Why Marx Was Right (21 page)

Marxists have also been
traditionally hostile to what they call ''adventurism,'' by which they mean
recklessly throwing a small band of revolutionaries against the colossal forces
of the state. The Bolshevik revolution was made not by a secret coterie of
conspirators but by individuals openly elected in the popular, representative
institutions known as soviets. Marx set his face resolutely against mock-heroic
uprisings by grim-faced militants brandishing pitchforks against tanks. In his
view, successful revolution required certain material preconditions. It is not
just a question of a steely will and a hefty dose of courage. You are obviously
likely to fare much better in the midst of a major crisis in which the
governing class is weak and divided, and socialist forces are robust and
well-organised, than when the government is buoyant and the opposition is
timorous and fragmented. In this sense, there is a relation between Marx's
materialism—his insistence on analyzing the material forces at work in
society—and the question of revolutionary violence.

Most working-class protest
in Britain, from the Chartists to the hunger marches of the 1930s, has been
peaceful. On the whole, working-class movements have resorted to violence only
when provoked, or at times of compelling need, or when peaceful tactics have
clearly failed. Much the same was true of the Suffragettes. The reluctance of
working people to shed blood has contrasted tellingly with the readiness of
their masters to wield the lash and the gun. Nor have they had at their
disposal anything like the formidable military resources of the capitalist
state. In many parts of the world today, a repressive state, prepared to roll
out its weapons against peaceable strikers and demonstrators, has become a
commonplace. As the German philosopher Walter Benjamin wrote, revolution is not
a runaway train; it is the application of the emergency brake. It is capitalism
which is out of control, driven as it is by the anarchy of market forces, and
socialism which attempts to reassert some collective mastery over this
rampaging beast.

If socialist revolutions
have generally involved violence, it is largely because propertied classes will
rarely surrender their privileges without a struggle. Even so, there are
reasonable grounds to hope that such use of force can be kept to a minimum.
This is because a revolution for Marxism is not the same thing as a coup
d'etat, or an outbreak of spontaneous disaffection. Revolutions are not just
attempts to bring down the state. A right-wing military coup might do that, but
it is not what Marxists regard as a revolution. In the fullest sense,
revolutions come about only when one social class overthrows the rule of
another and replaces it with its own power.

In the case of socialist
revolution, this means that the organised working class, along with its various
allies, take over from the bourgeoisie, or capitalist middle class. But Marx
regarded the working class as by far the largest class in capitalist society.
So we are speaking here of the actions of a majority, not of a small bunch of
rebels. Since socialism is about popular self-government, nobody can make a
socialist revolution on your behalf, just as nobody can become an expert poker
player on your behalf. As G. K. Chesterton writes, such popular
self-determination is ''a thing analogous to writing one's own love letters or
blowing one's own nose. These are things we want a man to do for himself, even
if he does them badly.''
²
My valet may be a great deal more
dexterous at blowing my nose than I am myself, but it befits my dignity that I
do it myself, or (if I am Prince Charles) at least every now and then.
Revolution cannot be handed down to you by a tight-knit vanguard of
conspirators. Nor, as Lenin insisted, can it be carried abroad and imposed at
the point of a bayonet, as Stalin did in eastern Europe. You have to be
actively involved in the making of it yourself, unlike the kind of artist who
instructs his assistants to go off and pickle a shark in his name. (No doubt
the same will soon be happening with novelists.) Only then will those who were
once relatively powerless have the experience, know-how and self-assurance to
go on to remake society as a whole. Socialist revolutions can only be
democratic ones. It is the ruling class which is the undemocratic minority. And
the large masses of people that such insurrections must involve by their very
nature are their surest bulwark against excessive force. In this sense,
revolutions which are likely to be successful are also likely to be the least
violent.

This is not to say that
revolutions may not provoke a bloody backlash from panic-stricken governments
prepared to unleash terror against them. But even autocratic states have to
rely on a certain amount of passive consent from those they govern, however
grudging and provisional. You cannot adequately govern a nation which is not
only in a permanent state of disaffection, but which denies any shred of
credibility to your rule. You can imprison some of the people some of the time,
but not all of the people all of the time. It is possible for such discredited
states to hang on for quite long periods. Think, for example, of the current regimes
in Burma or Zimbabwe. In the end, however, it can become clear even to tyrants
that the writing is on the wall. However cruel and murderous the apartheid
system of South Africa was, it eventually came to recognize that it could no
longer carry on. The same can be said of the dictatorships of Poland, East
Germany, Romania and other Soviet-controlled nations at the end of the 1980s.
It is also true of many Ulster Unionists today, who after years of bloodshed
have been forced to recognize that their exclusion of Catholic citizens is
simply no longer viable.

Why, though, do Marxists
look to revolution rather than to parliamentary democracy and social reform?
The answer is that they do not, or at least not entirely. Only so-called
ultra-leftists do this.
³
One of the first decrees of the Bolsheviks
when they came to power in Russia was to abolish the death penalty. Being a
reformist or a revolutionary is not like supporting either Everton or Arsenal.
Most revolutionaries are also champions of reform. Not any old reform, and not
reformism as a political panacea; but revolutionaries expect socialist change
to come all in a rush no more than feudal or capitalist change did. Where they
differ from reformists proper is not, say, in refusing to fight against hospital
closures because they distract attention from the all-important Revolution. It
is rather that they view such reforms in a longer, more radical perspective.
Reform is vital; but sooner or later you will hit a point where the system
refuses to give way, and for Marxism this is known as the social relations of
production. Or, in less politely technical language, a dominant class which
controls the material resources and is markedly reluctant to hand them over. It
is only then that a decisive choice between reform and revolution looms up. In
the end, as the socialist historian R. H. Tawney remarked, you can peel an
onion layer by layer, but you can't skin a tiger claw by claw. Peeling an
onion, however, makes reform sound rather too easy. Most of the reforms we now
regard as precious features of liberal society—universal suffrage, free
universal education, freedom of the press, trade unions and so on—were won by
popular struggle in the teeth of ferocious ruling-class resistance.

