As we know from Lenin a state only exists to enforce a dictatorship of one class over the rest. I’ve been thinking about the idea of national bourgeois vs international bourgeois in this context.
When the United States does regime change in a nation they are essentially reordering it to serve the interests of the international bourgeois. This does not always seem to align with the interests of national bourgeois. So we’ll see examples like Russia, and Iran where they engage in anti-imperialist activity while being a state run by the bourgeois class.
Now I am not asking if those states are valuable allies, as they clearly are, but more broadly how we should view the national bourgeois.
If the international bourgeois can be seen to be harming the interests of national bourgeois in a certain country is it valuable as a tactic to try and ally with those national bourgeois? There is always the risk of the being co-opted into the international bourgeois class. An example being the Cubans, Iranians, etc who fled to and live in the US.
But this might not be something to concern ourselves with either. The more the United States and the west in general try to co-opt another nations bourgeois the more it seems to destabilize their internal politics. You can see this in the United States in particular. And in none of these cases has it ever led to a significant victory for the United States. Even its most successfull attempt at this, Venezuela, seems to be a mess. Not giving it much benefit so far.
So it seems to me that perhaps supporting national bouregois movements in countries currently dominated by the international bourgeois may be an effective strategy to weaken the international bourgeois and fragment the global bourgeois class in general. Allowing for the international poletarian movements to gain more power and influence over all. Sort of a divide and conquer strategy.
I’m curious to hear other comrades thoughts on this. Is it a viable strategy? Is it too great a risk due to the potential for these national bourgeois to then support national fascist movements?
In the context of the oppressed country, the national bourgeoisie and proletariat / peasantry (as far as they still exist) can be allied. However, this allyship is not to be confused as a permanent allyship. Both the national bourgeoisie and the proletariat / peasantry cooperate against imperialism while fighting each other for ultimate control over the direction of the liberated nation. As the proletariat, we should use them precisely as far as they oppose the imperialist bourgeoisie, and undermine them as far as they work against the dictatorship of the proletariat, either before or after its establishment.
They cannot be allowed to form a dictatorship of the national bourgeoisie. If they do, it becomes far more difficult for the proletariat and peasantry, who need to somehow overthrow the dictatorship of the national bourgeoisie without resulting in a replacement with a dictatorship of the comprador bourgeoisie. This is the complex struggle of the proletariat and peasantry in Iran, Russia, etc, and why for now they balance opposition to the nationalist bourgeoisie with allyship against imperialism.
As a Statesian, my role is simpler: oppose the US empire by any and all means, undermine anything that serves to further imperialism and work to end it entirely.
Yes I agree with this for the most part. I do think maybe it leaves a few open questions about the issue in place for me. For example, China still has a national bourgeois class that it has control over. People like Jack Ma for example. A lot of these people seem to be useful to them internationally. And domestically they prevent them from gaining political power. I’m not quite sure how they managed this, or how it could be replicated elsewhere. To have a socialist state where the national bourgeois is weaponized in its favor. Then there’s the question of states where there is no real non-bourgeois force at all. Not that is organized. It would seem to me in this case it might be best to keep the international and national bouregois in a state of stalemate while we attempt to develop a vanguard in that state. Since allowing either to dominate may lead to a much more hostile political environmnt and security situation.
I also think there’s a bit of a phenomenon where say the national bourgeois are in power; They will feel threatened by the rising proletarian forces and will turn to the international bourgeois for their security. Leading to them handing over national resources as payment for this support. So how should we handle these situations? It seems the only answer would be to weaken the international bouregois enough they aren’t a viable way to remain in power any longer? It’s all seemingly quite complicated.
Regarding China, I agree, the national bourgeoisie are prevented from forming organized power. As a general strategy, marketizing underdeveloped sectors under a firm and total dictatorship of the proletariat is the more classically Marxist path to developing the productive forced. China keeps them in check by socializing the commanding heights of the economy. The metaphor I see used is that the capitalist may control the rubber ball factory, but the CPC has a total monopoly on the rubber industry, so the rubber ball capitalist is hopeless to go against them.
Regarding the complexity of the national bourgeoisie, it is in the collective proletariat’s interest to undermine imperialism. This also means supporting the rise of the global south economically, which entails historically progressive bourgeois states, such as Brazil, Burkina Faso, etc. Imperialism is the biggest obstacle to socialism globally, and weakening imperialism weakens the imperialist bourgeoise, opening the gate for global north revolution which in turn opens the gate for global south sovereignty and revolution.
