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Monday, June 01, 2026

Donald A. Bowman - My Battle of the Atlantic

The corvette convoy escort ships from World War II have gained a remarkable amount of fame for a small ship that was designed to fill a military gap. As the submarine war against Allied shipping escalated in the first years of the war, convoy protection became an urgent requirement. Yet no ships existed to fill this role, and navies had little experience, despite similar events in the First War. The corvette was created to fill the gap, and almost 300 were built through the war on both sides of the Atlantic.

The corvette is famous because it is the centerpiece of Nicholas Monsarsat's novel The Cruel Sea, and the subsequent film. Monsarrat also wrote a biographical work on his experience on the little ships. Monsarrat served in the Royal Navy, but corvettes were also used by the Canadian Navy as a key part of their commitment to the Allied war effort. Donald A. Bowman served on HMCS Edmunston escorting convoys to and fro across the dangerous Atlantic. This short biographical account of his experiences begins with his early training, and follows him through the war until HMCS Edmunston is decommissioned. Bowman was on the ship for almost its entire service life. The ship thus takes on a personality of its own.

Bowman's experiences are typical of many servicement. Hours of cold, discomfort and boredom, interpersed with moments of terror. But like any other disperate group of people forced together to work as a team, he also recounts the occasional fun and laughter. Interestingly though, he makes the point, that he never saw an enemy - alive or dead - through the war. Notably though he points out that this is the reason he volunteered. By doing so he could chose the service to be in, and this meant he could avoid the army and having to bayonet people or live in trenches. The shadow of World War One hung over his generation.

Bowman's book is very candid. He describes his sweet and lengthy marriage, and his honeymoon,cut short by the demands of the Navy, after just a couple of days. But readers will really want to know about the time on the ship. This is usually discomfort. The ships had "an open bridge... watchkeepers exposed to the weather" food was terrible:

By the fifth day at sea, bread was mouldy. The galley could not cope with baking bread for ninety-six crew. Hardtack biscuits were availale, but found few takers. A menu staple was "British Bangers" otherwise known as sausages.

The ship was crowded. Ninety-six crew in a space intended for sixty-five. And it was shared by lots of rats and cockroaches.

The corvette HMCS Sackville in Halifax, Nova Scotia

There's plenty here about life at sea. Refuelling, anti-submarine tactics and the stress of convoys at night. If that was it there would still be much to reward those interested in Naval warfare. But Bowman is equally candid about the stress and stress of life on the ship. His final chapters detail the suffering he experienced from what is now called PTSD. Googling Bowman's life beyond the book you can see the stories he tells here and how they continue to affect him. This is especially true of Charlie, a fellow trainee, he met after the war whose life was destroyed by his experiences in the war. Bowman's trauma comes in part from the loss of confidence he says he experienced as a result of taking off the uniform, which removed his sense of place in society. He also suffered terribly from the after affects of brain and hearing caused by the explosions from the "hedgehog" anti-submarine weapon. But it is actually the horror of what Charlie experienced that remains with Bowman, and every Remembrance Day "the futility of war visit my mind all day and late into the night, as I remember Charlie". Those looking for a sanitised miltiary adventure will not find it here, and nor should they.

This short book is thus much more than a memoir. It's an attempt to understand the war from the perspective of someone who was only a small cog. It's fascinating and when I visit the last corvette, HMCS Sackville in a few days time, I hope to see HMCS Edmunston's flag that Donald A. Bowman donated in memory of his friends and comrades.

Thursday, May 28, 2026

Hossam El-Hamalawy - Counter-Revolution in Egypt: Sisi's new republic

The Egyptian Revolution of 2011, was perhaps the important event of the 'Arab Spring'. It was a seminal moment for me, and a generation of activists who saw Revolution on the TV and social media on a nightly basis. I, like many other activists, followed events closely. The fall of the dictator Hosni Mubarak was a joyous day.

Hossam El-Hamalawy was an activist, socialist and journalist during those days. This, his analysis of the Egyptian state's evolution and the change and continuity it experienced during and after the Revolution is based on close study of events and documents, including leaked papers, and interviews. Some of it, including references to the imprisonment of activists and events during the Revolution is based on his own experiences.