Nor do revolutionaries
necessarily reject parliamentary democracy. If it can contribute to their
goals, so much the better. Marxists, however, have reservations about
parliamentary democracy—not because it is democratic, but because it is not
democratic enough. Parliaments are institutions to which ordinary people are
persuaded to permanently delegate their power, and over which they have very
little control. Revolution is generally thought to be the opposite of
democracy, as the work of sinister underground minorities out to subvert the will
of the majority. In fact, as a process by which men and women assume power over
their own existence through popular councils and assemblies, it is a great deal
more democratic than anything on offer at the moment. The Bolsheviks had an
impressive record of open controversy within their ranks, and the idea that
they should rule the country as the only political party was no part of their
original programme. Besides, as we shall see later, parliaments are part of a
state which is in business, by and large, to ensure the sovereignty of capital
over labour. This is not just the opinion of Marxists. As one
seventeenth-century commentator wrote, the English parliament is the
"bulwark of property.''
⁴
In the end, so Marx claims, parliament
or the state represents not so much the common people as the interests of
private property. Cicero, as we have seen, heartily agreed. No parliament in a
capitalist order would dare to confront the awesome power of such vested
interests. If it threatened to interfere with them too radically, it would
quickly be shown the door. It would be odd, then, for socialists to regard such
debating chambers as a vital means of promoting their cause, rather than as one
means among many.

Marx himself seems to have
believed that in countries like England, Holland and the United States,
socialists might achieve their goals by peaceful means. He did not dismiss
parliament or social reform. He also thought that a socialist party could
assume power only with the support of a majority of the working class. He was
an enthusiastic champion of reformist organs such as working-class political
parties, trade unions, cultural associations and political newspapers. He also
spoke out for specific reformist measures such as the extension of the
franchise and the shortening of the working day. In fact at one point he
considered rather optimistically that universal suffrage would itself undermine
capitalist rule. His collaborator Friedrich Engels also attached a good deal of
importance to peaceful social change, and looked forward to a nonviolent
revolution.

One of the problems with
socialist revolutions is that they are most likely to break out in places where
they are hardest to sustain. Lenin noted this irony in the case of the
Bolshevik uprising. Men and women who are cruelly oppressed and semistarving
may feel they have nothing to lose in making a revolution. On the other hand,
as we have seen, the backward social conditions which drive them to revolt are
the worst possible place to begin to build socialism. It may be easier in these
conditions to overthrow the state, but you do not have to hand the resources
that would allow you to build a viable alternative. People who feel content
with their condition are not likely to launch revolutions. But neither are people
who feel bereft of hope. The bad news for socialists is that men and women will
be extremely reluctant to transform their situation as long as there is still
something in that situation for them.

Marxists are sometimes
taunted with the supposed political apathy of the working class. Ordinary
people may well be indifferent to the day-to-day politics of a state which they
feel is indifferent to them. Once it tries to close their hospitals, shift
their factory to the west of Ireland or plant an airport in their back gardens,
however, they are likely to be stirred into action. It is also worth
emphasizing that apathy of a kind may be entirely rational. As long as a social
system can still yield its citizens some meagre gratification, it is not
unreasonable for them to stick with what they have, rather than take a perilous
leap into an unknowable future. Conservatism of this kind is not to be scoffed
at.

In any case, most people
are too preoccupied with keeping themselves afloat to bother with visions of
the future. Social disruption, understandably enough, is not something most men
and women are eager to embrace. They will certainly not embrace it just because
socialism sounds like a good idea. It is when the deprivations of the status
quo begin to outweigh the drawbacks of radical change that a leap into the
future begins to seem a reasonable proposition. Revolutions tend to break out
when almost any alternative seems preferable to the present. In that situation,
not to rebel would be irrational. Capitalism cannot complain when, having
appealed for centuries to the supremacy of self-interest, its hirelings
recognize that their collective self-interest lies in trying something
different for a change.

Reform and social
democracy can certainly buy off revolution. Marx himself lived long enough to
witness the beginnings of this process in Victorian Britain, but not long
enough to register its full impact. If a class-society can throw its minions
enough scraps and leavings, it is probably safe for the time being. Once it
fails to do so, it is very likely (though by no means inevitable) that those on
the losing end will seek to take it over. Why should they not? How could
anything be worse than no scraps or leavings at all? At this point, placing
your bets on an alternative future becomes an eminently rational decision. And
though reason in human beings does not go all the way down, it is robust enough
to know when abandoning the present for the future is almost certain to be to
its advantage.

Those who ask who is going
to bring capitalism low tend to forget that in one sense this is unnecessary.
Capitalism is perfectly capable of collapsing under its own contradictions
without even the slightest shove from its opponents. In fact, it came fairly
near to doing so just a few years ago. The result of a wholesale implosion of
the system, however, is more likely to be barbarism than socialism, if there is
no organised political force at hand to offer an alternative. One urgent reason
why we need such organisation, then, is that in the event of an almighty crisis
of capitalism, fewer people are likely to get hurt, and a new system of benefit
to all may be plucked from the ruins.