Libertarians see problems, not solutions

[Antonio Balmer]

I know plenty of people in my area who consider themselves libertarians. In general they tend to be middle aged small business owners who are struggling to get by. Their businesses often suffer because of competition from big business and because of government burdens of tax and insurance. This is a big deal and I think the Marxist perspective ought to be clarified regarding libertarian ideas.

Libertarians, to my understanding, are for free markets, free from government intervention, and social freedom. They will say they are fiscally responsible and socially tolerant. Sounds nice, but the problem is a distorted perception of capitalism. Libertarians lack a class conscious perspective, and seem to think that with less government burdens of tax/insurance that their business would prosper and the market would do just fine.

Small business owners, whether they recognize it or not, are struggling (generally) because of problems in capitalist economy that we Marxists understand. Like the concentration of capital into fewer and fewer hands. Libertarianism is not a ruling class ideology, although its ability to obscure people's perspective of capitalism no doubt benefits the ruling class. Small business owners are usually working people who got their hands on capital and were able to start a business (likely at least couple decades ago). So they have some faith in capitalism, and an interest in defending it. But the destiny of this class (Marx called them petty bourgeois) is to become obsolete as it falls into the working class. The small business are being replaced by big corporate franchises in small towns all over the country. There's plenty of this sort of economic activity going on in my town... small businesses failing, being replaced by chains like Denny's and Good Earth and Walmart.

Check out the FAQ section of Newyouth.com about the Marxist perspective of small business owners. We need to win libertarians to our ranks. We're suffering from the same problem.... capitalism.

[Christopher Hill]

I agree, They share many of the common goals and values that us Marxist hold so dear, yet in the end they fail to realize that by supporting Capitalism they uphold the very government which they despise so much, seeing that individual freedoms are being curbed and small businesses made less viable, yet seemingly ignorant to the very reason that this is happening, ignoring that it is in fact the influence of the Bourgeois class which has caused the government to place these restrictions on the people.

edit: Here is a good article on the subject from Socialist Appeal: http://www.socialistappeal.org/content/view/638/73/

[Paula Marx]

That's true. But liberals and libertarians have never hidden their opinions about Capitalism and that's the main difference between us and them. They support private property thinking it's part of liberty they fight for. They are sure petty bourgeois and reactionary in every way. Private business is always private business, no matter which scale of it. I know lots of those "liberal democrats", too. When Capitalism falls upside down, they will be treated like every bourgeois.

[Lech]

Truthfully, anyone who exists outside of the political norm of Democrats and Republicans shares the idea that there is something wrong with the way the government is run in this country. The difference is what they think is wrong.

Libertarians, for example, believe that the system isn't captialist enough. They are, in fact, socially progressive but econmically they are as reactionary as Augusto Pinochet.

It's not enough to say that communists are similar to libertarians just because they both share dissatisfaction with the current system. My sister and I can both dislike ham but it doesn't mean we have similar tastes. I could like steak and she could be a vegetarian.

I agree to a certain degree with Comrade Balmer that both communists and certain libertarians are agrieved with the state of the country right now. What I don't agree with is the assesment that the majority of libertarians are libertarians because of the effects of capitalism.

In my own experience, libertarians are generally either a) people, such as big bussinessmen, who benefit from unregulated, free market capitalism,  b) those who feel victimized by the government and feel a need to scale it back, or c) people, such as super-patriots or Randian Objectivists, who feel that libertarianism serves a higher ideal of human freedom and progress by promoting individuallism and social darwinism. Also in my experience, those who fall under b) are in the minority and are not nearly as politically active or concious as the other two. Because of this, I believe that it is a pipe dream to think that we can easily (I'm oversimplifying, forgive me) win libertarians over to communism. Not because we have seperate intersts per se but because our views of the problems of society are diametrically opposed. Whereas the communist might say that the greatest problem in society is greed, the libertarian might say that the problem is that people aren't greedy enough. Whereas the communist might say that the government doesn't take up for the disadvantaged enought, the libertarian might say that the government spends too much of thier money fixing problems that they don't care about.

