Atrocious Joe posted:

https://twitter.com/plbmagazine/status/1688950554796716033?s=20

Domenico Losurdo's Stalin book is getting an official English language release finally

tristeham posted:

Pentecoastal Elites posted:

moreover, capital is the medium which these particular institutions are built from. You can't remove capitalism without dismantling the structures that keep it in place: if you want to tear down a house you have to remove the walls and roof at some point. Once those structures are gone, there is no more of that stuff to reconstitute similar social structures. The institutions can't take hold because there is nothing for them to embed themselves in.

Absolutely you had a lot of movement from high status in feudalism to the capital class because in many cases the nobility was able to jump shift or use the extant power structure to force themselves into privileged positions, but that is because both feudalism and capitalism are class-based. The whole communism thing is about dissolving class, not specifically eliminating capitalism or capitalists. Once you get there and it's workers all the way down, what do you build your hegemonic institutions with? Wealth? How could you amass it? Military command? Who would the workers of the world fight against?

Communism wouldn't be the same sort of change that feudalism to capitalism was, it would be a change as fundamental as the one from hunter-gatherers to agricultural society was. Just a complete reformulation of the human experience and subjectivity.

Sunny Side Up posted:

if you want some non-doomer actually hopeful stuff for once, and not purely production-focused (e.g. "Four Futures"), there's some good accounts out there of the Great Leap Forward and how the attempt to decommodify production/exchange rippled and cascaded into interpersonal relationships. just cool poo poo, barely graspable, like a tesseract or an echo from the future

Pentecoastal Elites posted:

I love that stuff. Any recs?

Pentecoastal Elites posted:

For a while I got into similar periods in Cuban and Russian history and it's both incredibly inspiring and heartbreaking how once regular rear end normal people get involved with the revolutionary project everything just clicks into place. You get like, completely uneducated totally illiterate farmers who generate these completely salient and often profound marxist analyses in the immediate postrevolutionary period, not because they read anything (though I don't doubt everyone was talking about the relevant theory), but because they lived the revolutionary process, and its like... man if we started there? if that's where everyone was by say like 1930 or whatever? impossible to think about in the same way the sun is too bright to look at.

Atrocious Joe posted:

https://twitter.com/plbmagazine/status/1688950554796716033?s=20

Domenico Losurdo's Stalin book is getting an official English language release finally

Thomas Mann posted:

To place Russian communism and Nazi-fascism on the same moral plane, in
that both would be totalitarian, is superficial at best, fascism at worst. Whoever
insists on this equation may well consider himself a democrat, in truth and
in the bottom of his heart he is in fact already a fascist, and certainly only in
a hypocritical and insincere way will he fight fascism, while reserving all his
hatred for communism.

Raskolnikov38 posted:

oh sweet jesus is volume 3 a breath of fresh air after trudging through volume 2

Raskolnikov38 posted:

oh sweet jesus is volume 3 a breath of fresh air after trudging through volume 2

Raskolnikov38 posted:

oh sweet jesus is volume 3 a breath of fresh air after trudging through volume 2

Ferrinus posted:

Marenghi posted:

Seeing the replies and QTs to this, people saying if the government try take their property they'd do the same, along with salting the land so the Black people starve.
And it suddenly makes so much sense why Dekulakization was necessary.
https://twitter.com/AdvoBarryRoux/status/1689941425360605184?s=20

Ferrinus posted:

talking about dekulakization with anticommunists is funny because they'll exist in a state of quantum superposition where on one hand the cruel communists deliberately starved everyone to discipline them and on the other hand the brave landlords (oppressed) (smol) nobly chose death before dishonor just like anyone would. i've seen someone flip back and forth over whether it was the communists or the kulaks who actually slaughtered the cattle depending on whether it was rhetorically useful in the moment

J.V. Stalin, "On The Grain Front", 1928 posted:

Question: What should be considered as the basic cause of our difficulties in the matter of the grain supply? What is the way out of these difficulties? What, in connection with these difficulties, are the conclusions that must be drawn as regards the rate of development of our industry, particularly from the point of view of the relation between the light and heavy industries?

