Trotsky was both wrong and an asshole. Trotsky’s plan of Permanent Revolution rested on the idea that the peasantry would erode socialism, because he thought they could not be truly aligned with the proletariat. That’s why he wanted to kick off revolution in the west, hoping that would save Russian socialism. This was, of course, proven false, as socialism survived and trying to build up socialism together with the peasantry worked out.
Trotsky then spent much of his time attacking the soviet union, essentially whining due to his loss.
Trotsky’s take on the peasantry was wrong af though
Why does everyone here hate Trotsky/Trotskyism?
Trotsky had some good points, and some terrible points, both theoretically and personally.
Trotksyism has essentially been a western-friendly form of Marxism-Leninism that tries to be what Marxism-Leninism is, but with no party discipline and no support for Actually Existing Socialism. Trotskyist orgs relentlessly bash socialist countries, and split over and over again. They haven’t really done much of anything.
Trotskyist orgs relentlessly bash socialist countries.
I have seen this a lot. Like there are no currently succesful socialist countries. Are they just waiting for world revoluton?
But I also don’t want to be yet another leftist that believes there theory is the best and everyone could just end leftist fighting if they became a [insert my prefered leftist theory]
You can’t end leftist infighting by hoping for everyone to become the same kind of leftist, especially because different tendencies are often influenced by the given class character of a country. It’s why agrarian communists are more likely to be Maoists, like what’s found in the Naxalites, whereas western communists tend to be Trots. Marxism-Leninism is found everywhere, because it’s the tendency that has most been tested in real life.
I agree.
They are often incredibly stubborn and unwillingly to adapt socialist strategy to their different material conditions
I actually don’t know. I’m not that well-versed in communism, but I’ll try to make a suggestion:
Marx never said to force communism, an envisioned futuristic system, to happen, the same way that one shouldn’t force capitalism in the year 900, during the time of fuedalism if some visionary would predict such of type of governance to happen in the year 800. Even if you think capitalism is better than fuedalism, trying to implement it by introducing ballot boxes, constitutions, parliaments and such, likely would get you killed by the nobility and/or clergy, because you forgot to increase the increase the power of the merchants first, so that they could revolt, with lawyers by their side, or better said in front of them, against the old powers.
Trotsky wanted to implement a world government or capitalists will do everything in their power to try to destroy it.
Stalin wanted to develop socialism further in the Soviet Union into a better working model for other countries to emulate.Furious debates ensued on who was on the right track.
Kinda.
Marx’s point wasn’t that you shouldn’t try to advance modes of production, just that the ideas prevalent among the dominant classes at the time are shaped by their material conditions. Trotsky thought this meant socialism in Russia was impossible due to having a high number of the peasantry, thinking them incapable of allying with the proletariat. He was wrong. Stalin’s decision to not attack the peasantry, and instead focus on developing socialism within the USSR, led to the firm establishment of the first socialist state.
Because MLs aren’t very found of other leftists that offer criticism. This makes the revolution/movement weaker so better to label them as traitors
As an ML, I’m quite fond of other leftists, thank you very much.
While we might have our disagreements, some of them quite stark, I still get along with my Trotskyist or Anarchist friends, and their struggles are also my struggle. I might disagree with how they’re going about it, but that’s what critical support is for.
I love it when other leftists offer criticism. It makes the movement stronger, not weaker, by allowing us to root out wrong ideas or approaches. “Ruthless criticism of everything that exists,” as Marx said.
The problem I have with Trots is that they are incredibly obstinate about criticisms that make no fucking sense. For example, the chief Trotskyist criticism of the USSR is the whole “permanent revolution” thing, the idea of expanding the revolution globally. What that actually means is a permanent state of warfare with every other country on earth. Because supporting a revolution in another country’s borders is a violation of their sovereignty.
This is a completely impractical and self-destructive approach to foreign policy, and to the extent that the USSR did try to expand communism to other countries, for example, in Afghanistan, it is rightfully criticized for it. But Trots will simultaneously criticize the USSR for things like invading Afghanistan and critize it for not being expansionist enough!
They’re just contrarians for the sake of it. It’s impossible to know what the Trotskyist position on anything is going to be unless you know the Soviet position, in which case you know it’ll be the opposite. There’s no actual reasoning beyond that.
Exactly right.
Great article, highly recommended for anyone reading through this thread.
Well I’m an anarchist, so a Trotskyist state is still a monopoly of violence
It’s lemmy. It’s full of Stalinist Tankies.
I’ve mostly seen non-ml socialists and anarchists. I don’t know what you’ve heard, but Trotsky was also ML.
Trotskyists reject the term ML, instead preferring “Marxist and Leninist” over “Marxist-Leninist” to distance themselves from the soviet union, Trotsky himself rejected the ML label as well.
As far as not seeing many Marxist-Leninists, lemmy.blahaj.zone blocks Hexbear.net and Lemmygrad.ml, which have the bulk of the Marxist-Leninists on Lemmy.
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He just said it to the wrong guy.
He did not, in fact he talked even worse about Stalin. Lenin and Trotsky were pretty much friends. This is some tankie bullshit
Tell me you’ve never read anything Lenin wrote without telling me:
Trotsky arrived, and this scoundrel at once ganged up with the Right wing […]
What a swine this Trotsky is: Left phrases, and a bloc with the Right.
This is an instance of high-flown phraseology with which Trotsky always justifies opportunism… The phrase-bandying Trotsky has completely lost his bearings on a simple issue.
