The state is a special organization of force; it is an organization of
violence for the suppression of some classes. The question of the state
and its overarching roles in the present stage of world capitalism are
crucial questions of Indian revolution. Lenin castigated the people and
the parties swearing by Marxism but always evasive of the character of
the state in real life. He wrote disgustingly. "This (Marxian)
definition of the state has never been explained in the prevailing
propaganda and agitation literature of the official Social-Democratic
parties. More than that, it has been deliberately ignored, for it is
irreconcilable with reformism, and is a slap in the face for the common
opportunist prejudices and philistine illusions about the "peaceful
development of democracy".1
The rise of capitalism and the capitalist system soon after bestowed
upon the state the power of sole monopolizer of coercive sanctions and
physical and human resources. The constitution making exercise gave the
state two fundamental rights of eminent domain and police power. For the
struggle for democracy as well as the felt-need of a safety-valve to
diffuse the tensions the state arranged out-doors and windows as
elbow-room for individual in the Lockean sense. Here lies the difference
between the modern state and the states in the earlier stage. The
acceptance of groups, classes, communities, etc. as legitimate entities
within the national boundaries is symptomatic of leaving a space for
contest in various forms but the state as such was projected as
incontestable. The so-called society – centred state policy approach as
made by Mill and later pluralists, emphasized the need and scope of free
competition of groups and classes without endangering the state itself.
The so-called view of the welfare state preferred in the 1930s and
particularly in the post World War II, conceded the primitive role of
the state as dispenser of justice, relief and for the betterment of the
masses along side its regulative role over the people. Maintenance of
this regulative role implies the power over family, trade union,
revolting classes, ethnic groups, etc. simultaneously with the savage
power of marshalling of armaments, weaponry and armed forces.
Added to this material arrangement, the state develops and strengthens
its ideological apparatus concealing the hidden aspects behind all
constitutional rights of freedom and equality. The ideology of the state
and its organic intellectuals play a profound role in stabilizing the
existing system through multifarious ways in order to diffuse the
tensions and win the support of the masses. So along with the overt
threat of coercion and actual coercion the modern state has been greatly
successful in winning the consent of the people through its vast
ideological arrangements, institutions like legislative bodies, judicial
system, educational institutions, media, political parties, etc. And
when the powerful political parties with communist party signboards
plunge into the accommodative process of diffusing the discontent of the
masses with semblance of protestations on this or that issue the state
becomes the actual gainer as its legitimacy stands vindicated: as if all
grievances, problems, discontents, revolting tendencies can be solved
within the boundaries of the existing state.
This cushioning effect is eminently materialized by the
social–democratic parties in the modern states. The CPI and then the
CPI(M) are credited with this tremendous task in this sub-continent
called India. In the Communist Manifesto Marx and Engles boldly referred
to the spectre of communism reigning in Europe. After so many years of
this famous optimism the CPI, CPI(M) like parties can justly claim with
profuse pride: we have cast communism into a mould which is capitalist
and feudal-friendly. We can help crush revolts of the masses standing
faithfully by the side of the state and we can also proudly hijack the
programme of the militant struggles to the safe corridors of legislative
assemblies and the parliament.
To trek down the path of history, in England the Social Democratic
Federation started in 1885 by mostly defection of men and women of the
earlier Socialist League who threw themselves into the fray of
parliamentary action. It also had its object of collective ownership of
the means of production, distribution and exchange managed by a
democratic state. They also wanted palliative or temporary reforms of
the ills of the existing society. In the same line Fabian societies
emerged after 1882 and they developed a good following against Marxism.
George Bernard Shaw became one of its key figures. Such societies
preaching Fabian socialism were basically meant for legislative or
administrative measures in favour of collectivist theory of state and
municipal action for social reforms. Like the Social Democratic parties
the Fabian socialists too believed in the path of gradualism towards a
socialist system using the existing Parliamentary democracy
