The MacDonald Government¶
Core Argument¶
In October 1920, H.G. Wells visited Lenin in Moscow, an encounter that Lenin later dismissed as that of a “Philistine” and “middle class” mediocrity. Wells’s subsequent article revealed nothing of Lenin but everything of Wells’s own conceit: he complained about the difficulty of obtaining an audience, betraying his belief that he was honouring Russia with his visit; claimed Lenin was “not a writer”, ignorant of his major theoretical works; and offered a trivial, patronising physical description of the “little man” whose feet scarcely touched the floor. Wells imagined a Foreign Office minder was present to restrain Lenin’s imprudence. The conversation consisted of Wells lecturing Lenin on “evolutionary collectivism”—a Fabian project to civilise capitalism through education—while Lenin countered with facts demonstrating capitalism’s incurable predatory nature. Wells admitted to an “uphill argument” but used this to lecture British capitalists, never questioning his own position. This mentality, the author argues, typifies the British Labour Party’s leading layer: backward, arrogant, and burdened with bourgeois prejudices.
Trotsky’s analysis of the MacDonald government confirms this judgment. MacDonald is utterly subservient to the British bourgeoisie, a political steward who could win mass working-class support by abolishing the monarchy and House of Lords, nationalising land, mines, railways and banks, and building workers’ housing. Instead, he is conservative, defending the monarchy, private property and the church—a flexible, Menshevik institution that befuddles working-class consciousness. MacDonald preaches Christian morality yet confirms new cruisers and tanks, maintains the Conservative government’s military plans, and allies with Poincaré’s France against the Soviet Union. In the colonies, the Labour government is already hated: Trotsky cites MacDonald crowning a new Caliph in the Hejaz after Turkey abolished the caliphate, while cutting unemployment benefit.
The MacDonald government reflects the omnipotence of the London Stock Exchange, of which MacDonald is effectively the authorised agent. Soviet Russia is impoverished but tells the truth; Britain and France, as wealthy creditor nations, expect negotiations conducted with a bowed head. France insists it must be paid first as the chief creditor of Tsarist Russia. Britain cannot lend to Germany without creating a powerful industrial competitor, but can lend to the Soviet Union in exchange for raw materials and agricultural produce. The conservative-pacifist illusions of the British working class are booming under Labour, yet the number of strikes has sharply increased. MacDonald quivers at the voice of the bourgeoisie and restrains the proletariat. A broad treaty with the Soviet Union would combine British naval force with Soviet land power and compel European disarmament, but MacDonald is an unconscious tool of historical laws, preparing the ground for British Bolshevism against his own wishes. The Labour government’s rule will ultimately strengthen the revolutionary wing of the British working class.