Anarchists

Press, 20 December 1986, Page 20

Anarchists

Sir,—Great savagery — holocausts and butchery on an epic scale — is more often than not the work of those imbued with a great sense of their “holy” or "sacred” (i.e. essentially religious) mission to bring about the millennium (World War I seems an exception, in that it was brought about by those imbued with their great sense of epic stupidity). Stalin, Bakunin, Hitler and, more recently, Pol Pot, all being millenarians, all necessarily believed in the tabula rasa doctrine, or “canvas cleaning” phase, as a preliminary to creating heaven on Earth. On this much shortened list, Bakunin was the only non-practitioner of the doctrine since he never got the chance. Given the chance, Bakunin would have been as resourceful as his major competitors. Stalin having done such an efficient job, Soviet “canvas cleaning” today needs be less energetic. — Yours, etc.,

DAVID SHANKS. December 15, 1986.

Sir, —David Shanks (December 15) and Ted Hicks (December 16) provide further grounds to suggest that Engels’ statement that the State would "wither away” is in error. David Shanks points out that the assertion on the part of Engels (and Marx) was merely a terminological trick and Ted Hicks notes that the State has not “withered away” in any pseudo-communist country. My contention is that Marx and Engels confused the State with a particular form of government used by capitalism. Perhaps this confusion arose because of the desire to outmanoeuvre opponents (as David Shanks suggests), but certainly their self-deception has allowed, not communism, but State capitalism to emerge (as Ted Hicks notes). — Yours, etc.,

B. S. MEDER. December 16, 1986.