Contents "The internationalist proletarian" n.17
LIFE OF THE PARTY: GENERAL MEETING OF AUGUST 2025
Meeting development
The general meeting took place in two phases: one of study and the other one to make a assessment and a plan of activities. The study sessions were attended in person by militants from Spain and Venezuela, with telematic connections from Chile and Italy. Sympathizers also attended these study sessions.
The study phase lasted one week, with the focus on the study of Capital, although other aspects were also covered, as will be seen, in order to achieve a more comprehensive result in the training of militants and sympathizers. The readings took place in the morning and afternoon, following the schedule on the table below.
During the study sessions, comments were made to clarify and deepen the study materials, and questions or issues were also raised for clarification, which were answered and explored in depth as part of the reading, sometimes with supplementary material (as in the case of simple labor vs. complex labor) or through an explanation.
In the first session (Monday morning), the Critique of the Gotha Programme was read and discussed. This fundamental text is essential material for the theoretical struggle against revisionism (Stalinism, Maoism, Trotskyism, etc.) and also as a foundational theoretical basis for Marxist militant training.
In the second session (Monday afternoon), an introduction to Capital was given, explaining the function and reciprocal relationship of the three volumes of Capital, then the function and reciprocal relationship of the sections into which these three volumes are structured, and finally the function and reciprocal relationship of each of the chapters of the three volumes of Capital. In this way, one begins with an overview of Capital in order to understand the role played by each of its parts and thus have a "map" of the overall study carried out in this fundamental text of the Party.
The study of Capital is a fundamental part of Marxist militant training and at the same time presents significant difficulties of study because elements from the end (or from later on) are needed to fully understand the earlier parts. For this reason, it is highly recommended to read first "Wage Labour and Capital" (K. Marx, 1847), "Value, Price and Profit" (K. Marx, 1865), “Critique of the Gotha Programme” (K. Marx, F. Engels, 1875), “From Utopian Socialism to Scientific Socialism” (F. Engels, 1880) and “The Marxist Theory of Money” (General Meeting, 1967). For this reason, Party militants systematically give introductory and in-depth presentations at trade union premises, to which workers are invited in order to facilitate their understanding of Marxist theory. Furthermore, there is an important difference between “reading” and “studying”, and the most effective way to “study” is not necessarily always to “read” from beginning to end.
Specific materials were prepared for the meeting, with Sections or Chapters of Capital published in booklet form so that those who did not have the book could read it. The introduction to one of the materials, with excerpts from Capital, explains its function and the purpose of the study sessions devoted to Capital:
"This material is a tool for the militant study of Marxism and Capital in particular, part of a broader study plan of which this pamphlet is a part. It is a semi-finished material, on the one hand, and on the other, it does not exhaust or replace the reading of Capital.
The intention is to provide a first introduction to the study of Capital, using direct quotes from the text itself, the study of which it aims to facilitate. In this way, a first partial reading of this fundamental text is carried out in practice, the study of which is an important but difficult part of militant Marxist training.
In this booklet pamphlet a series of excerpts have been selected from Chapter III of Section I of the first book of Capital, devoted to the study of Money, or the circulation of commodities. (...)
At the end, the reader will find a questionnaire that should be used as another study tool, focusing not on the "correctness" of the answer but on analyzing the quotes proposed in the solutions in order to better understand them and absorb the concepts presented there.”
In the third session (Tuesday morning), the material prepared in the application of the historical line of the degeneration of the Third International was read, with most of the “details” sections being read, including extensive passages from fundamental texts such as “Party and Class” and “Party and Class Action”. The work carried out at the general meeting in August 2023, which is reflected in this web application, allows for an in-depth study of the degeneration of the International and also for an intensive session of approximately four hours of detailed general review of this part of the history of the communist movement, whose lessons are critical for the resumption of the class struggle.
In the fourth session (Tuesday afternoon), the first chapter of Capital, whose importance is specifically emphasized by Marx, was read and discussed in depth.
This is one of the most difficult chapters in Capital and its cornerstone. However, reading it with a full understanding of the argument greatly facilitates comprehension and absorption of its content.
