Front. Philos. China 2014, 9(3): 342–349 DOI 10.3868/s030-003-014-0029-6

   

SPECIAL THEME

Tom Rockmore

Marx and the Transition Problem Abstract Marx is concerned with theory that not only interprets but also changes the world. His central concern lies in the transition from capitalism to communism. This paper examines three ways that he might understand this transition as concerns economic crisis, politics, or the proletariat. Keywords

transition, capitalism, communism, crisis, politics, proletariat

In the famous eleventh “Thesis on Feuerbach,” Marx announced a conception of theory intended not merely to interpret but also to change the world. Now there are obviously different ways to do this, some useful, some pernicious, some intended to contribute to individual self-gratification, others meant to contribute to the welfare of the wider community. We know from many indications in other texts that Marx aims to change the world through bringing about a transition from capitalism to communism. This intention creates the so-called “transition problem,” which I will understand as the transition from capitalism to communism however understood. This transition is problematic on different levels. These include the meaning of the terms “capitalism” and “communism,” especially the latter, as well as the mechanism of this proposed transition. It is clear that a transition from capitalism to communism is not only desirable but also necessary; it is not clear how Marx intends this to occur or even that he has thought through this central problem in his theory. The importance of this theme is acknowledged in different ways by Marx’s supporters as well as his detractors. Marx’s critics acknowledge his success in changing the world while often deploring what has been accomplished in his name. Many opponents of Marxist regimes object less to Marx’s vision of a future society than to features that on even a simple interpretation of the texts seem incompatible with Marx’s intentions. Such features include Stalinist labor  

Received September 9, 2013  Tom Rockmore ( ) Department of Philosophy, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China E-mail: [email protected]

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camps, deportation of whole populations, wholesale censorship, massive famine, and so on. Others advance forms of the argument that the way that Marx’s position was realized in practice was in fact the only possibility since in his vision communism and freedom are incompatible. Still others, who support, or who claim to support Marx’s position in interpreting it in different ways, are concerned to realize his vision in inventing political means appropriate to the theory. We can, to begin with, call attention to different types of theory, which divide along practical, theoretical, or both practical as well as theoretical lines. Marx’s position is, like Aristotle’s, both theoretical and practical. It is theoretical in that Marx presents an account of modern industrial society, as it was known in his own time, centering on economic activity intended to meet basic species needs. It is practical in that Marx comes to grips with human activity on the level of practice. And it is both theoretical as well as practical in that Marx intends through his theory to bring about a basic change in human practice. In virtue of his concern with practice, Marx is sometimes described as a left-wing Aristotelian. The many interesting similarities between Marx and Aristotle include but are not limited to the distinction between theory and practice, the concern with activity as a key to the understanding of human beings within the social context, and the conception of ethics as basically political. Yet, Marx differs from Aristotle, who is concerned to realize ethics in practice, whereas Marx aims to change human practice in bringing about a basic modification of the social context. I believe it is in this sense that Marx makes the famous but obscure claim that in realizing itself philosophy also abolishes itself. Marx’s understanding of the transition from capitalism to communism is obscure. This paper will discuss three possibilities, which we can differentiate better in theory than in practice, and that I will characterize, for purposes of this discussion, as economic, political, or philosophical. By an economic approach I have in mind the view of the basic instability of the capitalist model as a transitory state in social development as well as the view of the self-transformation of capitalism itself into a further step, which is either communism or progress on the road leading to communism. By a political approach I will be referring to the emphasis on the decisive role of a particular subset in bringing about the change from capitalism to communism. And by a philosophical approach I will be intending a strategy linked to the supposed role of the proletariat in the transition in question.

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Transition through Economic Crisis

