For the Scientific Socialism Forum, CASS, Beijing, November 1, 2013

　　Wadi'h Halabi,

　　Economics Commission, Communist Party USA and

　　Center for Marxist Education, Massachusetts, USA

　　Eight Tasks of Scientific Socialism Today

　　As the general crisis of capitalism continues to unfold, the work of scientific socialism has never been more important. Scientific socialism is commonly associated with intellectual and theoretical tasks. But the reality is that intellectual tasks require organization and organizational tasks have deep intellectual foundations. Marx and Engels summarized their extraordinary work with – “Proletarians of all Countries, Unite!” They meant unity in organization.

　　Scientific socialism has to look out for the whole, over the long term, to meet human needs. Our work extends to the environment, women’s equality, development of our youth, sustainable social as well as environmental practices. We need to explain that the march of history has its ebbs and flows. This is consistent with the concept of scientific development.

　　What follows is my assessment of eight necessary tasks of scientific socialism:

　　1)We need to advance the unity of the workers of the world. The Communist Parties of the world are the starting point, as a Communist Party of China comrade once simply explained. This is because our Parties share powerful points of reference (the Russian Revolution, reinforced by the Chinese, Vietnamese, Albanian and other Revolutions), and substantial agreement on some defeats and near-defeats (the Paris Commune, Hungary 1956, Poland 1980, the fall of the USSR). Victories come at a cost, defeats illuminate our limitations. Unity can open with CPs simply reporting on problems we face and approaches we are taking to address them. It can advance with cooperation around necessary tasks we can agree on, for example in defense of persecuted labor organizers, or on environmental tasks.

　　2)The more conscious our unity, the more effective it will be. The same CPC comrade also simply clarified this point. Conscious unity requires scientific clarity on the five or six most important developments in world political economy, and their implications. We need clarity on the present general crisis of capitalism. The crisis can open the door for further advances in humanity’s historic transition from capitalism to socialism, but also carries the danger of terrible wars and serious defeats. We need clarity on the environmental crisis, which poses existential dangers for humanity. China’s extraordinary economic development may prove a turning point in working class history. And perhaps most important, we need to address and identify the various weaknesses – domestic and international -- that made counter-revolution possible in the Soviet Union and eleven other states. One challenge is that since 1917 and to this day, two social systems have been interacting and conflicting within the confines of a single world economy. Although the two systems are internally regulated by different laws, their interaction affects both. It is difficult to understand the collapse of the USSR or the relative stability of US GDP from 1945 to 2008 without taking into account the interactions between the two social systems.

　　3)We need to assess the material basis for revolutionary optimism today. This is like the work of a blood doctor – a mistake in one direction, and the patient will bleed to death; a mistake in the other direction, and clots will kill the patient! False optimism can lead us to make potentially serious errors leading to disappointments or defeats; false pessimism results in passivity, which guarantees defeats. Assessing the material basis for revolutionary optimism today will help us move forward. This requires carefully weighing the respective strengths and weaknesses of the world bourgeoisie, and the respective strengths and weaknesses of the working class and our organizations. (I believe the basis exists for cautious optimism.)

　　4)We need to expand education in Marxism and make it more effective, worldwide. Effective education requires empowering students of Marxism, at all ages! It should lead to conclusions, practice and further strengthening of theory and practice. That “freedom is the recognition of necessity” is one powerful part of Marxist education. Even the mighty Chinese state cannot do whatever it wants. Our Parties, states and unions are limited to making the best out of bad situations. But effective education also involves identifying limitations and acting to overcome them where possible.

　　5)We need to develop a culture of class solidarity -- a culture of respect, cooperation and scientific method. On that foundation we also need to develop respect for struggle and collective and individual motivations. This could be our most difficult task. But we have good examples to work from, including the Communist Party of China’s work among the masses in the difficult years leading to 1949, or various past or current practices by many Communist Parties and unions. Such a culture addresses profound needs of humanity, needs that exploitation is compelled to violate. Such a culture will strengthen our organizations and the effectiveness of education in Marxism, while weakening support for capitalism.

