[page 14]
The Colonial Revolution and the Deformed Workers' States In bourgeois countries in the past, where the bourgeoisie has a role to play and looks forward confidently to the future-i.e. when it is genuinely progressive in developing the productive forces-it has decades and generations to perfect the state as an instrument of its owi class rule. The army, police, civil service, middle layers and especially all key positions at the top; heads of civil service, heads of departments, police chiefs, the officer corps and especially the colonels and generals are carefully selected to serve the needs and interests of the ruling class. With a developing economy and a mission and a role they eagerly serve the "national interest" i.e. the interests of the possessing classes-the ruling class.
In Syria, as in all the ex-colonial countries, the imperialists, in this case the French, partly under the pressure of their rivals, especially American Imperialism, were compelled to relinquish their direct military domination.
The state which emerged is not fixed and static. The weakness and incapacity of the bourgeoisie gave a certain independence to the military caste. Hence the perpetual coups and counter-coups of the military. But in the last analysis they reflect the class interests of the ruling class. They cannot play an independent role.
The struggle between the cliques in the army reflects the instability and contradictions in the given society. The personal aims of the generals reflects the differing interests of social BY TED GRANT classes or fractions of classes in society, the petit-bourgeoisie in its various fractions, the bourgeoisie or even under certain conditions the proletariat in so far as they are successful in gaining power. The officer caste must reflect the interests of some class or grouping in society. They do not represent themselves though of course they can plunder the society and elevate their own ruling caste. Nevertheless they must have a class basis in a given society.
Bonapartist regimes do not rest on air but balance between the classes. In the final analysis they represent whichever is the dominant class in the society. The 13 Ethiopian People's Militin economy of that class determines its class character. Some of these countries, as in Latin America, a semi-colonial continent which was under the domination of British then especially American imperialism for the last century, nevertheless have been nominally independent for more than a century. In consequence despite a period or turbulence the ruling class of landowners and capitalists has had a sufficient period to perfect their state. Sometimes the armed forces or different fractions or factions of the armed can reflect forces, different fractions of the ruling class and even the pressures of im perialism, primarily nowadays Am-
[page 15]
erican imperialism.
But, up to now, they have always reflected the interest of the ruling class in the defence of private ownership.
In Burma. where the regime. newly emerged from British domination and where the ruling class was incapable of successfully "holding the country together", it faced a series of rebellions and wars. The army was formed from the Anti-Fascist Peoples Freedom League. which described itself as "socialist"
With China as a model next door, the army leaders tired of the incapacity of the landowners and capitalists to solve the problems of peat one, on oranted a coup expropriated the landowners and capitalists and established Burma as a "Burmese Buddhist Socialist State*.
China Yet up to the Russian revolution even Lenin denied the possibility of the victory proletarian of the revolution in a backward country. The Chinese revolution of 1944-49 did not proceed on the model of the revolution of 1925-27. It was a peasant war, which because of the, complete incapacity of the Chinese bourgeoisie to carry out the tasks of the bourgeois-democratic revolution the ending of landlordism, national unification and the expulsion of imperialism, ended with victory-to the Chinese Stalinists. The programme of the Chinese Stalinists was not fundamentally different to that of Castro later in Cuba; 50 or 100 years of national capitalism" and an alliance with the "national bourgeoisie". Hence of many the belief American bourgeois that they were "agrarian reformers"
Only the Marxist tendency gathered around the Militant in Britain argued against the Stalin- Ists, and the alleged "Trotskyist" sects and explained the inevitabll- Ity of Mao's victory and the estab. ahment of a deformed workers At a time when Mao and the Chinese CP had the programme of capitalism and "national democraer"
we could predict the inevitability of proletarian Bonapartism as the next stage in China. This had nothing in common with the methods of the proletarian revolution in Russia in 1917.
Power was gained through the peasant war by giving the land to soldiers in Chiang Kai Shek's army. Then by balancing between the classes and playing off the classes against each other in Bonapartist fashion, once military victory was achieved, landlordism capitalism expropriated. Nearly all the socalled "Trotskyist" sects now accept the accomplished fact. But never before in history has it been even theoretically posed that a peasant war on classical lines could lead to a workers' state, however deformed. The workers in China were passive throughout the civil war for reasons we will not enter into here. But here was a perfect example of one class-the peasants in the form of the Red Army-carrying out the tasks of another.
It is amusing now to see the sects swallowing the idea that a "workers state was established in China by the peasant army without turning a hair, only because at the head of the army was the so-called "Communist Party. In classical Marxist theory this idea would be precisely considered hair raising and fantastie.
The peasants, as a class, are least capable of assuming a socialist consciousness.
