Beyond Marx with Marx

Marxism and the Socialist Transition: Volume I: State, Power, and Bureaucracy

Author: Roberto Sáenz

Abstract: This volume addresses the "inescapable strategic debate" concerning Marxism and the transition to socialism, undertaking a critical examination of the non-capitalist historical experience of the last century. The central premise is that in numerous countries where capitalism was expropriated, the movement toward socialism was ultimately frustrated or blocked due to various reasons. The core analysis focuses on the Russian Revolution, identified as the greatest political-social revolution in history, where the working class originally seized power through its own organizations, only to suffer severe bureaucratic degeneration. Revolutions that followed (such as those in China, Vietnam, and Cuba) failed to empower the working class, thereby permanently stalling the socialist transition. Drawing on the critical legacy of classical and revolutionary Marxism, the work aims to offer a systematic balance of these collective experiences, filling a crucial gap in contemporary Marxist theory concerning the nature of the transitional state, property, and power for the revolutions of the future.----------------------------------------------------------------#Marxism #SocialistTransition #RussianRevolution #BureaucraticDegeneration #TransitionalState #WorkingClassPower #ExpropriationOfCapitalism #StrategicDebate #RobertoSáenz #NonCapitalistSocieties

This episode discusses the book "Marx and the Common: From Capital to the Late Writings," written by Luca Basso (2015).

This episode discusses the book "Pineault, E. R. (2023). A Social Ecology of Capital, London: Pluto Press."

The book under discussion is "The History of the World in Seven Cheap Things," written by Raj Patel and Jason W. Moore.

Book under discussion: Saito, K. (2017) Karl Marx's Ecosocialism: Capitalism, Nature, and the Unfinished Critique of Political Economy, New York: Monthly Review Press