Friedrich Engels' described the state as a collection of "special bodies of armed men" whose position seeks to defend the status quo, and expand capital's interests. This is nowhere more clear than in Egypt. In the decades before the Revolution the Egypt state had a huge, and overlapping, network of organisations, police, army, informers, spies and agents who watched, punished and restricted anyone expressing dissent. This included trade unionists, socialists, human rights campaigners and Muslim activists who questioned or challenged the existing setup. At the same time, Mubarak was a master at using the state against itself to prevent any threat to his position- giving its leading figures overlapping mandates, turning favourites against each other, bolstering one organisation against another, carefully manipulating the system to protect his position.

In February 2011 the Egyptian military deposed Mubarak. They did this under pressure from below and to try and limit the revolution. El-Hamalawy argues that we cannot see this event as part of a disguised plot by the generals to give themselves power through a coup even thoug this is what happened in July 2013 when Sisi took power from th elected President Morsi. El-Hamalawy argues:

While it is impossible to know every general's thinking, informed accounts suggest the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces aimed for a quick end to the uprising, a return to normality and troop withdrawl. One general explained the priority was to 'restrain the unrelenting revolutionary impulse, so that it does not smite the state's military, security, and economic apparatuses.

Crucially, says El-Hamalawy, "the generals were eager to transfer power to an elected [civilian] government as long as their interests were protected." This is further confirmed by a US State Department report that said the Army preferred "after the Mubarak experience" a situation like in Turkey, were "the army mainstains its status... but stays in its barracks under a democratic order"and is the "guarantor of democracy".

No doubt the military wanted a say in events. But they were not, at that stage, trying to dominate. What changed? Here the importance is the old saying that "Revolution is not an event, but a process". Morsi, who replaced Mubarak, was unable to hold back or end the Revolution. In fact, as El-Hamalawy says, his election became a focus for further radical demands.

The coup that Sisi led in 2013 was a response to the ongoing revolution, not the revolution per se. But it was, from the generals point of view, a necessary one. El-Hamalawy writes that "by the Spring of 2013, the country had become ungovernable". Industrial disputes were escalating and the capitalist class were "abandoning" Morsi after ongoing "mass protests". It was, a classic moment when the working classes were no longer willing to be governed in the older way, and the ruling classes were unable to govern in the old way.

Post coup Egypt demonstrates a strengthening of the state in both its size and its scope. The military is more powerful, and has managed to displace other forces such as the police as the chief instrument of control. The military have also extended their roots further into Egyptian society. Military capitalism, writes El-Hamalawy, "expanded massively in scale and scope after the coup":

From about $300 million in the early 1980s, the post-coup military's civilian involvement - via debt-financed projects run directly by the army or in partnership with local and international capial - rose to $200 billion over five years... this equalled two-thirds of GDP. Civilian employment in such ventures also grew from about two million in December 2016 to five million by September 2019.

He continues:

The repressive apparatus generals, with the military at the centre, have become predatory elites who sometimes cooperate with the civilian bourgeoisie but also seize their capital by force.

Repression, punishment and violence against dissenters has reached new levels. The Egyptian state is building some of the largest prisons on the planet, and modelling them on US prisons. Sisi's government has placed itself at the heart of every Egyptian cultural and political institution - from soap operas to mosque sermons. It is difficult to be optimistic about the situation in Egypt in the short term, though El-Hamalawy finds evidence for the "slow revival of dissent" and occasional strikes and protests. More importantly he notes that Eygptian society is also under enormous strain - not least from the global context of Trump and Israel's War on Iran and genocide against the politicians. These tensions are reflected within the state itself and El-Hamalawy notes that "cracks in authoritarian security coalitions rarely stay small".

Any hope we have for a renewed mass struggle will lie in the growth of confidence from below and the breaking open of disagreement within the state. For those studying Egypt Hossam El-Hamalawy's book is a must read. Despite at times the detail being a little overwhelming the book gives a clear picture of the way that Sisi's current government rests on a seemingly powerful, but inherently unstable, state-machine. There's much here on the specifics of Egypt. But the analysis will be useful for everyone trying to understand tensions in other states globally.

Wednesday, May 27, 2026

John Foot - Blood and Power: The rise and fall of Italian fascism

The rise of global far-right and fascist parties and movements is something of great concern to working people. It is, perhaps, the most dangerous time that the left has faced since the 1930s. While fascists and right-wingers have evolved and changed, as this penetrating article by Richard Donnelly shows, their core purpose remains intact. They aim for the complete destruction of democratic structures and the left, while using radical, right-wing, rhetoric to gain support through a critique of the system.