Now these small business owners might consider themselves libertarians because they don't agree with the way they are being taxed but at the end of the day, they just want more money in their own pocket. That is hardly a communist value.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think it is impossible to win over libertarians, I 'm just saying that we can't get too caught up in percieved similarities of political tendencies such that we lose sight of the real goal. I've seen it happen far too much with the CPUSA and the DSA.

[Joshua Purcell]

It may very well be difficult or impossible to win over some libertarians. I live in a very conservative area, and I am surrounded by people who consider themselves conservative. The people who I choose to talk with occasionally about politics consider themselves libertarian, and the reason I talk with them is for a couple of reasons: 1) I want to give them the benefit of the doubt and make an honest attempt to understand them, and 2) if I'm going to talk with anyone about politics around here then it will be a conservative 99% of the time... I may as well talk with someone who has thought through their political beliefs enough to know that the two-party system is a hoax. These people are never going to be convinced that the government can do anything positive, they don't believe the increasing wealth gap is an issue, they believe the recent supreme court ruling allowing unlimited corporate money in elections is a win for freedom of speech and democracy, and they believe that any weakening of private property rights for anyone is the same weakening or lessening that individual's freedom. These libertarians approach everything from the standpoint of the individual, where as Marxists we tend to approach everything from the collective to a more or less degree.

Looking at these glaring differences makes it pretty hard to even want to acknowledge that we even have anything in common with people like this, but the fact is that in spite of these and other major differences we still have at least one important aspect in common: both groups have a big overlap in the types of problems they see in our current political system. Libertarians have legitimate complaints against our current form of government. They just don't see that the main reason why it has gotten into this mess that it is in is because of capitalist interests changing and complicating issues in a way that benefits them the most, and over time this has caused the government to benefit, protect, and work for the people less and less. They focus their anger on the politicians in office, but don't recognize that there is a ton of money being sent to the politician from private interests (or if they do they don't think that is the cause of the problem).

But I think it is important to try as best as possible to focus on the similarities we do have when talking with either Libertarians or those who haven't decided to lean towards any specific ideology, because this makes it easier to at least understand our viewpoint if the person is going to attempt to do so. Many times if the person has been watching Fox News or talking with the wrong people, they will have a completely incorrect idea of what Marxism (or any other leftist tendency) stands for. They may not have taken the time to figure out what it is they are being told to demonize, and are just going along with the definitions that were given to them. If from the very beginning they have heard of the similarities of Marxism's identified problem areas with our government when compared to the gripes they are hearing about from conservative types, then it would make the person think at least a little bit more about what it is they are considering on both sides.

If younger kids grow up, get out of high school, understandably begin having problems with our system and start looking for answers in the alternative political groups, they will hear alot about Libertarians from the outset. They look alternative, the word revolutionary has even been brought up as a description in some circles I've been around, they are against the current political system, and they identify many of the same gripes with the system that this person who is new to politics would have already identified long ago. This is the time that this person needs to be given the opportunity to find out more information on some real alternative parties with real revolutionary goals and that has real changes planned that will begin to correct our system (both politically and economically). I know people in this situation, where they are just getting into politics and they run around calling themselves libertarians, when they are about as libertarian (in the capitalist sense) as... well I am. The only reason they chose the label of libertarian was because it wasn't either one of the two major parties, the ideology is OK with people smoking weed, they like the other selling points of individual freedom, and they have no idea that there are other non-satanic options. These are the types of people who are very much in need of readjusting politically, and they are much more receptive to this than someone who is libertarian because they are racist egotist neo-cons who believe in American Exceptionalism. The longer these newer kids are calling themselves libertarian though, the more likely it is that they will give in to these selfish protectionist tendencies that everyone else around them are sold on, and all because they like the idea of liberty and individual freedom, which isn't in any way incompatible with true Marxist principles. It doesn't have to be that way, though... you don't have to be a selfish American egotist to also work for freedom and liberty (in fact they work against each other in the long-term).