It is an aberration of Marxism to think that such a process is "normal"
'. It can only be explained by the impasse of capitalism in China. the paralysis of imperialism. the existence of a strong deformed Bonapartist state in Stalinist Russia, and most important of all, the delay in the victory of the revolution in the industrially advanced countries of the world. The colonial countries cannot wait. The problems are too crushing. There is no way forward on the basis of capitalism. Hence the peculiar aberrations in colonial countries. But the price for this, as in the Soviet Union, is a second political revolution to put the 14 control of society, industry and the state in the hands of the proletariat. Only thus could the first genuine beginnings of the transition to socialism, or rather steps in that direction, commence. The wide support for "socialism" not only in the working class, but among the peasants and wide layers of the petit-bourgeoisie in the cities in colonial countries, is the expression of the complete blind alley of landlordism and capitalism in the colonial i world in the modern epoch. It is also a result of the Russian and Chinese revolutions and their achievements in develop ing industry and the economy. It is this that lays the groundwork for the development of proletarian Bonapartism.
The state can be reduced to armed bodies of men, according to Engels.
With the defeat and destruction of the police and army of Chiang Kai Shek, as with the destruction of the army of Batista in Cuba, power was in the hands of Mao and Castro. The fact that nominally Mao was a "Communist" and Castro a bourgeois democrat altered nothing. Moscow's Image So far was Mao from the model of the proletarian revolution that on entering Shanghai and other cities, workers who had seized their factories and met Mao with demonstrations of red flags were instantly shot in order to "restore order"i The state created by Mao was in the image of Moscow. Moscow, 1945-49, not Moscow 1917!
Mao in typical Bonapartist fashion on the basis of the peasant army, always an instrument of (bourgeois) bonapartism in the past, balanced between the classes. Having perfected a state in the image of Moscow, leaning on the workers and peasants, he could snuff out the bourgeoisie painlessly. As Trotsky put it, for a lion you need a gun, for a flea, a fingernail will do! Having crushed the bourgeoisie, after having balanced between them and the workers and peasants in order to prevent the workers from taking
[page 16]
power, Mao and his gang-after perfecting the state-could then turn on the workers and peasants to crush whatever elements of workers' democracy had developed.
The bureaucracy then developed a totalitarian one-party dictatorship, centred round the Bonapartist dictatorship of one single individual-Mao. But, not for nothing has Marxist theory given the task of achieving the socialist revolution and the transition to socialism to the working class. This is not an arbitrary role but because the specific role in production of the proletariat gives a specific consciousness possessed by no other class. Least of all can the petit-bourgeois peasant develop this consciousness. A revolution based on the latter class by its very nature would be doomed to degeneration and Bonapartism. It is precisely because a proletarian Bonapartist dictatorship protects the privileges of the elites of state, party, the army, industry and the intellectuals of art and science that it has succeeded in so many backward countries.
Marxism finds in the development of the productive forces the key to the development of society. On a capitalist basis there is no longer a way forward particularly for backward countries. That is why army officers, intellectuals and others affected by the decay of their societies under cortal conditions
can switch their allegiance. A change to proletarian Bonapartism actually enlarges their power, prestige, privileges and income. They become the sole commanding and directing stratum of the society raising themselves even higher over the masses than in the past. Instead of being subservient to the weak, craven and ineffective bourgeoisie they become the masters of society.
Transitional Economies
The tendency towards statification of the productive forces, which has grown beyond the limits of private ownership, is manifest even in the most highly developed economies including even the United States. It is present even in the most reactionary colonial countries.
There is no possibility of a consistent, uninterrupted and continuous increase in productive forces in the countries of the so-called third world on a capitalist basis. Production stagnates or falls. In the world recessions, particularly in the smaller countries, living standards fall. There is no way out on the basis of the capitalist system. That explains the terror regimes of bourgeois Bonapartism like that of Pakistan, Indonesia, Argentina, Chile and Zaire. But with bayonets and bullets, on the basis of an out-dated and antiquated system, only a very
15
temporary respite is given. Discontent multiplies and is reflected in
the officer caste of the armed forces and throughout the society. This in
turn leads to conspiracies of individuals and groups of officers.
The army is a mirror of society and reflects its contradictions. That and not the mere whims of the officers concerned, as in Syria, is the cause of the upheavals. It is an indication of the agonised crisis of society; which cannot be solved in the old way. These strata of society can espouse "socialism" of the Stalinist variety-proletarian Bonapartism—all the more enthusiastiçally because of their contempt for the masses of workers and peasants.
The horrible caricature of workers rule in Russia, China, and the other countries of deformed workers' states precisely attracts them because of the position of the "intellectual" educated cadres of that society. What is repulsive to Marxism is what attracts them.
All that these states have in common with healthy workers' states of the norm or Russia of 1917-23 is state ownership of the means of production. On that basis they can plan and develop the productive forces with forced marches at a pace absolutely impossible on their former landlord-capitalist basis. This is possible of course for only a limited historical period of time. At some point the Stalinist regimes become an absolute hindrance and a fetter to production. Russia and Eastern Europe are reaching these limits.
In common with a healthy workers' state on the accepted Marxist norm is the fact that they are transitional economies between capitalism and socialism.
But Marxism teaches that a movement towards socialism requires the control, guidance and participation of the proletariat. With a privileged elite in uncontrolled dominance and not reconciled to the loss of its status in a "withering away" of the state, this produces new contradictions. As the corruption, nepotism, waste, mismanagement and chaos which bureaucratic control necessarily
[page 17]
involves comes more and more into contradiction with the needs of social development, this manifests itself in the heightened antagonism between the proletariat and the bureaucratic elite.
