GDR and PDS

[Johannes Schneider]

Alex  wrote:
>Thanks for your posts, Johannes, they're very interesting.  One question
>I do have though, is how do you define *Stalinist*?
Actually 'Stalinist' is among those terms that are of little scientific or
analytical value. It ranks just after 'petty-bourgeois'. Almost everyone
agrees its something bad, but you will seldom find two persons having the
same understanding of those terms. Nevertheless sometimes all of us use
terms like that.
I personally was surprised to see the registered Green and Adorno fan Dennis
showing interest in the PDS after having been disappointed by the Greens.
Recently a few (not so many) Greens joined the PDS.
>Where are you
>coming from politically?  Are you an independent marxist, bureaucratic
>collectivist, workers stater, flowing free and easy with the breeze,etc?
Ah, Billy you like definitions and categories. Though definitions are
basically non-dialectically they are sometimes usefull for the economics of
the mind. Just to give you some in hint, I am coming from a Trotskyte
background.
>Personally, my politics are close to the Fourth International
There are so many of them... I assume you mean the USec.
> but I'm
>relatively new to socialism and while I dont think that the fall of the
>GDR or the Soviet Union was a positvie development I still have
>questions about how the working classes in those countries could have
>organized to overthrow the bureacracies, given the political
>dictatorships that were in place there.
Did you ever consider the idea that developments in given society might have
positive and negative aspects at the same time. It seems you are holding the
position of a 'deformed workers state'. When arguing against anti-communist
prejudices this position is quite good, but when arguing positively what
socialism should look like taking the GDR or the Soviet Union as examples of
albeit 'deformed' workers state does not sound very impressive.
>The PDS sounds like the Russian CP- lots of bureaucratic leftovers and
>not a lot of potential for independent politics.
No, they are not as bad as that. Certainly they are no anti-semites like the
CPRF. Quite contrary the PDS and especially there leader in parliament were
the victims of anti-semitic campaigns.
Furthermore you have to keep in mind that the CPRF is much firmer rooted
within Russian society than the PDS in East Germany. There is no equivalent
to the Russian 'Red Directors' in East Germany. A lot of management
positions in the economy and the state apparatus in the East are now held by
people from the West. Sociologically the PDS is more the party of the former
East German officials. So during elections they get the highest scores (in
the East) among people with a university degree. This makes the PDS open to
reformist ideas and looking backward at the same time.
Johannes