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Bob McKee examines a recent pamphlet by socialist economist Andrew Glyn and concludes that it is only the Campaign Group of Labour MP's, the pamphlet's publishers, who still defend the ideas of the 'Alternative Economic Strategy'.
A Million Jobs A Year - Reviving the AES
In 1985 the Campaign Group of Labour MPs published a short pamphlet entitled A Million Jobs a Year- the case for olanning full employment. This pamphlet was written by Andrew Glyn, a socialist economist active in the labour movement, and in the past a regular contributor to the pages of the Militant newspaper and its publications. The pamphlet had a foreword from Tony Benn MP and received the signed endorsement of most of the Campaign Group, although not all.
This pamphlet clearly represents the basic views of what the media calls the 'hard left' in the Parliamentary Labour Party. The fact that it was not endorsed by even all the Campaign Group, let alone the bulk of Labour MPs, demonstrates that the policies put forward in it are too radical for Labour's leaders and for many Labour lefts. However Andrew Glyn's arguments expressed in the pamphlet must be seriously considered by Marxists in the labour movement for two reasons.
Firstly, while they may not be supported by the Labour leaders, the ideas in A Million Jobs a Year would almost certainly gain majority support among the rank and file activists in the labour movement. For that reason alone the pamphlet
deserves
careful consideration.
Keynesianism
But there is an even more important reason to examine the arguments presented in the pamphlet. In the late 1970's and early 1980's the general economic thinking in the labour movement coalesced around a set of proposals called the 'Alternative Economic Strategy'. The AES had wide support despite its several interpretations within the Labour Party. Since the 1983 election, however, the AES is no longer talked about and its basic policy measures have generally been jettisoned by Kinnock and the 'realigned' or 'soft left'. Anybody who reads the Campaign Group pamphlet will find that it is only in that group in the whole labour movement that the 'Alternative Economic Strategy' is preserved.
The Marxists in the labour movement always opposed the reasoning behind and the policy conclusions reached by the proponents of the AES, and this article will explain why. Unfortunately any analysis of the Campaign Group pamphlet will not only show its reliance on the fatal flaws of the policies of the
'Alternative Economic Strategy'. It will
also reveal how far Andrew Glyn,
formerly a vociferous and effective
Marxist opponent of this set of refor-
mist economic policies, has drifted
towards accepting them.
Andrew Glyn's opening line is "there
can be no dispute that the most fun-
damental economic and political pro-
blem facing the next Labour govern-
ment will be tacking mass unemploy-
ment" (p 1). While that is true, it would
be more accurate to say that the fun-
damental problem is the crisis of pro-
duction in the private profit capitalist
system, a symptom of which is mass
unemployment.
No matter, for Glyn outlines the
shocking waste of resources when
workers and plant are idle. He
estimates that the extra production
that could be created by putting the
unemployed to work would be
equivalent to "a trebling of council
house building, a doubling of manufacturing investment, plus a 50 per cent increase in pensions and in government spending on health and education."
We know only too well that the Tory government has made no effort to create jobs in the economy. On the contrary it has used the rising unemployment totals as a weapon to beat down those in work to accept a reduction in trade union rights, poorer conditions and lower wage rises. More recently rather than reduce the jobless, it has resorted to reducing the jobless statistics by fake employment programmes and a campaign of intimidation against the rights of claimants.
But it would be rather one-sided to suggest, as Andrew Glyn does in A Million Jobs a Year, that the only reason the Tories under Thatcher have dispensed with previously supported Keynesian policies of state spending is because they want to secure "social discipline' over the working class. A much more powerful reason has been that the Keynesian policies of state spending and cheap money have miserably failed to maintain the profitability of British capitalism. Profit rates fell throughout the 1970's and British production and productivity rates have declined with each successive recession (1970, 1974, 1979). Keynesian policies were not working for the profit system and would not work if re-introduced.
The last point is emphasised because beneath much of the radical talk of the proponents of the 'Alternative
Economic Strategy', and it is echoed in the Campaign Group pamphlet, is the belief that expansion of public spending under capitalism can right the economy.
Now it is true that Andrew Glyn wishes to disassociate himself from that Keynesian argument. But he does that by redefining Keynesianism to be a policy of expansion "which is not accompanied by such controls at the level of industry and economy as are necessary to secure success." (p 17) This seems to be a distortion of the essence of Keynesianism which is that an increase in 'effective demand' is all that is needed to provide a market for capitalist investment and production. And that 'demand' can be created by increased government spending, whether with controls over capitalists or not.
This is something that Marxism would not accept. Expanding markets are not enough to bring production and employment while production is for profit and not need and decisions about investment are made by the owners of capital, however 'controlled'. But the fundamental thesis of the Glyn pamphlet, as it was for the proponents of the Alternative Economic Strategy in all its variants, is that expansion under capitalism is possible "on the basis of extensive controls over foreign exchange transactions, over the financiat system, over prices, over trade and over investment and employment in the private sector' A Million Jobs a Year p 29). In this sense, the Campaign Group pamphlet is Keynesian not socialist economics.
'Controlled capitalism'
On the other hand, socialists have always stood by the tenet that the anarchic and wasteful private profit system must be replaced by a planned economy under workers' control and management, if production is to go ahead smoothly and if employment, wages and social needs are to be met. Planning cannot be successfully implemented without control of the economy. The question is can effective control over the economy be achieved by a Labour government (or perhaps more precisely, by the working class) without public ownership of the major financial and industrial companies that presently dominate it?
The Campaign Group pamphlet argues that the economy can be plann-
35
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Well heeled bosses join workers demonstration against hosiery and textile imports in 1980. Andrew Glyn was clear then that import controls are "nationalistic — an attempt to preserve the interests of the 'British nation' ', workers and capitalists alike.
ed without public ownership through a system of controls. But it is a dangerous illusion to imagine that a Labour government can 'control' capitalism and still meet the demands of the working class. Only the elimination of capitalism can do that. And in refuting the views of A Million Jobs a Year we can refer to Andrew Glyn's own arguments against 'controls' and for public ownership which he so ably expressed in his previous Militant pamphlet Capitalist crisis: Tribune's 'Alternative Economic Strategy' or a Socialist Plan written in 1978.
One of the arguments used in favour of controls in the Campaign Group pamphlet is the historical precedents of 1938-42 and 1945-8. Then, Glyn explains, one million jobs a year were created and this was made possible because controls were imposed on interest rates, prices, trade and investment by the government and adhered to by the capitalist class. As a result the government could expand public spending in 1938-42 to create jobs in the armed forces and in 1945-8 in industry:
But, as Glyn himself admits, "radical and rapid shifts in employment can be achieved" depending on "the political situation and whose interests are being served, ie whether those with decisive economic power more or less enthusiastically support the objective (as in 1939), reluctantly acquiesce (1945 perhaps) or bitterly oppose (1987?)" A Million Jobs a Year p12 36
Exactly! Controls over capitalist economic decision-making can only work with their agreement and that agreement is only given if it is in their interests and as soon as it is not, the agreement is broken. Even during the 1939-45 war some capitalist companies in the USA, such as ITT, secretly continued sustaining trade and investment with German subsidiaries. Legislation to isolate Rhodesia introduced by the Wilson government and supported by the Heath government was flagrantly flouted by capitalist firms, particularly the oil and armaments companies. And as Andrew Glyn pointed out in his Militant pamphlet, Capitalist Crisis, there was over £2,000 million of illegal export of capital under the post-war Labour government between 1946-8-now cited by him as a period of successful controls!
Exchange controls
And Glyn's somewhat tentative 1940's historical precedent for creating capitalist production and jobs through controls is not nearly so significant as the experience of the French socialist government which Glyn himself cites. For the lessons of that government are that even extensive controls do not allow a socialist government to plan the economy in the interests of the working class. Quoting
the Campaign Group pamphlet: "as imports were sucked in, the balance of payments deteriorated and pressure on the franc increased despite tightening of exchange controls" (my emphasis)... "control over the nationalised banking system did not guarantee an expansion of investment by the private sector or control over capital movements''
"control over a number of industrial commanding heights (over half of industrial employment in firms of over 2,000 workers was now in the public sector) did not generate expansion." p9
The key to the cooperation of the capitalist class in any government controls on their activities is: will they increase profitability? During the war of 1939-45 profits did increase dramatically, and anyway the very existence of British capitalist markets was at stake. The programme of controls and even nationalisation by the Labour government 1945-50 was not opposed by the capitalist class as a whole because the financial and structural support, provided by the government and financed by US capitalism, enabled British industry to reemploy workers in comparative social harmony and so boost profitability.