Answer: At first sight it may appear that our grain difficulties are an accident, the result merely of faulty planning, the result merely of a number of mistakes committed in the sphere of economic co-ordination. But it may appear so only at first sight. Actually the causes of the difficulties lie much deeper. That faulty planning and mistakes in economic co-ordination have played a considerable part—of that there cannot be any doubt. But to attribute everything to faulty planning and chance mistakes would be a gross error. It would be an error to belittle the role and importance of planning. But it would be a still greater error to exaggerate the part played by the planning principle, in the belief that we have already reached a stage of development when it is possible to plan and regulate everything.

It must not be forgotten that in addition to elements which lend themselves to our planning activities there are also other elements in our national economy which do not as yet lend themselves to planning; and that, lastly, there are classes hostile to us which cannot be overcome simply by the planning of the State Planning Commission.

That is why I think that we must not reduce everything to a mere accident, to mistakes in planning, etc.

And so, what is the basis of our difficulties on the grain front?

[...]

I have already said in one of my reports that the capitalist elements in the countryside, and primarily the kulaks, took advantage of these difficulties in order to disrupt Soviet economic policy. You know that the Soviet government adopted a number of measures aimed at putting a stop to the anti-Soviet action of the kulaks. I shall not therefore dwell on this matter here. In the present case it is another question that interests me. I have in mind the reasons for the slow increase in the production of marketable grain, the question why the increase in the production of marketable grain in our country is slower than the increase in the demand for grain, in spite of the fact that our crop area and the gross production of grain have already reached the pre-war level.

Indeed, is it not a fact that our grain crop area has already reached the pre-war mark? Yes, it is a fact. Is it not a fact that already last year the gross production of grain was equal to the pre-war output, i.e., 5,000 million poods? Yes, it is a fact. How, then, is it to be explained that, in spite of these circumstances, the amount of marketable grain we are producing is only one half, and the amount we are exporting is only about one-twentieth, of the pre-war figure?

J.V. Stalin, "Concerning Questions of Agrarian Policy in the U.S.S.R.", 1929 posted:

[...]

Until recently the Party adhered to the policy of restricting the exploiting tendencies of the kulaks. As you know, this policy was proclaimed as far back as the Eighth Party Congress. It was again announced at the time of the introduction of the NEP and at the Eleventh Congress of our Party. We all remember Lenin’s well-known letter about Preobrazhensky’s theses7 (1922), in which Lenin once again returned to the need for pursuing this policy. Finally, this policy was confirmed by the Fifteenth Congress of our Party. And it was this policy that we were pursuing until recently.

Was this policy correct? Yes, it was absolutely correct at the time. Could we have undertaken such an offensive against the kulaks some five years or three years ago? Could we then have counted on success in such an offensive? No, we could not. That would have been the most dangerous adventurism. It would have been a very dangerous playing at an offensive. For we should certainly have failed, and our failure would have strengthened the position of the kulaks. Why? Because we did not yet have in the countryside strong points in the form of a wide network of state farms and collective farms which could be the basis for a determined offensive against the kulaks. Because at that time we were not yet able to replace the capitalist production of the kulaks by the socialist production of the collective farms and state farms.

In 1926-1927, the Zinoviev-Trotsky opposition did its utmost to impose upon the Party the policy of an immediate offensive against the kulaks. The Party did not embark on that dangerous adventure, for it knew that serious people cannot afford to play at an offensive. An offensive against the kulaks is a serious matter. It should not be confused with declamations against the kulaks. Nor should it be confused with a policy of pinpricks against the kulaks, which the Zinoviev-Trotsky opposition did its utmost to impose upon the Party. To launch an offensive against the kulaks means that we must smash the kulaks, eliminate them as a class. Unless we set ourselves these aims, an offensive would be mere declamation, pin-pricks, phrase mongering, anything but a real Bolshevik offensive. To launch an offensive against the kulaks means that we must prepare for it and then strike at the kulaks, strike so hard as to prevent them from rising to their feet again. That is what we Bolsheviks call a real offensive. Could we have undertaken such an offensive some five years or three years ago with any prospect of success? No, we could not.

