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17 December 2017
Fatima Siraj (fs03865)
Dr. Shahram Azhar
Political Economy – exam

Was the USSR a Non- Capitalist Society?

Prompt: Using the concept of 'class analysis' that has been taught in this course, explain if,
and to what extent, the USSR can be seen as an example of a non-capitalist society?

By the time the Soviet Union was officially dissolved in 1991, analysts and politicians declared

the breakup as the death of communism. In "Class Theory and History: Capitalism and

Communism in the USSR," professors Stephen A. Resnick and Richard D. Wolff, apply their

previously developed class theory to analyze the creation, evolution and demise of the Soviet

Union. (Fitzgibbons, n.d.)

In our analysis of Marxian theory of class, class means surplus theory of class. Every

human economic system has production, appropriation and distribution of surplus. (Dr. Shahram

10/10/2017) He establishes this by distinguishing between necessary labor and surplus labor. He

speaks of surplus labor as the creation of “unpaid value” (Stephen A Resnick and Richard D.

Wolff, 1987) In this sense, Marx refers to wages as “price of necessary labor” (Knowledge and

Class pg 116) Therefore, surplus labor is the extra time of labor the producer performs beyond

the necessary labor. (K&C pg 64) The Fundamental class system deals with the appropriation

and production. Part of the surplus must be distributed with people who neither produce nor

appropriate because these people provide crucial conditions of existence – this is known as the

subsumed class process. (Shahram, 2017)

The distinction between fundamental and subsumed classes is the distinction between the

production and distribution of surplus value. (New Departures in Marxian Economic Theory, pg
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94) From our readings, we learn that Marx emphasizes on capital accumulation as a necessity for

capitalists to be able to sell commodities as fast as they were produced. The process of realizing

the surplus value from the capitalist fundamental class (and hence circulation) is a condition of

existence for the capitalist class process. (New Departures in Marxian Economic Theory, pg 96)

The subsumed class ensures that the surplus is realized. The subsumed class is both the

distributer and the recipient of surplus (K&C pg 118) Stalin's First Five-Year Plan, adopted by

the party in 1928, called for rapid industrialization of the economy, with an emphasis on heavy

industry. In the US, capitalism took similar route through the birth of large factories. It greatly

increased the number of goods; hence, production.

Historically speaking, by the 1980s, the state capitalist industries and farms were

incapable of generating enough surplus to sustain industrial capital accumulation, maintain the

USSR's superpower status, meet the consumer demands of the population and pay for the

Communist party. To ensure this, soon the Soviet leaders began to introduce more elements of

private capitalism. (Fitzgibbons, n.d.) The term “USSR’s superpower status” implies the central

organizing concept of the Marxist understanding of the capitalist system is that of the M-C-M´

cycle. Resnick and Wolff explain that state capitalism was originally seen by the Bolsheviks as a

necessary step in the evolution towards a communist state. (Fitzgibbons, n.d.) “If communism

ever existed within the USSR, says Resnick, it was during a brief period following the revolution

when the Bolsheviks redistributed land to the peasants, who formed farming collectives.

Working at the local level, farmers reached consensus on how their surplus products would be

used.” (Fitzgibbons, n.d.)

In the late Brezhnev period almost, all hiring took place either at the factory gates or at

the labour exchange. (Congress, n.d.) Marx, who devoted a chapter of Capital to the sale and
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purchase of labour-power teaches that labour turnover and competition to employ workers

provide a strong argument for the existence of wage-labour in the USSR. Furthermore, according

to Marx, of course, the social product under capitalism can be divided into three parts: constant

capital c, variable capital v, and surplus value s. (New Departures in Marxian Theory, pg 105-

108). These specifically capitalist forms can be expressed in relation to more general terms,

applicable not only to capitalism but to any society which produces more than the immediate

needs of the producers. Thus, constant capital is simply the form taken under capitalism by the

material means of production, both fixed and circulating; variable capital is the capitalist form of

the portion of the product which meets the socially-determined consumption needs of the

producers; and surplus value is the capitalist form of the surplus product. In the USSR each of

these portions takes a recognizably capitalist form, hence so does the mode of production. in a

planned society the capitalization of s is now governed solely by the needs of consumption (that

is, by v). Under Stalinism, s is not in the hands of “society”; it is in the hands of a stratum. It

could also be noticed that Stalin era the USSR was ‘transitional’ between capitalism and

socialism, for him the workers only began to be exploited after Stalin’s death – but this

conclusion is not convincing.

The argument that USSR was State Capitalist does not hold true since one class still

owned the means of production. It just shifted from the bourgeoisie to the state bureaucrats. The

state still exploited its workers and was corrupt. Since soviet democracy was limited under

Stalin, it was not a genuine worker’s state and so state ownership doesn’t characterize it as

socialist because socialism is worker ownership of means of production, not just state ownership.

(Lorimer)
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The consideration of the distribution of the means of production among those who did

control them can now be split into two parts. First, there is the question of the form which the

control over the means of production took; and second, there is the question of how the control

was distributed and redistributed among those who possessed it. The control over the means of

production was protected from the workers by force. The enterprise directors, ministerial

officials, planning officials, obkom secretaries, and so on, did not all exercise power in the same

fashion. This implies the existence of power struggle and each group occupying a different class

position. The workers who either worked in the factories or on the farms were involved in the

fundamental class processes and the directors and other managers were involved in the subsumed

class process. Often, the workers weren’t even provided in full in terms of wages or necessary

food, but the managers were – this shows that exploitation existed. This is also shows that

production and distribution were in separate hands, as taught by Marx this is a crucial feature

during our class analysis.

The question arises that, did the USSR know production for profit, and the categories

associated with it, namely money and capital accumulation? Even if the emphasis is put on

military production, the aim of Soviet production was not the fulfilment of the needs of the direct

producers, but rather production more than those needs, in fulfilment of the needs of the

exploiters. More than this, it was always apparent that the underlying systemic aim was the

development, both quantitative and technological. From the analysis, the conclusion is that the

USSR jumped straight from Feudalism to what many call State Capitalism; however, the system

had hints of Communism but not the kind Karl Marx talks about.
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Bibliography
Congress, U. L. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://countrystudies.us/russia/14.htm

Fitzgibbons, D. J. (n.d.). University of Massachusetts Amherst. Retrieved from

https://www.umass.edu/chronicle/archives/02/10-11/economics.html

Lorimer, D. (n.d.). The Collapse of Communism in the USSR. 45.

Shahram, D. (2017, 10 10). Notes.

Stephen A Resnick and Richard D. Wolff. (1987). Knowledge and Class. University of Chicago Press.