Trotsky long ago explained in the case of Russia that at three times the cost to the masses, nevertheless the bureaucracy developed the productive forces which the bourgeoisie was incapable of doing. It fulfills the function, a relatively progressive function, which the bourgeoisie had accomplished in the past. But Trotsky explained that this role also engenders its own contradictions. The bureaucracy no more than the bourgeoisie—in some senses even less—is prepared to reconcile itself to the loss of privilege and power. It grows even more to become a monstrous cancer on society. It can only be removed by political revolution. This will be triggered by events at home or the successful gaining of power by the proletariat and the constitution of a workers' democracy in one of the advanced capitalist countries. In the case of China and the postwar crop of these states, it will be by social revolution in the west or by victorious political revolution revolution in Russia and E. Europe that healthy workers' states and a workers' democracy will be created. It must be emphasised that all that these states have in common with the ideal workers' state is state ownership of the economy and a plan of production.
Only one of the "idealist" and "eclectic" sects could discover a fundamental difference between the peasant war in which Mao came to power and the guerrilla war of Castro, based on peasants and semi-peasants and landless peasants as well as some ex-workers. There is not much difference, despite the bourgeois democratic ideas in Castro's head which in any event were not all that different from the programme on which Mao fought the civil war. At least in the last, stages of the struggle the participation of the working class in Cuba with the general strike in turned the Castro's favour. Nothing of this sort happened in the Civil war in China of 1945-49. Nor was this kind of intervention desired by the forces of Mao; true, had it not been for the stupidity of American imperialism the outcome could have been different in Cuba. But with the impasse of Cuban capitalism like that of Chinese capitalism, just as Mao had used the strong proletarian Bonapartist state of Russia as a model, so Cas- 'tro used Eastern Europe and China as models in his conflict with Amercan imperialism.
In both cases this marked an enormous step forward historically. Landlordism and capitalism were eliminated. That meant the removal of the fetters of semi-feudal landlordism and of private ownership of industry. The monopoly of foreign trade, following the Russian model, is also a powerful progressive factor. These measures meant a gigantic release of the constraints on the productive forces. Hence in advance we could hail the Chinese revolution as the second greatest event in human history, the Russian revolution the first. Nevertheless because of its Bonapartist character-and the inevitable vested interest of the bureaucracy in maintaining the rule of privilege, prestige, power and income for the ruling layers of the bureaucracy itself-the masses would have to pay with a second revolution before there could be a workers' democracy on the level of that in Russia of Because of the incapacity of the sects to apply Marxism and "Marxist philosophy" in a concrete manner they have landed themselves in ludicrous contradictions. Thus they declared Eastern Europe to be state-capitalist in 1945-1947—while Russia which occupied Eastern Europe with the Red Army was a "degenerated workers' state".
When Tito broke with Stalin, overnight from mysteriously being "capitalist" Yugoslavia became a healthier workers' state than even Russia in 1917! This did not prevent these sects from simultaneously declaring Eastern Europe still to be capitalist. China 16 remained "state capitalist" according to them until 1951 or 1953. Then, "Hey Presto", China, from "state capitalism"
being was mysteriously transformed over our heads into a "healthy workers' state"!
All this muddle and theoretical confusion has never been explained by any one of these petit-bourgeois tendencies masquerading as Marxists. One sect claimed Cuba was a petit-bourgeois Bonapartist state while describing China as a relatively healthy workers' state in which political revolution was not necessary. Not a single one of these tendencies was capable of analysing the main forces and processes out of the epoch, in which the colonial world saw a caricature of permanent revolution and these weird and deformed workers' states being set up. Not a single one of them understood the meaning of the "cultural revolution". Some hailed this as a second version of the "Paris Commune"! Only recently-some 30 years too latesome reluctantly concluded that the Chinese revolution was deformed from the start. Our tendency explained the process in advance of Mao's victory.
All the objective conditions for a socialist revolution are now maturing in Western Europe, Japan and the USA. The process, however, will be protracted because of weakness of the forces of genuine Marxism. It is the delay of the revolution in the west and now its protracted character which gives room for these peculiar regimes in the neo-colonial countries. They are reaching unbearable tensions with the semi-starvation of great masses without a roof or a crust. The insolent parasitism and luxury of the landlords and capitalists in contrast, leaning on imperialism, invests all the contradictions in these societies with an explosive force. It is on the basis of this impasse-the decay and weakness of imperialism, the glaring rottenness and decay of landlordismcapitalism—which makes possible the development of the curious process of proletarian Bonapartism. Taking advantage of the revolt of the masses of peasants,
[page 18]
petit-bourgeoisie and even workers, the elite of officers, intellectuals etc. can emerge, as in Ethiopia, with firm power in their hands on the basis of the support of the workers and peasants. They can perfect a "KGB" secret police of their own-to silence anyone who would object to their privileges. The peasantry, by its very nature as a class of individuals not bound together by production, is the perfect instrument for bourgeois or proletarian bonapartism. It is a class, that by its nature can be manipulated and deceived; a class that looks towards the "Tsar as a father of the people"
, or to Stalin as "son of the sun"
or to the god-head, Mao. The urban petitbourgeois too have these attributes; in Germany and Italy they looked to Hitler and Mussolini as "leaders". Only the proletariat stands firmly for genuine democracy—i.e. workers democracy in a workers' state-which is the only system where its direct rule can be manifested.
