>All very true. As you both point out, some agreement on goals and
>strategy is essential for self-criticism, and that is certainly
>lacking in "the left" today. I would also agree with you that it may
>not be very sensible to talk about "the left" as a coherent entity
>today, but we seem to be still in the habit of using it as a
>shorthand term, though *what* it is shorthand for is increasingly
>vague.
I'd welcome discussion on goals and strategies, short-term, mid-term, and long-term. Perhaps, you can help us begin a constructive discussion on them by laying out what you think.
>But there is certainly a widespread dissatisfaction with the state
>of what it *used*, anyway, to make sense to call "the left" in the
>U.S. Whatever we want to call these folks now, they (we) seem to
>have very little power to affect the course of events, and there
>seems to be a vague notion that this is not entirely the result of
>outside forces, but has at least something to do with mistakes that
>"these folks" have been making.
>
>There is also a very strong feeling, as far as I can see, that it
>would be a good thing if these mistakes could be corrected and a
>stronger, more unified bunch of folks (call them "progressive" or
>whatever) organized. Or if not one bunch, a lot of bunches with
>different goals and strategies, but such that they could work
>synergistically with each other to help bring about a better world
>(maybe they could at least agree roughly on what "better" means
>here).
There have been a number of enlightening works on the history of a variety of struggles on the left in the United States: Max Elbaum, _Revolution in the Air: From Malcolm and Martin to Lenin, Mao, and Che_ (2001); Michael Kazin, _The Populist Persuasion: An American History_ (1995); Nelson N. Lichtenstein, _Labor's War at Home: the CIO in World War II_ (1992); Robin D.G. Kelley, _Hammer and Hoe: Alabama Communists During the Great Depression_ (1990); Mark Naison, _Communists in Harlem during the Depression_ (1983); etc. We can learn a lot from such works. The problem is that we, lacking in a mass movement, are not even in a position to make the same mistakes as theirs, whatever mistakes they made respectively.
>One big problem, it seems to me, is that, being in this powerless
>state, the various "left" groups become even more angry and
>resentful than before, and therefore lash out at each other,
>accusing each other of betraying the noble cause and acting as
>"class traitors" and "objective allies of the capitalist enemy,"
>etc. Perhaps one place self-criticism could start is with reflection
>on whether this kind of conflict really serves any purpose. In any
>case, "self-criticism" means *self*-criticism -- not just
>automatically assuming that one's own group or tendency has the
>right theory and practice, and everyone else is a jackass or worse.
So far, what has been offered here under the cover of "self-criticism" has been vague complaints about some other leftists or leftist groups -- not enlightening. -- Yoshie
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