First Published: Red Front, Vol. 2, No. 1, March-April 1968.
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba and Sam Richards
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In an effort to give some “theoretical” support to the reactionary “Scottish” nationalism and Welsh “nationalism” that is at present being peddled by certain spurious “Marxist-Leninist” groups, Brendan Clifford has been searching the Marxist classics. The results of his twelve months’ researches are published in a long article in the November 1967 issue of “The Communist”, organ of the trotskyite Communist Workers’ Organisation (anti-revisionist).
In 1891, cries Mr. Clifford triumphantly, Engels referred to the British Isles “where the two islands are peopled by four nations”.
Mr. Clifford “forgets”, however, that Marxist-Leninists do not regard the classics of Marxism as “holy writ”, every word of which must be taken as inspired from heaven. In 1891 the Marxist definition of the concept “nation” had not yet been developed. Although the fundamentals of this definition were laid by Stalin in 1912 in his famous work “Marxism and the national Question”, it was not until 1950 that even Stalin came to differentiate clearly between “nation” on the one hand, and the forerunner of a nation – “nationality” or “pre-nation” – on the other. Today, having the benefit of seventy-five years development of Marxism since Engels wrote that sentence in 1891, Marxist-Leninists are able to describe the British Isles more correctly as “two islands peopled by two nations”. These two nations are the Irish and the British nations, the latter being composed of three nationalities: Scottish, Welsh and English.
Mr. Clifford goes on to claim that in 1925 Stalin “re-assessed” the national question as it had been put forward in his 1912 work. Consequently, theses – such as that to the effect that Britain constitutes a single nation – based on “Marxism and the National Question” are not valid.
But did Stalin amend his definition of the “nation” as given in the 1912 work? Did he amend his definition of the British people as constituting a single nation? Not at all.
In fact, Stalin did not “amend” the 1912 work, he developed it into the conditions of a new historical period, the period of the general crisis of capitalism. He refers to a sentence from the earlier work:
The national struggle under the conditions of rising capitalism is a struggle of the bourgeois classes among themselves! (J.V. Stalin: “The National Question Once Again” in: “Works”, Vol.7; Moscow 1954, p.226).
Since this formulation refers specifically to “the conditions of rising capitalism”, it is correct, says Stalin. But now, he says, we are living in the period of the general crisis of capitalism which began the first imperialist war; now, therefore,
the national question ... had ceased to be a part of the general democratic movement, ... it had already become a component part of the general proletarian, socialist revolution.(J.V. Stalin: ibid: p.226).
Clearly, the Scottish and Welsh “national socialists” can derive no support from vague talk about Stalin’s “re-assessment” of his 1912 position.
The greater part of Clifford’s article is devoted not directly to the national question, but to a passage in an article on the national question in the organ of the A.C.M.L.U. The passage concerned, which Clifford misquotes, reads:
In this period, when capitalism was developing within the disintegrating old society, political actions which served the interests of the capitalist class, which assisted in the development of capitalist society, were progressive. ...
In this period, the best interests of the masses of the Scottish people (and the English people too) were served by the development of capitalism, and therefore by Union. (“The National Question in Britain”, in: “Hammer or Anvil”, November/December 1966; p.47).
Revisionist, anti-Marxist nonsense – cries Clifford.
Capital comes into existence ’dripping from head to foot’ ... with the blood of the masses. ... When coming into existence capitalism served the interests neither of the old masses of serfs or clansmen nor of the new proletarian masses. (B. Clifford: “Scotland: How Capitalism Serves the People”, in: “The Communist”; November 1967; p.11).
By the title of his article – “How Capitalism Serves the People” – Clifford wishes to suggest that HAMMER OR ANVIL is saying in the passage quoted that capitalism serves the interests of the masses now, in the period of the general crisis of capitalism. This is to sink to the depths of political dishonesty new even for trotskyites such as Clifford.
And to deny that the development of capitalism within the womb of feudal society was progressive, was in the interests of the masses of the people despite the suffering associated with its birth, is to deny one of the most fundamental concepts of Marxist-Leninist revolutionary theory:
Capitalism is progressive compared with feudalism”. (V.I. Lenin: “A Caricature of Marxism and ’Imperialist Economism’” in: “Selected Works”, Vol.5; London; undated p.299).
In the period prior to the February 1917 revolution, Lenin fought unremittingly for the spread of understanding among the working class of the essentially progressive character of the bourgeois revolution in Russia:
In countries like Russia, the working class suffers not so much from capitalism as from the lack of capitalist development. The working class is therefore undoubtedly interested in the widest, freest and speediest development of capitalism. The removal of all the remnants of the old order which are hampering the wide, free and speedy development of capitalism is of absolute advantage to the working class. The bourgeois revolution is precisely ... a revolution which most fully guarantees the widest, freest and speediest development of capitalism. ...
Therefore, the bourgeois revolution is in the highest degree advantageous to the proletariat. The bourgeois revolution is absolutely necessary in the interests of the proletariat. (V.I. Lenin: “Two Tactics of Social-Democracy in the Democratic Revolution”, in: “Selected Works”, Vol.3; London; 1946; p.75).
Had Clifford and his trotskyite rabble been in Russia in the early twentieth century, clearly they would have been denouncing the line of Lenin and the Bolsheviks, and assisting the Tsar with “leftist” phrases, just as they have for the last few years sought to disrupt the developing Marxist-Leninist movement here.