Trotsky Our tendency has explained and predicted these processes. There is no real possibility of moving forward in the colonial world on a capitalist basis. It is this, plus the lagging of the proletarian revolution in the advanced industrialised countries, which has led to these regimes taking ten steps forward and five steps back. They can at least-for a period(in most cases)develop the productive forces with seven league boots. They carry out in backward countries the historic job which was carried out by the bourgeoisie in the capitalist countries in the past.
The whole essence of Trotsky's theory of the permanent revolution lies in the idea that the colonial bourgeoisie and the bourgeoisie of the backward countries are incapable of carrying out the tasks of the bourgeois democratic revolution. This is because of their links with the landlords and the imperialists. The banks have mortgages on the land, industrialists have landed estates in the country, the landlords invest in industry and the whole is entangled together and linked with imperialism in a web of vested interests opposed to change. Under these circumstances the task of carrying out the bourgeoisdemocratic revolution fell on the shoulders of the proletariat. But the proletariat, leading the peasantry, and the big majority of the nation, having conquered power would not stop at the accomplishment of the bourgeois-democratic tasks of expropriating the landowners, unifying the nation, and expelling the imperialists. It would then pass on to the socialist tasks, the expropriation of the bourgeoisie and the setting up of a workers state. But the socialist tasks could not be encompassed in a single country. especially a backward colonial country. The revolution would have to spread to the more advanced countries.
term for this process. permanent revolution beginning as a bourgeois revolution. becoming one, and ending in international It is true that owing to the development of the Stalinist bureaucracy and the reformist degeneration of the Communist Parties exceptional difficulties have been put in the path of the proletariat in goals mine pie mie of both advanced and backward - countries. But the impasse of so-called third world-has been aggravated during the course of the decades since the outbreak of the second world war. For a period the industrialised capitalist countries passed through a relative development of productive forces once the political pre-conditions had been established by the betrayal in the early post-war period of Stalinism and reformism.
But while living standards in the 17 west increased at least in absolute terms, in the "Third World" with few exceptions there was a decline in already low living standards. The decay of antiquated land relations under the inexorable pressure of the world market continued apace. A large surplus population of paupers. beggars and lumpens is endemic in the colonial world. Living standards of the masses have fallen. On the old relations there is no way out.
Burma, Syria, Angola.
Mosambique.
Ethiopia and as models. Cuba and China (which in their turn had the model of Eastern Europe as a beacon showing the way) there has been a transformation of social relations.
This is because of the rotten ripeness of world capitalism for the socialist revolution. But all history shows that where. for one reason or another, the new progressive clais incapable of carrying out its functions of transforming society, this is often done (in a reactionary way. perhaps) by other classes or castes. Thus in Japan big sections of the feudal lords became capitalists and in Germany-as Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky recognised-the landowning Junkers of E. Prussia under Bismarck and the monarchy carried out the task of the national unification of Germany—a task of the bourgeois democratic revolution.
Attractive Power As Marx long ago explained. there is no such thing as a * supra-historical blue-print. It is necessary to take the material objective reality as it is and then explain it. That is the method of "marxist philosophy" and not the philosophical gibberish of the sects. But it is not only necessary to see objective reality as it is but to explain the process that brought it into being.
the contradictions encompassing it, the law of social movement which it represents and the future processes of contradictions and change which will envelop it. Its process of birth, development, decay and the changes which will destroy it.
[page 19]
Under the conditions of the dec-
ay of capitalism-landlordism in the
colonial countries all the social
contradictions are aggravated to an
extreme. Social tensions reach an
unbearable level. Hence in one
country after another of Asia,
Africa and Latin America, bour-
geois democracy is replaced by
bourgeois-Bonapartist dictator-
ships or proletarian bonapartist
dictatorships.
In the above-named ex-colonial
countries not one proceeded on the
model of the norm of the socialist
revolution. Neither did the coun-
tries of Eastern Europe before them
in the aftermath of the second
world war.
The great Marxist teachers in the
past have often explained that once
the norm of the socialist revolution
has been established in the main capitalist countries, it would have an irresistible appeal to the rest of
the world and result in a painless transformation without conflict.
Even the bourgeoisie would recog-
nise the superiority of workers
democracy, apart from the effect
this would have on the world working class. Marx himself believed that in this way the backward areas of the world, and even the backward countries of Europe, would be brought forward by the advanced industrialised countries acting as a magnet and a model of socialism. Lenin and Trotsky conceived of the socialist revolution taking place in some backward countries first only with the leading role and participation of the proletariat. The proletariat would lead the petitbourgeois masses especially the peasantry to the overthrow of landlordism and capitalism and then link the workers to the international working class and the tasks of the world revolution.