But that was not the case for the French government in the recession of the early 1980's. Their measures were bitterly opposed by the capitalist class who saw them as a threat to profitablilty. So controls which are deliberately
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designed to control profits, prices, investment etc introduced by a future Labour government would clearly and correctly be seen by capitalism as a threat to profitablity, already poor enough in the UK.
Yet despite the evidence in the Campaign Group pamphlet itself, its author proceeds to argue for a set of controls that would attempt to plan the economy under capitalism. Glyn has already recognised that the success of such controls depends on the support or acquiescence of the capitalist class to them and yet he still puts them forward. So let us examine the value of these planning controls in more detail.
Glyn points out that any Labour government coming to office with plans to expand spending for job creation will almost certainly be faced with a flight of capital out of the country, forcing down the value of sterling. In these circumstances, Glyn says, "extensive exchange controls would be necessary" p 19. Glyn proposes that a Labour government should separate out 'commercial transactions' from 'investment accounts' so that transfers of capital investment could be stopped without interrupting trade payments. He does acknowledge that such "a really comprehensive set of capital controls would involve plenty of technical difficulties" p 20 and yet it could be done, he says.
Price
controls
This is clearly a change of mind by Glyn. In his Militant pamphlet of 1978 he stated unequivocally that: "There is no exchange control system imaginable which can determine which overseas payments made by the monopolies are strictly commercial and which are tied to protecting themselves from fluctuations in the exchange rate. The only effective way to control such payments would be for these companies to be nationalised" (Capitalist Crisis p 46-second edition). And, as he added then, there is no surety that money blocked from fleeing abroad will be invested by capitalist firms in creating jobs: "Simply preventing capitalists from doing something will not automatically cause them to do what the government wants, especially given the political advantage for them in showing the government policy to be a failure' (Capitalist Crisis p 47). Glyn's previous arguments still seem to us to be valid as a criticism of the exchange and investment controls proposed by much of the left as an alternative to public ownership of the finance sector.
The main Tory argument presented against a Keynesian type expansion of public expenditure to raise production
and create jobs is that it will be inflationary, by accelerating the growth of the money supply, which if not matched by an increase in production will lead to an increase in prices.
Glyn attempts to answer this argument by saying that if there is increased expenditure, then increased demand will be matched by increased supply and so there will no inflation of prices: "a major expansion means more goods not less" (A Million Jobs a Year p 23.) But almost in the same breath Glyn seems to accept that there is no guarantee that increased demand will be met by increased production trom capitalist firms, particularly monopolies. They may prefer to take higher profits through higher prices. So he immediately suggests the need for price controls: "Price controls would have to be put in place to prevent firms taking advantage of the expanding markets to boost profits by banging up prices" p 24.
Glyn does not seem to remember the experience of price controls under the Labour government 1974-79. Then the Prices Commission set up by the Labour government was unable to control the myriad of 'new products' with 'new prices' introduced by companies to circumvent the controls. In fact the effect of the Prices Commission was estimated at just a reduction of half a per cent on the going rate of inflation. Eventually, after continual revisions of its terms of reference, the Commission became totally ineffective and the last years of the Labour government, before the 1979-81 recession saw a dramatic fall in prices, were years of almost hyper inflation of over 20 per cent per year.
And why were price controls ineffective? Because strict controls would have eaten into the profitability of capitalist industry, already too low for proper investment and production in the UK. If supply was to be increased under capitalism controls had to be revised and eventually dispensed with.
It is precisely this point that Andrew Glyn made when arguing against the value of price controls under capitalism in writing his Militant pamphlet: "to impose rigid and effective controls in a situation where workers were taking advantage of a temporary upswing and an ending of wage controls to put in for big wage increases would be to drastically worsen profitability. This would eliminate any possibility of the temporary rise of production being translated into a sustainable boom through higher investment." (Capitalist Crisis pp 39-40).
Glyn hammers home the point against the proponents of controls rather than ownership and planning
when he says that arguing for price controls is to "opt for a policy which ignores the working of the capitalist system by asserting that in a situation of crisis, production and investment can be expanded by driving down profitability further!" (Capitalist Crisis p40). Unfortunately the author of the Campaign Group pamphlet has forgotten those words. Under capitalism in crisis price controls would have to allow profits to rise not fall if there were to be a chance of persuading the capitalists to invest.
Another traditional policy of the reformist left designed to correct the inefficencies and weaknesses of the British capitalist economy has been devaluation of the currency. Previous Labour governments have used devaluation as a means of increasing the competitiveness of British exports and increasing the costs of imports in order to improve the balance of trade. At the last election Peter Shore, the right wing labour speaker on the economy, advocated a 25-30 per cent devaluation as the remedy for British economic ills. But the utter failure of this policy to revive exports or even stem the flood of imports into all sectors of the home economy has finally led the Labour left to drop it.
Import controls
The Campaign Group pamphlet wastes no time in dismissing devaluation. However it embraces enthusiastically the other main policy prescription of the Labour left on trade: import controls. The advantage over devaluation, Glyn claims, is that devaluation means increased prices through the higher cost of imports while controls on imports do not. lA Million Jobs a Year p25)..
This argument is just not valid and again is refuted by Glyn himself in his earlier pamphlet for Militant when he says: "the great advantage claimed for import controls is that unlike devaluation the price of imported commodities is not automatically pushed up.... but import controls would mean that British workers would be faced with higher prices. With sales limited, foreign capitalists would no longer have any incentive to undercut British firms and they would raise the price of the imports which were allowed in. Not only would workers be forced to switch to already dearer British goods, but these would also be increased in price as British capitalists would no longer be restrained by foreign competition. To a substantial extent then, import control is just a variant on the old capitalist theme of the necessity for the working class to pay with a wage cut for the
37
[page 37]
MIR Spring 1987: Alternative Economic Strategy privilege of maintaining employment." (Capitalist Crisis p41).
It now seems that Glyn wants workers to make that sacrifice or at least he feels that under "controlled capitalism'
no choice for workers. As he puts it: "Some people feel that the real costs of restricted access to imported goods are too high: that having to wait for a Toyota or a Sony hi-fi is too big a sacrifice. But there will be UK substitutes available, hopefully (sic!), of comparable performance and price. If the choice is presented honestly, to be what it really is, either ready availability of Toyotas rather than a substitute or reduced unemployment plus reduced queues for hip operations available BL cars, is there really any choice?"' (A Million Jobs a Year p 27) But is that presenting the situation 'honestly' or 'to be what it really is?' If workers make a sacrifice by paying higher prices for necessary consumer goods (not just Toyotas) or buy inferior and more expensive British goods, will they get in return more jobs, more houses, more training under 'controlled capitalism' i.e. while the decisions to invest and plan for these social needs are still in the hands of the capitalists? No, Glyn is stretching his new found naivety too far.
Not only would British workers not be able to buy cheaper consumer imports but, moreover, British industry, now very reliant on imports of machine goods and semi-manufactures as well as raw materials would be severely damaged if controls were placed on their imports. It is by no means certain that controls on imports would benefit the key sectors of the British economy without also driving up their input costs and so retard the growth of their A key argument used against import controls is that it invites retaliation from rival capitalist economies. This danger would be serious if Britain's major trading markets were to slap controls on British goods in response to controls by Britain. Glyn recognises this danger when he says that "retaliation and opposition should be anticipated" (p26), but his answer is to bite the bullet and face it out, to use the "blunt approach". And he makes an appeal "Labour's potential allies overseas are the labour movements and it would be to them that Labour would appeal to minimise the disruptive action of foreign governments and employers". (A Million Jobs a Year p27). But can Glyn be serious? Strong import controls can only hit the jobs of workers overseas who work for companies that export to Britain ie. Toyota 38 workers and Sony hi-fi workers. A Labour government takes away their jobs and then appeals to them for solidarity? No, Glyn was much clearer on the consequences of controls in his Militant pamphlet: "It is not difficult to what reception a Labour government would receive if it attempintroduce really tough import .. the depth of the economic crisis, and the competitive nature of the capitalist system, conceivable that the British state could get away without retaliation to the introduction of really tough import controls... workers abroad would be pushed into supporting their bosses in the campaign for retaliation and the same thing would develop in the UK as export industries met retaliation from import controls abroad... so the demand for import controls must be recognised as being nationalistic - an attempt to preserve the interests of the 'British nation', workers and capitalists alike, and on this basis there would be no possibility of British workers appealing to the labour movement abroad to oppose the retaliatory action of their capitalists'.