[caesarscook]

This is a very interesting discussion.  A few points I'd like to touch on.  One, I think that Vuldin has the right idea, which was, I believe, the thrust of Antonio's original point.  This is that libertarianism captures the allegiance of a certain layer of folks just entering political life, not because it necessarily best fits their initial dissatisfaction or "gripes" with the system, but because there is a vacuum of alternative explanations.  This would be the group "b" in Lech's three-part break down of the libertarian demographic.  I would actually, based on my experience, say that this is a much larger group than Lech did, but without objective data to base these assertions on, we'd be arguing over opinions.  That's not the crucial point anyway.  Where Lech is correct is that it is a near lost cause to reach these people once they believe to have found their answer.  That doesn't mean, as Vuldin pointed out, that we should necessarily break off any conversation with someone when we find out they don't agree with us.  The point, however, is one of priorities.  At this stage, our appeal is not to the broad mass and certainly not those that have a diametrically opposed ideology, but to the ones and twos that agree with us on a number of points.  We must present, as Plekhanov pointed out in the early propagandistic stages of the growth of Russian Marxism, a large number of ideas to a few people at this stage, educate them, transform them into revolutionary cadres, who will at a later point be capable of spreading the ideas further in an effective manner.

There was another point I wanted to touch on, which was Paula Marx's comment:

That's true. But liberals and libertarians have never hidden their opinions about Capitalism and that's the main difference between us and them. They support private property thinking it's part of liberty they fight for. They are sure petty bourgeois and reactionary in every way. Private business is always private business, no matter which scale of it. I know lots of those "liberal democrats", too. When Capitalism falls upside down, they will be treated like every bourgeois.

Where Paula is right is that "Private business is always private business, no matter which scale of it."  This is true, but it does not mean that after a revolutionary overturn that the petty bourgeoisie "will be treated like every bourgeois," as they are fundamentally different.  I would turn the comrades attention to Trotsky's "Transitional Program" and the section on small businesses and small farmers.  The petty bourgeoisie is a middle layer of society, incapable of playing an independent role in the revolution, but history shows that this class can play either a revolutionary or a reactionary role.  As Trotsky explains, we can win over layers of the petty bourgeoisie (albeit not all, or perhaps even a majority) to the workers' revolutionary program.  For example a workers' bank would be capable of offering beneficial loans to small businesses and farmers, far better than bourgeois banks run for profit.  Through incentives towards collectivization and through the example of the planned economy itself, we believe, as Marxists, that most of the petty bourgeoisie will eventually be won over.  During the transitional period, actually, the small businesses fill a certain role in a planned economy, filling certain gaps in the plan and working as a check on inefficiencies.  Eventually, as these gaps are filled and as the standard of living rises throughout the plan itself, most small businesses will wither away.  We certainly do not want to institute "forced collectivization," which was the ultra-left turn, Stalinist solution to the problem of small scale production in the 1930s.  This was not Bolshevism, but Stalinist schizophrenia.

This said, the workers' state would need to be aware of the inherent dangers of the survival of elements of the market no matter how small during the transitional period.  It would need to exercise its power as the dictatorship of the working class to make sure that petty bourgeois do not become big bourgeois, but this is a relatively simple operation, assuming we are dealing with a healthy workers' state.  We are dealing with a very small sector of society to begin with and the nationalization of the holdings of the big bourgeoisie and the integration of these into an overall democratic plan of production limits the potential influence of small capital, as the workers' state would have a monopoly, in practice, on the overall economy.

That's a bit off the topic of libertarianism, but I felt that it was an important point to flesh out theoretically.

[Joshua Purcell]

Libertarians are confused as to what it actually means to be a libertarian, and some (but not all) of these people are not out of the realm of being brought back from this state. I thought I'd post a link to audio of Chomsky giving a brief definition of what actual libertarianism is, and how it compares to the accepted definition here in the US.

http://yourlisten.com/channel/content/31798/Chomsky%20Talks%20about%20Libertarianism

We can have multiple ways of approaching and debating with libertarians... one is to explain Marxist ideas and show how the identified problems with our current system overlap, and the other is to explain how libertarianism is completely opposite of what the term has meant and still does mean outside of the US and historically.

