Socialist Studies
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Socialist Party of Great Britain Polemic - Socialism & The State-Why Buick is Wrong
The
following reply to the Clapham based Socialist Party regarding Socialism
and the State was circulated in October 1991.
Buick
claims that the circular from the expelled members "distort
the views of the Party and of Marx and Engels".
1).
He asserts that the 1984 Conference Resolution- "that Socialism
will entail the immediate abolition and not the gradual decline of
the State" - was intended "to re-assert the traditional
Party view".
Wrong
- the Party view was clearly stated in the statement adopted at the
1978 Conference. Dealing with the "predictable conditions
after
the process of establishing Socialism has been completed
the
State machinery, including the armed forces, will have passed out
of control of the capitalists and come under social control. Socialists
will constitute the majority in all occupations in which the working
class predominate - in production, transport, communications, police
and armed forces".
Referring
to Clause 6 of the Principles, it argued: "Implicit in this
conception has always been recognition that, in the period of changeover,
control of the armed forces would be continued for as long as necessary
in the light of conditions then existing. It has never been the Party's
case that simultaneously with gaining control the armed forces would
at once be wholly dismantled. In Engels' words: "The state is
not abolished. It dies out". (SOCIALISM: UTOPIAN AND SCIENTIFIC).
That
was the Socialist Party of Great Britain position. The 1984 resolution on "the immediate
abolition
of the State" changed it.
2).
Buick claims that the expelled members are wrong to state that "the
"abolition of the State" is an Anarchist theory"
since, he says, this is "an integral part of Socialist theory".
To
argue this is to ignore the history of the debate between Bakunin
and Marx. Bakunin argued that the abolition of the State was a pre-condition
of Socialism, while Marx and Engels held that socialism would result
in the state "dissolving" or "withering away"
as a consequence of the social revolution.
The Socialist Party of Great Britain developed its position in the D. of P. in 1904, and in the 1978
statement, on the basis of Marx's position. But the 1984 resolution
-especially with Buick's gloss that it dealt with "the conditions
that would have to be met before it could be said that socialism has
been established" - goes back to Bakunin. It asserts that abolition
of the state is a pre-condition for Socialism.
How
can that be consistent with Clause 6 of the 1904 Declaration of Principles?
If the S.P. takes the view that "the immediate abolition of
the State" is a pre-condition for Socialism, how can it also
argue that the working class must use "the machinery of government"
as "the agent of emancipation"?
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