Surrender of Marxism to Capitalism

At a recent 'Meet the Press' programme in Kolkata Press Club, while answering a query of a journalist, Buddhadeb Bhattacharya (The Chief Minister of West Bengal, India) had said, 'I can't implement socialism. Socialism is impracticable. What I am doing here is just capitalism. I am trying to use capitalism in the interest of workers and common people (Bartaman, April13, 2006)." Much before this, however, Buddhadeb Babu had termed the day of his finalizing a business deal with the Salim group of Indonesia as the 'best day of his life'. It is clear that what he had stated at the 'Meet the Press' programme was not a surprise statement. It is also not to be believed that the C.P.I(M) as a party did not endorse his view. On the contrary, it is very likely that Buddhadeb Babu made this statement consciously as the spokesman of the party and with full knowledge of his party's viewpoint in this regard. Without mincing words, it can be said that this statement is an abject surrender of Marxism to opportunism. It needs to be pointed out that this surrender is not an isolated event. It is just a reflection, in the context of West Bengal, of surrender of Marxism to capitalism throughout the world.

Marx and Engels wrote in Communist Manifesto, “The theory of the communists may be summed up in the single sentence: abolition of private property”.

While implementing this declaration in the post revolution (1917) scenario of the Russian society, the Russian economy was faced with an acute economic crisis. To get out of this crisis, the system of ‘kitchen farming’ was introduced where ownership of land, in certain cases, was left to individuals. This was in complete negation of the basic communist ideal which strictly professes private ownership. Later on, when it was found that the so called ‘collective farming’ was fetching no profit, the communist leadership lost no time in doing a complete turnaround by abolishing commune system and recognizing individual ownership. Even the Chinese communist leader Mao-Tse-Tung in his book ‘On Coalition Government’ wrote, “The goal of a democratic economy is to raise the standard of living of the people, to ensure unrestricted development of capitalist economy and to protect all property earned through honest means (page 31).” The communist countries came to be completely dependent on capitalist countries like USA, Australia, Canada etc. for food. Marx wrote ‘Das Capital’ and ‘Communist Manifesto’ declaring war against capitalism, but, ironically, the Marxists, very early in their journey, had to lend their support to capitalism. Thus the seed of death of Marxian socialism was planted at its very hour of birth.

The two basic premises of Marxian socialism are the establishment of the dictatorship of proletariats and the replacement of private ownership with state capitalism. But the simultaneous centralization of political and economic powers soon brought about the death of proletariat dictatorship giving birth to ‘totalitarianism’. The materialistic philosophy of life and lure for power propelled by the desire for earthly pleasures produced ‘demons in human form’. In his ‘Collected Works’ Lenin writes, “Dictatorship means unlimited power resting on violence and not on law.” This phrase ‘not on law’ later on created communist tyrants like Stalin, Mao-Tse-Tung, Honekar and Cesescu. Marxian socialism is dead, but a new form of fascism called ‘neo-fascism’ has taken its place. In order to keep this ‘neo-fascism’ alive, the Marxist leadership has thrown to the winds the slogan of international communism and is increasingly embracing nationalism. Like the ‘Gestapo’ of Hitler’s Germany and the ‘Black Shut’ of Mussolini’s Italy, emerged, in Soviet Russia, the infamous intelligence agency called K.G.B. The ruthless state machinery in the name of collective interest set alight the fire of oppression and repression and its blazing flames soon engulfed the whole communist world. Marxian socialism stumbled upon the altar of neo- fascism.

Marxism is out and out an unscientific theory. Whenever the leadership found it unable to keep pace with time, space and person, they switched over to new and newer theories. Such switch-over gave birth to various Marxist creeds like Marxism- Leninism, Marxism -Maoism, Marxism -Stalinism, Marxism -Trotskyism and, most recently in West Bengal, Marxism- Buddhaism. Once, abandoning the theory of class struggle, Stalin had declared, “ Socialism has to be established in Russia. Hence it is necessary to maintain peace at home and abroad. And for this we need a peaceful coexistence of socialism with democracy.” Leaders like Buddhadeb Bhattacharya who are disciples of Stalin have, however, gone many steps further. Leaving the slogan of peaceful coexistence of socialism with democracy, they have straightaway embraced capitalism. They are now chanting a single Mantra, “We want capitalism.” They are now communist- turned- capitalists!

