A Modest Proposal for The Empire

Margaret Ladd margaret_ladd at yahoo.com
Mon Dec 24 16:09:02 PST 2001


--- Thomas Seay <entheogens at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I know this diqualifies Hardt and Negri as having
> any
> legitimacy since you leninists already know
> everything
> and know how things should work (and look at the
> societies you have created with your wisdom.)

In fact all revolutions led by "Leninists" have been marked by their distinctness. Tito's Yugoslavia had nothing in common with Castro's Cuba, and Mao's China virtually threw the classic literature about proletarian revolution out the window. Sandinista Nicaragua celebrated Daniel Ortega's electoral victory by playing Michael Jackson at his windup rally.

Mostly, these revolutions seem to owe more to pragmatism than Marx--as indeed they would have to. When revolutionaries come to power, they tend to be constrained by material conditions rather than shape them. That's the unfortunate reality of socialist revolutions in the post-1917 epoch.

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