Indeed, in 1927 the kulaks produced over 600,000,000 poods of grain, about 130,000,000 poods of which they marketed outside the rural districts. That was a rather serious power, which had to be reckoned with. How much did our collective farms and state farms produce at that time? About 80,000,000 poods, of which about 35,000,000 poods were sent to the market (marketable grain). Judge for yourselves, could we at that time have replaced the kulak output and kulak marketable grain by the output and marketable grain of our collective farms and state farms? Obviously, we could not.

What would it have meant to launch a determined offensive against the kulaks under such conditions? It would have meant certain failure, strengthening the position of the kulaks and being left without grain. That is why we could not and should not have undertaken a determined offensive against the kulaks at that time, in spite of the adventurist declamations of the Zinoviev-Trotsky opposition.

But today? What is the position now? Today, we have an adequate material base for us to strike at the kulaks, to break their resistance, to eliminate them as a class, and to replace their output by the output of the collective farms and state farms. You know that in 1929 the grain produced on the collective farms and state farms has amounted to not less than 400,000,000 poods (200,000,000 poods less than the gross output of the kulak farms in 1927). You also know that in 1929 the collective farms and state farms have supplied more than 130,000,000 poods of marketable grain (i.e., more than the kulaks in 1927). Lastly, you know that in 1930 the gross output of the collective farms and state farms will amount to not less than 900,000,000 poods of grain (i.e., more than the gross output of the kulaks in 1927), and their output of marketable grain will be not less than 400,000,000 poods (i.e., incomparably more than the kulaks supplied in 1927).

mila kunis posted:

think i asked this before, but are there good resources on how collective was implemented in the PRC, and why the rollout wasn't a big disaster like it was in the USSR?

mila kunis posted:

think i asked this before, but are there good resources on how collective was implemented in the PRC, and why the rollout wasn't a big disaster like it was in the USSR?

quote:

Should the price of raw material fall by an amount = d, then s/C, or s/(c + v) becomes s/(C - d), or s/((c - d) + v). Thus, the rate of profit rises. Conversely, if the price of raw material rises, then s/C, or s/(c + v), becomes s/(C + d), or s/((c + d) + v), and the rate of profit falls.

quote:

Should the price of raw material fall by an amount = d, then s/C, or s/(c + v) becomes s/(C - d), or s/((c - d) + v), and the rate of profit falls.

Raskolnikov38 posted:

is the penguin edition of capital regarded as good? i just found an error in vol 3 chapter 6

it should read, according to the marxist.com version:

however the penguin edition reads:

which threw me for a loop because obvisiouly the math does not work that way and contradicts exactly what marx is saying lol

Raskolnikov38 posted:

is the penguin edition of capital regarded as good? i just found an error in vol 3 chapter 6

it should read, according to the marxist.com version:

however the penguin edition reads:

which threw me for a loop because obvisiouly the math does not work that way and contradicts exactly what marx is saying lol

Marenghi posted:

Penguin contradict themselves. It looks like they edited the sentence to be shorter but mangled the meaning.

At least it's an easy mistake to catch. If the price of materials go down the rate of profit increases.

swimsuit posted:

https://maoistcultexposed.wordpress.com

Miles Blundell posted:

Investment is predicated on growth, there's no reason to invest in a company if it's not going to be worth more next year, or next quarter or whatever.

Marx goes more into the specifics of it in kapital vol 1, but essentially the entire system requires neverending growth or it just collapses into recession and disaster. Since neverending growth is impossible in an extractive and exploitative system, we see a cycle of collapse and recession throughout capitalist history.

e: essentially if you're not growing then someone else is going to come in and eat your lunch and take up the slack from your stagnant business. All the motivating structures in capitalism boil down to "grow or die", a stagnant business is treated the same as a dying one, and investors will rapidly drop the stock, which drops the price of the company, which means that it's not worth anything anymore and all the extra debts and poo poo that it took when it thought it was worth a shitload are now unpayable.

Non-profit organizations don't need to generate unending profit and growth, as the name implies, but unless they work in a field in which profit is not a realistic option (ostensibly charity, but under neoliberalism even that isn't guaranteed) they will always be outcompeted by companies with a growth model, as they attract investment and an opportunity to raise a shitzillion dollars and market and overproduce until the non-profit is dead.