Marxian socialism says, before communism can flourish fully in a communist society, commune system should be the only method of production of which the state would be the sole owner. When ownership lies with an individual, s/he feels an oneness with the affairs of production and this provides him/her with an incentive to produce more. But as soon as the state becomes the owner, that feeling of oneness and the incentive are lost. As a consequence, production starts falling. Not only that. Just as concentration of wealth in the hands of an individual gives birth to private capitalism, it is very likely that state capitalism would follow in countries ruled by the communists. This is exactly what happened. In course of time this state capitalism, however, because of concentration of enormous state and economic powers, assumed a far more dangerous form.

While writing on the economy of a socialist society, Marx had said, “From each according to ability to each according to his need.” If man gets everything without expending any labour, he no longer feels any incentive to work. Hence to say ‘each according to his ability to each according to his need’ means the creation of economic problems in the society. Because, under such a system, people do not feel much inclined to the affairs of production. On the contrary, they tend to accumulate more and more wealth thus creating a severe economic crisis. That was why Lenin himself termed this slogan as ‘useless’. The one of the many reasons behind the collapse of Marxian socialism is this defect at the very root.

The third principle of dialectical materialism speaks of the ‘law of negation of negation’. According to this principle, in course of evolution of matter or, for that matter, any historical event, the emerging new is always in a higher state of development and inherits certain developed characteristics of the old. For example, a rice plant grows out of a rice seed. Here we get the rice plant out of negation of the rice seed. Out of that rice plant we get huge quantity of rice. Again from that huge quantity of rice we get huge quantity of seeds. Thus out of negation of negation of a rice seed we finally get a huge number of rice seeds. The same happens in the case of societal evolution. According to Marxists, the negation of the medieval slave system gave birth to feudalism, the negation of feudalism gave birth to capitalism and the negation of capitalist system would usher in a socialist system based on collective ownership. It is interesting to note that Buddhdeb Babu and others are now doing just the opposite. For so long, they were fighting against capitalism. After communist rule, according to dialectical materialism, one would expect socialism to follow. But, even after 30 years of continuous rule, they are now saying they can’t bring socialism and hence they want capitalism. Funnily enough, they are now reverting to capitalism by whose negation, professedly, they once promised to bring socialism! Some may argue that this retreat is only tactical and from this state, through a fresh dialectical process, they might again bring socialism in future.

Even if we accept, for argument’s sake, the logic, a question arises. In order to bring socialism in future, are the communists alone contract-bound to bring capitalism now? Should we then say that the communists have now turned into most trusted agents of the capitalists? If they accept that there is no other way out but capitalism, why did they hoodwink people so long by shouting high-sounding slogans like the dictatorship of proletariats, socialism etc.? Truly speaking, Buddhadeb Babu and others have very poor understanding of the difference between capital and the need for capital. Even in socialist system capital will be necessary to build up a strong and viable economy. After all, in a socialist system, people are not expected to live on air alone! The capital and the need for capital are not the same thing. Capital can be made and socialism established even without having recourse to capitalism. Unfortunately, that mystery is not known to Buddhadeb Babu and others. Hence they are reverting to capitalism. Sadly enough, dialectical materialism is now rolling on the ground being trampled by those very revolutionaries (Buddhadeb Babu and others) who once championed its cause so meticulously and vociferously! The most tragic fate indeed any theory has ever met in the course of human history.

If we look at the history of the world communist movement, it can be safely concluded that Marxism is out and out an unscientific doctrine and this is the reason why, in course of its decay, it came to be populated with numerous groups and sub groups. These groups are now at war with one another. Each is branding the other as revisionist or counter revolutionary. Each is crying hoarse to prove it is the real Marxist party. Thus Bernstein of Germany and Kawski of Russia were branded as revisionists when they sought to introduce the concept of social democracy in Marxism. Thus Browder, the secretary of Communist Party of America, had to give his nod in favour of moving with the bourgeoisie.

Khruschev in Russia had to speak of a peaceful coexistence with capitalism in order to establish socialism. The basic tenets of the treatise “Evolutionary Socialism”, authored by Bernstein are:- a) Marx’s prophecy about the imminent fall of capitalism did not come true. b) classification of the society into two classes, proletariats and capitalists is flawed. c) in the evolution of the society, the exploitive character of capitalism has changed. d) the concept of ‘dictatorship of proletariats’ should be abandoned and the society should have recourse to the path of a gradual transition to a synthetic social order. What the communist leadership of West Bengal is saying now is nothing but a somewhat modified version of Bernstein. It is interesting to note that even Buddhadeb Babu and his colleagues have at last been transformed into neo-revisionists!

