Constitution - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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Polls on politics, news, current affairs and history.

Coded or uncoded?

Coded
30
73%
Uncoded
11
27%
User avatar
By Unperson-S
#466785
Do/would you prefer to have a coded constitution or an uncoded constitution - (America has a coded constitution, the UK has an uncoded constitution)

I prefer an uncoded constitution, because it means that there doesnt have to be a massively long proccess for laws and acts to be passed.
User avatar
By Captain Hat
#466828
I prefer a coded Constitution because it outlines the specific powers of the government, thus avoiding (in theory) clashes of power between various branches and a more defined system of checks and balances.
User avatar
By Liberal
#466876
I voted for coded Consititution. This way, the citizens and the government will know their rights and obligations.
By Lejonet från Norden
#466930
Coded, agree with Hat and Liberal.
By Garibaldi
#466942
I voted coded, same as all before me. Basically, it makes everything neater and allows for a more protection of rights.
User avatar
By The Immortal Goon
#466945
Coded, harder to pull one over on the people (though clearly still possible)

-TIG :rockon:
User avatar
By David
#466947
I vote coded. :D
User avatar
By Mark
#466950
I voted 'coded'.



But the word is codified....a coded constitution would be one that is encrypted :roll:
By Korimyr the Rat
#466984
Codified.

An unwritten Constitution is not a Constitution at all-- an unfortunate fact I hope that our British brothers and sisters never have to discover for themselves.
User avatar
By Attila The Nun
#467019
Coded, because if not there's too much confusion about the government and how it's supposed to be set up, what are the laws and rights, ete.
By Wilhelm
#467175
Codified.

It is not that difficult to pass laws, not al laws are part of the Constitution. For instance, traffic laws are passed more easily becaus ethey do not change the constitution.
User avatar
By Potemkin
#467223
Korimyr the Rat wrote:Codified.

An unwritten Constitution is not a Constitution at all-- an unfortunate fact I hope that our British brothers and sisters never have to discover for themselves.

I voted 'uncodified', for exactly that reason. The lack of a codified Constitution or a Bill of Rights in Britain represents a great opportunity to any true revolutionary. The main obstacle to a workers' revolution in America is the existence of a written Constitution which 'enshrines' the values of bourgeois liberalism for all time. This has meant that America has never got beyond its bourgeois Revolution and achieved a proletarian Revolution. In Britain, that possibility still exists. The lack of a codified Constitution means that we haven't become stuck at a certain stage of our political development; our system, even its most fundamental principles, are still fluid and 'up for grabs'. Bourgeois liberalism is not 'written into' our system and can therefore be rolled back relatively easily. All we have to do is seize control of the apparatus of the bourgeois state and convert it into a dictatorship of the proletariat. There would be no awkward written Constitution which would have to be suspended or rewritten to make it consistent with a workers' state. So, as a revolutionary Marxist, I had to vote 'uncodified'.
User avatar
By Attila The Nun
#467245
There's a little problem, Potekim. First, you kind of half to get support of at least a majority of the people. All this "revolution" stuff won't happen unless people want the revolution to happen. A lot of British people really aren't up to that.
User avatar
By Potemkin
#467257
MosesWasALibertarian wrote:There's a little problem, Potekim. First, you kind of half to get support of at least a majority of the people. All this "revolution" stuff won't happen unless people want the revolution to happen. A lot of British people really aren't up to that.

Which is why Lenin developed the idea of the Party as the vanguard of the proletariat. Left to their own devices, most workers never develop beyond trade union consciousness. And a revolution can succeed even with only a significant minority of the population actively involved. Most Russians in 1917 were landless peasants who did not play an active role in the revolution. Indeed, even as late as 1923, Krupskaya (Lenin's wife) was complaining that there were still peasants in the provinces of Russia who hadn't heard that the Tsar was gone and there was a Communist government in Russia. The October Revolution was made in Moscow and Petrograd, and it was made by a sufficiently determined minority, in the name of the working people.