(Capitalist Crisis 'The crucial question'
The supporters of import controls can defend their position best when there is a general expansion of world trade. Then they can argue that with trade growing for everybody, controls on imports into Britain will not be so damaging for other trading nations. However the prospects for world trade have deteriorated sharply since Glyn so effectively attacked the supporters of import controls in 1978. Europe and the United States have begun imposing quotas over each other's exports in retaliatory action. What would happen to Britain if a Labour government attempted to restrict European and US Even an arch supporter of import controls, Wyn Godley of the 'Cambridge School' of economists, who strongly influenced the Labour left in the 1970s, has said that controls "would be much more difficult to introduce than in 1976" (Guardian 13 January 1987) and 'prefers' coordinated European reflation, predicting that without general expansion, "the mad mercantilists (ie protectionists) will devour us all." Yet Glyn adopts a policy he refuted before, just at a time when it has even less validity and is jettisoned by its previously strongest None of this denies the need for a workers government, where ownership, control and planning rest in the hands of the labour movement, imposing a state monopoly of foreign trade as an essential planning tool. But that would mean the public ownership of all those industries where controls are as a necessary part of a socialist plan to control the economy in society's interests.
And a socialist government of the working class coming to power in Britain would be a source of inspiration to the labour movement in many nations giving them the confidence to demand greater trade with a socialist Britain from their governments, not less. Socialists stand for international planning of the world's resources in the interests of working people. As Glyn said in the Militant pamphlet: "Neither import controls nor free trade provide a solution to the crisis of British capital. The fact that the capitalist class in Britain may be forced by the growing tide of protectionism and by its own weakness to impose import controls is all the more reason why socialists should give no credence to them." (Capitalist Crisis p45).
Up to this point in the Campaign Group pamphlet, Glyn has argued that the plan for a million jobs a year "would only be feasible on the basis of extensive controls over foreign exchange transactions, over the financial system, over prices, over trade and over investment and employment in the private • (p29) In this article we have attempted to expose the flaws in that view, explain that it is indistinguishable from the 'Alternative Strategy' put forward by the reformist left in earlier years; and a programme forthrightly demolished by Glyn himself over eight years ago.
The author of the Campaign Group pamphlet is partially aware of his own contradictions when he raises on p18 of A Million Jobs a Year the "crucial "whether the , which is:
solutions advocated below are consistent with private ownership of the major financial and industrial companies which dominate the economy"' then goes on to promote the idea that they are 'consistent' by advocating controls over capitalism rather than its abolition, as we have seen.
But still the contradiction bothers him and he returns to the 'crucial question' on p30 in another way: "could a plan for full employment along the lines sketched out be implemented on the basis of the present economic structure where private ownership occupies most of the commanding heights?' Glyn makes the point that controls only worked during the war because the capitalists "being committed to the objective of winning the war... were bound to abide more or less by them".
[page 38]
But as he goes on to say 'the position could hardly be more different now," and he presents the evidence to show how hostile the industrialists and financiers would be to controls now in the mid-1980s.
So what does he advocate? Firstly, action against the financial institutions: "taking them into immediate public ownership seems absolutely indispensable if a Labour government is to prevent financial crisis and be enabled to use the credit system as part of planning for full employment". There is no equivocation here.
But when Glyn looks at the industrial sector, he draws back from public ownership because "the capacity of the major industrial firms to frustrate a Labour government's plans for full employment is less immediate than the threat posed by the financial sector." Factories cannot be moved like money, he says, and the real task here is to ensure control over investment, production and marketing decisions. So he proposes not public ownership but compulsory planning agreements for the giant firms; and boards of company management where workers making and using the industry's products and government representatives have a majority of votes over shareholders. In this way control over industry could be achieved "without removing ownership of shares from the existing shareholders and without incorporating all major firms directly into the public sector" . I Million Jobs a Year p33)
Halfway house
This half-way house between controls and abolition of the capitalist system of production is seen by Glyn even to have positive benefits because "it can be argued (and presumably Glyn is arguing it here - RM) that such approaches to the control of industry would have the advantage of demonstrating, through the process of struggling to shape the development of the economy, the justification and eventual necessity of the full implementation of Clause IV," (p34). Glyn recognises that "nationalisation of all of the commanding heights of the economy is the most direct way of asserting society's control over its resources...the interests of shareholders would be explicitly denied and their power to do so removed." Yet for the author of the Campaign Group pamphlet, whether such measures are necessary or at least immediately necessary is a matter of "discussion and evaluation" to be justified during "the process of struggling to shape the development of the economy."
But is the luxury of time in 'discussion and evaluation' available to a Labour government which comes to office with a major economic crisis, facing outright hostility from the capitalists to any curbs on their decision making? Glyn admits that hostility to controls would be such as to threaten the very existence of the government, let alone its programme of controls. And as he says: "It would be irresponsible to suggest that such a shift (of control) would be achieved as soon as a parliamentary majority had been elected to carry it out. Active support would be required at every step to ensure that the main economic levers were removed from their present controllers (bit by bit apparently) and were operated in society's interests. Those who currently exercise economic power have non-economic weapons as wel!, through their influence on the state machine. The history of all previous attempts to transfer control of the economy indicate that the highest degree of active support and commitment would be required from Labour's supporters to overcome the threat of such extra-parliamentary opposition." (A Million Jobs a Year p 35).
But this statement begs several questions. Glyn draws back from advocating the "most direct way of asserting society's control over its resources" ie nationalisation of the commanding heights of industry as well as finance, because he says that it is not 'immediately necessary' and could be 'evaluated and discussed' as a course of action drawing upon the struggle of a Labour government against the dictates of the market.
But if he draws back from outright nationalisation because he hopes that controls would be more acceptable to big business, then he knows that is ruled out. If the labour movement proposed extensive and effective controls over investment and profits in industry, such policies would be greeted by a howl of reaction from the city and big business, just as great as for advocating public ownership of industry. They would immediately launch a campaign of opposition using the media, the courts, industrial sabotage and, if necessary, state power to block these controls and even to stop a government being elected pledged to carry them out. If the capitalists will do that to stop 'controls' anyway, why don't we push for the elimination of monopoly capitalism from the start?
As Glyn says, only the mobilisation of the labour movement and the working class as a whole in support of a Labour government implementing socialist economic policies for full employment could enable it to survive.
But if that is necessary for a programme of controls why confuse the issue for workers and stop short of a clear explanation that the ending of the private profit system is the only permanent guarantee of establishing full employment and all the social gains that go with a planned economy.
For planning is not possible without control of the economy and control is not really possible, as we have argued here, without ownership of the productive forces in the hands of the working class. Any halfway house is misleading to workers and will weaken their resolve to fight big business opposition to a socialist government.
That was certainly the view of Andrew Glyn in the Militant pamphlet when he attacked planning agreements as a diversion from public ownership measures: "the attempt to impose the outlines of a socialist plan (production for need rather than profit) on a capitalist economy, which is what planning agreements amount to, is bound to be hopeless while the capitalists still hold the main levers of economic power." (Capitalist Crisis p 57).
Publ
ownership
controls
Then Glyn did not consider controls versus ownership of industry as a matter for 'discussion or evaluation' , when he asserted that "only a programme of nationalisation of all the major monopolies would remove from the capitalist class the crucial levers of economic sabotage which are at present concentrated in their hands." (Capitalist Crisis p 68).
In that pamphlet, Glyn attacked the 'piecemeal way' that the proponents of the 'Alternative Economic Strategy' put forward their controls, making them "form an easy target for the capitalist media" allowing them to confuse the working class. In a nutshell the 'crucial question' is: is capitalism to survive or is it not? The answer is not clear from the proponents of the 'Alternative Economic Strategy' or from the author of A Million Jobs a Year.
