Revolutionary Political Program 2^nd part

So that socialism prevails, the revolutionary process must be victorious world-wide or at least in the basic capitalist countries. Socialism and communism, regardless of the terms chosen, as they were described by Marx, Engels and Lenin is contradictory on the one hand in relation to the “socialism” described by Kaoutsky, which proposed working power plus state property plus co-operatives, and on the other, in relation to that proposed by Stalin, who dwindled socialism to working power and transitional measures. Defining the final goal is of prime importance for the choice of ways so as to achieve this goal as well. The views supporting a peaceful passage to socialism were the aftermath of the degradation of socialism to working power plus state property plus co- operatives or working power and transitional measures. On the contrary, the Marxist conception of socialism is closely related to the choice of a revolutionary way.

The revolutionary process

The production relations of capitalism can not be overcome in a regular or automatic way, that is to say to be transformed into socialist production relations through the development of the production forces. This happened until now in history, as within the framework of the supreme mode of production, the production relations of the future system emerged and finally were imposed “spontaneously” and regularly. To give an example, the passage from feudalism to capitalism occurred through the appearance of capitalist relations within the feudalistic mode of production and their gradual domination. The bourgeois and the nation- liberating revolutions in the most developed countries have just accelerated this process, which proves to be objective, as the capitalist relations prevailed in backward countries that did not experience such revolutionary facts.

In contrast with the former modes of production and even though there are tendencies of the future society emerging from the capitalist mode of production and the bourgeois society, the passage from capitalism to socialism necessitates the domination of politics over economy. This is why the revolutionary novelty, the violent abolition of the political power of the bourgeois class, smashing the bourgeois state, and the working class seizing the power are absolutely necessary.

The victorious revolutionary process has nothing to do with conspiracy plans, secret companies which represent views that are foreign to Marxism. On the contrary, the most wide political action is needed so as to win the majority of the working class by means of a working policy and the struggle for working power. This is the basic political condition so as to launch a victorious revolution.

The existence of a powerful agent of the working policy, that is to say of a mass revolutionary party, may accentuate the system antagonisms and accelerate a revolutionary situation. Nevertheless, it does not consist the unique nor the most important factor to determine the passage in such a period. Believing such a thing is voluntarism. The objective circumstances give birth to the revolutionary situation. The Subject’s action switches the revolutionary situation into a victorious revolution, taking it to the end, until the subversion of the dictatorship of the bourgeois class and the establishment of the working power.

The revolutionary situation emerges within capitalism itself, as its crisis may break out in sharp forms, such as an abrupt deterioration of the living standard of workers or the abrupt precipitation of the middle strata into the proletariat (e.g. Argentine). The burst of public fury in an insurrection creates the ground for the working class and the ally strata to form the organs of a working policy, i.e. the revolutionary councils (soviets).

Only in such a period, the basic antagonism between work and capital appears naked in the fore, and that’s why the possibility appears for the whole working class to have a revolutionary policy, a possibility which is not offered in the period of “peaceful” class struggle, and that’s why it is possible only in such a period to form organs of working policy, the working revolutionary councils. Such councils presage the workers republic, and after the victory of revolution, the basic cells of the working power.

Switching the revolutionary situation into a victorious revolution cannot be realized if in the political foreground there is no such force that can play the role of a political revolutionary vanguard, i.e. the revolutionary party, or if the revolutionary forces are weak and have lost their connection with the working class.

The formulation of revolutionary councils signals the organization of the working class into a “class for itself” and the passage to a period of dual power, which ends either by the victory of the revolution and the subversion of the bourgeois class in the revolt country or by its shattering and the consolidation of the bourgeois power. The proposition for the formulation of the revolutionary councils, which are the basic cells of the working state is an element of the revolutionary political program.

Transitional period- working power- working republic program

From the victory of the revolution to the domination of socialism, the first phase of the communist society, there is a period of revolutionary transformations of society, the transitional period. Both the duration and the issue of this period depend mainly on the international power interrelation, in other words, on the rate of spreading the revolutionary process. A main condition for the victory of socialism is the victory of the revolution world- wide, or at least in the basic capitalist countries. The political program of the transition from capitalism to socialism, after the revolutionary subversion of the bourgeois supremacy, is the workers republic (or, in other words, the proletariat dictatorship) program, which constitutes a complete power proposition.