[caesarscook]

Libertarians are confused as to what it actually means to be a libertarian, and some (but not all) of these people are not out of the realm of being brought back from this state. I thought I'd post a link to audio of Chomsky giving a brief definition of what actual libertarianism is, and how it compares to the accepted definition here in the US.

http://yourlisten.com/channel/content/31798/Chomsky%20Talks%20about%20Libertarianism

We can have multiple ways of approaching and debating with libertarians... one is to explain Marxist ideas and show how the identified problems with our current system overlap, and the other is to explain how libertarianism is completely opposite of what the term has meant and still does mean outside of the US and historically.

This is true, however, we're not really out to win them to what Chomsky is referring to either.  So-called "libertarian socialism," aka anarchism, has its own problems, which need to be exposed and discussed with its adherents.  While Chomsky is all fine and good when it comes to criticizing US foreign policy or presenting innovative linguistic theories, he does a real disservice to the political education of anyone whose read any of his writings against Marxism.  One of his pamphlets, which was the first piece of political propaganda I ever received, miseducated me badly, so I speak from experience.  That said, I agree that there is a window in many cases for an open discussion with the adherents of the anarchist brand of libertarianism.  I am proof of that. 

And while we are on the topic of anarchists, I have just been informed that Howard Zinn passed away today.  While A People's History of the United States was not perfect, it is the best history of the United States this side of Herbert Aptheker, and Zinn's contribution to the furtherance of the emancipation of the working class and the oppressed will be missed.

[Joshua Purcell]

I would like the idea of debating with a person who is subscribed to the ideas that Chomsky has done a great deal to make popular much more than one who thinks our capitalist system would be fine if we could just remove the mean old government from the equation (ie. capitalist, conservative, or US libertarians). I listen to what Chomsky says often... in fact, if I'm in my car (which living in Texas that is plenty of my day) I'm probably listening to one of his lectures. I agree with everything he says minus the rare occasions where he easily lumps Bolshevism with other totalitarian/Stalinist/fascist regimes. This is an area where I haven't ever heard him going into specifics on, and I'm willing to bet that if he were to go into specifics we would see that he is referring to what came a while after the October Revolution once a subset of leadership (led by Stalin) departed from Marxist principles and took the state with them, that he doesn't give credit to the Bolsheviks for their part in promoting worker control, or that he is falling into the problem I have with Bakunin. He has mentioned Bakunin's prediction that "dictatorship of the proletariat" would lead to something worse than the Tsar in Russia as proof of a flaw in Marx's ideas from the beginning, but believe there is a major problem with Bakunin's idea (and by extension some inherent in much of Anarchism in general). From the wiki:

Bakunin’s political beliefs rejected governing systems in every name and shape...

Here we have an example of blind rejection (sometimes hatred) of any form of authority. Chomsky doesn't hold this belief from what I've heard... he says authoritative systems or organizations must be legitimate. Supposedly there has been plenty of discussion and planning around various acceptable forms of governing organizations that would be legitimate and anarchist at the same time, but I have never heard or read anything about these anarchist forms of government, and regardless from what it seems like to me Bakunin would be against those as well (based on the above assumption). Long story short, I don't believe anarchism would get anywhere in the long-term... short term though I think it's great :D (all the way up to the point of actually building a new form of government on top of the current system that both anarchists and Marxists have destroyed in one way or another). There is so much in common between the two ideologies that I have no problems believing we can work together in some type of way to further our shared goals... in theory at least. If we can get to the point where we are trying to convince anarchists rather than capitalist then we are 90% to the goal line. I think it is useful to even bring up Chomsky's ideas to these schizophrenic libertarians (the capitalist kind) to point out the blatant hypocrisy they are subscribing to, since it not an attempt to change their chosen label but only to show them what their chosen label really means and stands for. Once they have an accurate definition of the label (and they are willing to accept that), then we can begin to talk intelligently with them.

