Doug Henwood wrote:
>
> Justin Schwartz wrote:
>
> >Oops, sorry, there I go talking about alternatives again, silly utopian me.
>
> Not a problem here! Utope away.
>
Talking abour alternatives _in itself_ is not utopian. But to talk about an alternative (even an alternative plan for a cocktail party or a day at the beach) in isolation from a careful consideration of the kind of conditions that would make the alternative a issue is something else. What are the processes through which the working class would be in a position to impose any kind of structure. What kind of social conditions would such processes create? (For example, would the last 5 years of the route to socialism lay waste through riots all the major cities and wreck the power network?) And so forth. If you talk about an alternative assuming that conditions in which it will be implemented do not differ fundamentally from present conditions, then you are being worse than utopian, you are being silly.
Would the conditions under which a day at the beach is possible include transportation systems not operative, plans for the beach would be silly.
Prior to any socialist regime in the u.s. (whether 'peacefully' achieved or by insurrection) there will be immense bloodshed for many prior years. That's the way the capitalist state operates. Were a real socialist party to become a significant threat to gain electoral power in even one state, death squad activity would balloon. That would make many people unhappy, and various kinds of nuts would begin to operate in individualist ways. That would both make more people unhappy and trigger more police violence and repression. Property would be destroyed. Politicians would be assassinated. Et cetera. How do those workers who are going to run those cooperatives get the training to be responsible?
You can't separate pictures of results from descriptions of the modes of struggle (and the modes of repression) that might make those results possible.
Carrol