And why should the working class accept the tyranny of the majority? As Lenin said in 'State and Revolution', democracy is nothing more than the tyranny of the majority over the minority. If the petty-bourgeois class becomes the majority of the population, does this mean we should accept petty-bourgeois values? No, of course not. The proletariat is the vanguard class, and therefore has the right and the duty to seize power if it can.
By Wilhelm
#467273
So much for democracy. Everything for the "proletariat". Communism sucks.
User avatar
By Captain Hat
#467325
Potemkin wrote:The October Revolution was made in Moscow and Petrograd, and it was made by a sufficiently determined minority, in the name of the working people.


One can make the case, and many historians have, that the October Revolution wasn't a revolution at all, but rather an organized coup by the Bolsheviks, a minority party.

EDIT:
And why should the working class accept the tyranny of the majority?


This theory got another famous revolutionary in trouble. His name was Robespierre. He believed that the peasants and commoners had no idea what was in their best interests. Robespierre and his Jacobin Club felt that only they could interpret the "General Will." The end result were midnight arrests, Revolutionary Tribunals, and mass executions.
Gee, who else did this? The Bolsheviks! They felt they knew what was best, and again, midnight arrests, trials, and executions.
User avatar
By Potemkin
#467501
Captain Hat wrote:
Potemkin wrote:The October Revolution was made in Moscow and Petrograd, and it was made by a sufficiently determined minority, in the name of the working people.


One can make the case, and many historians have, that the October Revolution wasn't a revolution at all, but rather an organized coup by the Bolsheviks, a minority party.

Which is pretty much what I said. :)

EDIT:
And why should the working class accept the tyranny of the majority?


This theory got another famous revolutionary in trouble. His name was Robespierre. He believed that the peasants and commoners had no idea what was in their best interests. Robespierre and his Jacobin Club felt that only they could interpret the "General Will." The end result were midnight arrests, Revolutionary Tribunals, and mass executions.
Gee, who else did this? The Bolsheviks! They felt they knew what was best, and again, midnight arrests, trials, and executions.

We're back at the 'ascribed consciousness' versus 'actual consciousness' again. The reality is that the cultural and social hegemony of the bourgeois ruling class means that the consciousness of the working people is obfuscated. They are effectively brainwashed by the bourgeoisie, as well as being excluded from access to education, and therefore have difficulty in perceiving what is in their own best interests - many of the German proletariat even voted for Hitler in 1933! This is why Lenin was correct to point out that the working class needs the services of professional revolutionaries who are able to 'ascribe' the correct consciousness to them; that is, what they would think if they could properly perceive their own true interests. The working people believe they are weak, when in fact they are strong. They believe they are inferior when in fact they are superior. They believe they exist to be exploited when in fact they are the inheritors of the earth. They must simply be persuaded of the truth of these things, and they will then simply shrug their shoulders and cast off the dead weight of the exploiting classes.
User avatar
By Attila The Nun
#467523
Potemkin wrote:Which is why Lenin developed the idea of the Party as the vanguard of the proletariat. Left to their own devices, most workers never develop beyond trade union consciousness. And a revolution can succeed even with only a significant minority of the population actively involved. Most Russians in 1917 were landless peasants who did not play an active role in the revolution. Indeed, even as late as 1923, Krupskaya (Lenin's wife) was complaining that there were still peasants in the provinces of Russia who hadn't heard that the Tsar was gone and there was a Communist government in Russia. The October Revolution was made in Moscow and Petrograd, and it was made by a sufficiently determined minority, in the name of the working people.


You do realize that the Bolsheviks (what an ironic name) weren't even all of the marxists, right? They were a minority in a minority. That, and the November (since it did happen in November) revolution would have happened anyway. Bread strikes, decreasing morale in the war, it would have been eventually. The majority knew they were being screwed over already, all it took was Lenin to rile them up under a marxist banner. All he did was take advantage of desperate people.



