Selected Writings on the State and the Transition to Socialism

N. Bukharin,Richard B. Day,Stephen F. Cohen,Ken Coates

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781315496351
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Commerce
• Subtopic: Commerce Général

Underlying current controversies about environmental regulation are shared concerns, divided interests and different ways of thinking about the earth and our proper relationship to it. This book brings together writings on nature and environment that illuminate thought and action in this realm.

PART I
The Formative Years 1915–1921

Introduction

Bukharin’s formative years as a political theorist lasted from 1915 to 1921, and were marked by several important texts. In this section we have included the 1915 article “Toward a Theory of the Imperialist State” and excerpts from The Economics of the Transition Period, published in 1920. Other texts from this period include Imperialism and World Economy, written mainly in 1915 and published in 1917, and Historical Materialism, which first appeared in 1921. In one manner or another, all of these texts dealt with the theory of organization and its implications for the socialist transformation of society, a problem that was central to all of Bukharin’s writing.

“Toward a Theory of the Imperialist State” introduces Bukharin’s preoccupation with the role of the state. The article contains a striking paradox. On the one hand, Bukharin expresses his commitment to a future society “without a state organization”¹; on the other, he analyzes modern capitalism in terms of the theory of “state-capitalist trusts.” A “semi-anarchist” projection of the future—that was Lenin’s initial description of Bukharin’s reference to the stateless society—stands opposed to the grotesque nightmare of the New Leviathan.

The stateless society and the universalization of the state: these were the logical extremes within which Bukharin’s mind characteristically moved. In fairness, however, it should be emphasized that Bukharin was not alone in the theoretical difficulties he experienced while moving between these extremes. Lenin’s own State and Revolution (1917), a response to Bukharin’s work on the state, carried the libertarian (or “semi-anarchist”) tendency of Bolshevism further than Bukharin had ever contemplated. And Trotsky’s Terrorism and Communism (1920), appearing at the height of War Communism, took up the argument that the proletarian dictatorship must become all-embracing before it could even begin to wither away. Controversy over the relation of the dictatorship to other working-class organizations reflected the backwardness of Russian society and the resulting need to build socialism, using the state as an instrument of economic transformation. Yet for all its references to proletarian compulsion, The Economics of the Transition Period also introduced the concepts that eventually allowed Bukharin to make the transition from War Communism to the New Economic Policy. Particularly important in this regard was his attempt to reconcile Marxism with the theory of “equilibrium/’

For Bukharin the state, as the political “superstructure” of society, was “not simply a bell-glass, sitting on top of economic life”: rather, it was “an active force, a functioning organization that uses every means to strengthen the productive base upon which it arises.”² As the organized consciousness of society the state intervened to preserve equilibrium, internal uniformity, or social monism. In capitalist society control of industrial production had begun with control of commodity circulation: syndicate-organized sales logically preceded the organization of production by cartels and trusts. Bukharin expected socialist society to inherit the organizational forms of state capitalism insofar as industry was concerned. But in agriculture the “organizing tendency of the proletariat” would come into conflict with the “commodity-anarchistic tendency of the peasantry.”³ How was this contradiction to be transcended?

By analogy with the development of capitalism, Bukharin thought agricultural anarchy must first be curtailed in the sphere of circulation. The forced requisitioning of agricultural products would put an end to the free market, and state organs of distribution would later compensate the peasants with deliveries of industrial products from the cities. Common ownership of the means of agricultural production and the planned organization of a communist countryside would have to await the arrival of new technology. As Bukharin commented, “…for the great mass of small producers, inclusion within the organizational apparatus is possible mainly through the sphere of circulation, or formally by the same route as under the system of state capitalism. State and communal organs for procurement and distribution: these constitute the main apparatus of the new system of equilibrium.…”⁴ By the mid-1920s Bukharin would defend the NEP and Lenin’s so-called “cooperative plan” with exactly the same reasoning. Cooperatives for the organization of sales and purchases would become the logical counterpart of capitalist industrial syndicates and would indirectly regulate peasant production by manipulating market forces rather than eliminating them. In this respect The Economics of the Transition Period anticipated Bukharin’s program for “co-operative agrarian socialism” and indirectly anticipated the eventual split within the Bolshevik party over Socialism in One Country.