[caesarscook]

I'm willing to bet that if he were to go into specifics we would see that he is referring to what came a while after the October Revolution once a subset of leadership (led by Stalin) departed from Marxist principles and took the state with them, that he doesn't give credit to the Bolsheviks for their part in promoting worker control, or that he is falling into the problem I have with Bakunin. He has mentioned Bakunin's prediction that "dictatorship of the proletariat" would lead to something worse than the Tsar in Russia as proof of a flaw in Marx's ideas from the beginning, but believe there is a major problem with Bakunin's idea (and by extension some inherent in much of Anarchism in general).

I suggest you read Chomsky's writings on anarchism and Marxism, because none of the above is correct.  Believe me, as a former anarchist, my first piece of political propaganda was a pamphlet entitled "Marxism, Anarchism, and the State" by Chomsky that I received at an event.  Chomsky's view is basically that Bolshevism is synonymous with Stalinism, not that there was any degeneration.  Lenin was essentially as bad as Stalin, as far as Chomsky is concerned.  Also, his writings on Bakunin do not put forward the criticism you have.  Chomsky is an avid defender of Bakunin (see his writings on "Government in the Future") and anarchism in general. 

Like I said, Chomsky does a lot of good when it comes to criticizing US foreign policy, but he does a lot of damage in the realm of theory.  And not simply his anarchism (which by the way, many of his supporters don't even know about), but also his generally idealist interpretation of history.  Once you are well acquainted with the materialist conception of the historical process, you will definitely notice it in the way he presents and analyzes historical events.  For Chomsky, the overarching motive force in history is not the productive forces, but rather human ideas, which is the exact opposite of Marxist analysis.  But that is to be expected, as Chomsky explicitly regards Marxism as a "totalitarian ideology."  There is an interesting "Interview on Marxism" or some similar title that I once read by him, which is a dozen or so pages of the most inane vitriol imaginable against Marxism generally and Leninism specifically (he draws a strange line of separation with Luxemburg, which she would not have approved of). 

Anyway, bit of a side note, but Chomsky definitely has a downside.  There's actually an old article on IDOM (marxist.com) which critiques Chomsky's arguments about Lenin and the Bolsheviks.  It's sadly not very comprehensive and we need to produce something new that takes on the Chomsky/Albert school of anarchism, not in a mean way, but in a comradely way that approaches their adherents with reasoned arguments.  Like I said, I speak from real experience on this one.  I gobbled up Chomsky's arguments about anarchism and against the Bolsheviks as if they were the Bible Truth.  It did immense damage to my political development, as once I realized that perhaps I had received a one-sided presentation of Leninism and the Bolshevik revolution, I had to unlearn all that was previously learned about Makhno, Kronstadt, the Workers Opposition, etc.

As I alluded to above, it also distorted the way I analyzed history.  For example, compare Chomsky's analysis of the Constitutional Convention in the US with Herbert Aptheker's.  It's like night and day.  For Chomsky, the process of codifying US law was a conspiracy hatched by "elites," whereas Aptheker looks at the real underlying processes involved, the inevitable consolidation of the gains of the bourgeois democratic revolution, etc.  Aptheker acknowledges the element of a right-ward drift at the convention, but doesn't fall into the tendency of the critical idealist interpretation of history to view the historical process as a series of conspiracies.

As to the question of whether we can work with the anarchist brand of libertarians, that's a clear yes.  I would not have been recruited if some comrades in the IMT didn't have mountains of patience, but are there differences?  Yes.  Are they more than minor?  Believe me, yes.  That said, will some anarchists march side by side with us all the way past the smashing of the bourgeois state and to the setting up of a proletarian dictatorship?  Actually, yes.

[Paula Marx]

When it comes to Bolshevism, "Communism" in the USSR could never be a real Communism. Why? Because there was no Capitalism to ruin! There was Nicholas' monarchy. So those Bolsheviks did what they could, but it wasn't the right thing to do at the moment. Same thing happened to Yugoslavian communists and partisans. They ruined Fascism, not Capitalism! Capitalism came after Communism - not inversely. Of course Fascism is the bigger evil than Capitalism, but it's all similar, and logically Fascism will come again, after Capitalism.

[caesarscook]

When it comes to Bolshevism, "Communism" in the USSR could never be a real Communism. Why? Because there was no Capitalism to ruin! There was Nicholas' monarchy. So those Bolsheviks did what they could, but it wasn't the right thing to do at the moment.