　　6)We need to generalize and apply principles of effective organization of the working class, at the international, party, state, union and army levels. We now have well over a century of extraordinarily rich experiences to draw from, positive and negative. One principle appears require the relative separation of the various “subcommittees” addressing necessary tasks so that each can become strong in its own right; at the same time, periodic “harmonizing mechanisms” are essential to develop and implement policies and avoid organizational disintegration. Clarity on goals is essential. Knowledge of history is essential. Effective education in Marxism is essential. Measures to prevent gaps between the interests of leaders and of common workers are essential. The list is long. But the conclusions should be relatively short and clear, and put to test.

　　7)Tasks of land reform and national liberation in capitalist countries must still be addressed. Capitalism has generally violently suppressed these tasks, or dispersed oppressed nations, including in the USA. But these historic bourgeois-democratic tasks have not been resolved. The working class must still do that. Addressing these tasks has become much more complicated as over a billion poor and middle peasants, farmers and rural workers have been driven off the land and into slums in the past three decades, in part as a result of capitalization of agricultural production in capitalist countries, even poor ones. Those pushed off the land account for about two-thirds of the population of slums worldwide; this population now exceeds 1.5 billion. (The other third of slum dwellers appears to be former city residents who have become impoverished by the deepening contradictions of capitalism and ensuing ‘neoliberal’ policies.) This is one of our most challenging tasks, intellectually and practically. It is possible that experimental efforts to develop state-supported “agrotowns” in states such as China, Cuba and Vietnam, could help point the way out. (Agrotowns would combine ecological food production by the entire population in planned agglomerations that also include industrial, education and cultural facilities.) Agrotowns may also point the way to advancing the historic Communist commitment to overcome the opposition between physical and intellectual labor and between city and countryside. Land reform and national liberation are represented by the sickle on our flag. Religious fundamentalism will continue to spread in capitalist countries until the working class movement addresses this critical task.

　　8)Our union policies require great attention, both domestically and internationally. This will help us overcome the gap that has developed between many of our Parties and the mass of workers, a gap that is potentially fatal for our Parties and for the historic transition. Combined with effective education in Marxism, our union policies can reunite us with the mass of workers, who are often confused and demoralized, not least by the collapse of the Soviet Union but also by various measures taken to develop the productive forces in states such as China and Vietnam. Domestic union policies differ in capitalist countries and in states formed by socialist revolutions, such as China. In the latter, the unions need not only to defend the rights of workers but also to help strengthen the state in making the ‘best out of a bad situation’. In capitalist countries, the state is the instrument of the exploiters. But because there is one world economy, the working class is international. There are many necessary tasks around which we can organize international cooperation between unions in capitalist countries and unions in states formed by socialist revolutions. Examples include cooperation on environmental and safety-and-health tasks, organizing tasks, and defense of persecuted labor organizers.

　　The working class forms a single ‘organism’ internationally, which is pitted against a world bourgeoisie desperate to weaken if not destroy all organizations of the working class. Workers of the world, unite, consciously.

　　The ideas expressed in this paper do not necessarily represent those of the CPUSA. This paper was prepared in an individual capacity for the Scientific Socialism forum hosted by the Academy of Marxism of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Special thanks are due to the organizers of the conference and to Comrades Jin Huiming, Li Shenming, Cheng Enfu, Liu Shuchun, Ding Xiaoqin, Wu Xiangdong, and Chen Shuoying. Thanks also to my wife, Sandy Rosen, and to Richard Levins, Gary Hicks, Eric Brooks, Al Sargis, the late Maja Weisl, and many other comrades and friends of the CPUSA, the Center for Marxist Education, and the Boston China Study Group.

　　October 19, 2013

　　Editor: lanhe water