In the “Manifest of a communist party”, Marx and Engels cite ten points, which make up the first transitional program in history. The experience of the working movement has been enriched ever since, by the theoretic works of other revolutionaries and the positive and negative experiences of the revolutionary subversion and the attempts to consolidate the workers republic, especially in Russia, but in other countries as well. Profiting from the experience of the working movement is needed so as to formulate a modern revolutionary program, taking into consideration the development of the production forces and the technological progress that create new possibilitiew fir the working power.

So as to formulate a complete political program, it is necessary to have developed a wide network in society, and have a complete idea of all of the social strata and the production structures of a country. However, from today, the communists must discuss the criteria for the formulation of such a program text, its chief points and its connection with the everyday struggle. The workers republic program describes the first transformations of the working power which are guided by the final goal, the socialism- communism. That is why the connection of this program with the final goal is so important, as the differences in defining the final goal (socialism- communism) are reflected in all the political programs of the several parties, revealing huge differences distinguishing them.

The workers republic program is ruled by socialist criteria, but it describes transformations in the production and social relations which, once completed do not give passage to socialism in an automatic way. There is a limit which is provided objectively by the level of the production forces and the production and social relations of the society and the time in which it is formulated.

For instance, a basic goal must be the complete and substantial socialization of the means of production, meaning their administration by the producers in a substantial sense. Guided by this goal, the workers republic program may include working control over the production, the appropriation of the means of production in the property of the state, their submission to a central outline of economy, and their formal socialization, by giving workers the formal right to handle economy, though it takes workers a much longer time to have the substantial capacity to handle the economical activity in total. So as to acquire this substantial capacity, it is necessary to carry out much deeper transformations in all the levels of social activity.

Respectively, the suppression of the discrimination between manual and mental work can be conquered only after a series of political conditions have been realized and it constitutes a characteristic of complete communism, it is a goal, a guide and a criterion for describing the transformations leading society to this direction. It is not a simple reform to be conquered directly after the revolution by means of a simple decree, as supported by the anarchist and leftist conceptions. The points of the working republic program that serve to achieve this goal should concern reforms in education, reforms orientated to extend the education level of the working class (e.g. free access to all the levels of education, with the educational and economical support of the working state).

A basic aspect of the workers republic program is the substitution of the bourgeois state, which has been smashed by then, by the working semi- state. At that time, the social majority takes the place of the privileged minority special institutions. That is to say, the bourgeois state is replaced by the working councils (Soviets) which function in direct democracy, are represented by elected and directly revocable representatives; the wider sections of the working masses are attracted to fulfill the functions of the state power, the less necessary becomes this very power. In this sense, the state begins to get dead.

The workers republic political program must be exposed from now on to the working class, since it constitutes a relatively complete power proposition, a positive proposition for another form of social organization.

The connection of the transitional program with the everyday struggle- the “transitional demands”

The struggle of workers against their employer or a group of employers is an economic struggle. The struggle against the state for questions concerning the whole working class is a political struggle. Even in the case of a political struggle, even the most radical demand is no more than a struggle for a certain reform. The sum of radical demands does not constitute a revolutionary program on no account. Such a list of demands may be necessary in certain periods of time, but separately, without being connected to a total revolutionary program and the power question, could be made by the economists, but not by the revolutionaries.

A revolutionary party profits from its program in order to gather forces, to convince parts of the working class of the necessity and the possibility of the revolution and communism and to connect this program with the nowadays demands of the working class. This connection is realized by the transitional demands, which concern in fact some reforms which are conceived by workers as socially necessary, but can be realized only by the workers republic state.

To give an example, such a transitional demand is the demand for working control over the insurance funds. It impossible to be realized in capitalism, or in the best of all cases, it needs a power interrelation of a revolutionary situation, but it can be conceived by the working class as socially necessary and, consequently as a goal to struggle for. In the same way, the general demand for workers control over the production by elected and directly revocable representatives of workers is impossible in capitalism as well.

The transitional working state can satisfy these demands in a better way, by suppressing for example all the insurance funds, and giving the pensions out of the state budget, thus incorporating the demand for working control over the funds in the control the class must conduct over its state. Consequently, the transitional demands are the demands that evoke the transitional political program and the power of the working class, but must be included from today in the direct programs of struggle proposed to the class by the revolutionary party.