In organising to stop the right activists should learn from the past. Two strands of fascism dominated European politics. One of these was Hitler's Nazis in Germany. The other was Mussolini's fascists in Italy. The latter is not discussed as often as the former, so John Foot's Blood and Power is an important read. Foot begins:

Italy invented fascism. Out of the chaos of the First World War, in which nearly 600,00 Italian soldiers lost their lives, a new movement emerged which preached hatred for politicians and love for the fatherland. Fascists embraced violence, both in their language and on their streets.

The violence was needed. In the early 1920s the myriad of local fascist leaders out of whome Mussolini was to emerge was the sole leader faced a powerful foe - the working class movement and mass socialist organisations. As Foot says, the fascists were "overshadowed" by a "socialism uprising" at the end of World War One. One cannot downplay the scale or significance of the Italian workers' movement in this phase. The opening chapters of Foot's book are a sweeping, but powerful and inspiring account of a working class in open and confident confrontation with the state.

While Italian fascism was nationalist and racist, and later embraced antisemitism, it's core ideology was one of counter-revolution and patriotism. It was the perceived threat (even after the struggle had receded) from the workers' movement that gave Mussolini's fascists a chance to organise and a ideology to coalesce around. Italian fascism cannot be understood without seeing the centrality of counter-revolutionary politics. In 1914, for instance, the northern Italian city of Ravenna had been the centre of a major workers' revolt against World War One. The story itself is inspiring. But in July 1922 it was the scene of a brutal counter-revolutionary strike by the fascists:

Thousands of armed blackshirts descended on the city... The 'march on Ravenna' was carried out like a military invasion. It took place out in the open, during the day, and was accompanised by a selective purge - the victims being socialists, republicans and trade unionists... At least nine people were killed in Ravenna alone... but the attacks ranged across a vast area.

By the summer in Ravenna and Cremona, Ferrara, Bologna and countless other places, the fascists squads were in control, and "the state, police prefects, army and carrabinieri were all reduced to the role of onlookers, and often took sides, providing logistical assistance to the violent gangs".

The speed at which fascist gangs did defeat democracy and the left is breathtaking. In city after city, town after town, village after village fascist gangs smashed, murdered and broke local and regional organisations of trade unions and socialists, democratic organisations and elected bodies. It was systematic. One thing that should be recognised by all activists today, is that democratic organisation in any form - whether it was local councils or national government, was in no way a barrier to the fascists. Their deployment of extreme violence at the slightest provocation (and usually with no provocation at all) saw democratic institutions fall almost instantly. It seems incredible, but democracy as a set of ideas and institutions could not (and often did not try) to stop fascism. Foot writes:

Local democratic institutions fell, one by one, to fascist pressure. Forty [fascist] councillors had been elected to the provincial administration of Cremona... in May 1922. But this formal, democratic procedure was completely ignored by the local fascists. They did not recognise elections. In that same month, local fascist leader... Roberto Farinacci, insisted that he be allowed to speak as the 'forty-first councillor'. Farinacci had not even been a candidate in the elections... When asked who had elected him, he replied, 'I elected mysefl'. It was the last meeting of that provincial council.

He concludes "Election results and democracy had come up against fascist violence and the latter had won".

This begs the question, could the fascists have been stopped. There's no doubt that the left could and done so. Tom Behan's remarkable book The Resistable Rise of Mussolini shows how this happed in one location. The key was left unity and militant mass mobilisation. Certainly there was resistance and the fascists were held back temporarily in places. But there was not enough. One problem was clearly that the left (in a broad sense) did not understand that everyone was threatened. Too many liberals and moderates thought the fascists were only targetting the revolutionary left, but "moderates were often targeted in the same way, and with even more violence, than those on the far left". Tragically, in a number of key cases, such as when the fascists took out the left stronghold Bologna in November 1920, the leader of the radical left, the Mayor Ercole Bucco, backed down from armed defence, despite having a massive majority in the city. Foot concludes:

Bucco's actions that night also seemed to confirm the overall historical judgement on maximalism. They talked the talk, but were incapable of organising a real revolution. Local fascists on the other hand, were emboldened.

