Socialism must be democracy

Max Sawicky sawicky at epinet.org
Mon Mar 27 14:28:04 PST 2000


. . . If Charles Brown wants to explore the democratic character of socialism, Marx and Engels themselves are not quite handy. One can probably be true to the democratic spirit of the extraordinary powerful heritage of critical Marxism by going beyond Marx himself in some respects. I dare say, that is probably the best way to show respect to Marx. Manjur Karim


>>>>>>>

Bravo. All the jazz about popular sovereignty "the working class as the ruling class," "rule of the majority," etc. are utterly meaningless, since they beg all questions of rights and democratic procedures. If we had a vote every 20 years to Lord High Supreme Muckety-Muck, that could be described as rule by majority.

Some people feel obliged to apologize for any affront to democratic norms by the PRC government that anyone points to. It would be more forthright to simply admit that democracy has been sacrificed. Then we could consider whether the outcome of such a cost is worthy of it.

mbs



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list