rudatron posted:

he advocated permanent revolution (something that's just not technically feasible) and a lot of groups that identify as 'troskyist' have a nasty little habit of practicing entryism, which is basically where you join a small activist group, take over the leadership, and then divert its resources to your own book club or whatever

but the man himself was basically used as a monster-under-your-bed by stalin to consolidate power, a reputation he didn't really deserve

conclusion: a tragic historical figure, trotsky was a man of contrasts

quote:

But first, we need to clear something up, because every time I post theory for liberating a country in a half-revolution, I get the same comments asking over and over what it means, even though I have a whole paragraph in the introduction explaining it, which even starts with "if you're wondering what a half-revolution is, read this before commentating to ask". But maybe what you guys need isn't a paragraph. Maybe you guys need an EXAMPLE.

So, consider Lichtenstein--not even the whole county; just consider getting to that spot away from Switzerland's banking system, which is a necessary part of getting communism in Lichtenstein. So, how many revolutions does it take to get there? Well, if you say zero...that's wrong, because then the working class can't go far enough. If you say one, well, it's true that the working class can get there with one, but we can do a little better. We can do it in half a revolution. To do that, we enter Lichtenstein with the means of production already seized, and then we use that revolution to reach the platform.

Now, hold on. I know what you're thinking: A revolution is a revolution, permanently. You can't say it's only a half. Well, Leon """""Icepick""""" Trotsky, hear me out.

A revolution press actually has three parts to it: When the means of production are seized, when the means of production are held (in either a dictatorship of the proletariat or an anarchist commune), and when the state dissolves. And together, this forms one complete revolution. Now, usually, it's the seizing that's useful, because that's the only part that makes the borgiousie react. However, sometimes it's sufficient to just use the holding part, which allows the working class to do little kicks, to swim in liberal tears, to move outside of a market, and to spend labor vouchers instead of money. And as for the dissolution of the state, well, there's currently no cases where that's useful or important, so don't worry bout that part (since it hasn't happened historically yet).

Now, if we map out the required revolutions for Lichtenstein, it would look like this: we merely need to have our own means of production to not be dependent on the Swiss banking system, we need a revolution to provide a counternarrative against Lichtenstein's "princely" history, and we need a revolution again to achieve communism. So, how many revolutions is that total? Well, it appears to be three, and if we we're liberating this country in isolation, then yeah; it would be three. But in a worldwide spread of communism, there are other revolutions that occur earlier in history, such as /this/ revolution needed to offically dissolve the Switzerland-Lichtenstein border. So, if we take that revolution into consideration as well, then how many revolutions would it take? The left-com answer would be three: one to enter Lichtenstein, and the three within the country that we established earlier. However, we can do better! We can actually do it in two and a half, by simply holding the means of production seized during the border dissolution to be used for independence from the banking system, because the half-revolution only required the means of production to be held, not actually seized. So in this fashion, Lichtenstein only adds on an additional two revolutions to the worldwide spread of communism, since the first revolution only leeches off a previous revolution. So to capture this dialectic, we call it 2.5 revolutions. In a single country, you'd round that up to three, but in a worldwide spread, you'd round it down to two. So, in conclusion, since that first revolution counts in some contexts, but adds no additional revolutions in other contexts, we refer to it as a "half revolution".

Ferrinus posted:

Ferrinus posted:

Ferrinus posted:

Enjoy posted:

Permanent revolution was a programme in the context of the Soviet Union's early days: it was advocacy of outwards expansion by intervening on the side of fellow revolutionaries in Hungary, Germany etc. Rather similar to the actual policy pursued after the Second World War.

It's not literally having a revolt every day for eternity.

The ruling clique under Stalin instead went with Socialism in One Country, ie building up domestic heavy industries to reduce reliance on other countries. This was why they imported American architects to design Ford factories, and Alaskan gold mining engineers, for example. Shame a lot of them got shot in the purges.

Pener Kropoopkin posted:

The reason that idea is goofy and wouldn't work, is because it'd practically put the Soviet Union in a forever war with the entire planet, and no country is capable of keeping that up - especially not a country which was agrarian and had as little industry as the SU.

The Fascists attempted a forever war and it didn't work out.

Enjoy posted:

The idea was more like the USSR helping the PRC win their civil war, but with Germany and the former Austrian Empire. Big difference between outsiders helping a revolution, and the genocide campaigns of the Nazis.

Pener Kropoopkin posted:

The USSR helped the communists win in China because they occupied Manchuria as an ally against Imperial Japan. You can't just keep invading countries to install communist governments without a drat good excuse. The Soviets tried exporting revolution even during the civil war, and they got about as far as Warsaw before having a major setback. If you take an official footing of permanent revolution then you're inviting a First Coalition scenario with machineguns, barbed wire, and massed artillery.

Homework Explainer posted:

my phone knows the deal

SSJ_naruto_2003 posted:

Supporting communism is a good excuse imo

rudatron posted:

There's also the moral issues with interfering in a country through a political movement that does not have popular legitimacy or support from the majority of the population. If socialism is to work, it must be democratic, ergo it cannot be forced on any population unless and until a majority of that population actually supports it, ideologically. If they don't, they'll simply vote to repeal it.

Pener Kropoopkin posted:

The USSR helped the communists win in China because they occupied Manchuria as an ally against Imperial Japan. You can't just keep invading countries to install communist governments without a drat good excuse. The Soviets tried exporting revolution even during the civil war, and they got about as far as Warsaw before having a major setback. If you take an official footing of permanent revolution then you're inviting a First Coalition scenario with machineguns, barbed wire, and massed artillery.

Tacky-rear end Rococco posted:

Worked fine for the French. Sounds like communists lack courage in their convictions.

Enjoy posted:

Agreed. This is why I reject Marxism-Leninism, and the legacy of the Bolsheviks.

Pener Kropoopkin posted:

France was also the continental superpower, whereas the nascent Soviet Union had been blooded by three years of a disastrous Great War, and 4 years of possibly the most brutal civil war in human history. Their people were exhausted from all of the violence & strife, their industries and the industrial proletariat was decimated by civil war, and the economy was still mostly agrarian to begin with. The Soviet Union was in no condition for global conquest, and really no country in history ever has been except perhaps the Mongols.

And... if only Napoleon had invaded England instead of Russia


The Bolsheviks did end up representing the popular will, but only because the Mensheviks hosed up so hard.

Homework Explainer posted:

yes it is impossible to gauge how popular the bolsheviks were in the period from 1917 on. If only there were some kind of mass movement we could look to as demonstration

rudatron posted:

It's not feasible to have elections during the time of a full blown civil war

Homework Explainer posted:

yes it is impossible to gauge how popular the bolsheviks were in the period from 1917 on. If only there were some kind of mass movement we could look to as demonstration

Weeping Wound posted:

according to this poll taken by the czar, it appears they weren't very well-liked at all!

Tacky-rear end Rococco posted:

The US had federal elections in 1862 and 1864.

e: just pointing out that the US actually owns.

Enjoy posted:

It was after the Tsar had been overthrown. It was held by the liberal-dominated provisional government, and the left-wing Socialist Revolutionaries won, so pretending it was a sham held by the rulers (as the Soviet elections were) would be pretty absurd.

Tacky-rear end Rococco posted:

The US had federal elections in 1862 and 1864.

e: just pointing out that the US actually owns.

GalacticAcid posted:

Star Wars is for children

SSJ_naruto_2003 posted:

Supporting communism is a good excuse imo

rudatron posted:

the french revolution's personal waterloo

Yossarian-22 posted:

Countries are a bourgeois construct anyhow

Enjoy posted:

What do you mean by countries