The role of political economy in the transition from capitalism to communism is

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suggested by the crucial Marxian distinction between superstructure and base. This distinction can be interpreted either as a bilateral relation in which superstructure and base mutually influence each other, or, again, and more restrictively, as a claim that the superstructure depends on, and hence reflects, the independent economic base. Yet, however this distinction is read, in the final analysis capitalism depends on the organization of the means of production. Hence, the repercussions for capitalism of an economic crisis are clearly consistent with the Marxian analysis of modern industrial society. The claim for the economic transformation of capitalism into communism depends on a complex series of events leading from the former to the latter. In simplest terms, Marx seems to believe that capitalism is fraught with economic crises, leading eventually to a crisis of such intensity that it results in the destruction of capitalism, which falls of its own weight, as it were, further leading, as night follows day, to a further step toward communism. Many aspects of this complex claim are unclear, controversial, or both. Marx has different views of economic change, including economic innovation and economic crisis. Marx, like Hegel, appeals to the term “necessity” in his description of social phenomena. Marx’s appeal to the term “necessity” can be read in different ways, for instance, as a logical claim, or as a claim that it is necessary that the transformation of social organization be economic, or, again, as the double necessity that there be, for instance, an economic crisis of such intensity that it results in the destruction of capitalism as well as the further transition to communism. As early as the Paris Manuscripts Marx describes economic crisis in terms of necessity (Notwendigkeit), a term that is more appropriate for logic, as in the claim that if p, then necessarily q. Yet it seems incorrect to apply anything approaching logical necessity to economic phenomena, which, if they were indeed necessary, would be wholly predictable. Yet, since economic phenomena depend on the actions of individuals or groups, at most only strong tendencies, but nothing more than that, can be discerned. We need, for present purposes, to distinguish between Marx’s conception of economic crisis and its political consequences for the transition from capitalism to communism. Marx never wrote a treatise on capitalist crisis, and the role of crisis in his analysis of the anatomy of capitalism is unclear. Observers who think his view of crisis is crucial to his position, focus on it; others deny he has any single theory of crisis, and still others, most recently Habermas, concede he has a view of crisis but believe that it does not need to be taken seriously in evaluating Marx’s position. We cannot attempt to decide the question of the nature of Marx’s general conception of crisis. Whether or not Marx has such a conception,

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at a minimum he seems to believe that crises in capitalism are not accidental but rooted in the very nature of capitalism itself. Each of these economic claims is controversial. There is a clear and significant difference between economic crisis, an economic crisis that causes capitalism to founder, and an economic crisis of capitalism eventually leading to communism. The mere fact that there are crises in capitalism is not sufficient to separate it from other forms of organization of the means of production. It is clear that there are repeated economic crises in capitalism, but also in other economic models—for instance contemporary China—as well. Marx can be understood as suggesting that periodic economic crises are endemic to capitalism, that they will eventually cause capitalism to founder and that through a mechanism he does not describe the shipwreck of capitalism will lead not only to economic chaos but also to its replacement by communism. Some recent events might lead us to think that Marx’s conception of crisis is outdated, in need of revision, and no longer relevant in whole or more likely in part. Such developments include the increasing extension of globalization, the growing importance of international finance, the great recession of 2008, and so on.1 The great recession, whose continued effects are still being felt as this is being written, more in Europe and the United States than in East Asia, is an important test case. Marx often suggests that capitalism suffers from economic crises due to overproduction and increasing poverty, or the so-called “immiseration” of the workers. He implies that capitalism will eventually collapse under its own weight. It seems clear that capitalism is subject to periodic crises but it is unclear that they conform to a Marxian model. Clearly capitalism has not yet disappeared as the result of periodic economic crises. It further seems, unfortunately for those that think or at least hope that Marx’s theory can explain literally everything, that the current worldwide recession, which began in 2008, is merely another sign of the growing pains of international capitalism, which does not conform or at least does not fully conform to the Marxian model. Marx identifies three main factors of capitalist crises: the so-called full employment profit squeeze, the tendency of the rate of profit to fall, and overproduction. In Marx’s day the financial sector was less developed than it is now. It is then not surprising that Marx focuses on the so-called real economy, where he views crises as occurring, and not on the                                                               1

For an analysis of the great recession in terms of capital flow, see Harvey (2010). Harvey thinks that what occurred within the financial sector leading up to the great recession was due to the falling rate of profit, leading to a new type of so-called finance capitalism. For a study of the great recession and democracy, see Posner (2010). For a comparative study of the great depression and the great recession, see Krugman (2009).