For those who argue that Marx limited himself to studying capitalism and never considered the characteristics of a non-market, communist society, we will take this opportunity to recall one of the moments in Capital in which K. Marx expressly outlines the parameters of a communist society, in none other than the first chapter of the first section of the first book. In this passage, in line with the description of the first stage of a communist society (socialism) in “Critique of the Gotha Programme” (K. Marx, 1875), he refers to a non-market society in which working time completely changes its function and all social relations become clear and simple, having put an end to the anarchy of market production:
“Let us now picture to ourselves, by way of change, a community of free individuals, carrying on their work with the means of production in common, in which the labour power of all the different individuals is consciously applied as the combined labour power of the community. All the characteristics of Robinson’s labour are here repeated, but with this difference, that they are social, instead of individual. Everything produced by him was exclusively the result of his own personal labour, and therefore simply an object of use for himself. The total product of our community is a social product. One portion serves as fresh means of production and remains social. But another portion is consumed by the members as means of subsistence. A distribution of this portion amongst them is consequently necessary. The mode of this distribution will vary with the productive organisation of the community, and the degree of historical development attained by the producers. We will assume, but merely for the sake of a parallel with the production of commodities, that the share of each individual producer in the means of subsistence is determined by his labour time. Labour time would, in that case, play a double part. Its apportionment in accordance with a definite social plan maintains the proper proportion between the different kinds of work to be done and the various wants of the community. On the other hand, it also serves as a measure of the portion of the common labour borne by each individual, and of his share in the part of the total product destined for individual consumption. The social relations of the individual producers, with regard both to their labour and to its products, are in this case perfectly simple and intelligible, and that with regard not only to production but also to distribution.” (Capital, Volume I, Section I, Chapter I).
In the fifth session (Wednesday morning), the "Selection of Writings of the Communist Left 1912-1917" was read and commented. This has proven to be a very good introductory reading for contacts and sympathizers who are approaching the Party, but also for militants, as it raises a wide range of crucial issues in a very direct and fluid manner. These are related to the experiences of struggle lived directly by Party members and supporters, and provide a practical guide to a whole series of concepts and situations, as well as demonstrating the complete theoretical and programmatic continuity of the Italian Communist Left's line and helping to understand why our current was able to play the role of Marxist intransigence in the degeneration of the International, anticipating and warning of the degenerative process underway.
In the sixth session (Wednesday afternoon), the compilation of texts mentioned in the first part of the afternoon was finished reading, but the session took place mainly in a union site, inviting more members of the class union to this session to watch and comment on the video documentary "Alternative to the capitalist market system". The video was viewed in three half-hour parts: 1) the functioning of capitalism and its consequences, 2) the false alternatives to capitalism, and 3) the overcoming of capitalism through communist revolution. After each half hour, each aspect viewed was reviewed, relating it to what had been studied or was to be studied in the study sessions of Capital, and clarifying the more complex concepts.
In the seventh session (Thursday morning), the reading of "Primitive Accumulation" (Volume I, Section VII, Chapter XXIV) was carried out, culminating in the following fundamental passage:
“The expropriation of the immediate producers was accomplished with merciless Vandalism, and under the stimulus of passions the most infamous, the most sordid, the pettiest, the most meanly odious. Self-earned private property, that is based, so to say, on the fusing together of the isolated, independent labouring individual with the conditions of his labour, is supplanted by capitalistic private property, which rests on exploitation of the nominally free labour of others, i.e., on wage labour.
As soon as this process of transformation has sufficiently decomposed the old society from top to bottom, as soon as the labourers are turned into proletarians, their means of labour into capital, as soon as the capitalist mode of production stands on its own feet, then the further socialisation of labour and further transformation of the land and other means of production into socially exploited and, therefore, common means of production, as well as the further expropriation of private proprietors, takes a new form. That which is now to be expropriated is no longer the labourer working for himself, but the capitalist exploiting many labourers.
This expropriation is accomplished by the action of the immanent laws of capitalistic production itself, by the centralisation of capital. One capitalist always kills many. Hand in hand with this centralisation, or this expropriation of many capitalists by few, develop, on an ever-extending scale, the co-operative form of the labour process, the conscious technical application of science, the methodical cultivation of the soil, the transformation of the instruments of labour into instruments of labour only usable in common, the economising of all means of production by their use as means of production of combined, socialised labour, the entanglement of all peoples in the net of the world market, and with this, the international character of the capitalistic regime. Along with the constantly diminishing number of the magnates of capital, who usurp and monopolise all advantages of this process of transformation, grows the mass of misery, oppression, slavery, degradation, exploitation; but with this too grows the revolt of the working class, a class always increasing in numbers, and disciplined, united, organised by the very mechanism of the process of capitalist production itself. The monopoly of capital becomes a fetter upon the mode of production, which has sprung up and flourished along with, and under it. Centralisation of the means of production and socialisation of labour at last reach a point where they become incompatible with their capitalist integument. This integument is burst asunder. The knell of capitalist private property sounds. The expropriators are expropriated.