This is incorrect.  While it is true that Russia was semi-feudal, it is also the case that in Russia there was what Marxists refer to as combined and uneven development.  That is to say, the more backward, feudal characteristics of the peasant economy lived side-by-side the introduction of advanced capitalist production into the urban areas.  I suggest that you read Trotsky's Results and Prospects (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1931/tpr/rp-index.htm), as this phenomenon is presented in detail. 

The implications of combined and uneven development are that the national bourgeoisie, which had led the bourgeois democratic revolutions throughout Europe a century earlier, had entered the stage of Russian history too late.  They entered history directly tied to the Tsarist autocratic regime on the one hand and foreign capital on the other.  The only class within Russian society capable of carrying out even the bourgeois democratic tasks of the revolution was the working class, but the combined and uneven character of Russian development meant that within the cities, there existed capitalism.  The workers' struggle could not therefore be limited within the bounds of the bourgeois democratic revolution, but must rather "grow over" into the socialist tasks. 

The development of Russian capitalism (I would suggest reading Lenin's The Development of Capitalism in Russia  http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1899/devel/index.htm or the aforementioned Results and Prospects) also existed within the context of the broader development of capitalism on a world scale.  The Bolsheviks never had the idea that the revolution in Russia would build communism or socialism in a single country as such an idea was (and is) pure nonsense.  The goal was always for Russia to act as a fortress for spreading the revolution to the West, where the situation was ripe for socialism. 

Therefore, the revolution is permanent in two senses: 1) Due to combined and uneven development, the bourgeois democratic revolution must, by necessity, "grow over" permanently from the democratic tasks to the socialist and 2) while the revolution begins on the national stage, it can only be completed (socialism can only be built) on a world scale through the "permanent" spreading of the revolution across the globe.

They ruined Fascism, not Capitalism! Capitalism came after Communism - not inversely. Of course Fascism is the bigger evil than Capitalism, but it's all similar, and logically Fascism will come again, after Capitalism.

This is incorrect for several reasons.  First of all, fascism is not a different economic base from capitalism.  We need to here distinguish between the economic base and the state superstructure.  It is possible for one and the same economic system, say capitalism, to exist at different historic times and in different countries with a variety of state forms, from democratic republic to fascist to military dictatorship.  The same, by the way, is also true of a workers' state.  A healthy workers' state is very different than the bureaucratic proletarian bonapartist dictatorships that existed in Eastern Europe and in the former Soviet Union, i.e. Stalinism. 

Fascism is a form of capitalist rule.  It is the bonapartist apparatus of capitalism's senile decay, formed out of a plebeian mass movement of the petty bourgeoisie and lumpen elements, but ultimately representing the interests of the capitalist class, particularly its financial wing.  When the Yugoslavian partisans overthrew the fascists, they were, in fact, overthrowing the capitalists.  This is evidenced by the fact that when the Stalinists attempted to form so-called "popular front" governments throughout the former Nazi-occupied Eastern Europe and Yugoslavia, they had to do so with only the shadow of the bourgeoisie, as the bourgeois themselves had all fled, as either Nazi collaborators or sympathizers. 

"Logically," fascism does not "follow" capitalism in any sort of logical progression of history.  The turn towards fascism, which was made by various national capitalist classes throughout Europe in the 1920s and 1930s, was due to some very peculiar historical circumstances.  In fact, the mass base for a fascist movement (the small businessmen and farmers) have largely been eroded by the historical development of capitalism in the West.  It is not out of the question that at some future historical juncture the capitalists may turn towards fascism again, but this would be a last resort on their part, as fascism, given its plebeian character, is not as easily controlled as the military dictatorship or the bourgeois democratic republic, which by the way is the capitalist class's preferred form for class rule, as it gives the illusion of participation to the mass of the oppressed.

On a final note, while the questions of permanent revolution, bonapartism, and fascism are very interesting discussions, they don't have much to do with "libertarianism," so comrades should perhaps start a new thread on these topics.