As Glyn said in the Militant pamphlet, "if one theme runs through the various points of the Alternative Strategy it is that they attempt to implant in a partial fashion aspects of a full-blooded socialist plan on what would remain fundamentally a capitalist organism" (Capitalist Crisis p 68).
And in that earlier pamphlet, Glyn was scathing of those who advocated a step by step approach towards public ownership and planning ie, "demonstrating through the process of struggling to shape the development ot
39
ic ownership versus
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MIR Spring 1987: Alternative Economic Strategy
the economy, the justification and eventual necessity for the full implementation of Clause IV" - the words Glyn uses in the Campaign Group pamphlet. He answered that approach in the Militant pamphlet with: "by attempting to go part of the way towards a socialist programme, this strategy is not 'transitional' to such a programme, but is transitional to a tremendous disaster. An attempt simply to implement such a programme would be met by the capitalists using the enormous power left in their hands to sabotage the government's plans. The danger is not just that the ideas of socialism would be discredited in this way, but that the economic chaos which would result would pave the way for a reactionary takeover on the basis of crushing the organisations of the working class, as the Chilean experience makes clear,"' (Capitalist Crisis p 69).
That is the position which Marxists hold to, even if Glyn has changed his views since. A socialist leadership must explain to the working class clearly and from the beginning exactly what is necessary in order to give them the 'most direct way' of controlling the economy. That can only be a programme of public ownership, under workers' control and management, of the financial institutions and major industrial and commercial monopolies (around 200 or so companies). If a Labour government was to follow the policies of the Campaign Group and decide that it is not necessary 'immediately' or at all to take over the commanding heights, then it cannot succeed in really • controlling the economy. And it will also confuse and weaken workers' resolve if it changes its programme midstream after the capitalists have been able to sabotage the economy and prepare for political reaction. In such a situation the advantage is with the capitalist class while they continue to hold the levers of economic and political power.
The black history of Chile demonstrates that a socialist government with radical objectives to improve the lot of working people, but with only partial measures of nationalisation and workers' control, leaves itself open to a terrible defeat.
Perhaps another reason that the Campaign Group pamphlet is unwilling to spell out the need for a full blooded socialist plan for employment may be because it too accepts the myth propagated by the Tories and the Labour leaders that the British people do not want socialism, if it means public ownership. The Campaign Group may want it themselves (or at least most of them), but as the electorate does not, it is necessary to water down what is 40
necessary into what is acceptable.
Obviously there are some grains of truth in the argument that nationalisation is not supported by British workers-after all it is a dirty word shunned by the present Labour leaders. And the reason for that is the bureaucratic implementation of public ownership by previous Labour governments. Nationalisation has been used to save loss-making capitalist industries and firms, to be then run and controlled by unelected bureaucrats, often the former failed capitalists, with the main objective of 'rationalising' an industry through redundancies which the private employers did not dare do. No wonder many people see no value in public ownership.
Of course such nationalisation as we have seen bears no relation to the measures that would be introduced under a socialist programme which completely abolished the capitalist system of production for profit. With democratic workers' control and management of industry, workers would be involved in drawing up the plan for investment and production, expanding resources and technique to their full potential and enabling the full employment of all those able to work.
A summary
Andrew Glyn in the Campaign Group pamphlet ably speils out what extra resources could be achieved by ending the waste of unemployed workers, idle capital equipment and plant, and by a renewed programme of investment using the latest technology. For such gains to be achieved it requires a plan of production based on social ownership under the control of the working class; not on capitalism, however restrained by 'controls' "by one means or another' A Million Jobs a Year p 36).
If such a programme was campaigned for by the Labour leaders it would gain mass support. As Andrew Glyn said in his Militant pamphlet, 'it is not in the least unrealistic to believe in the success of such a campaign once the issues are clearly explained'' (Capitalist Crisis p 80). Moreover, only such a bold and clear explanation of the socialist alternative would produce the necessary resolve from the working people to defeat the inevitable reaction (including violent reaction) that would come from the capitalist class when they see their power under threat. Anything less, as the proponents of the 'Alternative Economic Strategy' in the past and the Campaign Group now seem to think possible, is a recipe for failure and terrible defeat by the forces of reaction.
To summarise, we have argued that the Campaign Group pamphlet's principal policy proposals are similar to those advocated by the proponents of the 'Alternative Economic Strategy' in the 1970s and eary 1980s, namely that a Labour government could direct a capitalist economy in such a way as to provide full employment and other social needs by an extensive series of controls over prices, investment at home and abroad, and trade - without the need to implement Clause IV and abolish capitalist ownership of the means of production.
We have argued against that view by trying to show that controls have not and will not work, especially if the capitalist class is opposed to them. If controls are weak to avoid antagonising financiers and industrialists, then they will be ineffecive and fail to revive investment and production for needas the experience of the socialist government in France and in the early 1980s has proven.
If, on the other hand, controls are extensive and firmly applied by a Labour government, or even look like being implemented to threaten the profitability of the capitalist class, then a Labour government would meet the all out resistance of the capitalist class to any measures, using the media, the law and eventually force to stop them being applied.
Our argument here is: why advocate a paraphernalia of regulations to control capitalism rather than abolish it, if it still leaves a Labour government open to a brutal attack threatening its survival? A clear campaign by the labour movement for the implementation of Clause IV by a Labour government would also be resisted by the capitalist in similarly vicious way, but a programme of public ownership and workers' management of a socialist plan would be much more likely to win support from working people as it would end the economic power of capitalism in one stroke. Such a programme, if properly explained, would be much more likely to mobilise and encourage the organised working class to defend a Labour government so that the political power of the capitalist class, in the last analysis, its state machine was defeated or neutralised if used against a democratically elected government. Because at the end of the day a socialist transformation and with it full employment will not be achieved by having the correct set of economic policies (controls or a socialist plan), but by the willingness and ability of working people to struggle for it against a ruling class which will not hand over its privileges without a no holds barred fight.
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Written en route to Mexico from Norway, 31 December 1936. In Norway Trotsky had been interned for nearly four months by the Norwegian Labour government, under pressure from Moscow, in an effort to silence his exposure as a frame-up the August 1936 show trial which ended with THE YEAR that is now ending will go down in history as the year of Cain. In view of the warnings by Zinoviev and Kamenev about Stalin's secret schemes and designs,, the question may be asked whether intentions of the very same kind did not arise in their minds in relation to Stalin after they found themselves cut off from all other means of combat. Both of them made no few turns and squandered no few principles in the last period of their lives. In that case why can't we grant the possibility that, despairing of the consequences of their own capitulations, they really did at a certain moment make a frantic turn toward terror? Later, as part of their final capitulation, they might have consented to meet the GPU halfway and to entangle me in their ill-starred designs, as a service to themselves and to the regime with which they once again sought to make peace.
This hypothesis has entered the minds of some of my friends. I have weighed it from all sides, without the slightest preconceptions or considerations of personal interest. And each time I came to the conclusion that it was utterly unfounded.
Lenin's testament Zinoviev and Kamenev are two profoundly different types. Zinoviev is an agitator, Kamenev a propagandist. Zinoviev was guided in the main by a subtle political instinct. Kamenev was given to reason and analysing. Zinoviev fly off at a was always inclined to tangent. Kamenev, on the contrary, erred on the side of excessive caution. Zinoviev was entirely absorbed by politics, cultivating no other interests and appetites. In Kamenev there sat a sybarite and an aesthete. Zinoviev was vindictive. Kamenev was good nature personified. I do not know what their mutual relations were in emigration. In 1917 they were brought close together. for a time by their opposition to the October Revolution. In the first few years after the victory, Kamenev's attitude toward Zinoviev was rather ironical. They were subsequently drawn together by their opposition to me and, later, to Stalin. Throughout the last thirteen years of their lives, they have marched side by side and their names were Fifty years since the Moscow Purge Trials, 1936-38 Zinoviev and Kamenev printed here.
By Leon Trotsky always mentioned together.
Despite all their individual differences and in addition to their common schooling in emigration under guidance, they were endowed with an almost identical range of intellect and Kamenev's analytical capacity served to complement Zinoviev's feel for a situation; and jointly they would explore for a common decision. The more cautious Kamenev would sometimes allow Zinoviev to carry him along further than he himself wanted to go, but in the long run they found themselves side by side along the same line of retreat. In the stature of their personalities they were peers, and they supplemented each other by their dissimilarities. Both of them were deeply and unreservedly devoted to the cause of socialism. Such is the explanation for their tragic union. There are no compelling reasons for me to take upon myself any political or moral responsibility for Zinoviev and brief Kamenev.
