I.1. The Opportunist Method

If theories are mirror images of the phenomena of the external world in the human brain, then in view of Eduard Bernstein’s theory one must at any rate add: sometimes mirror images stood on their heads. A theory of the introduction of socialism through social reforms, after German social reform has finally fallen asleep; of trade-union control over the process of production, after the defeat of the English engineers; of a Social-Democratic majority in parliament, after the revision of the Saxon constitution and the attacks on universal suffrage for the Reichstag! In our view, however, the centre of gravity of Bernstein’s argument lies not in his views on the practical tasks of Social Democracy but in what he says about the course of the objective development of capitalist society, with which those views are, of course, most closely connected.

According to Bernstein, a general collapse of capitalism becomes ever more improbable as capitalism develops, because the capitalist system shows, on the one hand, an ever greater capacity for adaptation, and, on the other, production becomes ever more differentiated. The capacity of capitalism for adaptation shows itself, according to Bernstein, first in the disappearance of general crises, thanks to the development of the credit system, of employers’ organisations, of communications and of the news service; secondly in the tenacity of the middle classes, as a result of the constant differentiation of branches of production and of the raising of large strata of the proletariat into the middle classes; and thirdly, finally, in the economic and political improvement of the position of the proletariat as a result of the trade-union struggle.

For the practical struggle of Social Democracy the general directive that follows from this is that it should direct its activity not towards taking possession of the political power of the state but towards improving the position of the working class, and towards the introduction of socialism not through a social and political crisis but through a gradual extension of social control and a step-by-step application of the principle of co-operation.

Bernstein himself sees nothing new in his arguments; on the contrary, he thinks that they agree as well with particular statements of Marx and Engels as with the general direction Social Democracy has taken until now. In our view, however, it can hardly be denied that Bernstein’s conception does in fact stand in fundamental contradiction to the line of thought of scientific socialism.

If the whole of Bernstein’s revision came down to saying that the course of capitalist development is much slower than people have grown used to assuming, this would in fact mean merely a postponement of the conquest of political power by the proletariat as assumed until now, from which at most a calmer pace of struggle might be inferred in practice. But this is not the case. What Bernstein has called into question is not the rapidity of the development but the very course of development of capitalist society and, in connection with it, the transition to the socialist order.

When socialist theory until now assumed that the starting point of the socialist transformation would be a general and devastating crisis, two things must, in our view, be distinguished in this: the fundamental idea concealed in it, and its external form. The idea consists in the assumption that the capitalist order would of itself, by virtue of its own contradictions, bring about the moment when it falls apart, when it simply becomes impossible. That this moment was thought of in the form of a general and shattering commercial crisis certainly had good reasons, but it remains nonetheless inessential and secondary for the fundamental idea. For, as is well known, the scientific foundation of socialism rests on three results of capitalist development: above all on the growing anarchy of the capitalist economy, which makes its downfall an inevitable result; secondly on the progressive socialisation of the process of production, which creates the positive starting points of the future social order; and thirdly on the growing organisation and class consciousness of the proletariat, which forms the active factor of the coming transformation.

It is the first of these pillars of scientific socialism that Bernstein removes. For he asserts that capitalist development is not heading towards a general economic crash. But in doing so he rejects not merely a particular form of the capitalist downfall but the downfall itself. He says expressly: “It might now be replied that when one speaks of the collapse of present society one has in view more than a generalised commercial crisis, stronger than before, namely a total collapse of the capitalist system from its own contradictions.” And to this he answers: “A complete collapse of the present system of production at approximately the same time becomes, with the progressive development of society, not more probable but less probable, because this development increases, on the one hand, the capacity of industry for adaptation and, on the other (or at the same time), its differentiation.”

But then the great question arises: why and how do we arrive at the final goal of our efforts at all? From the standpoint of scientific socialism, the historical necessity of the socialist transformation shows itself above all in the growing anarchy of the capitalist system, which also drives it into a blind alley with no way out. But if one assumes with Bernstein that capitalist development is not moving in the direction of its own downfall, then socialism ceases to be objectively necessary. Of the cornerstones of its scientific foundation there then remain only the two other results of the capitalist order: the socialised process of production and the class consciousness of the proletariat. Bernstein too has this in view when he says: “Socialist thought loses nothing whatever of its power of conviction (with the removal of the theory of collapse). For, looked at more closely, what are all the factors we have listed for the removal or modification of the old crises? All of them things that represent at the same time preconditions, and in part even beginnings, of the socialisation of production and exchange.”

A brief consideration suffices, however, to show this too to be a fallacy. Wherein lies the significance of the phenomena Bernstein describes as capitalist means of adaptation: cartels, credit, improved means of communication, the raising of the working class, and so on? Evidently in their removing, or at least blunting, the internal contradictions of the capitalist economy, and preventing them from unfolding and sharpening. Thus the removal of crises means the abolition of the contradiction between production and exchange on a capitalist basis; thus the raising of the condition of the working class, partly as such, partly into the middle classes, means the blunting of the contradiction between capital and labour. Since, then, cartels, the credit system, trade unions and so on abolish the capitalist contradictions, and so save the capitalist system from downfall and preserve capitalism (this is precisely why Bernstein calls them “means of adaptation”), how can they at the same time represent just as many “preconditions, and in part even beginnings,” of socialism? Evidently only in the sense that they give stronger expression to the social character of production. But by preserving it in its capitalist form, they conversely make the transition of this socialised production to the socialist form superfluous in the same measure. They can therefore represent beginnings and preconditions of the socialist order only in a conceptual and not in a historical sense; that is, they are phenomena which, on the basis of our idea of socialism, we know to be related to it, but which in fact not only do not bring about the socialist transformation but rather make it superfluous. There then remains as the foundation of socialism only the class consciousness of the proletariat. But in this case this too is not the simple mental reflection of the ever-sharpening contradictions of capitalism and of its approaching downfall (for that downfall is prevented by the means of adaptation), but a mere ideal, whose power of conviction rests on the perfections attributed to it.

In a word, what we obtain in this way is a foundation of the socialist programme by “pure knowledge”, that is, put simply, an idealist foundation, while objective necessity, that is, a foundation in the course of material social development, falls away. The revisionist theory faces an either-or. Either the socialist transformation follows, as before, from the internal contradictions of the capitalist order; then these contradictions develop along with this order, and a collapse in one form or another is at some point the inevitable result; but then the “means of adaptation” are ineffective and the theory of collapse is correct. Or the “means of adaptation” really are capable of preventing a collapse of the capitalist system, and so of making capitalism viable, and so of abolishing its contradictions; but then socialism ceases to be a historical necessity, and it is then anything you like, only not a result of the material development of society. This dilemma comes down to another: either revisionism is right about the course of capitalist development, and then the socialist transformation of society turns into a utopia; or socialism is not a utopia, and then the theory of the “means of adaptation” cannot hold water. That is the question.