Introduction
Mr. Gindin, a self-proclaimed socialist in Toronto, claims that the state in a socialist society will expand its services rather than wither away–in opposition to Marx’s and Engels’ views on socialism (from Socialism for Realists):
The expectations of full or near-full abundance, added to perfect or near-perfect social consciousness, have a further consequence: they imply a dramatic waning, if not end, of substantive social conflicts and so do away with any need for an “external” state. This fading away of the state is, as well, rooted in how we understand the nature of states. If states are reduced to only being oppressive institutions, then the democratization of the state by definition brings the withering away of the state (a “fully democratic state” becomes an oxymoron).18 On the other hand, if the state is seen as a set of specialized institutions that not only mediate social differences and oversee judicial discipline but also superintend the replacement of the hegemony of class and competitive markets with the democratic planning of the economy, then the state will likely play an even greater role under socialism.
This is more than a semantic issue. An orientation to the disappearance of the state tends to pass over a whole range of issues: the state’s effectiveness; balancing state power with greater participation from below; how to initiate experiences and learning that would not rest so heavily on the original praxis of introducing socialism but constitute a constant praxis that fosters socialist education, consciousness, and culture.19 Accepting the persistence of the state turns the focus to the transformation of the inherited capitalist state into a specifically socialist, democratic state that is central to the creative rethinking of all institutions. Even where the process of democratization includes the decentralization of some state functions, advancing postrevolutionary socialism may also include (as we’ll see) a need for an increase in the state’s other roles.
Or, again (from We Need to Say What Socialism Will Look Like):
Scarcity — the need to make choices between alternative uses of labor time and resources — is unlikely to end outside of utopian fantasies because popular demands, even when transformed into collective/socialist demands, are remarkably elastic: they can continue to grow. Think especially of better health care, more and richer education, greater care for the aged, the expansion of art and of cultural spaces — all of which require labor time and generally also complementary material goods. That is, they demand choices.
I have already criticized Gindin’s reference to scarcity in a couple of other posts (see Socialism, Part Nine: An Inadequate Conception of the Nature of Freedom and Necessity, or Free Time and Necessary Time, Part One and Socialism, Part Nine: Inadequate Conception of the Nature of Freedom and Necessity, or Free Time and Necessary Time, Part Two).
Gindin’s Neglect of the Oppressive Nature of the Modern State
Mr. Gindin’s views on socialism, however, by focusing on the expansion of the state, panders to the public-sector unions, idealizes their role and ignores the need to fight against the repressive nature of the modern state structure. His view would perpetuate oppression and that is why, ultimately, it feeds into the far right’s power base. To show that this is the case, I would like to refer to an issue that the social-reformist left never seem to address (and yet it forms part of the daily experience of many members of the working class)–child support laws.
I became interested in child support laws when I personally was forced to pay child support for my daughter, Francesca Harris-Garcia. I remember when I first had to pay child support for my daughter–I resented it and felt oppressed by it. I had graduated from the French university in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada in 1996, but I could not find a permanent teaching position. I substitute taught (with a few term positions) for 12 years before obtaining a “permanent” teaching position in Ashern, Manitoba in 2008.
I did not have to pay child support at first when I was divorced in 1996, but in that year it was my wife who obtained full custody of Francesca despite my opposition because Legal Aid Services refused to pay to fight for shared custody (Francesca’s mother and I had shared custody until then).
I returned to court to gain greater access for my daughter due to a number of issues. Firstly, Francesca’s mother was physically abusing Francesca, and no one was doing anything about it (for the continued physical abuse after 1998, see for example A Worker’s Resistance to the Capitalist Government or State and its Representatives, Part One). Secondly, I wanted to see Francesca more. Thirdly, I wanted to be able to take Francesca to see her grandmother (my mother), who lived in Calgary, Alberta, Canada (there was a ban on both me and Francesca’s mother from taking Francesca outside the province of Manitoba). Fourthly, in 1996, during mediation, my wife, probably under pressure from Winnipeg Child and Family Services, accused me (falsely) of sexually abusing Francesca. In 1997, again she accused me, by way of Winnipeg Child and Family Services, of sexually abusing Francesca. I called Winnipeg Child and Family Services and spoke to the supervisor of the person dealing with the accusation. I asked him how many times could I be accused of sexual abuse falsely before the Winnipeg Child and Family Services would stop taking such accusations seriously, The supervisor’s reply was shocking: 20 or 25 times (and he said it in a rather nonchalant manner).
I then went to court and gained greater access to see my daughter (I post the details of this adventure in other posts) (but not before being accused falsely of sexually abusing my daughter twice more by Francesca’s mother–although this time without the direct intervention of the Winnipeg Child and Family Services).
I began to pay child support in 1998 after I had gone to civil trial since Francesca’s mother not only refused to grant greater access but sought to reduce it. Given that Francesca’s mother continued to physically abuse Francesca after the trial (see for example A Worker’s Resistance to the Capitalist Government or State and its Representatives, Part One), the fact that I had to pay child support made the situation even more oppressive.
I was obliged, monthly, to pay child support to a person who was physically abusing Francesca (and who had lied persistently). What does the social-reformist or social-democratic left do in such cases? Either remain silent, or applaud the rights of women and children being applied through the courts and the “justice” system. I felt, however, that this system was anything but just. I resented having to send money under such circumstances to the government.
By the way, there was a change in government in 1999, from a Conservative to a New Democratic Party (NDP) government (the NDP is more friendly to unions and is a social-reformist or social-democratic party). At the level of child support laws, nothing changed. The NDP government was just as oppressive as was the Conservative government. Despite having very limited income to the extent that I found it difficult to go to McDonald’s for a coffee and a muffin, I had to pay child support according to governmental guidelines.