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financial sector.2 The great recession of 2008 presents a difficult explanatory problem. It was mainly unforeseen and expected. It is further difficult to grasp in terms of Marx’s theories. Some observers seek to explain it as the result of the flow of capital, hence situating it at least broadly within traditional Marxian theory.3 Yet this particular crisis, which is not located within the real economy, cannot therefore be explained, or solely explained, in terms of so-called real economic factors. Since it occurs within the financial sector, it must at least partly be explained through such other factors as the sheer greed of bankers and others within the financial community who were appropriately placed to create conditions favorable to themselves if not to others (Posner 2009). This suggests that at least in this case an adequate view of crisis theory needs to be restated in different form to encompass types of crisis Marx did not anticipate. Though Marx’s view of economic crisis is unclear, it is accorded political weight in the transition in question. Luxemberg believes that, on grounds of the economic instability of capitalism, communism can be attained through the spontaneous organization of the masses. For this reason, she criticized the Leninist view of the party as introducing a dictatorship of the proletariat, which would in turn lead to the dictatorship of one man over the party and the proletariat.

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Transition through a Political Solution

There is no way at present or perhaps even in the future to know if at some time in the future capitalism will be destroyed through a giant economic crisis. What I am calling the political solution consists in addressing what appears to be a political deficit in Marx’s position. This deficit is addressed in practice in different ways, for instance by Luxemberg through her view of the grassroots organization of class struggle, and above, by Lenin, in his theory of the party as the so-called vanguard of the revolution. This theory, which became the cornerstone of Marxism-Leninism, is popular among Marxist regimes. Luxemberg suggests that through the economic analysis of capitalism Marx’s theory spontaneously realizes itself. If that is correct, then it is only a matter of                                                               2

“The ultimate reason for all real crises always remains the poverty and restricted consumption of the masses as opposed to the drive of capitalist production to develop the productive forces as though only the absolute consuming power of society constituted their limit” (Karl Marx, Capital Vol. III, Part V: Division of Profit into Interest and Profit of Enterprise. Interest-Bearing Capital, §2, Chapter XXX: “Money-Capital and Real Capital.” New World Paperback edition, 484). 3 This argument is formulated by Harvey (2010).

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time before capitalism founders. Leninism, on the contrary, implies that capitalism will not simply go away by itself and can only be displaced through the concerted effort of a small cadre of professional revolutionaries concerned to realize Marx’s vision. Marxism-Leninism, or the Leninist variation of Marxism, is routinely understood as promoting an international communist society through the leadership of the party that is both the vanguard of the revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat. This view, which was invented by Lenin, is still the cornerstone of Marxism-Leninism. We now know that the leading role of the communist party in the Soviet Union neither allowed it to realize socialism in one country, nor to destroy capitalism. Neither the communist party nor the Soviet proletariat turned out to be the gravedigger of capitalism, though it also seems unclear that the counterclaim, formulated by Fukuyama, that capitalism destroyed communism is even vaguely plausible. It is more likely that the Soviet form of Marxism-Leninism and the Soviet Union both fell prey to the fact that despite massive propaganda finally nobody, or almost nobody, still believed in Marxism-Leninism. As a result of the Soviet experience, opinions are divided about efforts to effect a transition to communism by following some version of the Marxist-Leninist model. Many Westerners subscribe to some version of the view that Marxism-Leninism is the greatest fantasy of the twentieth century—even worse, if that is possible, than National Socialism. This general view is held by historians like Furet, economists like Hayek, and philosophers like Popper and Kolakowski. Others think that because Stalin concentrated on socialism in one country as opposed to worldwide revolution, the Leninist theory was not given a fair chance. The view that Stalinism was on the whole not a bad idea and that Stalin should be rehabilitated is notoriously held by such philosophers as Holz and Losurdo. Still others think that the occasional nostalgia for Stalinism, mainly among Western intellectuals more than among ordinary Russians, betrays an inability to learn from history rather than theoretical insight. Luxemberg’s famous suggestion, that the Leninist version of the dictatorship of the proletariat would in practice lead to dictatorship long before Stalinism or even Stalin’s emergence as the preeminent Soviet political figure, suggests that the transformation of Marx’s position into Stalinism was not a historical accident but rather central to the theory and that finally differences between Lenin and Stalin are mainly cosmetic. This point tends to support the idea that Marx’s theory could not have been realized in any other way. We are still waiting to see if communism as Marx understands it can in fact be realized through the leading role of the party in China. That cannot be known in theory and can only be known in human historical practice. A simple but not inaccurate way of describing the situation is to say that after the great leap forward and after the cultural revolution, which were intended to prevent the return of capitalism, Deng Xiaoping saved the Chinese economy, hence saved

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China in restoring what is often called Zhongguo tese shehui zhuyi 中国特色社会 主义. China today has numerous other problems that are specific to the Chinese situation.