The Bonapartist totalitarian dictatorship in Russia of a completely deformed workers' state repels workers in advanced capitalist countries. This is because nothing remains of October except the abolition of landlordism and capitalism, a plan of production, plus the monopoly of foreign trade, albeit bureaucratically twisted and distorted.
But nevertheless the mighty achievements of the revolution, the productive advances, the abolition of backwardness bringing Russia to the position of the second industrial power of the world, have an enormous attractive power for the colonial masses. (This is further reinforced by the example of the Chinese revolution which in the space of less than a quarter of a century has transformed China into a mighty power. In most of the colonial countries where it still exists, bourgeois democracy is a hollow and empty shell backed up at various times by "states of siege", "states of emergency" and even martial law.
Consequently the lack of workers' democracy in these proletarian bonapartist states is not such a drawback in attracting the masses. It is a positive attractive feature as far as the professional and lower army officers are concerned. The solution of their most pressing problems of food, clothing and shelter loom large in the minds of the colonial masses.
Ethiopia
This in its turn has an enormous effect in the countries of Asia,
Africa and Latin America. The bourgeois-Bonapartist regimes, in the colonial countries are charged with terrible contradictions. Their problems are insoluble. They spend large sums on armaments further exacerbating the poverty of the masses. They are inherently unstable. They provoke the hatred of the workers, the petit-bourgéoisie, the students and peasants. Even the weak bourgeoisie they represent comes into collision with them.
It is in this social soil that plots, counter-plots and conspiracies in the army flourish. The army [or armed forces] is always monied in the image of society and is not independent of it. Where the army dominates that indicates a crisis in society and a regime of crisis.
Different cliques, groups or even individuals at the top in the army come to reflect groupings, sections of classes or classes in society. They do not represent themselves but
18
precisely
antagonistic interests
classes in
society.
Under conditions of social crisis péople change. This applies to
classes and even individuals. Thus Marx explained that with the decay of feudalism a section of the feudal lords, bigger or smaller as the case may be, goes over to the side of the bourgeoisie in the bourgeois revolution. A section of the bourgeoisie, particularly the intellectual bourgeoisie, can also put themselves on the standpoint of the proletariat.
No more barren, formalistic, anti dialectical, philosophically idealist,
antı-"Marxist philosophy"* idea in
the history of the movement has
been put forward than by those who
argue that because Castro began
his revolutionary struggle as a
bourgeois democrat with bourgeois
democratic ideas and goals that
therefore he must remain a bourgeois democrat for all eternity.
They forget that Marx and Engels
themselves began as bourgeois democrats who broke decisively
with the bourgeoisie and became the leaders of the proletariat.
Under conditions of the crisis of capitalism in Portugal, a semi-colonial country, a majority of the officer caste, sickened by the decades of dictatorship and the seemingly unending wars in Africa, which they realised they could not win, moved in the direction of revolution and "socialism". Only. our tendency explained this process.
This gave an impetus to the move ment of the working class, which then reacted in its turn on the army. This affected not only the rank and file, and the lower ranks of the officers, but even some admirals and generals who were sincerely desirous of solving the problems of Portuguese society and the Portuguese people.
This was something that would have been impossible in previous revolutions. Thus 99% of the officer caste supported Franco in the Spanish civil war.
True enough, because of the reformist and Stalinist betrayal of the Portuguese revolution-by preventing it from being carried through to completion-there has
reflect the of different
[page 20]
been a reaction. The army has been purged and purged again to become once more a reliable instrument of the bourgeoisie.d
But how far this has succeeded remains to be tested in the events of the revolution in the coming months and years.
But what it has demonstrated is the need for a genuine dialectical understanding and interpretation of the events of the present epoch. If such a transformation was possible, in a semi colonial, but imperialist capitalist Portugal, how much more could similar processes take place in the newly independent countries of Africa and of Asia?
Events in Ethiopia have crush, ingly confirmed the theses we have worked out. There the famine brought about by Haile Selassie and the landlord nobility, was the last catastrophe even the officer caste was prepared to tolerate. The callous indifference of the Emperor and the landlord class to the famine and the death from starvation of hundreds of thousands and possibly even millions, plus the accumulated social contradictions in a backward country under the pressure of imperialism, pushed the middle layers of the officer caste to organise a coup.
This in its turn awakened the movement of the small working class in Addis Abbaba and the students and petit-bourgeois layers in the capital and in the towns. It awakened the peasantry also into a catacylsmic movement to gain control of land. Thus the 1,000 year old "empire" and its class structure under this impetus crumbled into dust.
The crisis in the army and the attempts at counter-revolution, the further impetus this gave to the guerrilla war in Eritrea, theguerrilla war in the Ogaden, aided by direct intervention of Somalia, the uprisings of the Galla and other tribes, all acted as a spur on the revolution.
