Bruno Leipold | Doctoral Candidate in Politics | University of Oxford |
[email protected]
Republican Marxism: On the Political Structure of Socialism
Introduction
A socialist society has usually been taken as a transformation in the economic
organisation of society, from one where the means of economic activity are held in a
few private hands and used to exploit and dominate the rest, to one where they are
held in common and for the benefit of all.1 But at least as important, I will argue, is
how we should envision the political organisation that is necessary to both reach and
maintain a socialist society. This question has often been neglected, sometimes even
deprecated, in Marxist thought. The argument of this paper is that there are resources
and ideas drawn from the republican tradition of political thought that can help
inform what this political structure should look like. I will focus particularly on
republican ideas around the continual threat of political institutions being corrupted
and the corresponding necessity of placing them firmly under popular control.
While it has often been assumed that the political structure that guides society from
capitalist to socialist society is temporary, I will instead argue that the need for these
political structures does not disappear in socialist society. We should see these
institutions as vital to the preservation of socialist society and to stop the reemergence of class rule. The need for politics does not disappear in socialism. This
argument has been suggested, though not developed, by Richard Bellamy, who argues
that:
republicanism has the capacity to offer a serious alternative to
liberalism by combining the Marxian critique of liberal political
economy with a Machiavellian appreciation of the need for politics.2
This political structure is, of course, universally known as the dictatorship of the
proletariat. But throughout this essay I will instead refer to it as a social republic.
This is consistent with Marx’s own terminology. While he was always contemptuous
towards the bourgeois republic (‘the most odious of all political regimes’ 3 ) he
1
I use ‘socialist’ rather than ‘communist’ society, despite Marx’s well-known distinction.
Bellamy, ‘Being Liberal with Republicanism’s Radical Heritage’, 272.
3
First Draft, 461.
2
1
frequently praised the idea of social republic (which he also calls a ‘Red republic’, a
‘republic of labour’ and the ‘true republic’4). Thus he says:
a Republic is only in France and Europe possible as a ‘Social
Republic’, that is a Republic which disowns the capital and
landowner class of the State machinery to supersede it by the
Commune, that frankly avows ‘social emancipation’ as the great goal
of the Republic and guarantees thus that social transformation by the
Communal organisation.5
Referring to the political structure as the social republic is also aimed to unsettle our
assumptions about what the dictatorship of the proletariat must be and helps avoid the
ideological and political baggage that has accrued to the term.6
My argument is in three parts. First, I set out in general terms what Marx suggested
the social republic should look like. Second, I discuss the extent to which Marx
thought that these political structures would be temporary and unnecessary in socialist
society. Third, I will argue in favour of seeing the social republic as permanent.
1. The Features of the Social Republic
What should the political structure that guides society from capitalism to socialism
look like? Marx gives no systematic answer to this question. What he thought on the
matter has to therefore be reconstructed from several of his other political writings.
Most important for this are Marx’s writings on the Paris Commune, namely the Civil
War in France and its two preparatory drafts. In that work Marx argues that the
Commune is a model for the kind of political structure that should guide capitalism to
socialism, calling it the ‘political form at last discovered under which to work out the
economical emancipation of Labour.’7
We should however keep two caveats in mind when looking at Marx’s account of the
Commune. The address was written with the intention of giving a public and defiant
defence of the Commune in the immediate wake of its brutal suppression, and not to
precisely detail its advantages and (especially not) its shortcomings as a model for
revolution. Furthermore, Marx sought to emphasize its communist elements against
4
Class Struggles in France, 122; Eighteenth Brumaire, 107–111; Civil War in France, 334, 336.
First Draft, 497.
6
Hal Draper counts just eleven mentions of the dictatorship of the proletariat in all of Marx and Engels’ writings,
‘Marx and the Dictatorship of the Proletariat’, 95.
7
Civil War in France, 334.