3

On a Possible Proletarian Solution

The third and final approach to the transformation of capitalism into communism is the philosophical complex including the master-slave distinction, the Marxian conception of the proletariat, and Lukács’ so-called identical subject-object. These are different versions of an insight which is originally advanced by Hegel, then taken over in different form by Marx, and finally reformulated by Lukács. The basic insight was originally formulated by Hegel in the famous passage on the master and the slave in the Phenomenology of Spirit. This passage has received extensive interpretation, which does not need to be repeated here. Suffice it to say that Hegel, who is sometimes regarded as endorsing the society of his time as the so-called end of history—the final stage of historical development—can rather be understood as offering a metaphorical description of the modern world not as stable but rather as unstable, as a result of which as is sometimes said the slave will become the master and the master will become the slave. In respect to Hegel’s analysis, what Marx contributes is a concrete, or more concrete, restatement of the Hegelian analysis of the binary distinction against the background of modern industrial society—which is defined by the property relation, which is the distinguishing feature of capitalism. Marx, who turns to the proletariat as in effect the keepers of the secret of history, alleges that Hegel supports rather than criticizes, or seeks to change, the pre-existing relation of social forces. Yet Marx does not differ from Hegel in his turn to the proletariat, which also occupies Hegel in his analysis of contemporary society. Marx differs from Hegel in his comparatively greater stress on the proletariat as a real historical force, which he understands as in effect the secret of history. Depending on how one reads Marx, he either contributes to altering the situation or he at least provides a dynamic analysis of the real social forces that constitute the framework of modern capitalism. Hence in either case in that respect he surpasses Hegel. Lukács, who is arguably still the best Marxist student of Hegel, proposes a variation of the Hegelian and Marxian models in his theory of the identical subject-object. This theory arguably has two purposes: to solve the problem of the unknowable thing in itself, which, as Lukács points out in criticizing Engels, cannot be overcome through praxis and industry; and, since praxis and industry are associated with the normal functioning of capitalism, they cannot be overcome within capitalism. We are left to infer, though Lukács does not say this

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clearly, that in his opinion Engels is not concerned with, or at least obviously does not resolve, the basic Marxian theme of how to move from capitalism to communism. Lukács believed he was in a revolutionary moment when he wrote History and Class Consciousness. Hegel similarly believed he was in a revolutionary moment almost immediately after the French Revolution. Lukács, like Hegel, later came to see that this possibility no longer obtained. Indeed, if Marcuse is correct, the proletariat whose existence Marx deduced, so to speak, in the early 1840s as a crucial aspect of his theory no longer exists in the Marxian sense and, if its role in the transition from capitalism to communism is the criterion, perhaps never existed in the way required for the transition from capitalism to communism otherwise than within the theory.

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Marx and the Transition from Capitalism to Communism

Marx proposes a theory of human practice within a self-constructed social context. As Marx famously pointed out, we make our own history, but we do not make it as we please. This paper has analyzed Marx’s theoretical understanding of the transition in practice. Marx’s theory differs from merely so-called “theoretical theories” in that it must as a moment of the theory discern within capitalism the real conditions of its transformation into communism, that is the transformation of what is the same into something that is other than itself. This cannot merely be shown in theory but must also be shown in practice, that is, within human history. This standard is the test of whether in the final analysis Marx’s theory successfully links together theory and practice in a theory which in realizing itself in practice abolishes the theory, or, on the contrary, is, despite its announced intentions, finally and merely just another theory—a theory that succeeds in theory but in theory only, since it does not transcend, but rather remains within, the iron cage of capitalism, and thus, unfortunately, fails the test of practice.

References Harvey, David. 2010. The Enigma of Capital and the Crises of Capitalism. New York: Oxford University Press. Krugman, Paul. 2009. The Return of Depression Economics and the Crisis of 2008. New York: W.W. Norton. Posner, Richard. 2009. A Failure of Capitalism: The Crisis of ’08 and the Descent into Depression. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Posner, Richard. 2010. The Crisis of Capitalist Democracy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.