The movement of the classes in its turn had its effect on the new ruling junta in the army. It produced splits and individual and group conspiracies of officers. These reflected the classes in battle in Ethiopia and the developing civil
war in the whole country. Whatever the individual whims of the officers, they reflected (as in Syria) -and had to reflect-the class struggle taking place. Hardly any wished for a return to the old regime.
The model of the Emperor's land lord semi-feudal regime was rejected by the bulk of the officer caste.
But there were differences as to how far to go which ended in armed conflicts and executions. This in a distorted way perhaps reflected the struggle of the classes in Ethiopia.
It ended in the victory of Lieutenant Colonel Mengistu. Already the land had been divided among the peasants and industry nationalised without compensation to the imperialists and the native capitalists (though of course com pensation is not necessarily the decisive factor).
In the struggles Lieutenant Colonel Mengistu has emerged victorious as a Bonapartist dictator under the influence of the wars and civil wars. In order to obtain mass support Lieutenant Colonel Mengistu, formerly a high-up officer of His Majesty has gone all the way. He (probably without reading a single word of Marx or Lenin) has declared himself a "Marxist Leninist" and set about creating a one party "Marxist-Leninist" totalitari-
19
publle meeting
an dictatorship. This is in the image of Moscow or Peking. The land: lords and capitalists are expr opriated and the imperialist countries are without real influence on the processes taking place in Ethiopia.
In this case the process is clear. It is even clearer than in Mozambique, Angola or the former Aden, and this without a direct struggle against imperialist occupation.
The imperialists are too weak and debilitated to intervene directly by military means and can only grind their teeth in impotence.
But undoubtedly only the Militant foresaw these possibilities in advance for many countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America. The revolution, or rather the primary tasks of the revolution, in backward countries have been accomplished in the regimes mentioned above. Landlordism has been eliminated. Capitalism has been destroyed, the influence of imperialism dispelled.
Thus the bourgeois origin of the leadership of the guerrilla movement in Cuba was of third or fifth rate importance. What was important was the attempt to take action to bring Cuba back to neo-colonial status which precipitated the break of Castro with American imperialism.
It is the social and economic
[page 21]
basic similarities which are decisive for a Marxist in the social overturns in these countries.
To carry through a revolation like that of Russia of October 1917 Tequires the consciousness, the action, the understanding and the active participation and movement of the proletariat itself in the overthrow of capitalism landlordism. It requires organs and organisations through which the proletariat can move such as soviets, shop stewards committees, trade unions and so on. After the victory of the rule of the workers, the checking and control can be effected by such organs of workers' rule.
In fact the outline of the new state within the framework of the old state of capitalism is developed by trade unions. shop stewards committees. co-ops and other organisations with their rights and powers.
In a revolution according to the norm such ad hoe committees and traditional organisations are indispensable. They are a training ground for the workers in the art of running the state. of developing the solidarity and understanding of the workers. After a victorious overthrow of capital they become vehicles for workers' rule, the organs of the new state and of workers' democracy.
But where—as in Eastern Europe. China. Cuba. Syria. Ethiopia-the overthrow takes place with the support of the workers and peasants certainly but without their active control, clearly the result must be different. The petit-bourgeois intellectuals, army officers, leaders of guerrilla bands use the workers and peasants as cannon fodder, merely as points of support, as a gun rest, so to speak.
Their aim, sonaclens, or unconsclous, is not power for the workers and peasants, but power for the their elite. They had and have their model in Stalinist Russia. / The revolution-change in property relations-begins where the Russian revolution • ended, Stalinist Russia of 1945-49, or if you prefer Stalinist Russia of 1978. They are fundamentally the same; a one party totalitarian | state machine
where the proletariat is helpless and atomised, with an apparatus of control of the state by the officials. The guerriila army chiefs who with an iron hand imposed not voluntary discipline-take control undoubtedly with the support of the masses but with no organs of workers' rule Independent of the state whatsoever. Also none of the rights and powers of the workers and peasants, which the existence of soviets as organs of workers' power would mean, exist.
For a transition to a Bonapartist workers' state such organs of workers' democracy, indispensable for a healthy workers' state, would be an enormous hindrance. They constituted a tremendous obstacle to the Stalinist bureaucracy in Russia. which had to wage a Herculean struggle and even a one-sided civil war to erase the last remnants of workers* democracy which stood in the way of their untrammelled and dictatorial rule. This was reflected through the one man dictatorship of Stalin and his successors.
What is important is that this was the model of "socialism" for Mao, for Castro, for Lieutenant Col onel Mengistu, for the Burmese generals and for the Syrian Baathist "Muslim" generals in Syria.
Engels Explained
It is important to see what all these variegated forces have in common not the secondary personal differences but the social forces and class forces they represent.
Lieutenant Colonel Mengistu, Castro, the Burmese generals broke with their class background and the advantages or disadvantages of their "bourgeois and university education" and outlook. It is true that they did not put themselves on the standpoint of the proletariat— as Marx, and Lenin did-but they accepted the much easier "socialism" which entailed the individual rule of them and of their elite on the backs of the working class and peasants.
All individual differences stamped out by the decisive
are class
20
and economic changes which they have presided over in their countries and their societies.
