A response to Ted Grant, part 0 : Establishing terms [16/01/25]

[Recently, I was talking with a member of the RCP on the topic of the Degenerated Workers State theory, and from this discussion they sent me an article written by Ted Grant titled « Against the Theory of State Capitalism. » They told me to read it, and I did, and it definitely left an impression. Inspiring me to pick up the pen again, I took it upon myself to both write out my thoughts and delve more into the meat of Marx's critique of political-economy. The following text is the result of both. For formatting purposes, I've decided to serialise its release corresponding to the sections of Mr Grant's article. This part in particular might be a bit more boring but unfortunately it is necessary to get into weeds and sort out definitions. Trust. Also the citation style is Chicago, should that cause confusion. Much love ^^] 

Before even reading a word that Ted Grant has written, it would be useful to establish the terms used in analysing the economic and political structure of the USSR. In clarifying what these terms mean, we can avoid purely semantic arguments and get into the meat of the matter.

...

Mode of production

I’m sure that no one would contest that at the heart of historical materialist analysis is the conceptualisation of the mode of production, which can be broadly defined as the method by which a society produces goods. This method is composed of two dialectically intertwined aspects: 1) the productive forces; and 2) the relations of production. 

The productive forces of a society are the sum total of the instruments of production (i.e. the tools used to produce goods), the subjects of production (i.e. the raw materials turned into finished goods) and the labour which uses the former to transform the latter. 

The relations of production are the sum of the relationships that people have to the process of production, formed through social production, exchange and distribution of the products of production. In a society with private property, these relations are differentiated into classes, marked by how they materially relate to the production process and, ipso facto, other classes. 

The transformation of one mode of production into another takes place when the productive forces can no longer be sufficiently advanced by the existing relations of production. To quote Marx: 

« In the social production of their existence, men inevitably enter into definite relations, which are independent of their will, namely relations of production appropriate to a given stage in the development of their material forces of production. The totality of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which arises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness… At a certain stage of development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production or – this merely expresses the same thing in legal terms – with the property relations within the framework of which they have operated hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an era of social revolution. The changes in the economic foundation lead sooner or later to the transformation of the whole immense superstructure. »[1]

The capitalist mode of production, as we will look over next, has its own particular relations of production, but more broadly, the mode of production is the subject of Marxist historical materialist analysis. 

Capitalism

Capitalism (or, the capitalist mode of production) can be broadly defined as the socio-economic system in which production is on the basis of commodity production — more specifically, it is predicated on capital and, ipso facto, the exploitation of wage-labour. 

The capitalist mode of production is marked by: 1) generalised commodity production (i.e. the majority or entirety of social production is based on the production and exchange of commodities); 2) the accumulation of money as an end in and of itself; and 3) the employment of wage-labour by the owners of capital in the pursuit of accumulation

The process by which money accumulates and multiplies is through capital, which can be broadly defined as the social process by which value transforms itself, through the process of circulation, into an even greater value. In order for values to truly be capital, there are certain conditions that must be met:

1. The forces of production must be sufficiently developed as to allow for labour to produce more than it requires to reproduce itself;
2. The existence of the proletariat (i.e. a class of people whose only means of subsistence is the sale of their ability to work); and
3. The purchase of said ability to work by the owners of the means of production, and the separation of the proletariat from direct ownership over the means of production.

To again quote Marx:

« How then does a sum of commodities, of exchange values, become capital? Thereby, that as an independent social power – i.e., as the power of a part of society – it preserves itself and multiplies by exchange with direct, living labour-power. The existence of a class which possesses nothing but the ability to work is a necessary presupposition of capital. »[2]

Central to the process of capital is its relationship with wage-labour (said « exchange with direct, living labour-power »). The circuit of capital, M–C–ΔM, by which a sum of money-capital is transformed into a greater sum of money, is only made possible by the purchase of wage-labour (conversely operating in the commodity circuit, C–M–C). On the one hand, capital is only capable of appropriating surplus-value through the purchase of labour-power; on the other hand, the proletarian — by virtue of selling their ability to work for a sum of money — necessarily produces values which are alienated from them and appropriated by the capital owner. This is to say, capital cannot realise itself without wage-labour and wage-labour cannot be separated from the process of capital. Marx again:

« To say that the interests of capital and the interests of the workers are identical, signifies only this: that capital and wage-labour are two sides of one and the same relation. The one conditions the other in the same way that the usurer and the borrower condition each other. As long as the wage-labourer remains a wage-labourer, his lot is dependent upon capital… If capital grows, the mass of wage-labour grows, the number of wage-workers increases; in a word, the sway of capital extends over a greater mass of individuals. »[3]

Communism

Communism (or, the communist mode of production) can be broadly defined as the socio-economic system in which production is on the basis of being for use and not for exchange — more specifically, it is predicated on neither the law of value, nor private property.

The communist mode of production is marked by: 1) production being solely for the purpose of direct use and not for market exchange, signifying the absence of commodity production and the value-form; 2) the abolition of money — hence the lack of both commodities and value — signifying the absence of wage-labour and capital; 3) the abolition of class, hence the lack of differentiation in the relationship to production; and 4) the abolition of the basis for the state. 

Quote Marx:

« Within the co-operative society based on common ownership of the means of production, the producers do not exchange their products; just as little does the labour employed on the products appear here as the value of these products, as a material quality possessed by them, since now, in contrast to capitalist society, individual labour no longer exists in an indirect fashion but directly as a component part of total labour. The phrase "proceeds of labour", objectionable also today on account of its ambiguity, thus loses all meaning… [With the labour-voucher system in the initial phase of communism] the same principle prevails as that which regulates the exchange of commodities, as far as this is exchange of equal values. Content and form are changed, because under the altered circumstances no one can give anything except his labour, and because, on the other hand, nothing can pass to the ownership of individuals, except individual means of consumption. »[4]

Again, Marx:

« If we conceive society as being not capitalistic but communistic, there will be no money-capital at all in the first place, not the disguises cloaking the transactions arising on account of it. The question then comes down to the need of society to calculate beforehand how much labour, means of production, and means of subsistence it can invest, without detriment, in such lines of business as for instance the building of railways, which do not furnish any means of production or subsistence, nor produce any useful effect for a long time, a year or more, while they extract labour, means of production and means of subsistence from the total annual production. In capitalist society however where social reason always asserts itself only post festum great disturbances may and must constantly occur. »[5]

Marx differentiates the communist mode of production into two phases: 1) the lower-phase (commonly referred to as socialism), or communist society immediately after it has superseded the capitalist mode of production; and 2) the higher-phase, or communist society immediately after it has completely shed the past marks of capitalist society (the state, bourgeois equal right, alienation from labour, mental vs physical labour, town vs countryside, etc.).

...

With definitions established and agreed upon, we can now dive into Mr Grant’s work. 

1: Karl Marx, A contribution to the critique of political economy: Volume 1 (Marxist Internet Archive, 1999), 4, https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/Marx_Contribution_to_the_Critique_of_Political_Economy.pdf 

2: Karl Marx, Wage labour and capital (Marxist Internet Archive, 2010), 14, https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/pdf/wage-labour-capital.pdf 

3: Ibid., 15-16

4: Karl Marx, Critique of the Gotha Program (Marxist Internet Archive, 1999), 9-10, https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/Marx_Critque_of_the_Gotha_Programme.pdf 

5: Karl Marx, A contribution to the critique of political economy: Volume 2 (Marxist Internet Archive, 2010), 192, https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/pdf/Capital-Volume-II.pdf