Page - 260 - in Otto Bauer (1881–1938) - Thinker and Politician

260 chapter 6 able functionsofdemocracy in theproletarianstruggle foranewsocialorder promptsaquery:howdidhereconcilehisparliamentaryhopeswiththeinev- itabilityofsocialism?Infact, theansweris farsimplerthanthequestionitself. The inevitabilityof socialismdue toobjectivehistorical lawswasadogmaof theSecond International.With thepassageof time, it degenerated into rhet- oric,thoughadmittedlysomeSocialDemocrats,includingBauer,unflinchingly believed in it until the end. Even so, faith did not prevent them from focus- ing on specific duties in their political practice, including using parliament asaplatform.TheSocialDemocrats regardedreformsthathelpedto improve the condition of theworking class in the bourgeois state as necessary steps toovercomethecapitalistsystem.Consequently,all reformsachievedthrough parliamentwereregardedasstepping-stonesonthepathtosocialism–nodis- tinctionbetweenshort-termandlong-termobjectiveswasmade.Thepostwar social-democraticmovementpreservedthissentiment,believingtherewasno need to discontinue capitalist property relations or attack bourgeois demo- cracy, but rather to takeadvantageof the legal frameworkof the state towin economicandpolitical reformsintheinterestof thebroadestsocial layers. AsitwasBauer’sbeliefthatbourgeoisdemocracyrepresentedatransitional stage between capitalism and socialism, it is necessary to assess the three central premisesuponwhichBauerbasedhis ideaof democracy’s inevitable developmenttowardssocialism.Thefirstwasthatthedemocraticformsofthe capitaliststatewererelativelyenduring.Thesecondwasbasedonasociological argument: thenumber of employees grewasmembers of themiddle classes becamedeclassed, and thisaffected theirpolitical consciousness.Toadvance their own interests, Bauer thought, they would endorse the programme of SocialDemocracy,whichwouldleadtheworkers’partytovictory.Upuntil1932, Bauerofferednoexplanationas towhy theeconomic crisis saw theworking massesbolstertheranksofthefascistsratherthantheSocialDemocrats. The third premise decisively shaped the idea that bourgeois democracy wasaprerequisite forsocialist transformation. Itcontainedanimportant idea of Bauer’s unique position in the socialist movement. He assumed that it was possible to deepen democracy by associating the principle of popular sovereigntywith the social and economic realms. In his texts, he developed the concept of functional democracy to substantiate this. The core idea of functionaldemocracywasthat thedemocraticsocial structures thatmadeup apoliticalsystemevolvedfrombelow. TheconceptoffunctionaldemocracywasanintegralcomponentofBauer’s dynamicmodelofdemocracy–onemightsayasupplementtopoliticaldemo- cracy. His understanding of functional democracy and its special variation, industrialdemocracy,requiressomeexplanation.Inlayman’sterms,functional