All the self-styled "Marxist- Leninists" sects have not even understood the ABC of Marxism as taught by its founder and echoed by Lenin and Trotsky. This is something to marvel at. The emancipat- Ion of the working class is the task of the workers themselves. This is not because it is some kind of penance which the workers must do or because they are "nice people" . It is because, without this there is the inevitability of a small minority taking control of art, science, industry and the state. Engels explained that in the event of a minority having a monopoly of culture they will then use-and inevitably abuse-their power against the interests of the workers and peasants and in their own interests. Also the mobilisation of the proletariat, its conscious struggle for power, and fight for workers' democracy transforms the proletariat and fits it for the task of workers' rule. This, then partially rubs off onto the peasants and petit-bourgeoisie which follow the proletariat in both the advanced and the backward countries. This process does not take place with the struggle of petit-bourgeois guerrilla bands or where radical army officer cliques take power.
Thus the intellectual and army elite in all the social revolutions and overturns in the countries mentioned took state control firmly into their own hands. They had the passive—or more or less active support—of the masses. But there was not the conscious organised movement of the proletariat. The peasants and petit-bourgeoisie are not a viable substitute for the "self-movement" of the proletariat.
It is a striking fact that in the case of every sect, ex-post-facto they accept Mao and the Chinese revolution and find in the "Communist" badge of Mao the excuse for this. In reality Mao was an ex-Communist who had broken with the proletariat and put himself at the head of a peasant war.
The fact that he later balanced between the classes and in typical Bonapartist fashion, leaned on the
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workers for a time, alters nothing. The fact that the Peking gangsters called their hideous caricature "socialism" or sometimes the "dictatorship of the proletariat" also alters nothing. There is no fundamental difference economically or socially between any of these regimes. This means that the secondary differences in comparison with the basic fundamentals are only of trifling importance. Lenin's Mistake It is no accident also that all the base themselves sects on the mistake of Lenin in "What is to be Done" ie that the proletariat is capable by itself only of "trade union consciousness"
and not "socialist consciousness". In reality this is not Lenin's idea but appropriately Kautsky's. Lenin discovered his mistake, and Lenin's works, as those of Marx and Engels and Trotsky.
not to add Luxembourg and Mehring, are the living refutation of this idea. In all 55 volumes of Lenin's works there is never again the repetition of this error. In fact, without idealising the proletariat, as with all the great Marxists-all his works, down to the smallest article. are saturated with confidence and trust in the mighty power of the proletariat as the only vehicle which would lead mankind to socialism. This, of course, comes from the dialectical materialism of Marx.
In reality all these gentlemen of a haughty if sects have secret-and sometimes not completely secret at that-contempt for the working class. Dialectically, while embracing enthusiastically this false idea, at the same time. they worship at the shrine of Ho Chi Minh or Mao or Castro or Tito or some other proletarian apartist dictator. They are incapable of understanding the process the temporary conjuncture of the economic upswing which led to a long lull in the class struggle in the west and the continuing crisis of society in the underdeveloped world. This was one of the corollary factors of the West's boom. This inevitably led to the rise and development of proletarian Bonapartism in the colonial world, which the dominance of Stalinism in Russia and the predominance of Stalinism and reformism in the workers' movement in the world contributed. to. Only genuine Marxism has been able from the beginning to explain all these "outlandish"
phenomena from the viewpoint of the working class and the class nature of society and the organic crisis of world capitalism which is manifested first of all at its weaker and more backward extremities.
All these regines are temporary aberrations on the road of the world revolution. The excrescence which Stalinism represents will be eliminated almost in passing when the mighty proletariat of one of the advanced countries takes power in the West or the regimes of Russia and Eastern Europe are regenerated by the overthrow of the bureaucracies.
Eclectic Method The "Marxist" sects either preserve a discreet silence as to the class nature of Ethiopia-now-or otherwise characterise the regime as a "petit-bourgeois" or "Bonapartist"
as they did in the case of Cuba.
Such an eclectic method is entirely foreign to Marxism. Genuine Marxists would first take the general world trend of development of society and the international relation of forces between the classes. Then they would consider the relations between the great powers and the world balance of forces between them.
They would also consider the enormous power of the deformed workers* states like that of Russia and China standing at the • back of the development of colonial revolution on the continents of Asia, Africa and Latin America. They would see the impotence of imperialism, especially the strongest.
the USA. to intervene directly at the present Having taken the international context as a basis they would examine the processes taking place in the colonial world. The factors 21 which should be taken into account are the impasse of the colonial countries on a landlord-capitalist basis; the rottenness, premature senility and degeneration of the colonial bourgeoisie: their absolute incapacity in all colonial countries to solve the problems of economic development; the frightful ruin and pauperism of the peasantry, the big majority of the population: the blind alley for the professional classes and the petit-bourgeoisie; a small and weak working class without Marxist leadership and perspectives.
