What was the USSR?

[RedViper]

I would like to recomend the excellent article-series "What was the USSR?" by the brittish Aufheben group:
http://www.geocities.com/aufheben2/auf_6_ussr1.html
http://www.geocities.com/aufheben2/auf_7_ussr2.html
http://www.geocities.com/aufheben2/auf_8_ussr_3.html
http://www.geocities.com/aufheben2/auf_9_ussr4.html
I have also made a .pdf file including all parts of the series available on the net:
http://upl.silentwhisper.net/uplfolders/upload2/what_was_the_ussr_en.pdf

This is probably the best analyzis on the USSR that I have ever read. It also includes a critique on the most common trotskyist theories (Cliff, Ticktin, etc).
I would very much recomend you to print it out and read...it is great.

[P.O.U.M]

Though I havent read the whole thing, I'll give it to them that for anti-Bolshevik's, they made the least amount of bumbling errors and falsifications about Lenin and Trotsky.

But then, I think the first article touched on this, there have been other Trotskyists who reject the theory of state capitalism.

Against the Theory of State Capitalism
-Ted Grant

[turnoviseous]

I will check it out when i have more time. In the meanwhile, has anyone read their theory and could make a brief analysis or a sum.?

[RedViper]

"Though I havent read the whole thing, I'll give it to them that for anti-Bolshevik's, they made the least amount of bumbling errors and falsifications about Lenin and Trotsky."

Indeed they do. Even if Iam no leninist myself I hate it when some people dismiss everythink Lenin and/or the leninists said or did as bullshit, etc. I like Aufheben for treating for example the Trotskyists and their theories with respect, (and thus give them a deep, serious and friendly critique) even though they disagree.


"But then, I think the first article touched on this, there have been other Trotskyists who reject the theory of state capitalism."

Accually Aufheben agree that the USSR was capitalist.



"I will check it out when i have more time. In the meanwhile, has anyone read their theory and could make a brief analysis or a sum.?"

I am not entirely done with it yet, it is a quite a large piece of work. However there is a outline under "Introcuction" that briefly tells what it is all about:



"In this issue and the next one we shall explore the inadequacies of various versions of the theory that the USSR was a form of state capitalism; firstly when compared with the standard Trotskyist theory of the Soviet Union as a degenerated workers' state, and secondly, and perhaps more tellingly, in the light of the analysis of the USSR put forward by Ticktin which purports to go beyond both state capitalist and degenerated workers' state conceptions of the nature of the Soviet Union.

To begin with we shall examine Trotsky's theory of the USSR as a degenerated workers' state, which, at least in Britain, has served as the standard critical analysis of the nature of the Soviet Union since the 1930s. Then we shall see how Tony Cliff, having borrowed the conception of the USSR as state capitalist from the left communists in the 1940s, developed his own version of the theory of the USSR as a form of state capitalism which, while radically revising the Trotskyist orthodoxy with regard to Russia, sought to remain faithful to Trotsky's broader theoretical conceptions. As we shall see, and as is well recognized, although through the propaganda work of the SWP and its sister organizations world wide Cliff's version of the state capitalist theory is perhaps the most well known, it is also one of the weakest. Indeed, as we shall observe, Cliff's theory has often been used by orthodox Trotskyists as a straw man with which to refute all state capitalist theories and sustain their own conception of the USSR as a degenerated workers' state.

In contrast to Cliff's theory we shall, in the next issue, consider other perhaps less well known versions of the theory of the USSR as state capitalist that have been put forward by left communists and other more recent writers. This will then allow us to consider Ticktin's analysis of USSR and its claim to go beyond both the theory of the USSR as state capitalist and the theory of the USSR as a degenerated workers' state.

Having explored the inadequacies of the theory that the USSR was a form of state capitalism, in the light of both the Trotskyist theory of the Soviet Union as a degenerated workers' state and, more importantly, Ticktin's analysis of the USSR, we shall in Aufheben 8 seek to present a tentative restatement of the state capitalist theory in terms of a theory of the deformation of value."

[P.O.U.M]

Ive nearly finished reading the first article. They have some history wrong concerning Lenin and Trotsky. Mostly pre-1917 stuff, but thats what I know best about anti-Leninst mistruths. So, not saying that there is, but there's a possibility they made so more Trotsky distortions after 1917. But for the most part they were quite respectful towards Trotskyists and didnt outright dimiss anything.

The first half of the article was mostly history. The the second half discussed Trotsky's theory of the degenerated workers state along with Cliff's theory of state capitalism. And thats where I stopped reading.

The article, did to my suprise, basicaly leave out Ted Grant. He is by far todays leading Trotskyist theorist. And has been defending Trotskyist ideas for quite sometime. They only qouted him once to refute Cliff's idea of state capitalism.