In the United States, Police, Sheriffs and other “officers of the law” kill three people a day, every day, on average. With Ferguson, people began to address the idea of “state-sanctioned murder.” These young leaders are principally from a generation that was born in 1980 or later. They represent the motion of a new class of proletarians, the hundreds of thousands of people who are not permitted regular work in the Digital Era of laborless production. This class is specifically targeted by the coercive forces of the state.
The state is one of the essential theoretical concepts in Marxism. When the spontaneous movement itself raises the concept, Marxists have the obligation to address the issue.
The state as a social institution has existed in some form since the division of society into hostile classes. In each era of human history since, a ruling class always uses the state as an instrument to achieve and maintain its domination. The state apparatus is likewise a structure that aggressively organizes the expansion of capitalist rule.
Regardless of form, however, what gives rise to the state? What precedes the state in the minds of the people of a society that allows the state to exist? What does the state have to do to play its role as the leading edge of the superstructure of society? What vulnerabilities does this produce?
Engels addresses these questions. Taking these ideas further, Lenin discusses contradictions within the state. Another question then appears: if the state is an apparatus of one class to suppress another class, how can there be contradictions within a state?
The State is “above” society
The following quotes address these questions (underlining added):
“But now a society had come into being that by the force of all its economic conditions of existence had to split up into freemen and slaves, into exploiting rich and exploited poor; a society that was not only incapable of reconciling these antagonisms, but had to drive them more and more to a head. Such a society could only exist either in a state of continuous, open struggle of these classes against one another or under the rule of a third power which, while ostensibly standing above the classes struggling with each other, suppressed their open conflict and permitted a class struggle at most in the economic field, in a so-called legal form.” (Engels. Origins of the Family, Private Property and the State, p 156)
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“The state is, therefore, by no means a power forced on society from without; just as little is it “the reality of the ethical idea”, “the image and reality of reason”, as Hegel maintains. Rather, it is a product of society at a certain stage of development; it is the admission that this society has become entangled in an insoluble contradiction with itself, that it has split into irreconcilable antagonisms which it is powerless to dispel. But in order that these antagonisms, classes with conflicting economic interests, might not consume themselves and society in fruitless struggle, it became necessary to have a power seemingly standing above society that would alleviate the conflict and keep it within the bounds of “order”; and this power, arisen out of society but placing itself above it, and alienating itself more and more from it, is the state.” (Engels Origin…, p 157 in online version.)
(Commentary) – The notion that the state somehow stands “above” society is certainly part of the propaganda of capitalism. However, there is an objective side to this. The state cannot establish and maintain “the bounds of order” without this mantle, since otherwise the working class would respond with force to its constant attacks and predations. The state guarantees the looting of society by capitalists just as much as it guarantees the dispossession of almost everyone. As Engels notes, the state is “not only incapable of reconciling these antagonisms, but has to drive them more and more to a head.”
Part of the development that both Engels and Lenin describe is how the state itself destroys this camouflage as the polarization of society develops. Historically, the internal contradictions of society have brought down states more than once. These proceed from “the insoluble contradictions of society” that drive the already unstable capitalist system into economic crisis then political crisis, which then often proceeds into revolutionary crisis.
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“In most of the historical states, the rights of citizens are, besides, apportioned according to their wealth, thus directly expressing the fact that the state is an organisation of the possessing class for its protection against the nonpossessing class. It was so already in the Athenian and Roman classification according to property. It was so in the mediaeval feudal state, in which the alignment of political power was in conformity with the amount of land owned. It is seen in the electoral qualifications of the modern representative states. Yet this political recognition of property distinctions is by no means essential. On the contrary, it marks a low stage of state development. The highest form of the state, the democratic republic, which under our modern conditions of society is more and more becoming an inevitable necessity, and is the form of state in which alone the last decisive struggle between proletariat and bourgeoisie can be fought out — the democratic republic officially knows nothing any more of property distinctions. In it wealth exercises its power indirectly, but all the more surely.” (Origins… p 159)
– In the 21st Century, the state is aggressively expanding private property by allowing corporations to seize and privatize everything from water to natural proteins to infrastructure and your house. Private property is rapidly devouring both public property and personal property. Privilege is ever more openly tied to private property ownership: Paul Manafort goes to an elite prison for committing major felonies while those who can’t post bail, and are innocent of petty crimes they are charged with, remain in jail.
Ever more openly, “the rights of citizens” are subordinated to the rights of property. The Citizens United decision recognizes corporations as people and money as speech. This re-establishes the conditions at the time of the US Revolution where only men of property could vote. In that same era, slavery was not only legal, but lauded. It is no accident that US capitalism encourages the use of prisoners as slaves, often in private prisons.
However, the state propagandizes that there are no distinctions of property and privilege in America. This is a corollary to the sanctified illusion of the American Dream. Sooner or later, however, the facts are going to overwhelm the lies, especially since more and more people are living out what the state really is. This step is the historic realization in the US of the necessity that the state will “drive these contradictions to a head.”