I still believe the global south will have far more revolutions more quickly than the global north, as has historically been the case, but the point here is that ending the unipolar era of US hegemony opens far more doors for us to navigate within. This means a temporary alliance with national bourgeoisie in the imperialized world, insofar as they do not have the ability to overturn the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie or oppose its formation in the future.
The bourgeoisie is still our class enemy. We cannot forget this.
Yes of course they’ll always be our class enemy. Yet they will continue to exist even once socialism becomes dominant. I want to be clear I’m not talking about you, but there are many who I see that speak as if after a revolution the bourgeois will be gone. That is not the case. Just as the state currently run by bourgeois contains proles the state eventually run by proles will contain bourgeois. We see that in all socialist projects, and how they manage their domestic bourgeois seems to heavily impact their success. The goal of eventually becoming a classless society would see them no longer exist, but that’s far off.
So I guess part of my musings is wondering how the way we treat them now will impact the class relations of the post-revolutionary state. If it was possible to reach a detente with them against imperialism, then to arrange a situation as China has post-revolution where they become dependent on the new socialist state for their own prosperity, I think it could lead to a more robust and stable post-revolutionary state. As one of the main entryways of imperialists to undermine them tends to be the national bourgeois.
I also think a large part of this is having a good national narrative. China has this too. The century of humiliation, and the emphasis it puts on what the west did to it during that, reminds the national bourgeois that were they to defect and the imperialists win that it may not actually be a benefit to them.
This is largely true. The national bourgeois in China benefit much more from the CPC’s rule than they would from a western puppet government. I think a large part of China’s success in keeping them as a useful force for the state has been in hammering this lesson home. The fatal flaw of the bourgeois has always been its tendency to be blinded by its own greed and shoot itself in the foot. They dismantle their own states infrastucture for profit never thinking of how that very infrastucture makes their wealth possible, and useful. So the CPC prevents this and keeps the wider society stable and prosperous. So long as the national bourgeois in China do not forget this fact they will be less likely to act as a comprador for imperialist forces.
I guess I would make a distinction between them being an ally and them being a useful tool. Capitalist societies keep their proles as useful tools and use propaganda to prevent class conciousness in them. I would say we should do the same to the national bourgeois post-revolution. Prevent them from having class consciousness, put them to use, and keep them comfortable. But never trust them too far. And always keep a close eye on them.
Ultimately, it depends on if your national bourgeoisie are also imperialist bourgeoisie or not. In the global north, the petite bourgeoisie is the national bourgeoisie, and the national bourgeoisie are imperialists. The petite bourgeoisie can be used to help develop underdeveloped industry, but the national bourgeoisie already reached monopoly scale and now function as imperialists. The petite bourgeoisie form just as weak an ally as the national bourgeoisie does to the colonized, but a weak ally it remains.
In the global south, the national bourgeoisie directly combats the imperialist bourgeoisie. This is where alliances can be found, and who do play a part in developing the productive forces.
Does this make sense?
Yes, I think I agree with this.
Not much stopping the international bourgeoisie from simply luring the nationals to do their bidding with the chance of becoming internationals themselves, and killing or neutering any national bourgeoisie who are patriotic.
Too dangerous an idea to court long term. Short-term I’m sure some arguments could be made.
Yes that’s true, but to expand on my earlier point: I think the capacity for them to do this is limited. To bring national bourgeois into the international they must share the wealth with them. Include them in the corrupt games they play. The entire purpose of these systems of corruption and imperialism is to concentrate wealth in a few hands. So maybe bringing a few into the fold is easy, but if we force them to do this more and more eventually it causes infighting amongst the international bourgeois themselves. I think we’re already seeing that. The best example of this is WW2. Europe was able to keep a lot of wealth moving around amongst their bourgeois during colonialism but eventually their colonies got less profitable and some nations were getting told they were no longer going to be able to benefit. Germany lost WW1 and was then forced to pay reperations and lost its colonies.
When wealthy capitalist nations get less wealthy due to a decline in imperial profits first the national proles will get angry and more reactionary. Then the national bourgeois will do the same. I would compare it to a hungry predator. While sated it won’t attack its fellow wolves, but once it gets hungry enough it very well may. So forcing them to onboard more national bouregois accelerates this process I think. Then once the international bouregois collapses under this weight into factionalism and infighting the colonized states are able to assert themselves. Which is exactly what we see post-WW2.