I took Francesca to Calgary in 1999, after the civil trial, and I took her to see her grandmother in 2001 and then in 2002. Two days after we arrived, my mother had a massive heart attack, and she died two days later.
When I returned to Winnipeg, Manitoba, I continued to purchase money orders for child support, but I did not send them. I resented immensely having had to pay child support to a person (and government) that had denied my mother the right to see her grandchild without having to go to court. I also continued to resent immensely having to pay child support to someone who continued to physically abuse Francesca.
After about six months, I received a letter from the NDP government, Child Support Division (or some such governmental department), threatening to take me to court if I did not pay the child support payments with either jail time, a fine or both. I then sent the money orders, but I also resented this threat and the need to continue to pay child support.
The attitude of the “left” in Winnipeg simply was either indifference or silence. It did not want to address the issue at all.
The Right Uses the Oppressive Nature of the Modern State–Unlike the Left
The Oppressive Nature of Child-Support Laws
Such a situation is ripe for the far right to capture such resentment. Indeed, I came across a document that expresses some of my own experiences as a father–a document published by the Canadian Constitution Foundation and the Frontier Center for Public Policy (both organizations have been considered to be conservative or right-wing organizations by the social-democratic left): Ideology And Dysfunction In Family Law: How Courts Disenfranchise Fathers, Grant Brown, 2013. We read in this work, page 56:
On May 1, 1997, Canada adopted an American-style child-support regime, simultaneously altering the tax rule for declaring child support. These changes represented a double hit for non-custodial parents – overwhelmingly men1 – because the federal Child Support Guidelines substantially increased support obligations even as payors were no longer allowed to deduct their contributions from income for tax purposes. While the Guidelines were introduced at the federal level for married couples seeking a divorce, each of the Provinces and Territories – with the notable exception of Quebec – participated in their development and concurrently implemented parallel changes to provincial laws affecting parents who were not married. The provinces also moved to establish draconian agencies with extraordinary powers to enforce payment of child-support obligations. It has been aptly said that criminals today have more rights than non-custodial fathers.
The right-wing feeds off the anger of those oppressed by governmental institutions (the “public sector” so idealized by the social-democratic left, such as Mr. Gindin). The social-democratic left talk a lot about how bad neoliberalism is, and yet they could not (and cannot) address this aspect of neoliberalism (since a focus on child support laws shifted child care from a social responsibility to a personal or private responsibility).
If I were not a Marxist, I would have undoubtedly been influenced by the right-wing rhetoric of Mr. Brown’s publication, such as the following (page 2):
The penultimate chapter comprehensively critiques the [Child-Support] Guidelines and their draconian enforcement in the context of a sustained constitutional challenge. It is argued that the child-support regime is mainly an income redistribution mechanism whose objective is to maintain mothers after separation “in the style to which they had become accustomed.”
The Child Support Guidelines (established by government) are certainly “an income redistribution mechanism,” but not in the sense as indicated. They limit the economic responsibility of the government (and therefore, as the apparent representative of the “public interest,” society’s responsibility) for taking care of children, and shift such responsibility onto the backs of working-class parents by distributing such economic responsibility between the parents, usually in a one-sided fashion. This results in a division of interests between working-class parents. What does the left do? Nothing.
What is Mr. Gindin’s position on the issue of the oppressive nature of child-support laws? This is a daily experience of many members of the working class. How does such experience relate to Mr. Gindin’s neglect of such oppression and the implicit wish to expand public power? If a worker who has experience first hand the oppressive nature of governmental power in the form of oppressive child-support laws were to read Mr. Gindin’s call for “an increase in the state’s other roles, what would such a worker think?
It is not just a question of “democratic economic planning” but about the oppressive nature of the modern state, with its bureaucratic tentacles and its oppressive and, ultimately, dictatorial features. Mr. Gindin simply minimizes the importance of focusing on the elimination of those oppressive structures. What kind of public services will remain after the elimination of such oppressive structures will be left for those who experience a new world, where an oppressive state no longer exists.
The Oppressive Nature of the Grading System in Schools
For example, marks or grades in schools: do not many students in schools experience them as oppressive? Would marks or grades exist in a socialist society? (For the issue of the oppressive nature of marks or grades in schools, see Critical Education Articles Placed in the Teacher Staff Lounge While I Was a Teacher, Part Fifteen: Progressive Versus Regressive Grading Systems in Schools and The Expansion of Public Services Versus a Basic Income, Part Two: How the Social-democratic Left Ignore the Oppressive Nature of Public Services: Part Two: Oppressive Welfare Services). If so, why? If not, how would we evaluate progress of learning among students? Would it be qualitative, as it appears was the case in the Laboratory School of the University of Chicago (frequently called the Dewey School in Chicago between 1896 and 1904? This form of assessment is supposed to provide feedback to students without quantifying it–it is more qualitative and narrative–the kind of feedback you receive by a teacher in the form of written comments on an essay, for example.
Gindin, however, like much of the left, is probably unaware of the issue of the oppressive nature of the grading system in schools.
Conclusion
Like much of the social-democratic left, Gindin’s view–that what we need is an expansion of public services–fails to recognize the oppressive nature of the modern state in general and, in particular, forms of child-support laws and an oppressive grading system in schools.
A socialist strategy requires recognition of the oppressive nature of the modern state and the need to dismantle its oppressive structures.
A socialist society would not involve an oppressive state–except to oppress the class of employers and their representatives. Once the class of employers and their associated economic, political and social structures have been neutralized, there would be no need for a repressive state and public services would indeed be public services–unlike the repressive public services that now exist.
The Abolitionary 