Time and again the left was to fail. In January 1921 the Socialist Party left split, and the Italian Communist Party walked out. Foot regards this as a mistake. He says that "at a time of mass fascist violence directed against socialists, the main political organisations... divided into two, weakened any sense of opposition or even defence". This was, of course, a dangerous time. The trick would have been if the Communist Party had been able to respond in a way that would have built left unity in an anti-fascist alliance while maintaining independence. This failed to happen, and probably it was too late after January 1921. Had the CP prepared the ground by organising like this, the split could have been much more productive in terms of anti-fascist mobilisations. I was reminded of Clara Zetkin's analysis of fascism in Italy:

Fascism... is not at all the revenge of the bourgeoisie against the militant uprising of the proletariat. In historical terms, viewed objectively, fascism arrives much more as punishment because the proletariat has not carried and driven forward the revolution that began in Russia.

At the start of this review I mentioned the ideology of Italian fascism. It is notable that while the fascists were appalling racists, many Jewish people were members. Mussolini's alliance with Hitler and his adoption of a vicious antisemitism shocked them. Italian fascism was not more benign than in Germany. Jewish people were hounded, murdered, arrested and lost everything. Many were sent to Concentration Camps, particularly later in the war. Foot's analysis of fascism in power is an important counter to those today who argue that Mussolini was not as vicious. The Italian fascist state was a violent, repressive and murderous entity - and its violence extended into Africa with the occupation of Ethiopia.

Nonetheless fascism in Italy was weak. It seemed extremely powerful, but the contradictions of economic and imperilaist policies undermined its position. By the time it had entered the war, the longer anti-fascist and anti-war traditions of the working class were beginning to make themselves felt. When Mussolini's regime eventually fell, it was a surprisingly quick series of events. This period, and the subsequent German take over of Italy, is well told by Foot.

Foot's book concludes with an analysis of Italian fascism in the context of contemporary Italian politics. It is clear that the failure of the Italian state to properly come to terms with, or confront, the legacy of Italian fascism - including its failure to prosecute or challenge many of its key figures - has left a belief that Mussolini's time was "wonderful". Foot's expose reminds us that it was for a few people - those who were frightened by the rise of a powerful workers' movement. But the reality for millions was the opposite.

It is an excellent (and extremely readable) account of a period of history we ought to study more. I would have liked more accounts of anti-fascist resistance and further analysis of how the left could have stopped fascism. Nonetheless this is a very useful read.

Monday, May 25, 2026

Lis Angus - That Other Family

How would you react if suddenly, out of the blue, you discovered that everything you were certain about your parents was untrue? This is what happens to Julie Walker in Lis Angus' latest thriller. Julie lives a happy life as the mother of three teenage kids, happily maried to husband Matt, with a decent job at Ottawa's main public library. One day she meets Frances Boyle at work. Frances brings with her some photos of her family and there in the middle, unmistakably is Julie's father. It turns out that Julie's beloved father had two entirely separate families.

For most people this would be a shattering revelation. Frances wants to meet Julie's mother - to her, she's the other woman. With Julie's and Frances' father dead, only her mother can offer an explanation to both women. Before Frances can meet her though, Julie heads out to talk to her mum. To her surprise, when she tries to gently break the news, Julie's mum knows all about the other family. Shock piles on shock for Julie. How could these secrets have been kept quiet for so long. Then her mum spills the beans. The other family is no ordinary family. They're part of a major criminal gang. The sort of criminals bound by honour and committed to revenge. Had they known of the other family the lives of Julie's mum and dad would have been worthless.

Despite some waryness from Julie, Frances bonds with her and her family. Julie's worries seem to disappear. Then, one early morning while Julie's family is out, their house explodes.

So begins Julie's quest for the truth. She's desperate to protect her family. But every turn she's met with official disbelief - even Matt isn't sure things are real. As the threats get closer again, Julie's faced with betrayal and violence from an unknown enemy. Why are the Walkers' being targetted? More importantly, who is targetting them?

Lis Angus is a thriller writer based in Ontario. That Other Family is her second novel, and it is full of delightful twists and turns, tension and a genuinely original plot. The novel is set in an area that Lis knows well. Her acknowledgements include a thanks to an Ottawan librarian for showing her around the library which features in the book! But the landscape and the small towns and villages around the city are clearly drawn from personal knowledge. It makes for an even more realistic story.