With the advent of computer-driven laborless production, the US capitalist class began to withdraw the economic bribe that stabilized the illusions of the American Dream. This process began with the so-called “Reagan Revolution” of the 1980s where manufacturing corporations were encouraged to flee the old industrial base to exploit cheap labor in Mexico, China and beyond. It escalated after the 2008 financial meltdown.
Nature abhors a vacuum. Relaxing ideological control – the result of abandoning the myth of the American Dream – requires augmenting somewhere else. The US state stepped in to ensure social order in place of the bribe. At the same time, like every institution in society, the state that was built for the Industrial Era itself had to change. The process of alienation of the state from society described by Engels began.
The declaration of the bourgeoisie – We “the exploiting class exploits the oppressed class solely and exclusively in the interest of the exploited class itself” – somehow begins to ring hollow. The state today is increasingly merging directly with corporations and developing towards a thoroughly privatized state. This process is fascism. The state steps in where bourgeois ideology begins to fail and angels fear to tread.
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“What is good for the ruling class should be good for the whole of the society with which the ruling class identifies itself. Therefore, the more civilization advances, the more it is compelled to cover the ills it necessarily creates with the cloak of love, to embellish them, or to deny their existence; in short, to introduce conventional hypocrisy — unknown both in previous forms of society and even in the earliest stages of civilization — that culminates in the declaration: The exploiting class exploits the oppressed class solely and exclusively in the interest of the exploited class itself; and if the latter fails to appreciate this, and even becomes rebellious, it thereby shows the basest ingratitude to its benefactors, the exploiters.” (Origins… p 163)
— As we are living out today, the traditional “cloak of love” is wearing thin in a country where some 50% must work temp jobs and over 40% are stricken with crippling poverty. One of the real lessons of the Civil Rights Era was that nothing can be gained without grasping the nature of the power structure. Issues of class power and privilege come to the fore as people take the necessary step of demanding that both government and the state actually fulfill their mission of guaranteeing the well-being of people instead of corporations.
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Lenin discusses this in these quotes from The State and Revolution —–
“But what is lost sight of or glossed over is this: If the state is a product of the irreconcilability of class contradictions, if it is a power standing above society and “alienating itself more and more from it” then it is obvious that the liberation of the oppressed class is impossible without a violent revolution, but also without the destruction of the apparatus of state power which was created by the ruling class and which is the embodiment of this “alienation”. P 11
— The objective process of polarization inherent in “the irreconcilability of class contradictions” drives the state to ever more openly attack the new proletarian class. Thus, the state increasingly alienates itself and is forced to abandon all pretense that it is somehow “neutral” and ruling in the interests of the exploited class itself. The state passes from the defender of society to attacking society in order to eliminate the old institutions of the Industrial Era that objectively impede the free flow of capital around the globe.
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“[The public power] grows stronger, however in proportion as class contradictions within the state become more acute, and as adjacent states become larger and more populous.” P 14
– Contradictions within the state begin with this naked clash between the activities of the state apparatus that shatter the hallowed notions of its “impartiality”. These contradictions destroy the covenant between the rulers and the people. Cops who are supposed to “serve and protect” no longer hide their malice to the new proletarian class and the Youth. The vaunted “rule of law” becomes a whole lot more about the force that’s doing the ruling than the law itself. Police become open murderers as they appropriate the role of judge, jury and executioner.
Another form of contradiction takes place as events force the ruling class elements in their covenant to begin to struggle against each other. So today in the Trump Era, we see the FBI and the CIA in unprecedented domestic struggle almost on a daily basis. The escalating military effort to somehow force regime change in Russia that was so dear to the hearts of Hillary and Obama is now openly challenged. Sections of the bourgeoisie are forced out into the open as they enter into tactical conflict over how to proceed.
Commonly in the revolutions of the 20th Century, another kind of contradiction arises as the state is employed to subdue the workers. These armed bodies of men, from police to jails to armies, are of course principally made up of the working class who are driven by social force to implement the policies of the oppressive class. Sooner or later, these forces are also thrown into revolt. Traditionally in revolutions, the police go over to the people, while the armies – far more segregated from society – remain for a while the attack dog of the ruling class.
The Eric Garner murder put the focus on what the NYPD mostly does every day: bully people and write thousands of “quality of life” tickets that raise revenue for the city. For a moment, this predominantly minority police force was fed up with ticketing predominantly minority people and initiated a work slowdown.
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“Let them, nevertheless, put through their anti-revolt bills, make them still worse, transform the whole penal law into india-rubber, they will achieve nothing but anew proof of their impotence. In order seriously to hit Social-Democracy, they will have to resort to quite other measures. They can only hold in check the Social-Democratic revolt which is just now doing so well by keeping within the law, by revolt on the part of the parties of order, which cannot live without breaking the laws…. Herr Rossler, the Prussian bureaucrat, and Herr von Boguslawski, the Prussian general, have shown them the only way in which the workers, who refuse to let themselves be lured into street fighting, can still, perhaps, be held in check. Breach of the constitution, dictatorship, return to absolutism, regis voluntas suprema lex! Therefore, only courage, gentlemen; here is no backing out of it; here you are in for it!
