had been involved in 'treasonable' activities to oust the government in 1974. other revelations, are now printed from ex-MI5 agent Peter Wright's Spycatcher — the book in which the voluntarily exiled former spy has poured his memoirs.
The extent and breadth disregard. Indeed contempt. tor legar procedure which the security services engaged in, is startling. The illegalities' included bizarrely a discredit Paisley' campaign considered by MIS during the Ulsters' Workers Council strike in 1974 including a plan for his assassination. VOSE Importanly reported that Spycatcher contains 'information on 23 criminal conspiracies and 12 instances of treason by members of the British security services' and that Wright and a colleague burgled their way across London at the state's behest'. while top civil servants "looked the other way' operated within the "Thou shall not get caught' Despite a growing clamour cher has refused point blank to hold a public enquiry. ' The Attorney General started proceedings for The Independent and other papers that reported details about the MIS plot against Harold Wilson. Such action, according to the Speaker, made the issue sub judice (ie, under judicial consideration ) therefore it cannot be discussed in parliament. High Court has already agreed to the proceedings against the three papers.
James Callaghan has refused to call for an enquiry. The press is stressing that only a 'small handful' of 'nutters' was involved. State In fact the affair indicates why the state exists. So that when the ruling class feeels the 'normal democratic procedure' threatens its dominance resorts to the permanent institutions of the state to ensure the maintenance of its rule. The fact that sections MIS believe that the 1974 Wilson government threatened capitalism does not alter the essence of the matter - they were simply being over zealous.
MIS together with MI6, the Privy Council, the monarchy, the Church England, the Judiciary, the police, top echelons of the civil service, and the armed forces, among others, stitutions of the British state which are. unaccountable to democratic scrutiny. This bourgeos state 1s the machiner through which the ruling class exerts political power over society. As Ernest Mandel wrote in The Marxist Theory of the State: 'The power of the state is a permanent Dower' tions 'are isolated from and independent of so changeable and unstable an influence as universal suffrage of the reported papers cher).
'Security Service'
my', 'bugged and must also and that MIS 11th commandwithout elections -Thatcriminal con1o celera vidas sacred schots.
The nant ideology. Reason non-elected Wing the 1984-85 strike, harassing the plains the reality, are in- essence of class rule gressive movement against its guide for working class action.
parliament rules, and its institusprove ethal.
The people who serve in these institutions know what they are ior: 'Politicians may come and go, but the Security Service goes on tor ever' (one remarks in SpycatYou just have to replace the with 'courts', ar 'police' or 'civil servants' in the above citation and the real nature of the state institutions becomes clear. The indispensability of such bodies stressed because bourgeois rule can be enforced and maintainea without parlament anc as in Nazi Germany. But capital cannot rule without these permanent state institutions. force Marxists don't adhere to a particular theory of the state for either ideological or dogmatic reasons, not They do so because Marx's theory allows the understanding of the real essence of structures like the state. It is a role quite different to its purely apparent functions embellished by the domiBut there is a much more tundamental reason for adhering to the Marxist theory of the state. The state affects people in very real ways: it kills them, it imprisons them, it represses them. lhe state acoures a most vivid expression when somebody is hit in worse. It manifests itself in all the acts of violence of class rule such as in the sequestration of the NUM funds durin the killing which and maiming of ordinary people by the use of plastic bullets and in the strip searches against women in Northern Ireland; in the bailiffs and cops Greenham Common women: in the dalv police harassment and violence against blacks and gays. The marxist theory of the state ex- vants, as well as the and thereby the working class and enemies. Marxist theory has/should have very practical implications: it is a after Anyone who believes either that For inal lo be in government amounts to holding actual power, suffers from delusions that in key moments of the class strug The widespread theoretical misconception reformists, socialists, Stalinists, liberals that confuses who governmental office with who holds state power has led the working class to disastrous and tragic defeats.
Engels wrote in the introduction to the Communist Manifesto One thing especially was proved by the (Paris) Commune, viz that working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes The proletariat, in order to succeed, has to destroy the bourgeois state apparatus and build a new one to working rule murderous defeat of the working class in 1973, and what showed about the state apparatus illustrates inis point rather convincing ly - as well as showing a rather more advance case of the activities describ ed by Peter Wright.
Parties During Allende's Popular Unity government in Chile from 1970-73 the parties of the ruling class in Chile lost control of government to a coalition led by Communists and Socialists. However, the bourgeoisie never lost control of the indispensable permanent insitutions of the state, especially the armed forces. The key lesson to be democratic rule is not working for its interests, does not hesitate to break its own legality and engage in activities discredit thr ugh assassination plots campaigns to a bloody coup d'etat.
The Chilean ruling class had its power entrenched in all the non acountable institue negof sessean, apparatus systell. judiciary, secret services , top civil serpolice forces. It hatched plot after plot and engaged in endless obstruction and sabotage throughout the period of Allende's government. From the moment its parties lost the election, bourgeoisie began to plot. The day campaign phone calls organised by the outgoing Chancellor of the Exchequor, Christian Democrat Rafael Zaldivar began urging people to withdraw their bank deposits.
This was followed by the kidnapp. among ing, General Rene Schneider, the chief of holds staff, before Allende was sworn in as president Schneider sidered not hostile Alende government. Inis assassina• tion involved generals from all three that: branches of the armed forces and the police.
'the and eventual assassination of British nowhere enough the Wing class.
Democratic conspired not police, special drew up contingency plans to wave paramilitary groups, Lenin, commitment professional, This obedient plays which including disciplinperiod that office was force injunctions, tion.
Populai Unity to contend with such Obviously, the situation facing the working today those faced by . 1LS Chilean counterpart in 1970-73. The MIS plot against Wilson was merely a fringe foretaste of what would hap pen here should a left wing government threaten the interests of the rulNevertheless, the Peter Wright revelations do get to the core of the The unaccountable instituhons ol tne stale nave to De placea m their proper context - that of being Dar geois pue. That applies both here and parcel of the totality of and in Chile. The revelations concern ing plots to overthrow Wilson, other reported MIS activities, have once again concretely exposed the true essence of the state.
Belief The widespread belief the state stands as an 'impartial arbiter' above the selfish claims of diverse interes claims of particular classes, is simply false. Equally false is the view that the state is a class struc ture presiding over a pure democracy based on the consent of the people following Marx Engel's footsteps, defined the state as 'the organisation of violence for the repression of one class by another. It is for that reason that bureaucracy and the standing army are the mos! characteristic institutions of the state.
does not mean that the capitalist state is exclusively and sole ly an instrument of armed repression.
an important role in the reproduction of the entire system ol infations of capitalist production ce educating workforce maintaining its family sytem, and sus taining its ideology. But in the las analysis all these rest directly on the ruling class's domination of armed armed force organised to protect capitalist relations of producPeter Wright's revelations listed justa corner of the veil normally drawn over that reality. They showed that the marxist view of the state is not a 'dogma' but an accurate guide to it reality. It is to prevent that reality be ing seen that Thatcher, and reformists Callaghan, - doing everything possible to prevent -the publication of that book