ABSTRACT
Qualitative change was to involve the intervention of human subjectivity in overcoming the blind forces of the capitalist market, and the results could not be completely predetermined. The problem was to render both subordination and power democratic; in other words, to find an economic expression for the organizational principle of democratic centralism. Lenin’s commitment to diversified economic forms underlies the need for caution in analyzing the connections between Marxist theory and revolutionary practice. Lenin’s differences with the Left Communists were rooted not in ultimate theoretical commitments, but in method. The implications of this remark are clear: a capitalist mode of production determines the existence of some form of capitalist state; a socialist mode of production presupposes a socialist state; but the specific forms of each cannot be universally predetermined in accordance with a single pattern. The ‘natural’ economy would require norms of pay to be determined in labor values by the state and the trade unions.