That Other Family is a tight piece of writing that lovers of thrillers will enjoy. But there is no morose detective solving the crime, no muscley heroes despatching the bad guys. Instead there's a mother fighting for her family and that's the best sort of hero.

Alistair Macleod - No Great Mischief

Preparing for a trip to Nova Scotia and Cape Breton one is struck how the interconnected history of Indigenous people and immigrants remain central to the region, and indeed the formation of modern Canada as a whole. Alistair Macleod's No Great Mischief focuses on the immigrant experience, those who left Scotland to settle in Nova Scotia, to work its land and mines and build a better life. It is a sweeping history of shared identity and the challenges of building a new life.

The novel begins however, in the modern era, with Alexander MacDonald, a successful dentist, visiting his alcoholic, elder brother Calum. Through a series of flashbacks we begin to construct their shared history, the tragedies that have left the MacDonad children orphans, and the struggles they have fought in the Uranium mines and the fields of Canada. Tragedies outnumber the good times. These are lives, like most immigrants, of long days of hard work, of low pay and accidents. Their are good times, often fuelled by music, dance, poetry and drinking. But while the flashbacks return as far back as 1779 when the first MacDonalds fled Scotland to settle, it is perhaps only Alexander who has broken free of the endless cycle of poverty and death.

Immigrant identity looms everywhere over the novel. Strangers who share the characteristic red hair of the MacDonalds, and claim heritage to the original clann Chalum Ruaidh, stop each other in the street to bond over shared history and family. It's a fierce defensive mechanism that brings conflict with other immigrants groups in the mines and the fields. It creates a culture that pervades contemporary Nova Scotia in many different ways.

The book is hard to characterise. It's focus on groups in the rugged landscape means that the place itself is part of the story. The rocky coasts and barren landscape. There is, for me, a frustrating lack of presence of Indigenous people whose culture would have been in conflict with the immigrant experience. Perhaps the story would have benefited from inclusion of some of the great working class struggles that Nova Scotia has seen - particularly in the mines. But this is a celebration of brotherhood and solidarity in other ways, the fight to preserve identity and to stand true to who you are. Its a lovely book that will linger as I explore Cape Breton.

Sunday, May 24, 2026

V.I. Lenin - Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism

Lenin's short book on Imperialism is perhaps the best known of his extensive writings. So well known, in fact, that the edition I've just read is number 96 of the Penguin "Great Ideas" series. Make of that what you will. Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism remains a key reference point because of the continuation of imperialism itself. It is a succinct presentation and defence of the Marxist understanding of Imperialism, defended by Lenin principly (and deliberately) through reference to bourgeois commentators and statistical sources and defended by Lenin from critiques on the left, most prominently Karl Kautsky.

The book is itself limited, or rather it is very much of its time. Lenin acknowledged this because he was writing for the censor. Written in 1916 it needed to bypass Tsarist censorship and thus Lenin's conclusions and language are deliberately mitigated. Michael Kidron, his his own discussion of Lenin's work noted more critically that "have all been lost sight of in an uncritical, almost universal, acceptance of its central themes. This is all the more strange since much of what he analysed has clearly either gone or become much less important than in his day."

Kidron goes on to make some sharp criticisms of Lenin's work. Recognising it as a brilliant piece of revolutionary work at the time, but acknowleding that it has its limits and is very much of its time. Lenin himself acknowledges this in one of the prefaces written after the Revolution when he notes that the book was limited by lack of research material while writing in exile. Kidron's criticisms focus on the changing role of banks and finance capital, which was central to Lenin's analysis and he argues, a over generalisation from the German economic situation. The changing importance of capital export from developed economies to the developing world is also something noted by Kidron.

These criticisms remain important and Marxist theorists such as Alex Callinicos have continued to develop the theory of imperialism for a new years, 60 years after Kidron's critique and over a century since Lenin's. Nonetheless Lenin's book remains crucial to understanding modern imperialism because it offers a Marxist account of the interaction between capitalist development and imperialist structure. Lenin argues that his left critics, such as Kautsky continually misunderstand imperialism prescisely because of their neglect for context.