But do not forget that the German Empire, just as all small states and generally, all modern states, is a product of a covenant (contract); of a covenant (contract), firstly, of the rulers (princes) with one another and, secondly, of the rulers (princes) with the people. If one side breaks the agreement (contract), the whole of it (contract) falls to the ground; the other side is then also no longer bound.”( Engels. Introduction to the Class Struggles in France”)
— In the process of alienating itself, the state breaks its covenant with the people and turns to open criminality, terror and violence to carry out the goals and objectives that the ruling class sets for it. Being undocumented was not a felony until Trump proclaimed it so. The state then began separating families. Next it criminalized any direct aid to the undocumented – legal, shelter, food, medical – and made it illegal for public agencies to render this care. The provision of services for the undocumented is legal only by private corporations, once they are incarcerated… in private jails! The same progression towards criminality occurs, though in different forms, in different sectors of society where the state is active.
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We can summarize:
The state comes into being to establish the social order that the ruling class demands. As such, the state objectively takes the position that it is “above society;” that it rules in the name of society as a whole, for the benefit of all. In capitalist society, the state dares not permit the recognition that it serves the ruling class, for when the class struggle reaches this consciousness, the political stage of open class struggle ensues. The working class openly begins to oppose the attacks of the state apparatus.
Preceding this phase, the state increasingly alienates itself in the eyes of the public by mobilizing ever more concerted political attacks as well as the police and the standing army. It is driven ever further, ever more openly into illegal actions to suppress the sections of society it is supposed to protect. By its own actions, it strips away all the illusions, all the ideas of the middle that subordinate the consciousness of the working class to the capitalist class, all notions of fairness and justice, all the lies that it rules in the name of society as a whole. It reveals the true nature of the state apparatus as systematic attack, in the name of private property, on the working class and on society as a whole.
This alienation is an objective process. As the working class begins the struggle for political power, it begins to counter and attack the laws, institutions and objectives of the state, even if in a piecemeal fashion early on. Such political struggle begins to contradict and paralyze the execution of the state apparatus, increasingly blocking it from achieving the specific goals of private property. The process then begins to compound the contradictions, rendering the state increasingly politically impotent, if not less murderous.
We have seen this political paralysis develop in East Germany with the overrunning of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and then the collapse of the Soviet state in 1991. The French Revolution of 1789 and the Soviet seizure of state power in 1917 were likewise essentially non-violent. The violence inevitably ensures from the counter-revolution that then begins to mobilize.
The lack of violence that topples the state indicates the direction for revolutionaries to develop. This is not the mindless destruction of the anarchists, nor the idiotic attempts to violently clash with a class force of overwhelming superiority in men armed with the latest in ordinance. The direction is to engage in the battle of ideas that convinces people to withdraw from the covenant with the ever more alienating state. These are actions that take place on the battlefield of consciousness. The break results from politicizing what has been termed the Line of March that characterizes every revolution as class understanding passes from social awareness to social consciousness to political consciousness.
Lenin points out that once the working class begins acting consciously in its own class interests it begins to batter the state apparatus by directing social force against components of the state. These become ever more ensnared in contradictions and lose the political initiative to compel events on a higher scale that straight up massacres.
Extending this thinking, Fidel Castro called for “Two, Three, Many Vietnams” in the mid 1960s, just as the Vietnam War was escalating. It was already clear that the US had lost the strategic initiative by that time, and that it was also impossible for that military to fight a two or three front war.
One important consequence of politicizing the battle of ideas is the recognition that it is too early to take and hold territory. That phase ended with Occupy. At a certain point, the overwhelmingly superior forces of the state simply swept up the protests. The Water Protectors at Standing Rock recognized when they could no longer hold territory against overwhelming force. They did what conscious guerrillas have done since the beginning of capitalism – they abandoned the battlefield of the land even as they won victory on the battlefield of world opinion.
To imagine further forward, what would have been the case if there were two, three, many Standing Rocks? The state invariably becomes enmeshed in further contradictions. The old Thai fable rings true here, “Ten thousand spider webs snare the water buffalo!”
The fight for what they need to survive will more and more force the working class to confront the question of who holds political power. At the same time, the state becomes ever more dedicated to dispossession. To win political power, the new proletarian class must move from scattered economic struggles against the corporations to united political struggles against the state. This direction depends upon that class forming itself subjectively, in other words, understanding itself as a class for itself, a class that must have political power to end the attacks of the state. The alienated state that increasingly employs violence against the people it claims to protect becomes a topic for politicization just as much as their lived economic experience.
As society polarizes, two classes face off in a political struggle over who will have the power to decide the future. With that, goal of the struggle becomes apparent. The state seeks to implement the corporate reorganization of society, even as laborless production creates the potential to reorganize society in the interest of humanity. Revolutionaries need to understand and educate about the common political struggle in which we are all now engaged, whatever its particular face on each front.
Steven Miller
September 6, 2018
Nanodog2@hotmail.com