And why should the working class accept the tyranny of the majority? As Lenin said in 'State and Revolution', democracy is nothing more than the tyranny of the majority over the minority. If the petty-bourgeois class becomes the majority of the population, does this mean we should accept petty-bourgeois values? No, of course not. The proletariat is the vanguard class, and therefore has the right and the duty to seize power if it can.


That doesn't make any sense. The bourgeoise could never become the majority, because then they wouldn't be the bourgeoise. Their money would simply decrease in value if they became that rich because of the plentifulness of it.

And the majority will always be the working class, because of it. The working class, who you are out to defend, is the majority. And if the majority, the working class does not want bolshevik rule, then what's the point? You're not protecting them, then, just your own interests.
User avatar
By Potemkin
#467543
MosesWasALibertarian wrote:You do realize that the Bolsheviks (what an ironic name) weren't even all of the marxists, right? They were a minority in a minority. That, and the November (since it did happen in November) revolution would have happened anyway. Bread strikes, decreasing morale in the war, it would have been eventually. The majority knew they were being screwed over already, all it took was Lenin to rile them up under a marxist banner. All he did was take advantage of desperate people.

Yes, I know that the Bolsheviks (lit. 'Majoritarians') were a minority of the Russian Social Democratic Party who split from it to form their own party. The rump of the SDP (who were thenceforth known as Mensheviks (lit. 'Minoritarians')) drifted towards the right and became Revisionists along the same lines as the German SDP. And the October Revolution happened in October according to the Julian calendar, but November according to the Gregorian calendar (which is the one we use now). Russia switched to the Gregorian calendar in, I think, 1918, yet they continued to call it the 'October' Revolution. I think we should continue calling it that too.

And as for the October Revolution being 'inevitable', I think you mean the February Revolution (which no doubt really happened in April). The Bolsheviks, contrary to popular opinion, did not overthrow Nicholas II. By the time they got their act together, the Tsarist regime was long gone, overthrown by a combination of military and economic collapse and the boiling discontent of workers and peasants. Lenin arrived in April 1917 to try to politically benefit from the collapse of Tsarism. It was the Provisional Government (who were just as anti-Tsarist as Lenin) which the Bolsheviks overthrew.

That doesn't make any sense. The bourgeoise could never become the majority, because then they wouldn't be the bourgeoise. Their money would simply decrease in value if they became that rich because of the plentifulness of it.

And the majority will always be the working class, because of it. The working class, who you are out to defend, is the majority. And if the majority, the working class does not want bolshevik rule, then what's the point? You're not protecting them, then, just your own interests.

I specifically said the petty-bourgeoisie. The haute bourgeois class permits the creation of a lower class of small businessmen and shopkeepers which we call 'lower middle class' or petty-bourgeois. They identify themselves with authority figures and adopt a bourgeois set of values and attitudes, even though the haute bourgeois class itself despises them. They are useful to the ruling class in spreading false consciousness and in actively suppressing working class opposition if necessary. Under certain conditions, for example, the super-profits created by imperialist exploitation, this petty-bourgeois class can grow very large indeed. Modern America or even Britain are examples of this. But the fundamental, underlying system of exploitation and oppression remains in place. Marx wrote about the beginnings of this process as far back as the late 19th century, when he talked about the creation of a 'labour aristocracy' from imperialist superprofits. In Britain, right now, the working class constitutes only about a third of the population, the petty-bourgeois class about half the population, and the rest are either lumpen-proletarian, haute bourgeois or aristocratic. If the other classes band together, they can easily outnumber the proletariat. Does this mean we should simply surrender to the class enemy? No, absolutely not! The petty-bourgois class are the victims of false consciousness. They have banded with the haute bourgeoise to help them keep the working class in line, but thir class 'allies' actually despise them. You only have to look at the British Tory Party, and the relations between its haute bourgeois and its petty-bourgeois members, to see this very clearly.

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