From: "Joe R. Golowka" <joeG at ieee.org> Subject: Re:
> Marxism is a science
>
> Cian O'Conner:
> How would you set out to disprove Marx's maxim about
> the inevitability of revolution? Maybe you can, but
> noone has managed it, or tried really.
>
> %%%%%
>
> CB: Hasn't this maxim been _proved_ a dozen times since Marx ?
No. The advanced industrialized countries, which should have been the first to have revolutions, never experienced Socialist Revolutions. And in countries that did have Marxist revolutions those revolutions did not turn out the way Marx claimed they would (no state withering away and all that).
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CB: Well, now you are addressing a "lemma" not an axiom.
I'm not sure either one of you has an accurate statement of what Marx said on these.
On the state whithering away, you are premature to claim that it won't, if we take Marx to be speaking of a multigenerational process, epoch in length, which is reasonable for a world revolution. Also, the socialist state can't whither away until there are no more capitalist states. The last 75 years of expereince adds this explicit lemma too. It is too soon to make the definite conclusion that you do on the subsidiary issues. But the basic claim of revolutions has been significantly met. Pretty good accuracy.