Discounting interval - 1926-27 - they were always my bitter adversaries. Personally, I did not place much trust in them. Each of them, to be sure, was Stalin's intellectual superior. But they lacked sufficient character. Lenin had precisely this trait in mind when he wrote in his "testament" that it was "no accident" that Zinoviev and Kamenev were opponents of the insurrection in the autumn of 1917. They failed to withstand the pressure of bourgeois public opinion. When deep-going social shifts in the Soviet Union began to crystallise, combined with the formation of a privileged bureaucracy, it was "no accident' that Zinoviev and Kamenev allowed themselves to be swept away into the camp of Thermidor (1922-26). They far excelled their then allies, including Stalin, in their theoretical understanding of the processes taking place. Herein lies the explanation of their attempt to break with the bureaucracy and to oppose it. In July at the plenum of the Central Committee, Zinoviev declared that "on the question of apparatus-bureaucratic Trotsky was correct as against us." Zinoviev, at that time, the execution of the sixteen defendants, including the old Bolsheviks, Zinoviev and Kamenev. It was not until he was on the Atlantic that he was able to begin a systematic written refutation of Stalin's purge trials, including the article acknowledged that his mistake in waging a struggle against me was even "more dangerous" than his mistake in 1917! However, the pressure of the privileged stratum reached overwhelming proportions. It was "no accident' that Zinoviev and Kamenev capitulated to Stalin at the end of 1927 and carried with them those who were younger and less authoritative. Thereafter they expended no little effort in denouncing the Opposition. But in 1930-32, when the country's entire organism was convulsed by the frightful consequences of the forced and unbridled collectivisation, Zinoviev and Kamenev, like so many other capitulators, anxiously lifted their heads and began discussing in whispers among themselves the dangers of the government's new policy. They were caught reading a critical document which had originated in the ranks of the Right Opposition. For this terrible crime they were expelled from the party-no other charge was brought against them!-and, to top it off, were exiled. In 1933, Zinoviev and Kamenev not only recanted once again but prostrated themselves before Stalin. No slander was too vile for them to cast against the Opposition and especially against me personally. Their self-disarmament rendered them completely helpless before the bureaucracy, which could henceforth demand of them any confession whatever. Their subsequent fate was a result of these progressive capitulations and self-abasements. Conduct at the trial Yes, they lacked sufficient character. These words, however, should not be taken too simplistically. The strength of any material is measured in terms of the forces operating on it and tending to destroy it. Between the beginning of the trial and my internment (in Norway at the end of 1936-Ed) I had occasion to hear tranquil petty-bourgeois people "It's impossible to complain to me:
understand Zinoviev. He is so lacking in character!" And my reply to them was: "Have you yourselves experienced the full weight of the pressures to which he has been subjected for a number of years?" Unintelligent in the extreme are the comparisons, so 41
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widespread in intellectual circles, with the conduct in court of Danton, Robespierre, and others. Those were the cases of revolutionary tribunes who came directly from the combat arena to face the knife of justice, still at the height of their powers, with their nerves almost unaffected, and — at the same time - without the slightest hope of survival after the trial.
Even more inappropriate are comparisons with Dimitrov's conduct in the Leipzig trial,. To be sure, compared to Torgler, Dimitrov made a favourable showing by his resoluteness and courage. But revolutionists in various lands and especially in tsarist Russia have shown no less firmness under incomparably more difficult conditions. Dimitrov was facing the most vicious class enemy. There was no evidence against him, nor could there have been. The state apparatus of the Nazis was still in its formative stages, and not adapted to totalitarian frame-ups. Dimitrov had the support of the gigantic Soviet state and the Comintern. From all the corners of the earth the sympathies of the popular masses went out to him. His friends were present at the trial. To become a "hero" one need only have had ordinary human courage.
But was this the situation of Zinoviev and Kamenev when they faced the GPU and the court? For ten years they had been enveloped by clouds of slander paid for in heavy gold. For ten years they had been suspended between life and death, first in a political sense then in a moral sense, and lastly in a physical sense. Can one find in all past history examples of such systematic, refined, and fiendish destructive work upon the spines and nerves, upon all the elements of the human spirit? Zinoviev or Kamenev would have had more than ample character for a tranquil period. But our epoch of tremendous social and political convulsions demanded an extraordinary firmness of these men, whose abilities had secured them a leading place in the revolution. The disproportion between their abilities and wills led to tragic results.
The history of my relations with Zinoviev and Kamenev can be traced without difficulty in documents, articles and books. The Biulleten Oppozitsii (1929-36) alone sufficiently defines the abyss which decisively separated us starting from the day of their capitulation. Between us and them there were no ties whatever, no relations, no correspondence, nor even any attempts in this direction - there were none nor could there have been. In my letters and articles, I invariably advised the Oppositionists, in the interests 42
Kamenev and Zinoviev
of political and moral self-preservation, to break ruthlessly with the capitulators. Consequently, whatever I am able to say concerning the views and plans of Zinoviev - Kamenev for the last eight years of their lives can in no case be construed as the deposition of a witness. But I have in my possession a sufficient number of documents and facts which are easily verifiable. I am so well acquainted with the participants, their characters, their relations, and the entire background as to be able to state with absolute assurance that the accusation of terrorism against Zinoviev and Kamenev is from beginning to end a contemptible, police-manufactured frame-up without an iota of truth in it.
"Lust for power"
The mere reading of the record of the court proceedings confronts every thoughtful person with the following enigma: Who exactly are these extraordinary defendants? Are they old and experienced politicians, struggling in the name of a definite programme and capable of combining the means with the end, or are they victims of an Inquisition, with their conduct determined not by their own reason or will but by the interests of the Inquisitors? Are we dealing with normal people whose psychology is internally consistent and reflected in their words and actions, or with clinical cases who chose the least rational course, and who motivate their choice by the most incongruous arguments?
These questions apply above all to Zinoviev and Kamenev. Just what were their motives - motives that must have been exceedingly powerful-that guided them in their purported terror? At the first trial in January 1935, Zinoviev and Kamenev, while denying their participation in the assassination of Kirov, did acknowledge, by way
of compensation, their "moral responsibility" for the terrorist tendencies, and in doing so they cited as the incentive for their oppositional activity their desire "to restore capitalism' . If we had nothing else to go on but this unnatural political "confession," it would be sufficient to expose the lie of Stalinist justice. And indeed who can believe that Kamenev and Zinoviev were so frantically set upon restoring the capitalism they had overthrown that they were ready to sacrifice their own as well as other heads to attain this goal? The confession of the defendants in January 1935 so crudely revealed the hand of Stalin behind it that the sensibilities of even the least exacting "friends of the Soviet Union' were jarred.
In the trial of the sixteen (August 1936) the "restoration of capitalism' is completely discarded. The impending motive to terror is the naked "lust for power" . The indictment rejects one version in favour of another as if it were a question of alternative solutions to a chess problem, with the interchange of solutions made in silence and without any commentaries. Following the state prosecutor, the defendants now repeat that they had no programme, but simply were seized by an irresistible desire to capture the commanding heights of the state, regardless of the price. But we should like to ask: just how could the assassination of the "leaders" have delivered power into the hands of people who had managed through a series of recantations to undermine confidence in themselves, to degrade themselves, to trample themselves into the mud, and thereby forever to deprive themselves of the possibility of playing any leading political role in the future?
If the goal of Zinoviev and Kamenev is incredible, their means are still more irrational. In the most carefully thoughtout depositions of Kamenev it is
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underscored with special insistence that the Opposition had completely isolated itself from the masses, had lost its principles, and was thereby deprived of any hope of gaining influence in the future; and it was for precisely for this reason that the Opposition came to the idea of terror. It is not hard to understand how advantageous such a self-characterisation is to Stalin; it is his order that is being carried out -that is absolutely self-evident. But while the depositions of Kamenev are suited for the purpose of discrediting the Opposition, they are utterly unsuited for the justification of terror. It is precisely in conditions of political isolation that terrorist struggle signifies swift selfdestruction for a revolutionary faction. We Russians are only too well aware of this from the example of Narodnaya Volya (1879-83) as well as from the example of the Social Revolutionaries in the period of reaction (1907-09). Zinoviev and Kamenev were not only brought up on these lessons, but they themselves commented innumerable times upon them in the party press. Could they, Old Bolsheviks, have forgotten and rejected the ABCs of the Russian revolutionary movement only because they wanted power so very much? To believe this is utterly impossible.
