Stalinism: Its Origin and Future. Andy Blunden 1993
The five volumes of this work are based around the thesis that Stalinism is the politics expressing the interests of the bureaucracy of a workers' state.
According to the basic tenets of Marxism "workers' state" is itself a living contradiction – or more accurately a "dying contradiction," for it is the sole mission of a workers state to prepare the basis for its own obsolescence – the overthrow of capitalism and the transition of a free, classless, socialist society. A workers' state which finds itself isolated within a capitalist world after the ebb of the revolutionary tide is in a near impossible situation.
Whether a successful revolution gives rise to a rapid spread of revolution across the world, a short interregnum before new upheavals, or a protracted period of isolation, there is an inherent contradiction between the working class and its professional representatives. This contradiction manifests itself in all workers' organisations, but the manifestation of this social contradiction within a state apparatus is a contradiction of a specific character. The study of this specific character has been the subject of all the previous sections of this work.
Beginning from about the time of the death of Stalin, the glue which bound the international Communist movement together began to weaken. The failed Eastern European political revolution was followed by the Sino-Soviet split in the world communist movement, "Euro-communism" and an accelerating process of disintegration which rolled from the West, through Eastern Europe and the Baltic Republics to the gates of the Russian Parliament.
Rather like the Portuguese fascist state in 1974, the Stalinist state of the USSR had outlived all its internal enemies but also its usefulness, and in 1991 slit its own throat.
Castro still survives in Cuba, and in China, the Communist Party remains in power but is organising the reconstruction of capitalism. In some countries of the former Soviet bloc, the leaders of the former Stalinist regimes are back in national leadership. But these qualifications in no way alter the essential fact that the social base of Stalinism – the workers' state bureaucracy – is gone. That social basis cannot return other than as a by-product of a new successful socialist revolution – an entirely different social and political situation which will have to be evaluated in its time.
With the loss of its social base, Stalinism as a world movement is gone. The governments, parties, groups and individuals who were part of that world movement in past years have all gone their own way. It is of the utmost importance for the period we are now living in that every single individual, grouping or party be allowed to find their own way and not be judged either on the basis of past political positions or on the remnants of that past in their political conceptions.
In the minds of the masses there is not a sharp line easily drawn between the revolutionary movements of the past and their heroic leaders. In finding their way to new revolutionary struggles, the workers will undoubtedly rediscover the problems and errors of the past.
Of course, the experience of the past 70 years provides the basis to rectify these errors and overcome the degeneration which affected past movements. But that does not mean that the lessons of the past will be easily learnt. Revolutionary socialists of all persuasions, including both Trotskyists and Stalinists and the younger generation which is learning its Marxism under conditions where the nature of these two tendencies is relatively obscure, now have the opportunity to join hands in the fight against social-democracy and all the parties of capitalism. It is absolutely essential that we are able engage in political discussion and draw the lessons of the past while maintaining and expressing the utmost respect for each other.
"Stalinism" is a word which is very much a part of the Trotskyist lexicon which therefore easily acts as a barrier to such a discussion. Nevertheless, "Stalinism" is a concept the understanding of which is absolutely essential to the success of the next socialist revolution. Thus it is necessary to learn how to discuss the nature of Stalinism.
In the foregoing, I have not discussed at all the history of the Trotskyist movement. That is an entirely different story – but nor is it a pretty one! Nevertheless, there is little to be said of the history of the Trotskyist movement that is not more or less adequately covered in the foregoing discussion of Stalinism. Without for a moment letting go of the value of the Trotskyist analysis of the workers' state bureaucracy, we must so far as possible draw upon the theoretical common ground of classical Marxism as the arena of political analysis.
Such an approach has the added advantage of obliging us all to rework all the analyses and, dare I say, mythology of twentieth century communism in the process of making an analysis of post-modern capitalism.