The capitalist mode of appropriation, the result of the capitalist mode of production, produces capitalist private property. This is the first negation of individual private property, as founded on the labour of the proprietor. But capitalist production begets, with the inexorability of a law of Nature, its own negation. It is the negation of negation. This does not re-establish private property for the producer, but gives him individual property based on the acquisition of the capitalist era: i.e., on co-operation and the possession in common of the land and of the means of production.”
After the reading, the delusional explanation spread by certain currents of feminism in relation to the process of proletarianization described in Chapter XXIV, as if it were a process "against women" and their sexual freedom, which Marx would have tried to hide, also accusing the male part of the English working class of having allied itself with the employers so that the female workers would do the domestic tasks, was referred to and refuted. Several examples were given of the vacuity of the arguments of this misrepresentation promoted by the bourgeoisie.
In the eighth session (Thursday afternoon), we studied "The Transformation of Money into Capital" (Volume I, Section II, Chapter IV) and excerpts from the first chapter (Chapter V) of Section III of the first book devoted to "The Production of Absolute Surplus-Value". The combination of these two chapters provided a complete explanation of the basis of Marx's discovery: surplus-value is unpaid time for the working class that is pocketed by the capitalist class. At this point, a digression was made to delve deeper into the question of simple and complex labour, using a series of quotes and numerical examples to illustrate and clarify the question raised by Marx and Engels:
“In taking labour time as the measure of value, do we at least assume that working days are equivalent and that one man's working day is worth as much as another's? No." (The Poverty of Philosophy, Anti-Proudhon, Marx).
“If the equivalence of working times means that every worker produces the same value in the same time, without the need to measure it by an average value, then the statement is obviously false. Even between two workers, even in the same profession, the value produced per hour of work will always vary in terms of work intensity and skill; no economic commune, or at least no economic commune located on our celestial body, can eliminate this disorder, which is, of course, only a disorder for people like Dühring." (Anti-Dühring, Engels).
The material used to clarify the issue will be published in the review in following numbers.
In the ninth session (Friday morning), the study of the excerpts from Section III of the first book devoted to “The Production of Absolute Surplus-Value" was continued and completed.
In the tenth session (Friday afternoon), the study of the extracts from the chapters devoted to the "Production of Relative Surplus-Value" (Volume I, Sec. IV) was carried out, from simple cooperation to automation through manufacturing.
In the eleventh session (Saturday morning), the study of "The Law of the Tendency of the Rate of Profit to Fall" (Volume III, Sec. III) was carried out: “The development of the social productiveness of labour expresses itself with the progress of capitalist production on the one hand in a tendency of the rate of profit to fall progressively and, on the other, in a progressive growth of the absolute mass of the appropriated surplus-value, or profit; so that on the whole a relative decrease of variable capital and profit is accompanied by an absolute increase of both.” (Capital, Volume III, Section III, Chapter XIV).
Although present throughout Capital, it is at this point that it becomes obvious that it is not a study of the biology of capital but rather its obituary:
“The rate of profit is the motive power of capitalist production. Things are produced only so long as they can be produced with a profit. Hence the concern of the English economists over the decline of the rate of profit. (…) Development of the productive forces of social labour is the historical task and justification of capital. This is just the way in which it unconsciously creates the material requirements of a higher mode of production (…) It comes to the surface here in a purely economic way – i.e., from the bourgeois point of view, within the limitations of capitalist understanding, from the standpoint of capitalist production itself – that it has its barrier, that it is relative, that it is not an absolute, but only a historical mode of production corresponding to a definite limited epoch in the development of the material requirements of production. (Capital, Volume III, Section III, Chapter XV).
“The real barrier of capitalist production is capital itself. It is that capital and its self-expansion appear as the starting and the closing point, the motive and the purpose of production; that production is only production for capital and not vice versa, the means of production are not mere means for a constant expansion of the living process of the society of producers. The limits within which the preservation and self-expansion of the value of capital resting on the expropriation and pauperisation of the great mass of producers can alone move – these limits come continually into conflict with the methods of production employed by capital for its purposes, which drive towards unlimited extension of production, towards production as an end in itself, towards unconditional development of the social productivity of labour. The means – unconditional development of the productive forces of society – comes continually into conflict with the limited purpose, the self-expansion of the existing capital. The capitalist mode of production is, for this reason, a historical means of developing the material forces of production and creating an appropriate world-market and is, at the same time, a continual conflict between this its historical task and its own corresponding relations of social production.” (Capital, Volume III, Section III, Chapter XV).