5
2
the competing anarchist, Blanquist, Proudhonist, and republican interpretations. The
Civil War in France is therefore better seen as a general guide to Marx’s ideas on the
topic rather than a critical or strictly impartial account of the Commune’s actual
features.8
With this in mind, what political features of the Commune lead Marx to the
judgement that it could ‘serve as the lever for uprooting the economical foundations’
of class society?9 Using the description Marx gives of the Commune, we can draw out
the following features:10
1. Structure of the Commune
•
Members elected by universal (male) suffrage11
•
Short terms which are revocable
•
Members were majority working class/representatives of the working class
•
Combined executive and legislative body
•
Commune’s workings publicly published
2. Public administration
•
Subordinate to the Commune
•
All public officials paid workmen’s wages (including Commune members)
•
Privileges of high state dignitaries removed
•
All public officials to be ‘elective, responsible, and revocable’
3. Forces of physical repression
•
Standing army replaced by a people’s militia
•
Police depoliticized and placed under control of the Commune
•
Police revocable at all times
4. Judiciary
•
Removal of ‘sham independence’ from the government
•
Judges elected, responsible and revocable
5. National structure
8
McLellan, Karl Marx, 397–401.
Civil War in France, 334.
10
This draws primarily from Ibid., 331–4. It is adapted from Draper, Karl Marx’s Theory of Revolution Vol. 3,
273.
11
Though only men could vote in the Commune’s election, Marx refers to this as ‘universal suffrage’. He does
however defend the role women played in defending the Commune on the barricades. Civil War in France, 350.
9
3
•
Each rural hamlet has its own commune
•
Rural communes send delegates to a district assembly in a central town
•
Each district assembly sends delegates to a National Delegation in Paris
•
Every delegate bound by a ‘mandat impératif’ (binding mandate) and are
revocable at all times
6. Separation of church and state
•
Clergy removed from public roles
•
Education made free and independent of the church
Though some of these features might now seem a little quaint (separation of church
and state) and others indefensible (male suffrage), the overall vision is radically
democratic. As Marx argues, the Commune ‘supplied the Republic with the basis of
really democratic institutions.’12 The truly democratic nature of the Commune is
evidenced, Marx argues, by the social measures it had already undertaken in its short
lifespan (abolition of night work and employer fines on wages, etc.). This showed, in
an echo of Lincoln’s words, that it was ‘a government of the people by the people.’13
The features outlined above are not exhaustive of what political structures we need to
reach and maintain a socialist society. But they do give a good general outline. What
stands out is Marx’s repeated assertion that all public positions must be elected and
subject to recall by the people. Political representatives are really delegates, bound by
the decisions of their citizens who chose them. Indeed the entire state machinery is
transformed and subordinated to popular control. These are the kind of political
features that I think would be crucial to a socialist society.
2. The Transitional Nature of the Social Republic
But what does Marx have to say about the importance of these political structures
beyond facilitating the transition to socialism? In the Civil War in France Marx states
that these political features of the Commune are secondary to its economic objective.
After applauding the Commune’s cutting of government expenses and providing the
Republic with truly democratic institutions, Marx goes on to say ‘But neither cheap
government nor the “true Republic” was its ultimate aim; they were its mere
12
13
Ibid., 334.
Ibid., 339.
4
concomitants.’14 The true aim is still the economic emancipation of labour, and the
political institutions of the social republic are secondary to that aim.
This somewhat deflationary comment on the importance of the social republic is in
line with the suggestion that Marx thinks that these structures are only transitory, that
they will not be required in a future socialist society. Consider Marx’s brief
discussion in the ‘Critique of the Gotha Programme’ of what form the political
structure will take in the future:
The question then arises: what transformation will the state undergo
in communist society? In other words, what social functions will
remain in existence there that are analogous to present state
functions? The question can only be answered scientifically…15
We might feel, justifiably, somewhat disappointed by this answer. Can we really say
nothing about what structures will still be required? Why can this only be answered
'scientifically', and what would it even mean to do so? Immediately after this passage
comes the famous quote on the dictatorship of the proletariat:
Between capitalist and communist society lies the period of the
revolutionary transformation of the one into the other. Corresponding
to this is also the political transition period in which the state can be
nothing but the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat.16
The dictatorship of the proletariat, the social republic, is therefore only a ‘political
transition period’. Indeed ‘dictatorship’ itself implies that it is only temporary,
referring as it does to the institution of the Roman Republic where one man would be
granted emergency powers by the Senate for a set period of time to deal with a crisis.
