Changed Subject Line from Re: (no subject)
Comments below...
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
> [mailto:owner-lbo-talk at lists.panix.com]On Behalf Of Der Mann ohne
> Eigenschaften
> Sent: Thursday, October 24, 2002 12:39 AM
> To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
> Subject: Re: (no subject)
>
>
> > > >>>As was said in the piece on "The Left and 9/11"
> > > by Don Guttenplan, for
> > > some "there is only one imperialism, and if it
> isn't
> > > American it's not imperialism." Hence the volley
> of red
> > > herrings.<<<
> > >
> > > are there many competing imperialisms today?
> >
> > There is one country currently capable of world
> > imperialism, but there are
> > several movements and regimes that are fascist or
> > authoritarian oligarchies.
> > We should be careful not to support fascism or
> > oligarchy as a way to combat
> > imperialism. That is suicidal.
>
> were the taliban fascist? then, today's fascism must
> be a weak force, as they got pretty easily louted by a
> few months of bombings, special forces, assorted warlords....
This is an absurd reductionism of the term fascist to be equivalent to military power.
See: Towards A Marxist Theory Of Fascism by Dave Renton http://members.lycos.co.uk/mere_pseud_mag_ed/Ideology/Renton-Theory.htm
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"The earliest expression of the 'Third' Marxist theory of fascism probably originated outside Italy, in the discussions of the Communist International (Comintern). At first, the Comintern failed to take fascism sufficiently seriously: at the third Congress of the Communist International, in June and July 1921, the discussion on Italy was limited to calls for the formation of a united Italian Communist Party. The Russian delegation's paper 'On Tactics', failed to discuss fascism at all. At the 4th Congress, which was held between November and December 1922, the discussion seems to have been far more urgent. There were four sessions in which fascism was discussed, and the consensus of analysis combined the left stress on fascism as anti-proletarian reaction with the 'right' emphasis on fascism as a mass movement with a logic of its own. In the words of the Thesis On Comintern Tactics, for example, 'The characteristic feature of 'classical' Italian fascism... is that the fascists not only form counter-revolutionary fighting organisations, armed to the teeth, but also attempt to use social demagogy to gain a base among the masses.' "
"Two sources from 1923 reveal a similar approach: Klara Zetkin's speech to the Executive of the Comintern and Gyula Sas's Der Fascismus in Italien. Zetkin explained the rise of fascism within a context of shifting class forces, using a language of dynamism and change, similar to that used by Marx in The Eighteenth Brumaire. She described fascism as the product of a period, itself shaped by 'the decay and the disintegration of the capitalist economy;' which combined with 'the standstill in the world revolution;' to enable a capitalist offensive. Inside this context, fascism could grow. Fascism was an ally of the bourgeoisie, not its instrument. Zetkin criticised both left and right analyses of fascism. She stressed that fascism was 'a mass movement with deep social roots;' but re-iterated the point, also, that fascism was a product of capitalist society, which could only be destroyed by a workers revolution. Sas, a Hungarian Communist living in Italy, followed Zetkin. He synthesised the left and right analyses of fascism, and in the process he went beyond them. He blamed their mutual over-simplifications on the Italian Marxists' inability to look beyond the immediate situation. 'The Italian workers were in too close contact,' he argued, 'to have a clear perspective'. Like Zetkin, he linked the rise of fascism to a period of capitalist offensive. Like Zetkin, again, he stressed that this 'explanation' was insufficient. Sas married the theories of the left and the right Marxists: fascism was both a new form of capitalist dictatorship, which aimed to crush working-class organisations; and, at the same time, a political movement which employed a language that combined socialist and nationalist terms and which appeared revolutionary, and which had a mass support. What follows from this analysis is the notion that fascism was contradictory. Fascism as a specific historical force was shaped by the conflict between the reactionary goals of the movement, and the mass base of support that the movement received. "
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Let me pose a sharper question. Do you support allying with brutal authoritarian regimes to smash imperialism? Is the enemy of my enemy always my friend?
-Chip Berlet