In the twelfth session (Saturday afternoon), a series of quotations grouped under the title "Notes on the Question of Value" were studied, which reinforced and expanded on the concepts of socially necessary time, the complexity and intensity of labor, etc. in the determination of value. Marx's study in Volume II of Capital and Section IV of Volume III was introduced, concerning how the labor time devoted to the purchase and sale of commodities does not add value and, as a consequence, a whole series of jobs do not add value, notwithstanding the fact that they may be carried out on the basis of wage labor and therefore only part of the time devoted to them is remunerated. Cases in which value is added were also studied, such as production processes that extend into the sphere of circulation and cases in which the branch of production produces a result that is not a physical object.
The second part of this session began with a study of the question of money and credit in Capital, with a reading of excerpts from Chapter III of Volume I, Section I of Capital.
In the thirteenth session (Sunday morning), we studied excerpts from Sections II and III of Volume II of Capital, in which Marx explains the inevitable formation of latent capital in the form of money capital, which in turn is the basis for the formation of capitalist credit.
In the fourteenth session (Sunday afternoon), excerpts from Section V of Capital were studied to delve deeper into the formation of capitalist credit in its various phases that coexist simultaneously today: commercial credit (credit to the first power), banknotes (credit to the second power) and bank credit (credit to the third power). The study of this section showed that all the phenomena relating to credit in the contemporary capitalist world already existed in England at the time of the study of Capital. This section examined, among other things, concepts such as the splitting of profit into interest and enterprise profit and the reflection of this splitting in the bourgeoisie's explanation of its profit as if it were a 'wage'. We also studied the existence of a downward trend in interest rates as a reflection of the downward trend in the rate of profit and the phenomenon corresponding to this law, which is the tendency for fictitious capital to swell as capitalism develops. This section also explains why countries with older forms of capitalism tend towards a hypertrophy of credit and rentiers, an explanation that is combined with the effect of the declining rate of profit, which causes younger forms of capitalism to accumulate more quickly and older forms of capitalism to accumulate more slowly.
Study material had also been prepared on the levelling of the rate of profit, land rent and the process of capital reproduction, which was discussed in two subsequent dedicated sessions in September.
In addition to all the study sessions outlined above, moments that are not strictly study sessions are also part of the Party's activity and the general meeting, involving all those present:
"The meaning of unitarianism and organic centralism is that the party develops within itself the organs suitable for the various functions, which we call propaganda, proselytism, proletarian organisation, trade union work, etc., until, tomorrow, we reach armed organisation, but nothing should be concluded based on the number of comrades considered to be dedicated to such functions, because in principle no comrade should be alien to any of them." (Considerations on the organic activity of the party when the general situation is historically unfavourable, 1965).
This has made it possible to evaluate experiences and comment on the activities that are being or have been carried out, the development of imperialism, the tasks underway within the Party and issues that have appeared in the bourgeois press; this constitutes a lively preparation for the second part of the general meeting, the assessment and plan of activities, held in two sessions the following week. In addition, although the materials for the first few days had already been prepared initially, as part of the meeting itself, the booklets that were used were printed and assembled, an activity in which the attendees participated in a coordinated manner, as well as in the other logistical tasks. In this context, two booklets were distributed, read and discussed among those attending the meeting: "Cardinal point of the communist program: resolute struggle against specialization" and "Overproduction crisis leads to imperialist war. Let's put an end to capitalism!", which developed aspects studied in the sessions.
During the meeting, the militant study method established in the Party texts, which we have recalled so many times in the summaries and in our review, was followed:
“The disinfection to which we devote ninety percent of our poor work will only be completed in a long future and will continue long after us: it is that which fights the epidemic of all places and all times (everywhere and always dangerous) of revisers, updaters, contemplators and innovators. It is useless and harmful to specify or personalize, and to search in the distance or in the vicinity for the launcher of the bacteriological bombs; it is a matter of individualizing the virus and applying the antibiotic, which we stubbornly distinguish in the continuity of the line, in the fidelity to the principles, in preferring nine hundred and ninety-nine times over a thousand the CATECHIST REMASTICATION to the adventure of the new scientific discovery that requires eagle wings, and to which every mosquito feels called by destiny. So let the angry flyers, whom we bring back frigidly and little by little to the modest altitude to which we are allowed to soar, be concerned, we who are forbidden all heroism and all romance, who stick to irony instead of lyricism and are forced from time to time to turn back the fieriest: Do not play the Phaethons! Therefore, while too many have the hysteria of sublime calculation, we catalog them at the level of the abacus, and verify whether they know how to count on the tips of their fingers." (The Marxism of the stammerers, Sinistra, 1952).