So what does Lenin argue? Imperialism, says Lenin, arises out of a stage in capitalist development when monopoly capitalism (existence of gigantic firms that have swallowed up most, or all, of their competitors) comes to dominant and can obtain massive profits from exporting capital into delveloping countries. This is faciliated, Lenin argues, when banks have reached such proportions that they control finance capital and can deploy it to further their own interests and those of other capitalists. This then goes further, as Lenin writes, "the 'personal union' between the banks and industry is completed by the 'personal union' between both and the state."

This union between capital and the state means that the state itself can and must intervene in the interest of its own national capital in the world. While this can lead to war, Lenin also highlights that imperialism is more than war. It is the intervention of the state in trade, economic relations and colonial development, in the interests of its capital. Two countries, he writes

England and France are the oldest capitalist countries, and... possess the most colonies; the other two, the United States and Germany, are the front rank as regards rapidty of development the degree of extension of capitalist monopolies in industry. Together these four countries own 479,000,000,00 francs... nearly 80 percent of the world's financial capital. Thus... the whole world is more or less the debtor to and tributary of these four international banker countries, the four 'pillars' of world finance capital.

Such a relationship rests on the ability of the state to deploy military power if required, as Thomas Friedman famously said in 1999:

The hidden hand of the market will never work without a hidden fist. McDonald's cannot flourish without McDonnell Douglas, the designer of the F-15. And the hidden fist that keeps the world safe for Silicon Valley's technologies to flourish is called the US Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps.

It is this analysis that makes Lenin's work such a crucial starting point for anyone trying to analyse the modern world. Think of US intervention in the Middle East, or Russia and Ukraine's war. We cannot understand these without understanding the "economic essence of imperialism", to use Lenin's words. Take Ukrain and Russia. Russian aggression began the conflict, but it was Nato and Western interests attempt to hold back Russia's economic interests that identify the conflict as a proxy imperialist one.

But there are aspects to contemporary imperialism that remain absent from Lenin's book. One of these is the question of "sub imperialism", those nations who have broken from colonial domination and now exert their own economic and political interests, sometimes militarily. Israel in the wider Middle East, or Iran and UAE in Syria and Sudan. Lenin's work is dominated by an attempt to explain World War One and link this understanding to a fight against "opportunists" whose siding with their nation state had so badly damaged the socialist movement. Nonetheless, understanding how the development of capital in post-colonial countries and regions has led to sub-imperialist clashes, hinges on the same recognition as Lenin developed in understanding the rise of the Great Powers in the colonial era. If Lenin's work doesn't anticipate these developments, it does, at every stage recognise that colonialism needed to be resisted by those workers and peasants in colonial states. Had he lived to see this era, he would no doubt have analysed it as succinctly and clearly as he does in this work.

Related Reviews

Lenin - The Development of Capitalism in Russia
Lenin - The Agrarian Programme of Social-Democracy in the First Russian Revolution 1905-1907
Lenin - Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade Kautsky
Lenin - Will the Bolsheviks Maintain Power?
Callinicos - Imperialism and Global Political Economy

Tuesday, May 19, 2026

V.I. Lenin - The Development of Capitalism in Russia

First published in 1899 with a new edition in 1908, Lenin's The Development of Capitalism in Russia is a systematic exploration of the Russian economy at the start of the century. It is based on an extremely detailed reading of official studies and statistics for the Russian economy, something that can prove daunting to the reader as Lenin repeatedly cites figures for machinery, land, farms, workers and almost every aspect of the economy. Lenin is challenging those, particularly the Russian radical Narodniks, who were arguing that Russia was not capitalist, or could not be capitalist. Instead Lenin deploys arsenals of statistics to prove quite the opposite. Russia was seeing the rapid development of capitalism in every part of the economy and those parts of the economy that were organised in older ways, were being squeezed by new markets, trade with the cities and production for profit.

One of the things that Lenin is keen to argue for, is the progressive nature of capitalist relations over those that preceed this. This theme runs through the book. For instance, in discussing the migration of labour around Russia aslabrouers seek work and better wages he writes:

Like the diversion of the population from agriculture to the towns, non-agricultural migration is a progressive phenomenon. It tears the population out of the neglected backward, history-forgotten remote spots and draws them into the whirlpool of modern social life. It increases literacy among the population, heightens their understanding, and gives them civilised habits and requirements.