'Terrorists-without
ideals?'
Let us suppose for a moment, however, that it actually occurred to Zinoviev and Kamenev to hope to gain power by a public disavowal of their past, supplemented by a campaign of anonymous terror. (Such a supposition is equivalent in fact to declaring them psychopaths!) In that case, what impulses would have driven those who carried out the terrorist actions, those who inevitably would have had to pay with their own heads for someone else's ideas? A hired killer who acts with the assurance of immunity, given in advance - that is believable. But terrorists without an ideal or a profound faith in their cause, offering themselves up for sacrifice? - that is inconceivable. In the trial of the sixteen, the Kirov assassination is portrayed as a small part of a vast plan for the extermination of the whole top layer of rulers. What is presented is a systematic terror on an enormous scale. For the direct work of assassination, many dozens, if not hundreds, of fanatical, hardened, self-sacrificing fighters would have been necessary. Such people do not fal! from the sky. They have to be picked, trained, organised. They have to be thoroughly imbued with conviction that the only salvation lies in terror. Beside
Spring 1987: Zinoviev and Kamenev
the active terrorists, reserves are needed. These can be counted on only if there are broad layers within the young generation inspired with sympathy for terrorism. Only by extensive propaganda in favour of terrorism can such moods be created, and such a propaganda effort would have an especially intense and passionate character, because the entire tradition of Russian Marxism goes against terror. This tradition would have to be broken down, and a new doctrine counterposed to it. If Zinoviev and Kamenev could not have repudiated their entire antiterrorist past without saying a word, even less could they have steered their supporters toward this Golgotha without a critical discussion, without polemics, without conflicts, without splits, and-without denunciations reaching the authorities. Such a drastic ideological rearming, involving hundreds and thousands of revolutionaries, could not have failed, in turn, to leave its traces in innumerable material ways (documents, letters etc). Where is all this? Where is the propaganda? Where is the terrorist literature? Where are all the echoes of the internal struggles and debates? In the trial materials there is not even a hint of all of this.
For Vyshinsky,, as for Stalin, the defendants in general do not exist as human personalities. Thus, any question of their political psychology is also lost sight of. When one of the accused tried to invoke his "feelings" , which he claimed prevented him from firing at Stalin, Vyshinsky alleged in reply that there were certain physical obstacles: "These:.. are the real reasons, the objective reasons, all the rest is psychology." "Psychology'! What annihilating contempt! The accused have no psychology: that is, they dare not have any. Their confessions are not the product of normal human motivation. The psychology of the ruling clique, through the mechanism of the Inquisition, totally subordinates the psychology of the defendants to its own devices. The trial is modelled after some tragic puppet show. The accus-
Notes 1. This refers to revelations made by Kamenev and Zinoviev to Trotsky, when they split with Stalin and made a bloc with the Left Opposition in 1926. During the period of the 'triumvirate' of Stalin, Kamenev and Zinoviev, Stalin had seriously discussed the possiblity of physically eliminating Trotsky by organising a terrorist attack, desisting, as Zinoviev reported, on one consideration only: "that the youth would place the responsibility upon the 'triumvirate' or upon him personally, and resort to terrorist acts. Stalin therefore considered it necessary to crush the cadres of the opposition youth beforehand."
ed are manipulated by strings, or, rather, by the ropes around their necks. There is no room for "psychology."
Nevertheless, without the psychology of terrorism, terrorist action is inconceivable!
Let us for a moment allow the charges in all their absurdity: Driven by their "lust for power," the capitulator-leaders become terrorists. Hundreds of others are, in turn, so swept up by Zinoviev and Kamenev's "lust for power" that they, too, obligingly risk their necks. And all this-in alliance with Hitler! The criminal work, invisible, to be sure, to the unwary eye, reaches unheard-of proportions: the assassination of all the "leaders", universal sabotage, and espionage are organised. And this goes on for not just a day or a month, but almost five years! All under the mask of loyalty to the party! It is impossible to imagine more hard-bitten, cold-blooded, ferocious criminals.
Victims of the GPU
But then what? In late July 1936 these monsters suddenly renounce their past and themselves and pathetically confess one after the other. None of them defend their ideas, aims, or methods of struggle. They vie in denouncing each other and themselves. No evidence is in the prosecutor's hands but the confessions of the accused. Yesterday's terrorists, saboteurs, and fascists now prostrate themselves to Stalin and swear their ardent love for him. What in the world are these fantastic defendants —criminals? psychopaths? a little of both? No, they are the clientele of Vyshinsky and Yagoda,. This is what people look like who have gone through the laboratories of the GPU.
There is as much truth in Zinoviev and Kamenev's tales of their past criminal activity as in their protestations of love for Stalin. They died the victims of a totalitarian system that deserves nothing but condemnation!
2. This refers to the 1933 trial by the Nazis of Georgi Dimitrov, a Bulgarian communist who had moved to Germany, and Ernst Torgler, a German CP leader, who were tried on charges of having set the Reichstag on fire.
3. Andrei Vyshinsky (1883-1954)—a Menshevik from 1903-1920, when he joined the Bolsheviks. Was chief prosecutor in the Moscow trials.
4. Henry Yagoda (1891-1938) — As head of the secret police, the GPU, was responsible for organising the 1936 Moscow trials. But he himself was made a defendant at the 1938 Purge Trial and was shot.
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Book Reviews Policing Industrial Disputes- 1893-1985 By Roger Geary.
Published by Methuen, 1986.
Reviewed by Chris Herriot (Sacked Monktonhall miner) POLICE VIOLENCE at Orgreave and elsewhere in the course of the miners' strike, took those on the receiving end completely by surprise. Despite having watched or even participated in the events of the strikes of 1972 and 1974, Grunwicks, the Warrington dispute or the national steel strike, and witnessed state brutality in action, most miners including union officials or activists still had a respect for the 'guardians of law and order'. The 'excesses' of the coal dispute-cavalry charges, riot squads, dogs, batons and 'snatch squads'—put paid to all that.
Policing Industrial Disputes, although it adopts an academic approach, provides a useful contribution on the nature of police activities in industrial conflicts, placing the role of the police in the 1984-85 miners' strike in its historical context. While it is often necessary to read between the lines of what the author is saying in order to draw out the important lessons, nevertheless it becomes absolutely clear from the book that the ruling class and their agents strive continuously to learn from every conflict in order to improve and adapt the systems and instruments of repression.
Superficial method Geary's method of analysis is to map out the "changing nature of industrial confrontation" since 1893, outlining 5 or 6 periods of time wherein a distinctive "form of disorder" prevailed. Each 'disorder', he argues, was accompanied 'inappropriate by an 'appropriate or response' from the state. While this is a completely superficial approach to providing an understanding of the different conditions involved in each struggle, the economic background, the balance of class forces etc, nonetheless Geary does produce some interesting facts. Apparently it was as late as the 1890's that it was still the task of the army rather 44 than the small local police forces to intervene in instances of social unrest, under the control of a local magistrate. However, since these magistrates tended to be the local coal or mill owner, such naked forms of repression had to be democracy' were to be maintained. While it was possible to bring detachments of Scots Greys into Liverpool to quell unrest when a conflict became generalised rather than confined to a particular locality then the problem of troops identifying with workers arose. Events such as the 'Featherstone shootings', troops at the disposal of coalowners murdered unarmed strikers, alterted the capitalists to the dangers inherent in using the army at such as early stage in class battles.
The military are the last line of defence of the capitalist's property and to commit them in the field so early, with so little provocation and without having first carried out the necessary nation-wide propaganda campaign is to take an enormous risk. Further, use of the police could be portrayed as defending 'law and order' whilst military intervention from the outset can only be seen as outright strike breaking by the state. Using police can also have the effect of containing the conflict in a particular area. So the period of 1910-1914 is portrayed as a time of violent picketing with "blacklegs', which saw the use of the police as the key instrument of social control with the army in readiness should it be necessary.
