L.L. Men (sometimes LLM or L.L.M.) was a Hong Kong-based left communist who in the 1980s corresponded and debated with at least the International Communist Current, Communist Workers Organization, and the Communist Bulletin group.
The book-length "Two Texts For Defining the Communist Programme" is comprised of two texts: "The Nature of the 'Socialist' Countries: A Politico-Economic Analysis" and "Russia: Revolution and Counter-Revolution (1917-1921)."
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Comments
Thanks for uploading this. Was critically reviewed by the CBG in this issue here:
https://libcom.org/library/communist-bulletin-issue-12-summer-1987
Many many thanks to schalken for uploading this book. Myself, I had it soon after publication and then lost it. Without having gone through all of it again, I might say that the author's demolition of the notion of any 'communist' content to early Bolshevik ' War "Communism" ' merits reading and comment. That's mainly on pages 178- 203.
Some quotes from this section (pardon for not using the quote function):
'The CWO seems to endow the abolition of the *phenomenal* form of money with a significance it does not have (cf. its muddleheaded thesis that money was 'abolished' in the state sector during War Communism). '
'We have already proven that the law of value was never touched during War Communism. At the same time, as the soviet government immediately began to rapidly destroy the Paris Commune principle as soon as it was formed (see the relevent section later), the nationalization movement which began in mid-1918 did not alter, in terms of real social relations and not legal categories, the separation of the producers from the means of production. '
'We do not need Marxist revolutionaries to peddle the ideology that War Communism was "proto-communist" while the NEP "restored capitalism". Bourgeois ideologues such as Carr are competent enough to propagate such ideologies'
'From this angle, though the NEP differed a great deal in details from the War Communist programme, both programmes were capitalist from A to Z. '
' As pointed out earlier, the payment of wage in kind did not change the nature of wage as variable capital. '
Dyjbas:
I don't recall that the CWO ever reviewed this book, which would be strange, Can you check and see?
It's quite a bit before my time, but I'll check if we have. I know that this doesn't correspond to our views nowadays (if it ever did):
See for example our pamphlet on Stalinism from the early 2000s:
So there is correspondence between us and L.L. Men in both Workers' Voice and Communist Review (our old publications, which unfortunately are not online - but plan is to have them up at some point). Some of it probably responds to the points made in these texts, and more (since it goes up to at least 1992).