Lenin cites studies and statistics to back up these claims. His argument is not just, however, that capitalist relations improve the lives and conditions (and outlook) of the producers, but also that the capitalist mode of production is an advance on the old feudal order, improving output, quality and developing the means of production rapidly. He thus rails against those, such as the Narodniks, who argue that capitalism is not a development, but rather a worsening of the situation for ordinary producers. They celebrate the older social relations, the small production units, the family farms and manufacturers, failing to recognise the historic significance of the emergence of capitalism out of feudalism. Lenin writes:

[The Narodnik economists] deny the progressive nature of capitalism in Russia, pointing to the fact that in agriculture our entrepreneurs readily resort to labour-service and in industry to the distribution of home work and that in mining they seek to secure the tying down of the worker, legislative prohibition of competition by small establishments, etc., etc. The illogicality of such arguments and their flagrant distortion of historical perspective are glaring. Whence, indeed, does it follow that the efforts of our entrepreneurs to utilise the advantages of pre-capitalist methods of production should be charged to our capitalism, and not to those survivals of the past which retard the development of capitalism and which in many cases are preserved by force of law?

He continues:

Should we not... be surprised at the fact that, under the circumstances, there are people who are capable of idealising the pre-capitalist economic order in Russia, and who shut their eyes to the most urgent and pressing necessity of abolishing all obsolete institutions that hinder the development of capitalism.

This is not to say that Lenin ignores the way that capitalism exploits working people. While arguing that "the drawing of women and juveniles into production is, at bottom, progressive" he continues that "the capitalist factory places these categories of the working population in particularly hard conditions" and argues for legislation that will reduce hours of work, improve conditions and so on. But he is very clear that it would be wrong to argue for the banning of women and young people from working in factories. The reason is, he argues, that the entry of these sections of the population into industry is smashing apart the old patriarchal order:

By destroying the old patriarchal isolation of these categories of the population who formerly never emerged from the narrow circle of domestic, family relationships, by drawing them into direct participation in social produciton, large-scale machine industry stimulates their development and increases their independence, in other words, creates conditions of life that are incomparably superior to the patriarch immobility of pre-capitalist relations.

It is remarkable to see how Lenin understands these dynamics, celebrating the shattering of old social relations and the emergence of new relations as capitalism develops new towns, new technology and draws millions into new forms of production.

Lenin tracks the way this takes place, first noting how emerging capitalist relations in the countryside have created stratas among the peasantry, the richer ones taking more land and beginning to employ other peasants as workers, then expanding their interests into other forms of production. He writes:

The separation of industry from agriculture takes place in connection with the differentiation of the peasantry, and does so by different paths at the two poles of the countryside: the wrll-to-do minority open industrial establishments, enlarge them improve their farming methods, hire farm labourers to till the land, devote and increasing part of the year to industry and... find it more convenient to separate their industrial from their agricultural undertakings.

Lenin emphasises the importance of the parallel processes of the "depeasantising" of the peasantry as labowners move from "labour-service" to wage labour, together with the transition of agriculture "into commodity production". This was the start, but it is inseparable from the development of capitalist industrial production. The parallels with the development of capitalism in England as analysed by Marx, are clear for all to see.

Lenin also follows Marx by noting that in addition to capitalism's exploitation of workers, it also impacts other relations. Here, for instance, Lenin discusses how the relationship between agriculture and industry could be mutually beneficial:

The growth of agricultural technical trades is extremely important as regards the development of capitalism. Firstly, this growth represents one of the forms of the development of commercial farming, and is, moreover, the form that shows most vividly the conversion of agriculture into a branch of industry of capitalist society. Secondly, the development of the technical processing of agricultural produce is usually connected intimately with technical progress in agriculture: on the one hand, the very production of the raw material for processing often necessitates agricultural improvement (the planting of root-crops, for example); on the other hand, the waste products of the processing are frequently utilised in agriculture, thus increasing its effectiveness and restoring, at least in some measure, the equilibrium, the interdependence, between agriculture and industry, the disturbance of which constitutes one of the most profound contradictions of capitalism.

Marx's writing on the "metabolic rift" between human society and nature, emerged from his critique of capitalist agriculture, and here Lenin shows his awareness of this, through a recognition that a rational use of the by-products of food processing could be used to offset one of capitalism's most profound contradictions.