Under such conditions all these factors in the society would affect the ranks of the army not only the peasant rank and file but the lower layers of the officer caste, and even the middle layers, and possibly also some of the tops. The prevailing moods and attitudes of society, even in a semi-feudal society, are bound to affect all layers of the army under conditions of crisis and The army is not hermetically sealed off from the developments in society. In a country of absolutism without a developed proletariat, it is precisely in the army that the crisis of society will reflect itself. We have the fresh example of Portugal, even in a relatively developed semi-colonial country, of the process of revolution beginning in the army. When we consider the regimes of oriental despotism, which the regime of Haile Selassie resembles, it is precisely here that coups and conspiracies in the army are endemic leading to this or that dynasty being replaced by another. In China there were revolts by the peasants over 2000 years leading to victory in many cases but inevitably ending in the vicious circle of the betrayal of the peasants and a new dynasty. That was because there was no economic or political way out on the basis of the Asiatic relations of cumstances we could have had a similar result in Ethiopia. But the whole national and international environment is different to the past. Imperialism, capitalism and finance capital.
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penetrated Ethiopia disastrous decay and society.
The army generals or colonels who began the coup (like those in Portugal) had no idea where they were going. They probably had no intention of even dethroning the Emperor, initially but only in imposing certain reforms on him. But this action lifted the lid on the boiling forces of class. tension underneath the calm. In this case too a crisis in society reflects itself among the ruling class and the ruling elite first.
It opened up a Pandora's box of clashes between classes on the basis of the thousand year old feudal or semi-feudal relations onto which had been grafted the relations and pressures of capitalism and the world market.
Students, always a sensitive barometer, • began to organise, demonstrate and clash with the police and the Army. They reflected the discontent at the lack of outlets and the barbarism and backwardness of the society. The splendour and luxury of the nobility and the court contrasted with peasants who died of hunger.
The wage-earning working class organised strikes and trade unions. The guerrilla war in Eritrea was intensified. This was one of the factors, as in Burma and Portugal, for the collapse of the regime.
The Emperor had no solution to the problems of these national revolts and wars. The Army ranks too were affected by this process. The soldiers were mainly poorer peasants.
All the problems were aggravated by the fall of the Emperor. The students raised the question of "socialism". The workers in the capital and the towns were affected by similar ideas. The peasants, as always hungered for the land.
It is in this atmosphere that plots-and counter-plots-affected the lower, middle and even upper layers of the Army. First births are usually difficult. Later births are usually much easier. In the turmoil in Ethiopia, there were the shining examples of China, Cuba and the other countries of proletarian Bonapartism.
leading to ruin of the
To give themselves a basis in society and within the ranks of the army, after a series of upheavals the ruling junta divided the land among the peasants, and foreign capital, 90% of capital in Ethiopia, was nationalised: After a further upheaval in the leading core of the junta, and tacing wars and civil war simultaneously in the Ogaden, Eritrea and in Ethiopia proper-Mengistu saw 10 way out but to turn to "socialism" '. In this way he outmanoeuvred the students and workers and satisfied the soldiers and peasants, temporarily perhaps but for a historical period nonetheless. It gave the radical officers supporting him a firm basis and access to aid in arms, and economic assistance from Russia and Cuba. (The latter was a willing arm of the Russians), In addition, Cuba provided technicians, special troops and trained fighters and pilots.
Lt. Col. Mengistu
• The hope of the imperialists Ethiopia would disintegrate falsified precisely because she the path of the revolution even distorted form.
Of course, on the road of proletarian Bonapartism the independent trade unions were suppressed and the students' organisations banned. All political parties were banned except for the self-styled "Marxist-Leninist" Party of Mengistu. But in this Mengistu, and the sections of the officer caste supporting him, followed the well worn road of Stalin in Russia and Mao in China etc.
With all the economic
society in the hands of
that was took in a
resources the state,
22•
the ruling caste sees a glittering future before it. They, with the help of Russian arms and aid, seem already to have beaten the revolt of the nobility in its attempts at counter-revolution and the restoration of the "Ancien Regime" They have forced the retreat of the Somali Army from the Ogaden and crushed the national liberation attempt of the Somali separatists. They are poised to bloodily crush the Eritrean insurgency with the help of superior arms supplied by Russia and specialist troops as auxiliaries supplied by Cuba, unless the Eritrean insurgents come to some compromise with them (under pressure from Russia and Cuba, involving some measure of autonomy)
Castro
On this basis the leading clique see a glorious future before them. They are the sole and dominant ruling elite. Basing themselves on state ownership and Marxism-
Leninism" they can decisively develop society in a way which was impossible under the old system, or even under capitalism where they would have been completely dominated-at least economically-by international finance capital and at the mercy of neo-colonialism and the big imperialist powers.
Inevitably the contradictions latent in proletarian Bonapartism will develop and mature. On the other hand there could be a massive increase in class struggles of the working classes in developed countries which will in turn affect Ethiopia.
But such considerations never even enter the heads of the new elite. All they can see are the empirical facts and a glorious future for them and their country (Whose "interests" of course they interpret as being synonymous with their own welfare and domination). In the process of the wars and civil wars which have taken place the decisive economic transition— with all its contradictions on a low economic base-has taken place. Capitalism and landlordism have been overthrown and at least the germs of the new economic system.
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