The unscientific theory of Marxism never found root in so called socialist and communist countries. That was why the leadership of Soviet Russia, the fatherland of communism, was forced to walk the road of peaceful coexistence with capitalism, embrace revisionism and finally capitulate to capitalism. Even then Soviet Russia could not be saved. Why only Russia, the entire communist empire ultimately collapsed. A handful of countries that survived the landslide had to open their door to free market economy. The President of the United States of America, a country that feasted on the blood of Vietnamese people in a prolonged ‘imperialist’ war in Vietnam, was accorded a red-carpet welcome by the Government of Vietnam. After the death of Mao-Tse-tung in China, in the third plenary session of the eleventh Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, a new policy statement was made proclaiming an open door policy to free market economy. Decks were cleared for the entry of capital to 14 cities of China including Chen Jen adjacent to Hongkong. Even the government- owned marketing agencies were handed over to private Chinese and foreign companies All these stories are burning examples of meek surrender of Marxism to capitalism.

Buddhadeb Babu and others are walking on the same road. Ironically, these communists leaders, even a few years ago like their counterparts in communist countries, were heard shouting revolutionary slogans at the top of their voice. They threatened to take away the night’s sleep from the eyes of the bourgeoisie. Now they themselves have turned into biggest patrons of the bourgeoisie. Buddha Babu and others are now welcoming Tatas, Birlas and Goenkas whom they had identified as class enemies in 1967-77. He is reported to have said, “I am a communist who can compromise with capitalists (Bartaman, May 18, 2006).” He said further, “We should remember that we are surrounded by capitalism on all sides. We can not remain isolated and practice socialism alone (Ananda Bazar Patrika, May 16, 2006).” Like a communist vanquished by the capitalists, Buddhadeb Babu now says, “The collapse of Berlin wall has taught us that man must be given the right to say ‘no’. This right of saying ‘no’, this freedom of press must be protected at all costs…………I want a harmony between workers and industrialists………………..if capital is not harmonized with labour, survival would be difficult.” Marx, on the other hand, had said that the conflict between capitalists and workers, between capital and labour would continue eternally. Recently C.P.I.(M) leader Nirupam Sen has written in Ganashakti, “While talking of an alternative we, the communists, generally talk of an alternative to capitalistic system………the only alternative to capitalism is socialism………but in a part of a country……the alternative that has been spoken of in the party programme can not be the socialist alternative.” That means the C.P.I(M) leaders are now socialist in theory but capitalist in practice! Sorry, Mr.Nirupam Sen, you are sadly mistaken! What to talk of a state of India, you could not establish socialism even in a so called single communist country. Marxian socialism, the world over, has now been transformed into opportunism – the communists of West Bengal have also adopted the same path. Why it happened? It happened because the very doctrine of Marxism is flawed from beginning to end. All talks of Communist Manifesto, proletariat leadership, materialistic view of life, internationalism, classless society, an ideal communism state, irreligiousness, the collective sans the individual, are now tragically reduced to anguished cries within the confines of a lost belief. To get rid of this terrible situation, the communist leadership, from time to time, created a host of isms, and in doing so obliterated Marxism itself! And quite naturally, this has led to the shameful ‘surrender of Marxism to opportunism’. Marxism has succumbed to its own inherent flaws.

Capitalism can not be the means for an all-round progressive social order. Even if it can bring economic prosperity to some extent, it can not bring permanent good and happiness to all. Alongside with creating psychic distortion in the society, it transforms a man into a beggar. On the other hand, the utopian ideas of Marxism have already collapsed like a pack of cards. In this scenario, the only alternative before man is PROUT and its doctrine of progressive socialism. This socialism can not be found in the books of Karl Marx. This has to evolve out of a symbiotic approach to life and world, of the soul of India’s very own traditional thought-currents. Only PROUT provides that synthesis. Through a unique harmony of individual and collective, of material and spiritual, it has opened up a new road of physical, psychic and spiritual development of man and society. In days to come, this will certainly be the only saga of the onward journey of universal humanity towards peace, harmony and progress. (Translated by Ác Priyashivananda Avt. from Bengali)

Posted by proutist-universal on May 30, 2006 9:22 PM | TrackBack

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