It is clear that the capitalists were in a state of fear that the strike movement of the time would develop to threaten the very fabric of society. This explains the beginings of the extensive use of intelligence-gathering against the labour movement. During the 1914-18 war, the 'Ministry of Munitions' set up a 'directorate of intelligence' to spy on unions in arms factories and the army itself also took a keen interest in industrial matters. Of course the CID had to get in on the act as well: Geary refers to "a meeting of the Central 'Stop the War' Committee. The only two attendants were two lady police spies, who entered into conversation, neither knowing the other's occupation. At a subsequent election for vacancies on the Committee both these ladies were elected...
"! Finally, the multiplicity of intelligence groups were brought under one umbrella with Special Branch in the role of co-ordinator. Despite the 1926 General Strike, the period up to 1945 is described by Geary as being relatively free of violence-with the exception of conflict with the fascists. The lack of violence by pickets is put down to 'moderate' trade union leader- POLICING INDUSTRIAL DISPUTES 3™› ship. Now we're beginning to get to the real point of the book as far as the author is concerned-and its weakness. From 1946 to 1980, we're told picketing was relatively non-violent. The miners' strikes of 1972 and 1974 are cited as typical examples. Only 'pushing and shoving' situations arose at mass pickets. It was all kind of fun really, sporting. The police responded with 'symbolic confrontation' ie they paraded their strength and threatened and intimidated the strikers. Of course, there was some genuine banter and humour but, as the author himself points out, the police are encouraged to adopt this approach to lessen the possibility of conflict. I would add that it is also an excellent means of putting someone off guard. Confrontation seldom occurs when the police are heavily outnumbered. But there was an outbreak of violence in 1972 at Saltley Gate. And who was in charge that day? Arthur Scargill, the 'revolutionary fanatic.' 1984-85 Miners' strike The final era is the current situation, or at least, up to the end of the miners' strike. Violence is the order of the day. Scabs are beaten up. Property is damaged and destroyed. It is a repeat of the first stage of Geary's 'study' when the masses were a leaderless mob. Now, they are led by a Marxist fanatic, ultra-lefts or else the 'moderate' leadership temporarily lose control. If only Neil Kinnock had been at the head of the miners... But, instead, the miners were set on a disastrous course. Geary concedes that the state was well primed. The Ridley Report had seen to the hiring of non-union lorry drivers, the stockpiling of coal and so on. The police had developed their tactics in the course and aftermath of the inner-city riots of 1981. They reactivated the National Recording Centre established following the 1972 dispute. And Thatcher had brought them over as soon as she had
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come to power in the form of a wage rise. A much more sophisticated and efficient machine-intelligence surveillance and all—stood ready to do battle with men and women whose only weapon was the right to strike. In fairness, apart from the disgusting attempt to blame left leadership for the few isolated acts of violence that did occur at the hands of the strikers, the book does attempt to give something of an explanation of the contributory factors that may cause frustrated strikers to take 'criminal' action. However it must be clearly understood that the vast bulk of assaults and acts of violence were carried out by the police on unarmed, passive pickets. But an academic attempting to balance reality against the fiction of the state and the media is doomed to fall far short of the mark. Nevertheless, the facts and information contained in the book make it well worth a read. For all its obvious faults, it is a useful contribution to the debate on the role of the police in industrial conflicts.
The Coming of the Spanish Civil War, by Paul Preston.
Published by Methuen, 1983, £6.50.
Reviewed by Tim White THE SPANISH revolution and civil war of 1936-39 has an important place in the history of the international labour movement. While there are many books dealing with the civil war itself they only touch upon the period preceding its outbreak. The Coming of the Spanish Civil War fills There are many shortcomings in the book as can be expected of a liberal academic but it does contain much useful information on the unfolding revolution and its effect on the labour movement. The defeats suffered by the working class in Europe in 1933-34 had a profound effect on the Spanish Socialist Party. The victory of Hitler in Germany, with the 13 million strong Social Democratic/Communist and trade union movement being crushed without a shot being fired and the February 1934 defeat of the Austrian Social Democrats by Chancellor Dolfuss, gave a grim warning of the intentions of the capitalists internationally. Police action at Wapping Above: Right-wing Socialist Party leader, Negrin. Right: Largo Caballero. In Spain the Socialist/Republican government was defeated by a right wing coalition of Lerroux's Radicals and Gil Robles CEDA. As Lerroux manoeuvred to bring the clerical reactionaries of CEDA into his government, the formerly homogenous Socialist party, under pressure from its rank and file, shifted dramatically to the left splitting into reformist and revolutionary tendencies. 'Spanish Lenin'
Preston charts the development of the Socialist party during and after their exin perience 1930-33 Republican/Socialist coalition which, in the 2 years of its existence, solved none of the problems of Spanish society, particularly the land hunger of the peasants. Photo: Dave Sinclair One example of the processes at work within the Socialist party was the evolution of Largo Caballero. In the 1920's Caballero was quite content to be the Minister of Labour in the military dictatorship of Primo de Rivera, presiding over the repression of Anarchists and Communists. However, in the 1930's, under pressure from the rank and file workers particularly in the Socialist trade union federation, the UGT, Caballero shifted radically to the left. He was even hailed as "the Spanish Lenin" by his supporters. Similiarly the Socialist youth movement, the Juventudes Socialistas Unificadas (JSU), Caballeros strongest supporters demanded that the followers of Trotsky in Spain around Adrés Nin join the Socialist party to "Bolshevise" it, an episode that Preston touches upon 45
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MIR Spring 1987: Book Reviews' in his book. It was a major mistake by Nin that he did not take up the offer. Meanwhile the hardened reformists around Prieto and Bestieros tried desperately to swim against the revolutionary tide. It is this struggle that Preston tends to sympathise with and therefore the book should be read with that in mind.
Also dealt with at some length is the evolution of the semi-fascist CEDA (Con- The British worker question:
a new look at workers and productivity in manufacturing by Theo Nichols, by published Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1986 £8.95.
Reviewed by Bob McKee.
ARE BRITISH workers lazier than their European, American Japanese counterparts? Or to be more accurate without using tabloid press language: is the relative economic decline of the British economy in relation to its rival capitalist economies, partly expressed in a much lower rate of productivity growth, caused by the British workers' inefficiency, unwillingness to work, trade unionism etc?
Theo Nichols sets out to answer these questions in his book. And he clearly wants to dispel the myth put forward by the Tory press, capitalist economists and sociologists, and even Labour leaders, that poor productivity can be blamed on the workers.
He does this by a painstaking analysis of all the available evidence on the subject collected in various economic, social and management studies.
However, it is not easy to see exactly what conclusions he reaches as a result of his rather convoluted progress through the evidence of others. At least this reader did not find it easy. It may be rather old fashioned but readers do like conclusions, even if they are heavily qualified, but it is difficult to grasp Nichols', particularly as the book appears to tack on some chapters about the success or otherwise 46 federacion Espanola Derechas Autonomas) and the conflict between them and other forces on the far right as they moved in the direction of fascism. There is a section which covers in considerable detail the general strike and Asturian Commune of 1934 when the Socialist party moved to fight against the attempts of Lerroux to bring Gil Robles, leader of the CEDA, into the govern- This episode is dealt with in a ment.
of Thatcherism and then meander into some commentary pieces unrelated to what has gone before.
But this lack of summarised conclu-v ions shouls not put the reader off li book. Perseverance with Theo Nichol produces some real nuggets of information that activists in the labour movement can use to effect against Tories or anybody else who says that Britain's economic mess is due to the lazy, strike happy, over unionised British worker. Nichols shows that those hoary old arguments really are old. Even in 1901 The Times was arguing that Britain's relative decline, which was already well underway by then, should be blamed on the "injurious effect of trade unionism". Nichols demonstrates that it is part of British capitalist ideology that their employees work less hard than Japanese and Germans and that even those liberals who appear as friends of the labour movement accept this as fact—they simply think it is good that British workers have 'chosen' more leisure time over more 'work'! Such is the brainwashing of the media on this 'fact' that most people when interviewed also accept it. But if it was true, then as Nichols points out, it must have been true for nearly a century, because British productivity growth has lagged behind that of the USA and Germany for all that time. There must be a deeper explanation of the decline of the British economy. Low capital investment Nichols examines the major economic and sociological studies on British workers productivity-by Pratten in 1976, CPRS in 1975 and Caves in 1980. He exposes their evidence as biased to the management view and reinterprets it to develop vastly different conclusions from the ones they drew; which can be summarised as blaming low productivity on restrictive practices and trade union 'conservatism'
Nichols brings up more compelling reasons for Britain's lower productivity: the lack of a cheap labour pool of the size available to Germany and Japan which meant not only lower costs but also a more subdued workforce amenable to previous edition of the Militant International Review (Issue No 27 Autumn 1984).