In mentioning Marx, we should finish of this review by noting that Lenin's work (like Marx's Capital) has little to say about socialism. This is because Lenin, again like Marx, is engaged in a project of understanding capitalism in order to progress the radical and revolutionary movement against it. The Development of Capitalism in Russia is in effect a polemic against those who fail to grasp either the development of capitalism itself in that country or its historical significance.

Lenin's sharp awareness of the development and growth of the working class in rural and urban areas is a recognition in the emergence of a force in Russia that could challenge both capitalism and the remnants of the old order. A few years after the completion of the first edition of this book, that working class would explode onto Russia's historical stage in the revolution of 1905, the dress rehearsal for the revolution of 1917. Lenin would further develop these ideas in his articles on the agrarian programme for the left.

Few today read The Development of Capitalism in Russia. This is a shame. It is a book that has perhaps been unduly neglected for Marxists studying the development of capitalism. Much of the material here has clear parallels with the emergence of capitalism in Europe. The book is, in places, a difficult read - mostly because Lenin backs up every single argument with multiple statistics and figures. Some of the editions of this work have some beautiful pull outs of tables, and facsimilies of Lenin's original drafts. The figures however should not deter the reader. There's much of interest here.

Monday, May 18, 2026

Willa Cather - O Pioneers!

I stumbled upon Willa Cather's O Pioneers!' due to my interest in the people and history of the North American praire. First published in 1913, but in part based on the authors' own experiences as a youngster in the late 1800s, it feels like a very modern novel.

Alexandra Bergson is the capable and highly intelligent daughter of her and her brothers' beloved widowed father. On his death she takes over the running of the land and through a series of carefully planned decisions manages to turn the farm into a highly successful concern. She carefully questions the other farmers, reads the news and keeps abreast of the market, planting crops that are considered marginal, until they become highly profitable. Quickly the farm expands, but Alexandra herself defies convention - she doesn't marry and prefers an austere lifestyle. Eventually she falls out with her brothers who are convinced that despite her leadership on the farm, most of the land is rightfully hers.

The book, like many others of its type, tells a number of shorter stories centred on the lives and loves of the people in the area. There are two great arcs though, the first centres on Alexandra and her relationship to the land. The land is a key character in the novel - the changing seasons as well as the industrialisation of the farms as they change from early, amateur efforts into a managed landscape. The other arc traces the love between Alexandra's younger brother Emil and her, married, friend Marie.

These stories form the heart of the novel. The praire is a tough place to farm. As the novel opens many farms are failing and families are heading back to the cities to try for jobs in factories and industry to improve their lot. The reader knows, of course, that two decades after this novel is set the Dustbowl and the Great Depression will decimate the farms again. But Alexandra draws the farm into prosperity in a time when farming in North America could boom.

But what struck me reading the book was the novel's treatment of three issues that feel very modern. The first of these is gender and sexuality. It is very likely that Willa Cather herself was LGBT+. It is hard not to see some of her life in Alexandra's decisions which seem to defy the traditional relationships of the community around her.

Secondly is the question of Mental Distress. One of the people who work on Alexandra's farm is Ivar. A many who hate the killing of animals, who prefers to live alone and prefers a cave to a house. He is a wizard with horses and animal care, he advises Alexandra how to look after their pigs when others are dying of disease. But his unusual behaviour and frequent mood swings and depressions lead some to think that Ivar is dangerous and threatening. Once again, in defiance of the community around her, Alexandra refuses to accept this and promises to become Ivar's ward if the doctors come to take him away. This kindness brings its rewards towards the end of the novel. But the most interesting thing is how this kindness and rejection of the stigma of mental health feels so unusal for a novel of this time period.

Finally, the question of immigration is central to the story. Almost everyone in the book is a Swedish-American immigrant. The religion, politics and culture of the old world is transplanted to the New, and evolves. At the back of many of the older members of society are their hopes and dreams, and memories, of Europe.

There is one big ommission - Native Americans play no role in the book. I didn't see a single reference, which is disappointing given the great themes of land and labour.

While the nostalgia that is at the heart of the motive power of O Pioneers! can feel a little thick at times, this is still a powerful and moving book. I look forward to reading the follow up books in Cather's trilogy.

Related Reviews

Norris - The Octopus
Williams - Butcher's Crossing
Cronon - Nature's Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West
McDonald - The Red Corner: The Rise & Fall of Communism in Northeastern Montana