Thus of the (very) limited number of statements we have from Marx there is certainly
some suggestion that the structures of the social republic are temporary. It is however
striking just how little Marx has to say on the topic. This was not some unconscious
oversight; ‘Marx did not simply forget to portray future developments in any detail;
his unwillingness, in this regard, was neither accidental nor a matter of regret for
him.’17 His failure to explicitly commit to the continual importance of these political
structures and of making them a permanent feature of communist society, is reflective
14
Civil War in France, 334.
‘Critique of the Gotha Programme’, 95.
16
Ibid.
17
Leopold, The Young Karl Marx, 279–80.
15
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of his general reticence to specify details of the future socialist society. Socialists, he
thought, should not be in the business of ‘writing recipes…for the cook-shops of the
future.’18 It perhaps goes to far, as some have claimed, that Marx believed that
‘collective ownership of the means of production would remove the need for
politics.’19 But it is the case that Marx fails to take definitive stand on whether or not
there will be a continuing need for the political structures of the social republic.
3. Why the Social Republic should be Permanent
What reasons could one give for thinking that the political structures of the social
republic will be redundant in socialist society? Two reasons will be explored here.
First, human nature will be sufficiently altered in socialist society that political
conflict will no longer occur. Second, since class is the primary driver of political
conflict, a society without class will not need the political structures to deal with this
conflict.
The idea that human nature would be so different in socialist society that political
conflict disappears strikes me as the less plausible of the two. The claim might be that
the experience of cooperative production and mutual aid would make people less
competitive, less materialistic and more inclined to egalitarian relations. As a result
people would be much less disposed to the desire to establish dominance and control
over others and this would hence lead to the disappearance of political conflict. Of
course, socialists are committed to some degree to this idea, wishing to avoid the
frequent conservative claim that an unchangeable human nature makes a socialist
society impossible. However, it is one thing to say that human nature is malleable and
dependent on historical circumstances, and another that it can be entirely refashioned.
Instead, I think we should draw on Machiavelli’s pessimistic account of human
nature. Throughout his Discourses he repeats again and again the view that the central
aspect of human nature that politics needs to content with, is that humans are
permanently ambitious, always desiring more than they have, and consequently
always susceptible to corruption. In a representative passage concerning the struggle
18
19
Capital Vol. I, 17.
Bellamy, ‘Being Liberal with Republicanism’s Radical Heritage’, 272.
6
between the plebeians and patricians in the Roman Republic, Machiavelli argues that
people:
fight for the sake of ambition, which is so powerful a passion in the
human breast that, no matter the rank to which a man may rise, he
never abandons it. The reason is that nature has created men in such
a way that they can desire everything but are unable to obtain
everything, so that their desire is always greater than their power of
acquisition.20
The consequence of this ambitiousness is that people in positions of public
responsibility are easily corrupted, turning from serving the common good to their
own private interests. This, Machiavelli says, is the case no matter no matter how
‘good and well educated they may be’.21
But despite this pessimistic account of human nature, Machiavelli does not (at least in
the Discourses) combine it with a conservative political theory that justifies
monarchical absolutism. Machiavelli’s concern is instead the search for popular
republican institutions that can check this ambitiousness and ensure that that they are
not corrupted for private gain. The result is a kind of progressive realism, which holds
that a popular republic is possible but must respond to the facts of human nature. We
should take from this an attitude of anti-utopian scepticism; an appreciation for the
fact that we will never fully eradicate the ambitiousness of people to dominate others,
and that the political structures of socialism need to respond to that. As Machiavelli
puts it:
it is necessary for anyone who organizes a republic and establishes
laws in it to take for granted that all men are evil and that they will
always act according to the wickedness of their nature whenever they
have the opportunity.22
The second reason, that the removal of classless society will end the primary cause of
political conflict, has I think greater plausibility. The argument goes that the primary
function of political institutions is to maintain the rule of a particular class over
another. When class distinctions are abolished the corresponding need for these
political institutions disappears. This argument is primarily associated with the well-
20
Machiavelli, Discourses, I.37. See similar statements in I.28 and II. Preface.