All in all The Coming of the Spanish Civil War is well worth reading. Providing that readers disregard the political position of the author, they will get information that they might have to otherwise search for high and low. From this standpoint alone it is a book to be recommended.
tougher working conditions. In Germany capitalists forced their employees to work *intensively to the point where fatalities 'and injuries at work were four times as high as in the UK. But conversely, German workers were better trained technically for their job, so raising their productivity.
The studies of Pratten and Caves tried to suggest that modern machinery made no difference to British worker productivity, and that British capital investment per worker was not lower than elsewhere. Nichols disputes this, explaining how most of British investment on research and development goes into projects for the armed forces and not industry (four times more than Germany and 18 times • British capitalists, fed on a diet of super profits for decades from their colonial markets, found it unnecessary to invest in new techniques or to take advantage of economies of scale by expanding plant (the UK has on average the smallest size of plants in economies). British management is less skilled at organising its production, its workforce and plant; and less able to engineer and develop new innovations. In his final chapters, Nichol deals with the Tory attack of the 1980s on trade unionism particularly on the shopfloor, in big business' attempt to raise productivity and profits by taking away the hard earned rights of organised workers. Quoting from a 'much-cited' article that. appeared in Militant, he describes how management's drive for 'flexibility' on the shopfloor is really aimed at the destruction of workers conditions. As it is, productivity has only risen under the Tories because unemployment has risen faster than production has gone down. It has not been a result of increased investment or better organisation. And nothing has really changed-German capitalists pay higher wages and their workers work less hours and have more holidays, yet their costs per unit of labour employed are lower than unit costs in Britain. Why? Because British industrial productivity lags way behind that of Germany-as it has done for nearly a century.
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Video Review 'The Great Frame up' 1986 SAW the 50th anniversary of the infamous purge trials - the systematic removal by the Stalinist bureaucracy of the last vestiges of the old Bolshevik leadership of the Soviet Union. The main person accused at these trials was not present; Leon Trotsky was already in exile, driven from the soviet Union by Stalin and his gangsters. To commemorate the anniversary, Militant produced much material on the trials, including a half hour video, first shown at the 1986 national Militant rally. The video, The Great Frame-Up, gives some insight into the political fight taken up by Trotsky and the Left Opposition, against the bureaucracy. The video covers a period of sixteen years: from the period of reaction, after Lenin's death in 1924, to the death of Trotsky himself, in 1940. It explains how the bureaucracy was born from the degeneration of the victorious October Revolution and, most importantly, how the trials were sickening frameups, judicial murders, carried out by the bureaucracy to consolidate its rule over the Russian working class. Finally, it deals with the role played by Trotsky in his fight to maintain the democratic and internationalist traditions of October.
The video is best used as an introduction to a discussion at a Marxist an LPYS Discussion Group or even meeting on the trials. However, the video is no substitute for the books, pamphlets and articles that are now Booknotes By Bob McKee NEW TITLES received for review this quarter by the Militant International Review include The Value Dimension, edited by Ben Fine, and published by Routledge and Kegan Paul at £6.95. Marx's value theory and his analysis of the contradictions inherent within the capitalist system of production came attack from the capitalist economists as soon as Capital was published. The economist who paid most attention to Marx's theories was E Von Bohm Bawerk, an Austrian apologist for capitalism who launched an attack soon after the publication of Volume 3 of Capital.
In recent years the attack on Marxist economics has come not just from capitalist economists like Samuelson and Joan Robinson, but also from some who consider themselves economists socialists and even Marxists but who follow the ideas of David Ricardo, the available on the Moscow Trials. The video gives a taste of the experiences of the old Bolsheviks. It cannot replace the benefits to be made by actually reading the different material on the trials.
While 1986 saw the anniversary of the Moscow Trials, 1987 ushers in the 7Oth anniversary of the great October Revolution. Over the next year, readers should look to organising local meetings around the question of both the revolution and the show trials. The "Old series of articles in the Militant, Bolsheviks Remembered", can form the basis of discussion in Marxist Discussion Groups. MIR debates with Advert A complete review and index to Militant International Review, Numbers 10 to 32, March 1976 to Summer 1986 Thirty-four pages of concise summaries of every article that has been printed in the Militant International Review over the last ten years, plus a subject index.
A Stevenage Militant supporters pamphlet.
Available at 70p, plus 25p postage, from World Socialist Books, 3/13 Hepscott Road, London E9 5HB classical capitalist economist of the early 19th century who developed a labour theory of value. These neo-Ricardians, like Piero Sraffa and more recently lan Steedman, have attempted to argue that Marx's value theory is either wrong or irrelevant or both.
In collecting into one book some important articles by economists defending Marx, Ben Fine has made another useful contribution to the debate-in addition to the books he and others have published over the last decade which have helped to clarify many of the issues. But this book may not be the place to start for a reader unfamiliar with the arguments. In a series of articles in the future, the MIR hopes to explain the latest developments in this battle over economic theory and bring out its practical relevance to the struggle for socialism.
Also from Routledge and Kegan Paul, as part of the series of paperbacks reprinting essays on themes that have been debated in the journal, Economy and Society, our review office has received Industrialisation and Soviet Soviet Maturity, edited by Keith Smith, and Review by David Kaplan supporters of the Russian bureaucracy in the labour movement, such as the Morning Star-now controlled by the pro-Moscow Communist Campaign Group - can also be organised, again to bring to light the atrocities carried out by the bureaucracy in the names of Marx and Lenin.
Systematic planning of discussions, leading up to local rallies in October commemorating the Russian revolution, will benefit readers in clarifying the questions raised by this valuable video on the trials.
Mililant Mantant sternational review .:
International Review Militant International A Complete Review Militant into Review and Index To MIR No.s 10-32 Economic Calculation and Policy Formation, edited by Grahame Thompson, both priced at £6.95.
From Verso has come The Meaning of the Second World War by Ernest Mandel, £6.95. This is just a 'pot boiler' of the causes and conflicts of the events of 1939-45. It is not clear why it was written except perhaps to clear out a few cobwebs still clinging to the inside of the author's head. Understanding Capital by Duncan K Foley, published by the Harvard University Press at f7.25, is a clear and succinct account of Marx's economic theory, dealing with all the latest debates with the neo-Ricardians and providing a useful list of further reading. Maybe a place to start for a reader not familar with Marxist economics.
Certainly not recommended are An Introduction to Karl Marx by John Elster and the companion Karl Marx: A Reader, edited by Elster, both published by the Cambridge University Press at £5.95 and £6.95 respectively. Why somebody who writes that "Scientific socialism is dead" feels himself competent to edit a selection of Marx's writings remains a mystery.
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Available from World Socialist Books CAPITALIST Tribune's "Alternative Strategy or Socialist Plan Andrew Glyn-Capitalist Crisis: Tribune's 'Alternative Strategy' or a Socialist Plan.
Ted Grant-The Marxist Theory of the state.
Ted Grant- The Coming World Revolution Ted Grant-The Rise of De Gaulle and the Class struggle.
Militant-Greece: Workers demand socialism Militant-Import controls or socialist planning?
Peter Taffe-Cuba: Analysis of the revolution.
Leon Trotsky - Stalinism and Bolshevism.
MIR No 11, August 1976-Twelve page article by Roger. Silverman on the Southern European Socialist Parties.
Orders to World Socialist Books, 3/13 Hepscott to orders under f5, 10 per cent to orders under £10, over £10 post free. Cheques payable to World Socialist Books.
CRISIS by Andrew Glyn £1.00 50p 30p 30p . 35p . 25p . 20p 40p 30p Road, London E9 5HB. Please add 25 per cent