jawa).

Sumpah Palapa dari Gajah Mada tertulis “Lamun huwus kalah nusantara, isun amukti palapa” (Jika telah kalah pulau-pulau seberang, barulah saya menikmati istirahat).

Oleh Dr. Setiabudi, kata nusantara zaman Majapahit yang berkonotasi jahiliyah itu, diberi pengertian yang nasionalistis. Dengan mengambil kata Melayu asli antara, maka Nusantara kini memiliki arti yang baru yaitu “nusa di antara dua benua dan dua samudra”, sehingga Jawa pun termasuk dalam definisi nusantara yang modern.

Istilah nusantara dari Setiabudi ini dengan cepat menjadi populer penggunaannya sebagai alternatif dari nama Hindia Belanda. Sampai hari ini istilah nusantara tetap dipakai untuk menyebutkan wilayah tanah air dari Sabang sampai Merauke.

Pada tahun 1847 di Singapura terbit sebuah majalah ilmiah tahunan, Journal of the Indian Archipelago and Eastern Asia (JIAEA), yang dikelola oleh James Richardson Logan (1819-1869), seorang Skotlandia yang meraih sarjana hukum dari Universitas Edinburgh.

Kemudian pada tahun 1849 seorang ahli etnologi bangsa Ingris, George Samuel Windsor Earl (1813-1865), menggabungkan diri sebagai redaksi majalah JIAEA.
Dalam JIAEA Volume IV tahun 1850, halaman 66-74, Earl menulis artikel On the Leading Characteristics of the Papuan, Australian and Malay-Polynesian Nations. Dalam artikelnya, Earl menegaskan bahwa sudah tiba saatnya bagi penduduk Kepulauan Hindia atau Kepulauan Melayu untuk memiliki nama khas (a distinctive name).

Sebab nama Hindia tidaklah tepat dan sering rancu dengan penyebutan India yang lain. Earl mengajukan dua pilihan nama: Indunesia atau Malayunesia (nesos dalam bahasa Yunani berarti pulau). Pada halaman 71 artikelnya itu tertulis:

“… the inhabitants of the Indian Archipelago or Malayan Archipelago would become respectively Indunesians or Malayunesians”.

Earl sendiri menyatakan memilih nama Malayunesia (Kepulauan Melayu) daripada Indunesia (Kepulauan Hindia). Sebab Malayunesia sangat tepat untuk ras Melayu, sedangkan Indunesia bisa juga digunakan untuk Ceylon (Srilanka) dan Maladewa.

Earl berpendapat juga bahwa bahasa Melayu dipakai di seluruh kepulauan ini. Dalam tulisannya itu Earl memang menggunakan istilah Malayunesia dan tidak memakai istilah Indunesia.

Dalam JIAEA Volume IV itu juga, halaman 252-347, James Richardson Logan menulis artikel The Ethnology of the Indian Archipelago. Pada awal tulisannya, Richardson Logan pun menyatakan perlunya nama khas bagi kepulauan tanah air kita, sebab istilah “Indian Archipelago” terlalu panjang dan membingungkan.

Logan memungut nama Indunesia yang dibuang Earl, dan huruf u digantinya dengan huruf o agar ucapannya lebih baik. Maka lahirlah istilah Indonesia. Untuk pertama kalinya kata Indonesia muncul di dunia dengan tercetak pada halaman 254 dalam tulisan Logan:

“Mr. Earl suggests the ethnographical term Indunesian, but rejects it in favour of Malayunesian. I prefer the purely geographical term Indonesia, which is merely a shorter synonym for the Indian Islands or the Indian Archipelago”.

Ketika mengusulkan nama “Indonesia”, agaknya Logan tidak menyadari bahwa di kemudian hari nama itu akan menjadi nama resmi. Sejak saat itu Logan secara konsisten menggunakan nama “Indonesia” dalam tulisan-tulisan ilmiahnya, dan lambat laun pemakaian istilah ini menyebar di kalangan para ilmuwan bidang etnologi dan geografi.

Pada tahun 1884 guru besar etnologi di Universitas Berlin yang bernama Adolf Bastian (1826-1905) menerbitkan buku Indonesien oder die Inseln des Malayischen Archipel sebanyak lima volume, yang memuat hasil penelitiannya ketika mengembara ke tanah air pada tahun 1864 sampai 1880.

Buku Bastian inilah yang memopulerkan istilah “Indonesia” di kalangan sarjana Belanda, sehingga sempat timbul anggapan bahwa istilah “Indonesia” itu ciptaan Bastian. Pendapat yang tidak benar itu, antara lain tercantum dalam Encyclopedie van Nederlandsch-Indie tahun 1918. Padahal Bastian mengambil istilah “Indonesia” itu dari tulisan-tulisan Logan.

Pribumi yang mula-mula menggunakan istilah “Indonesia” adalah Suwardi Suryaningrat ( Ki Hajar Dewantara ). Ketika dibuang ke negeri Belanda tahun 1913 beliau mendirikan sebuah biro pers dengan nama Indonesische Pers-bureau.

Nama indonesisch (Indonesia) juga diperkenalkan sebagai pengganti indisch (Hindia) oleh Prof. Cornelis van Vollenhoven (1917). Sejalan dengan itu, inlander (pribumi) diganti dengan indonesiër (orang Indonesia).

