Volume 1

  • Section I 1941 — First Analysis of Russia as a State-Capitalist Society

  • (1) Russia is a State-Capitalist Society

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/51.pdf

    by Freddie James, Washington D.C. This was the first document in which Freddie James (Raya Dunayevskaya) called Russia a state-capitalist society. It was submitted to the Second Workers Party National Convention, 1941, independently of other critiques of Russia.

  • (2) Resolution on the Russian Question

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/52.pdf

    by J.R. Johnson, Sept. 19, 1941. Submitted to same Workers Party Convention. F. Forest (Raya Dunayevskaya) and J.R. Johnson (C.L.R. James) formed the State-Capitalist Tendency. In 1945 it renamed itself the Johnson-Forest Tendency.

  • Section II

    1942-1944 — In the Midst of World War II: Further Developments on the Russian Question and on Europe

  • A. F. Forest

  • (1) The Nature of the Russian Economy

    completed Nov. 1942

  • a. An Analysis of Russian Economy

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/69.pdf

    in New International (N.I.), Dec. 1942, Jan. 1943, and Feb. 1943. Part I of a study of the Russian economy. This study of the first three Five-Year Plans was the first anywhere based on original Russian documents. The analysis was widely referred to in the world press as well as in books such as The Yogi and the Commissar by Arthur Koestler, 1945 (p. 158). (This study along with published Part II (see Vol. I, Sec. IV) was reissued by News and Letters Committees, Detroit under the title Russia as a State-Capitalist Society, 1973.)

  • b. Labor and Society

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/87.pdf

    Introduction to Part II of “The Nature of the Russian Economy.” In “Labor and Society,” Marx’s Humanist Essays were first brought into the development of the State-Capitalist Tendency. “Labor and Society” remained unpublished until mimeographed by the Johnson-Forest Tendency in the “Interim Period.” (See Vol. II). (For the first English translation of Marx’s Humanist Essays see Essays by Karl Marx selected from the Economic-Philosophic Manuscripts, Vol. II , Sec. ID. For first publication see Marxism and Freedom, From 1776 until Today, 1958 edition, Vol. IV, Sec. III.)

  • c. Politics and Economics

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/102.pdf

    Unpublished typescript of Part II of “The Nature of the Russian Economy.” Includes a section entitled “Stalinist Russia: A Bureaucratic Collectivist or State Capitalist Society” (page 90). A revised Part II was published as “The Nature of the Russian Economy” (see Vol. I, Sec. IVA).

  • (2) On Quoting Trotsky

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/164.pdf

    Nov. 10, 1943. A short polemic against the National Committee Majority Resolution of the Workers Party on the European situation which exposes their distortion of Trotsky’s position on the relation of fascism to the possibility of proletarian revolution.

  • (3) A Restatement of Some Fundamentals of Marxism Against Carter’s Vulgarization

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/167.pdf

    Nov. 14, 1943. (Mimeographed Bulletin, March 1944.) A defense of Johnson’s short article “Production for Production’s Sake” (see Vol. I, Sec. IIE) that had been subject to debate within the Workers Party, in particular a response by Carter. Forest’s discussion of Marx’s economics concentrates on the mode of production rather than the will of the capitalists as being the dominant factor. (Reprinted by News and Letters Committees, 1978.)

  • (4) Stalin’s Revision of Marx’s Analysis of the Law of Value

  • a. Teaching of Economics in the Soviet Union

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/193.pdf

    translated from the Russian by Raya Dunayevskaya, in American Economic Review (AER), Sept. 1944. This article from Pod Znamenem Marxizma (Under the Banner of Marxism), No. 7-8, 1943, marked a dramatic shift in Russian economic theory. Where previously Russian political economists had said the law of value did not operate under socialism, they now claimed that it did. To accompany this reversal they proposed beginning the teaching of Marx’s Capital not with Chapter One on “Commodities.” Dunayevskaya’s analysis of this drastic revision immediately followed her translation.

  • b. A New Revision of Marxian Economics

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/209.pdf

    in AER, Sept. 1944. A commentary on “Teaching of Economics in the Soviet Union.” Because the timing of the revision occurred in the midst of World War II when Russia and the West were allies, whereas Dunayevskaya’s critique said it signified the beginning of world competition between the two, the article hit the front page of the New York Times in Oct. 1944. It became the subject of a year-long debate within the pages of the American Economic Review, in 1944-1945. For Dunayevskaya’s response, see “Revision or Reaffirmation of Marxism? A Rejoinder.”

  • B. J.R. Johnson

  • (1) Production for Production’s Sake

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/225.pdf

    A Reply to Carter, submitted Dec. 1942 to one of the editors of N.I. and printed in Bulletin of Workers Party with statement of the Secretariat, April 1943. Dunayevskaya’s “A Restatement of Some Fundamentals of Marxism Against Carter’s Vulgarization” came to Johnson’s defense in a much expanded thesis.