R.B.D.

NOTES

1. N. I. Bukharin, “Toward a Theory of the Imperialist State,” p. 13 below.

2. N. I. Bukharin, “The Economics of the Transition Period,” pp. 45–46 below.

3. Ibid., p. 60.

4. Ibid. p. 61.

Toward a Theory of the Imperialist State

Many “socialists,” if one may call them such, are consciously undertaking a dizzying “movement to the right.”¹ When viewed in terms of ideology, the action of these “socialists” (whose name is Legion) represents the logical consequence of a whole series of retreats from Marxism. Insignificant at first, such retreats snowball and soon are transformed (according to the “needs” of governments and the “abilities” of the ideologists) from retreats into formal apostasy (vulgo), into betrayal. The most cowardly and hypocritical conceal their flight by repeating the “old” phrases and the old terminology (an example being the Russian Marxist Potresov, who spouts the slogan “Struggle for patriotism”). Others (German social-imperialists such as Heine) appeal directly to the “raison d’état” of Bismarck and the “military reason” of the General Staff. With the passage of time, of course, our sirens all begin to sing the same tune: there is an objective logic at work here, which cannot be reversed once it is set in motion. It is in the nature of our time to raise all tactical questions to unprecedented heights of principle. Today things must be thought through to the end; for what many once took to be “academic scholasticism,” “gray theory,” etc., has now acquired the most pressing, practical significance. And it is precisely for this reason that so many have decided to “relearn.” They were compelled to do so: Fata volentem ducunt, nolentem trahunt. To evade questions and obscure issues and become conciliatory would be the most hopeless course of all now that the abyss between the tactics (and therefore the theory as well) of Marxism and all shades of reformism has been demonstrated in practice.

Among the general questions that have become particularly acute is the matter of social democracy’s relationship to the state power. This development is explained by two closely related circumstances. In the first place, the imperialist epoch is one of intensified struggle on the part of state-capitalist trusts, with the result that the question of the state’s military might, its “Machtpolitik,” etc., acquires enormous importance. In the second place, this same epoch also gives unprecedented significance to state power in the “internal” life of the peoples, the tentacles of this monster penetrating every crack and embracing every aspect of social life. It is at this very moment—when state power is “murdering and destroying” the peoples for the sake of the business affairs of the ruling classes, when the most acute class struggle must become the slogan of the day for the proletariat of all countries—that the patriotic Gentlemen are putting dots over all of the “i’s.” In foreign policy thay are becoming the ardent supporters of armaments, and by implication of imperialist slaughter; in domestic policy they are emerging as the apologists of civil peace. Once they adhered to the slogan “Peace for the huts and war upon the palaces!”; now they have another version, “Peace for the palaces and war upon other people’s huts! “An orientation toward the class interests of the international proletariat has been replaced by an orientation toward the interests of the imperialist state. The onetime priests of freedom, the democrats and the socialists, have prostrated themselves before the boots of the Generals; and it is only in mockery that one can say they “did not lick the feet or even the hands of the strong.” Choking with emotion, they are in fact licking both the hands and the feet of the “strong” with equal zeal.

1. THE GENERAL THEORY OF THE STATE

1) The state as an organization of the ruling classes. 2) The origin of the state. 3) The state as a historical category. Socialist society and the state. 4) The functions of the state. 5) Types of state. The imperialist state as a historical category.

In the social-patriotic literature of all countries a clear reversal of the normal movement of thought can be observed. Concepts and terms that once had a quite precise meaning give way to the “general phrase.” At one time a person had to know how to “differentiate”; today, on the contrary, people prefer to work with the most undifferentiated concepts, such as “nations,” “peoples,” the “interests of the whole,” etc.

