Let me comment first that there are now decades of internationalist discussions which have learned that the progressive forces inside a country naturally have tasks and priorities that are different to those of the progressive forces outside that country. Russell may well be right about certain targets of internal struggle. But from a world stage, those of us in places like the USA and England need to recognise that South Africa as a whole is oppressed and exploited.
>Chris Burford wrote:
>
>
>>Conflict resolution measures seem to be compatible with a marxist approach:
>>they define interest groups which have material needs. They avoid
>>idealising peace, and argue that it is an alternative to war, and another
>>way of managing conflict. The main weakness of conflict resolution
>>discourse at the moment is its lack of specific reference to classes. But
>>progressive influence could help shape that.
>
>I doubt it. I believe the "conflict resolution approach is in fact part of
>the new shape being taken by the humanitarian interventionist approach of
>the big powers.
Certainly it has this aspect as well, but it is part of the developing understanding of the state and of how to run countries that does not rely only on the violent oppression of one class or group by another. It recognises power issues, including ones that are very unequal, and then tries to negotiate around them.
This is one of the respects in which imperialism may be progressive by comparison with pre-monopoly capitalism.
>South Africa has in particular been a testing ground for
>this via the Truth & Reconciliation Commission.
I was not mainly thinking of the TRC but of the long drawn out negotiations by which the apartheid South African armed forces, accepted re-organisation and integration with Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing of the ANC, even though the apartheid forces had not been defeated internally.
>And what about the lousy deal people have had to put up with since? That's
>the real issue for me.
Sure but was it a deal? How could any post apartheid regime have bucked the power of the international bond traders? Do your think that the progressive economic policy promoted by some left wing economists as an option before the election, could ever have worked against the power of international finance capital? I think not, which is why I favoured an international struggle continuing for reparations to the people of Africa for the apartheid wars.
>Open confrontation has literally been made illegal
>and replaced with all sorts of institutionalised resolution measures.
I am sure that you have serious grounds for your statements. But what is the purpose of promoting economist trade union struggles for higher wages if the economy as a whole is at the mercy of international finance capital?
>But don't you see that the new "humanitarian" West will always try to use a
>more friendly-looking local surrogate to do the job?
Of course. That does not stop a campaign to make that surrogate responsible.
>>The line of demarcation with imperialism on intervention is not
>>intervention as such but is on the economic programme of reconstruction
>>that usually follows intervention. In many ways the referendum in East
>>Timor is part of the fragmentation of the Indonesian state into different
>>areas often defined by religion. This process has been accelerated by the
>>crises of international finance capital. Finance capital cannot provide the
>>answers about how different communal groups can live and productively work
>>together. A more radical democratic economic programme should accompany
>>these interventions, calling for preservation of the security of livelihood
>>of the poorest people of the territory.
>
>I'm opposed to all intervention.
Saying that does not stop intervention and influence, which occurs a thousand and one ways every week, mainly in the interests of imperialism.
>However, accepting your aguments for the
>sake of debate, how on earth could it ever be enforced given the balance of
>forces.
US hegemonism is not all powerful. In Indonesia and East Timor it had to get some formal agreement from the Security Council of the United Nations.
By choosing the target correctly it is possible to affect the momentum of world history. To believe the opposite is to give up.
>Who will put forward your "radical democratic economic programme"?
Well a second rate singer like Bob Geldorf, in alliance with the Pope will put it forward, by calling for change in the Bretton Woods institutions that have overseen the present massive debt situation.
>Just look at the neo-colonial style setup in the bits of the former
>Yugoslavia under western rule for the real results of what you propose. Or
>are you saying that some of the big powers involved might play this
>"progressive" role?
"To carry on a war for the overthrow of the international bourgeoisie, a war which is a hundred times more difficult, protracted and complicated than the most stubborn of ordinary wars between states, and to refuse beforehand to manouvre, to utilize the conflict of interests (even though temporary) among one's enemies, to refuse to temporize and compromise with possible (even though temporary, unstable, vacillating and conditional) allies - is this not ridiculous in the extreme?" (Need I cite the author yet again? - he just puts the argument so eloquently.)
> Your appraoch postulates some sort
>of disinterested overarching humanitarian force which just doesn't exist.
No it does not. It says that the formation of a global state will occur through many partial, temporary, unsatisfactory compromises, in which the progressive forces hopefully usually at each turn choose the less reactionary side. Meanwhile an international law is being hammered out that to some extent stands above classes and nations, even while at the same time it is enforced by armed men controlled more by some nations than others.
>The humainitarian approach is in reality the current form of imperialist
>intervention at a time when the West's need for old-style despots in the
>third world no longer exists.
Yes. And it may partly be progressive compared for example to what Russia is doing in Chechnya now.
>They would much rather decorate their
>interference in the affairs of small countries with humanitarian and
>civilising trappings.
Is this new, of any ruling class or ruling group?
>What world governance? Is your understanding that particular national
>interests have been superceded?
No but overarching ideas emerge. It is unprecedented that Pinochet is still under house arrest in London as the result of a developing international concept of crimes against humanity, even though at present that is enforced by English law.
>>4) that the marxist theory of the state, on the international level as well
>>as the national, (and by that I mean the emerging forces of a global
>>superstate) is not purely about a body of armed men capable of suppressing
>>one group in favour of another. It is also about shaping and having an
>>ideological framework of social justice, which to some extent has a life of
>>its own, to which appeals can be made.
>>
>You seem to be talking about some mythical international state form which
>can exist prior to the removal of what exists today.
If Pinochet was bound only by a myth he would be free to fly to Chile to die in peace today.
>>5) that to weaken imperialism and transnationals, world structures should
>>be strengthened and redesigned to set a stadnard of accountability. One of
>>the most important powers for a new world government is to be able to raise
>>taxes directly to pay for its own independent intervention force.
>
>
>Again what are you talking about? Where are the signs of such a phenomenon?
I am talking about discussing ways of raising world taxation, something specifically censured by moves initiated by Jessie Helms in the US congress to cut off all US funds to any bodies promoting ideas of independent raising of global taxation.
Your scepticism on this point inadvertently plays into the hands of ruthless imperialists like Jessie Helms. Think about why he would have wanted to insist on this, if it was so unnecessary.
I appreciate you taking up the challenge to debate these issues.
Chris Burford
London