  • (2) The Socialist United States of Europe: Nearer Not Further Away

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/241.pdf

    Parts II (“The Particular Forms”) and III (“The Concrete Application”), May 1943. Part I (“The Way Out for Europe”) not included here. See N.I., April 1943. A defense of the slogan “For the Socialist United States of Europe” as applicable for Europe, 1943.

  • Section III 1944-1946 — The Negro Question and the Writings of Johnson and Forest

    In the midst of the war came the Black uprisings in Detroit and Harlem, as well as a miners’ strike which included large numbers of Black miners. Forest and Johnson wrote a series of pioneering studies on the Negro Question in America and its relation to socialist revolution and the Marxist movement.

  • (2) Negro Intellectuals in Dilemma

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/271.pdf

    Myrdal’s Study of a Crucial Problem, by F. Forest, in N.I., Nov. 1944. A critique of Gunnar Myrdal’s An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democrat, with critique also of the role of Negro intellectuals who worked with him.

  • (3) Resolution of the Minority on the Negro Question

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/275.pdf

    by J.R. Johnson, in N.I., Jan. 1945. Submitted as a resolution of the minority to the Workers Party Convention of 1944.

  • (4) Negroes in the Revolution: The Significance of Their Independent Struggles

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/282.pdf

    by F. Forest, in N.I., May 1945. A polemic against the resolution of the National Committee of the Workers Party on “Negroes and the Revolution,” written by Coolidge.

  • (6) Abstract of Com. Coolidge’s Document on Negro Question

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/296.pdf

    by F. Forest. These notes were prepared for a debate with Coolidge (Ernest Rice McKinney) held at the Workers Party Convention, May 27-31, 1946. McKinney was the leading Black spokesman for the Shachtmanite position.

  • Section IV 1943-47 World War II Ends; A New Age Begins

  • A. F. Forest: Studies on Marx’s Capital, on Luxemburg, on Stalin’s Russia

  • (1) Outline of Marx’s Capital Volume One.

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/324.pdf

    A series of 14 lectures covering all eight parts of Marx’s Capital. It is a 54-page teaching guide including questions for the various lectures. Prepared originally for Educational Department, Workers Party. (Reissued by News and Letters Committees, 1979.)

  • (2) Outline of Marx’s Capital Volume Two

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/385.pdf

    prepared in 1945. A 34-page teaching outline, plus one page of definitions. A class taught by F. Forest beginning in Nov. 1946. A one-page bibliography for the class included.

  • (7) Luxemburg’s Theory of Accumulation. How It Differed with Marx and Lenin

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/436.pdf

    in N.I., April, 1945 and May, 1946. Also included is an exchange of letters between Australian Marxist W.H. Emmett (N.I., Feb. 1947) and F. Forest (N.I., April 1947). (Essay reprinted by News and Letters Committees, 1967.)

  • (8) New Developments in Stalin’s Russia

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/448.pdf

    a series of five articles published in the Workers Party weekly, Labor Action, beginning Oct. 7, 1946. An analysis of post-war Russian economy.

  • (9) The Nature of the Russian Economy

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/454.pdf

    in N.I., Dec. 1946 and Jan. 1947. The revised Part II of “The Nature of the Russian Economy” (see Vol. I. Sec. II A). (Reproduced by News and Letters Committees as part of Russia as a State-Capitalist Society, 1973.) Included here is Johnson’s review of Leon Trotsky’s The Revolution Betrayed, “After Ten Years,” first published in N.I., Oct. 1946.

  • B. First Draft of what was to become Marxism and Freedom

  • (1) State-Capitalism and Marxism

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/472.pdf

    by Raya Dunayevskaya, 1947. This 80- page outline is the first draft of what became Marxism and Freedom. The outline was submitted to Oxford University Press and to Professor Joan Robinson, the British economist, whose critical notes accompany the text. For the development of State-Capitalism and Marxism into Marxism and Freedom see Vols. III and IV.

  • C. J.R. Johnson: Discussions within Workers Party, Historical Retrogressionism

  • (2) Historical Retrogression or Socialist Revolution

    link to PDF file: http://rayadunayevskaya.org/ArchivePDFs/534.pdf

    Sept. 10, 1945. Published in N.I., Jan. 1946 and Feb. 1946. A discussion article on the thesis of the IKD (International Communists of Germany).

  • (3) Resolutions to the Workers Party Convention of 1946

    the final Convention the Johnson-Forest Tendency attended before leaving the Workers Party in 1947:

  • D. Final Split Documents of Johnson-Forest Tendency from Workers Party