To use such general terms is both easier and, for certain purposes, more convenient. Thus, it becomes necessary to reiterate the old truths, which at one time were commonplace, in order to repel the insufferable, quasi-theoretical rubbish confronting the reading public on all sides. The question of the imperialist state must be prefaced by the question of the nature of the state in general, and that is where we shall begin.

Definitions of the state are endless in number. We shall ignore all those theories that see in the state some sort of teleological or metaphysical “essence,” “the reality of the moral idea” (Hegel), etc. Equally uninteresting for us are the numerous definitions given by jurists, who approach the state from the limited viewpoint of formal-juridical dogma and thus end up, for the most part, in a vicious circle—defining the state in terms of law, and law in terms of the state. Such “theories” provide nothing in the way of positive knowledge, for they are devoid of a sociological foundation and hang in the air. The state can be understood only as a social phenomenon. Therefore, one must know its social nature, its social functions, its genesis; in other words, what we need is a sociological theory of the state. Marxism provides just such a theory. From the Marxist point of view, the state is nothing but the most general organization of the ruling classes, its basic function being to preserve and expand the exploitation of the oppressed classes. The state is a relationship among people—a relationship of domination, power, and enslavement. It is true that the famous Code of Hammurabi, as early as about two and a half thousand years B.C., announced the purpose of the state to be “the establishment of law within the country, the elimination of wickedness and evil, in order that the strong shall not harm the weak.”² It is also true that this ancient lie prevails even to the present day, that all teachings concerning the “purpose of the state” are nothing but repetitions of this lie. “State order (Ordnung) and laws exist not for the benefit of the rulers (des Herrschers), not in order to preserve and multiply their personal wealth, but for the benefit of the ruled.”³ The whip exists not for the benefit of the gentleman, but for the education of the slave—such is the thesis of bourgeois science in our own day. Of course, in reality things are quite different. To the extent that the organizations of state power are constructed according to a plan and are consciously regulated (something that occurs only at a certain stage in the state’s development), to the extent, in other words, that one can speak of the state’s having a purpose, that purpose must be defined by the interests of the ruling classes and their interests alone. This situation is by no means contradicted by the fact that the state fulfills, and has fulfilled, a variety of socially useful functions. The latter are simply a necessary condition, the conditio sine qua non for the existence of state power. Thus, the “socially useful activities” of the state are essentially the conditions for prolonging and promoting to the utmost the exploitation of the enslaved classes of contemporary society, above all, of the proletariat. In their politics the ruling classes are guided by certain calculations, and the principle of the economy of forces prevails within the state organization as well. The state builds railways, undertakes irrigation works, erects schools, etc. Why? Because this is the only way to facilitate the further development of capitalist relations, to ensure that a greater mass of values is created and flows into the pocket of the capitalist class, to guarantee that the process of exploitation will proceed even more smoothly and quietly. The state undertakes a number of sanitary measures, comes forth as the “protector of labor” (factory legislation, etc.). Why? Again, not because the enslaved proletarians have pretty eyes, but because it is profitable for the ruling class, under certain conditions, to take this approach. The ruling class acts either in its own direct interest (e.g., the contemporary state is interested in good soldierly material and therefor occasionally has nothing against measures that somewhat retard national degeneration), or else out of strategic considerations in the class struggle against the oppressed. In the latter case the state power makes concessions because otherwise the process of exploitation would not proceed so smoothly. In this case the governing principle is still the interests of the ruling classes, which are merely hidden under a pseudonym—the interests of the “nation,” the “people,” the “whole.” And the state is still the organization “of the most powerful, economically dominant class, which, through the medium of...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication Page
• Contents
• Foreword The Afterlife of Nikolai Bukharin
• Foreword The Case Is Not Closed
• Introduction The New Leviathan: Bukharin’s Contribution to the Theory of the State and the Transition to Socialism
• Part I The Formative Years (1915–1921)
• Part II The Years of Hope and Struggle (1921–1927)
• Part III The Years of Disorientation and Defeat (1928—1929)
• About the Editor