Stolenfromreddit

Stolenfromreddit wrote

State capitalism is not a new form of economy nor is it a transitional form between capitalism and socialism: it is pure capitalism, and appeared along with all the other forms of monopoly in the period of the victory of the bourgeoisie over the feudal powers. On the other hand, the capital-state relation lies at the basis of the bourgeois economy in all of its stages.

In short;

  • Capitalists existed in Russia. Both social and actual individuals. The state took the form of a capitalist and also the collective farms and peasants with their private plots. Markets existed, even free markets, including a black market. There were even "soviet millionaires". Private property was enshrined by law in the collective farms.

  • Capital ran Russia. The law of value made itself felt by the shifting changes in prices and wages and on what was produced. Profit existed, in fact, it was made into a legal requirement for state firms to make a profit. Speculation existed in the countryside with their markets.

  • Labour was alienated, there was a constant drive to push down wages and make labour more productive (along capitalist lines, of course). Relative freedom was only awarded due to the need for labour in the process of industrialisation. Still, unemployment was wide spread.

  • Russia was not tending towards or transitioning to socialism/communism only to be thwarted at the last minute by "revisionists" and "capitalist roaders".

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Stolenfromreddit wrote

The writings of Proudhon were adopted by Valois and Sorel due to their popularity in France (as well as due to Proudhon's actually-existing misogynist, racist, antisemitic beliefs, although these were not central to his social science). In Italy and Spain, Mussolini and Franco cited communist and syndicalist works, respectively. Oswald Mosely had distinctly socialist leanings originally, as did many early Nazis. There is perhaps more of a link between the far-right and the far-left than most leftists (and right-wingers too, for that matter) would be willing to admit, and for perfectly good reasons, being that to acknowledge this would lend at least a little bit of credence to the horseshoe-theory dingdongs. All of us know how eager the right is to co-opt our imagery, organizational strategies, and tactics, starved of good ideas as they are. But it is important for us to acknowledge how many right wingers emerged out of the left wing, including Mosely, Sorel, Mussolini, Franco, Valois, Strasser, etc. This makes at least some sense because of how socialism and nationalism emerged as ideologies. Socialism is not theoretically incompatible with nationalism (although in practice it is), and so the idea that nationalists would co-opt the revolutionary theories of socialism for their own reactionary ends, or even that certain socialist thinkers may be swayed by the arguments of nationalism is not unthinkable. These facts are less true today than they were eighty, ninety, one hundred years ago, but its worth noting that Jason Kessler, the garbage monster who organized the "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville, cut his teeth on Occupy Wall Street. This kind of shit is why we need to be wary of extreme anti-idpol douches. Call them in, and if they refuse to grow or change, cut them out.

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