Ibid., I.43.
22
Ibid., I.3.
21
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known section of Engels’ Socialism: Utopian and Scientific dealing with the
‘withering away’ or ‘dying out’ of the state. Setting out this view, Engels writes:
As soon as there is no longer any social class to be held in
subjection; as soon as class rule…[is] removed, nothing more
remains to be repressed, and a special repressive force, a State, is no
longer necessary.23
The consequence is that more and more political functions become ‘superfluous’, and
in the end the ‘government of persons is replaced by the administration of things’.24
In response to this point two points need to be made. The first, and obvious point, is
that the argument relies on viewing class as the nearly exclusive cause of all political
conflict. While I accept the claim that class is at the foundation of most political
conflict, it goes too far to suggest that it is the only cause and that its removal will see
the end of other autonomous forms of conflict. As feminist and anti-racist theorists
have long argued not all forms of conflict, oppression and domination can be reduced
to class. Expecting it to do so misunderstands their causes in present society. The
removal of class will not see the end of all political divisions and we need the political
structures of the social republic to give people subordinated by these other forms of
oppression the means to combat them.
But beyond this I think the central reason we cannot accept this argument is that even
if a classless society removes one of the key, perhaps even the main, form of political
conflict, we need the political structures of the social republic to ensure that we do not
return to a class society. The view of human nature, derived from Machiavelli, leads
to an appreciation for the constant need to guard against those people who would try
to reintroduce class society. The institutions of the social republic are a vital check on
the ability of a determined person or persons to assimilate power and prestige that
would enable them to corrupt the political institutions and ultimately reintroduce a
class society.
This concern with the perpetual possibility of the corruption of even good institutions
is exemplified in Machiavelli’s discussion of the Roman’s tribunes.25 This public
23
Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, 321.
Ibid. Engels is speaking specifically here of the state and state functions, but I think the point can be extended to
political institutions considered more broadly since the ‘administration of things’ suggests a profoundly antipolitical understanding of the remaining tasks.
24
8
office was only open to plebeians and it could veto Senate decisions and legislation
that harmed the interests of the people. Machiavelli praises the tribunes for providing
a vital check on the ambitiousness and arrogance of the patricians. However, he says
that even the institution of the tribune contained the possibility of corruption. As
Machiavelli writes that ‘because everything holds within it some hidden evil that can
give rise to new circumstances…it is necessary to provide against such evils with new
institutions.’26
Of course, accepting the point that a socialist society could at any point be returned to
a mode of production based on class distinctions goes against strongly determinist
accounts of historical materialism. We should however see reaching a socialist society
as a precarious achievement; it could always be undone, and it must therefore be
continuously renewed and defended.
Conclusion
The argument above attempts to make a preliminary case for the fruitfulness of
applying republican ideas to Marxist debates about the political structure of socialism.
I have here focused on how the Machiavellian insights into human nature and
corruption show that the political structures that are supposed to transform capitalism
into socialism must be seen as a permanent feature of socialist society. Further
insights might include the necessity of distributing power between different branches
of the social republic and the intrinsic value of citizens participating directly in
politics. Developing these ideas further could, I believe, show the possibility and
desirability of a republican Marxism.
Characters: 19,984
25
26
For further discussion see McCormick, Machiavellian Democracy.
Machiavelli, Discourses, III.11.
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