Trotsky has never yet held a firm opinion on any important question of Marxism. He always contrives to worm his way into the cracks of any given difference of opinion, and desert one side for the other.
Trotsky behaves like a despicable careerist and factionalist of the Ryazanov-and-co type. Either equality on the editorial board, subordination to the central committee and no one’s transfer to Paris except Trotsky’s (the scoundrel, he wants to ‘fix up’ the whole rascally crew of ‘Pravda’ at our expense!) – or a break with this swindler and an exposure of him in the CO. He pays lip-service to the Party and behaves worse than any other of the factionalists.
“Friends” is overselling it, and Stalin was the one that was elected because he was a more capable leader with a better understanding of Marxist theory. With Sverdlov and Lenin dead, the choice was fairly obvious.
Trotsky’s plan of Permanent Revolution rested on the idea that the peasantry would erode socialism, because he thought they could not be truly aligned with the proletariat. That’s why he wanted to kick off revolution in the west, hoping that would save Russian socialism. This was, of course, proven false, as socialism survived and trying to build up socialism together with the peasantry worked out.
Trotsky then spent much of his time attacking the soviet union, essentially whining due to his loss. I don’t think using a pejorative meant for those who defend socialist countries and oppose imperialism helps your argument here.
Trotsky’s plan of Permanent Revolution rested on the idea that the peasantry would erode socialism, because he thought they could not be truly aligned with the proletariat.
Isn’t that just in the case of later developing capitalist countries? My understanding was that he believed later developed capitalist countries would be unable to build the industrialized economy that creates a large proletariat class. So in these countries the existing proletariat would have to seize control and then later form an alliance with the peasantry down the road.
However, I don’t think that means he only wanted to develop socialism with western nations. I mean Stalin and him had a major rift develop over Trotsky wanting to support the Chinese communist and Stalin siding with the kmt. One of the things I kinda agree with when it comes to Trotsky was his opposition to the socialism in one country policy.
This is kinda dependent on what year it is of course, Trotsky was kinda all over the place once he fell from grace.
When the Russian revolution failed to inspire successful revolution in the west, they reached a dillema. Trotsky feared the Russian peasantry would attack, and so wanted to go on the offensive first, forcing collectivization early, hoping that would inspire the western proletariat. Stalin wanted to build up socialism domestically, rather than attack the peasantry. The peasantry turned out to be capable allies, and thus Stalin was correct.
Stalin’s insistence on supporting the KMT even later as a bullwark against Japan ended up being wrong, but it’s also worth noting that the Chinese Trotskyists were wrong, wanting to attack both the KMT and Japan before kicking out Japan. Mao and the CPC formed a temporary alliance against Japan, then kicked out the KMT, which ended up being correct.
When the Russian revolution failed to inspire successful revolution in the west, they reached a dillema. Trotsky feared the Russian peasantry would attack, and so wanted to go on the offensive first
What time frame are we referring too here, and what peasantry? Im guessing well before the implementation of the five year plan? Also, in his references to the peasantry I always kinda figured he was speaking about the kulaks.
Chinese Trotskyists were wrong, wanting to attack both the KMT and Japan before kicking out Japan. Mao and the CPC formed a temporary alliance against Japan, then kicked out the KMT, which ended up being correct.
I mean… Like most things in this time period, it kinda depends on when you are talking about. In the beginning most communist did not like the decision to form a united front with the kmt, but acknowledged it as necessary. There wasn’t really much of a delineation between trotskyists and stalinist until when it came to the kmt until the Shanghai massacre. And tbf it’s kinda understandable that people like chen duxiu would want to break/attack with the kmt afterwards.
Before the Russian revolution, and the experience and information gained by it, there was a wrong but prevalent idea that the peasantry would be counter-revolutionary, as they would have more of a petite-bourgeois ideology based on their largely self-driven living conditions. This isn’t about kulaks, but the actual peasantry. Peasants are not proletarians, they are working classes but engage in fundamentally different relations.
Trotsky believed this wrong conclusion, which is why he believed that stable socialism could only come from developed capitalist countries, and that without their support Russian socialism was doomed. Trotsky also rejected that a country itself could be socialist, as he believed internationally the system being capitalist would cause a reversion to capitalism eventually. MLs don’t disagree that international socialism is necessary, but Trotskyists tend to use this point as a way to bitterly attack socialist countries for not being “pure,” which they can only believe will happen if global capitalism is eradicated. Basically, there’s a destruction of nuance.
As for the Chinese Trotskyists, Mao and other ckmmunists had written them off as suicidal due to their obstinancy and determination to attack the KMT and Japan at the same time. I recommend reading Lu Xun’s letter to Chen Duxiu, Reply to a Letter from the Trotksyites. This shows the sheer distrust of the peasantry the Chen Duxiu had, true to his Trotskyism, and again proven wrong by Mao when the peasantry was made red.
but prevalent idea that the peasantry would be counter-revolutionary, as they would have more of a petite-bourgeois ideology based on their largely self-driven living conditions.
I guess hindsight 20/20, but I had always figured they were referring to the landed peasants like kulaks or sub-kulaks. Seems incongruous that peasants in poverty would be counterrevolutionary.
Trotsky also rejected that a country itself could be socialist, as he believed internationally the system being capitalist would cause a reversion to capitalism eventually.
Kinda agree with this to an extent.