Pada dasawarsa 1920-an, nama “Indonesia” yang merupakan istilah ilmiah dalam etnologi dan geografi itu diambil alih oleh tokoh-tokoh pergerakan kemerdekaan tanah air kita, sehingga nama “Indonesia” akhirnya memiliki makna politis, yaitu identitas suatu bangsa yang memperjuangkan kemerdekaan. Akibatnya pemerintah Belanda mulai curiga dan waspada terhadap pemakaian kata ciptaan Logan itu.

Pada tahun 1922, atas inisiatif Mohammad Hatta, seorang mahasiswa Handels Hoogeschool (Sekolah Tinggi Ekonomi) di Rotterdam, organisasi pelajar dan mahasiswa Hindia di Negeri Belanda yang terbentuk tahun 1908 dengan nama Indische Vereeniging berubah nama menjadi Indonesische Vereeniging atau Perhimpoenan Indonesia. Majalah mereka, Hindia Poetra, berganti nama menjadi Indonesia Merdeka.

Bung Hatta menegaskan dalam tulisannya ;

“Negara Indonesia Merdeka yang akan datang (de toekomstige vrije Indonesische staat) mustahil disebut “Hindia Belanda”. Juga tidak “Hindia” saja, sebab dapat menimbulkan kekeliruan dengan India yang asli. Bagi kami nama Indonesia menyatakan suatu tujuan politik (een politiek doel), karena melambangkan dan mencita-citakan suatu tanah air di masa depan, dan untuk mewujudkannya tiap orang Indonesia (Indonesier) akan berusaha dengan segala tenaga dan kemampuannya.”

Di tanah air, Dr. Sutomo mendirikan Indonesische Studie Club pada tahun 1924. Pada tahun 1925, Jong Islamieten Bond membentuk kepanduan Nationaal Indonesische Padvinderij (Natipij). Itulah tiga organisasi di tanah air yang mula-mula menggunakan nama “Indonesia”. Akhirnya nama “Indonesia” dinobatkan sebagai nama tanah air, bangsa, dan bahasa pada Kerapatan Pemoeda-Pemoedi Indonesia tanggal 28 Oktober 1928, yang kini dikenal dengan sebutan Sumpah Pemuda.

Pada bulan Agustus 1939 tiga orang anggota Volksraad (Dewan Rakyat; parlemen Hindia Belanda), Muhammad Husni Thamrin, Wiwoho Purbohadidjojo dan Sutardjo Kartohadikusumo, mengajukan mosi kepada Pemerintah Hindia Belanda agar nama “Indonesia” diresmikan sebagai pengganti nama “Nederlandsch-Indie”. Tetapi Belanda menolak mosi ini.

Akhirnya, dengan jatuhnya tanah air ke tangan Jepang pada tanggal 8 Maret 1942, lenyaplah nama “Hindia Belanda”. Lalu pada tanggal 17 Agustus 1945, lahirlah Negara Republik Indonesia.

Revolutions Indonesia

Introduction To Marxist Economics

Introduction

Conditions for capitalism

Value and commodities

Average labour

Money

Prices of commodities

Profits

Labour power

Not cheated!

Surplus value

The working day

Constant capital

Variable capital

Necessary and surplus labour

Rate of surplus value

The rate of profit

Export of capital

Introduction To Historical Materialsm

Primitive Communism

Slave Society

The Rise of Feudalism

The Rise of the Absolute Monarch

The Capitalist Revolution

The Triumph of Capitalism

Imperialism

The Law of Uneven and Combined Development

The Socialist Transformation

Socialism, the Classless Society

The Method Of Marxism ' An Introduction To Dialectical Materialism '

What is a Philosophy?

Idealism and Materialism

The Origins of Materialism

What are Dialectics ?

Dialectics and Metaphysics

Hegel

Quantity and Quality

The Interpenetration of Opposites

What is Marxism?

The Indonesian Workers And The 'Spirit Of Reformasi'

Introduction

The new labour laws will result in:

Marxism in Indonesia - Preface to the New Indonesian Edition of Reason in Revolt

Ebook - Naar de 'Republiek Indonesia' Menuju Republik Indonesia - Tan Malaka (1925)

First General Strike In 50 Years

Revolution And Counter - Revolution in Indonesia (1965)

Menshevik policy of the PKI

Palace Revolution

The gathering reaction

Review of “The Act of Killing”

“In terms of the numbers killed, the anti-PKI massacres in Indonesia rank as one of the worst mass murders of the twentieth century". (CIA study in 1968)

National Trauma

Impunity

Introduction To The Indonesian Edition Of The Permanent Revolution

Leninism and Menshevism

The October Revolution

The Permanent Revolution Today

Role of the Communist Parties

Indonesia

Menshevik policy of the PKI

The "September 30th Movement"

Lessons of the defeat

Death Of Monster

The reaction of the masses

True nature of "Democracy" revealed

A Sobering Perspective for the Left

20 Tempat Wisata Di Indonesia Yang Mendunia

Awal Mula Nama " Indonesia "

The "September 30^th Movement"