I suppose, and as a person interested in political theory, modern history, and socialist thought (and if there is any such thing, action), I have a lingering interest in these matters (the histoty of the FSU and the Communist movement). Besides I used to be a sort of Sovietologist. I have a wall of books on the FSU that I really have to purge, most of them not only will I never read any more, but no one will. Still, there are ways and ways of discussing thing stuff:
1) a bad way, refighting the battles of the past as if nothing had happened since 1989 or 91 or whenever. having discussions in the manner of Norman Mailer's Barbary Coast (anyone ever read that relic?), Stalin or Trotsky, or like the old debates between Michael Harrington or Irving Howe or Max Schachtman and the New Left. There is no USSR to "defend" or attack any more. The remanants of the CPUSA are pretty much an old-folks club of practical centrist Democrats who like to talk big in their off hours. (It's not clear that apart from the handful of spies, and I mean handful, that they ever were anything else after the 30s.)
2) One OK way: understanding soberly what the nature and consequences of the 20th century wave of revolutions was. This is just modern history, but it has a political point. Hobsbawm and Anderson and Arrighi argue in different ways that Fukayama was right, that these upheavels depended on special circumstances that never existed, or early on ceased to exist, in the advanced capitalist countries, that far from being a first draft of socialism, the Stalinist regimes were a sort of brute force modernization programs for peasant societies with superannuated aristocratic governments, and the Communist movements in the West were part of an essentially social democratic self-defense effort that has had the ground cut out from under it by its own success as far as it has succeeded as well as by the discrediting of Stalinism.
That seem like a reasonable set of null hypotheses to me. I am not sure how much detailed discussion of the USSR and the Western Communist movements can illuminate these issues but I'm open-minded.) If so, where does that leave us if we do not cave in to Woj's despair, and Orwell's, "If there is hope, it lies with the proles," but they'd rather sing pop trash turned out by machines than even think about acting collectively to improve their lives. ("It was only an 'opeless fancy . . . ." )" (This is a quote from _1984._)
If the hypothesis is wrong, I'd like to know why. Chuck thinks the anarchists are on the march and middle America is fed up and ready to get rid of the government. I suspect they may be fed up and ready to get rid of the government, but I am not sure in aways that Chuck and I would like. I would like to have more to point to than an occasional increase in the turnout at small demonstrations.
A revitalized union movement would be nice, but private sector union density is down below 8% this year, am I right about that Doug? Or Charles thinks that a second draft of Communism would be better, maybe so, but why does he think there is any movement that way?
Finally I think there are a number of very specific lessons that can be drawn from the history of Communism:
1) without a strong militant, extreme left wing, the right will walk all over us, like they are doing now
2) No movement, state, party, or organization that is not committed to liberal democracy deserves or stands a chance in the modern world. That does not mean restricting ourselves solely to electoral politics.
3) the working class, broadly defined, is an essential part, if not the core, of any movement for radical change; where it is strong and organized, i.e., has uniomns and parties, especially independent ones, there are at least prospects for social democracy.
4) Talk about getting rid of markets and planning the whole economy is utopian foolishness that ought not even bt on on the agenda outside a merely academic discussion of Marxian theory or economic modeling carried out for eirther purposes of historical study or conceptual investigation of logical possibilities.
5) We are about a million miles from anyplace we want to be politically, reduced to offering unhappy support to a spinelessa nd rapidly right-ward drifting Democratic Party that doesn't even particualtly want us because, in the absence of the other factors I've discussed, the far right has gone bananas.
Am I being too pessimistic>?
jks
--- Marvin Gandall <marvgandall at rogers.com> wrote:
>
>
> andie nachgeborenen wrote:
>
>
> > Peple like Mike P and Charles B who are still
> > interesting in fighting about an ex-country with a
> > dead religion was a good idea are wasting their
> time
> > and everyone else's. We need people fighting the
> > Patriot Act, supporing single payer, opposing bad
> > judges and the Iraq War and the rest of the Bushie
> > agenda...Move fucking on. This is boring and
> pointless.
> ----------------------------
> I liked much of your excellent post, and your point
> in this excerpt about
> focusing on current developments. But you're
> speaking from exasperation if
> you're suggesting that discussing the past - in this
> case, of "an ex-country
> with a dead religion" - is "boring and pointless".
> The rise and fall of the
> 20th century revolutions have much to tell us about
> how and why whole
> populations radicalize, what constitutes socialism,
> and under what
> conditions, if any, it might be realizable of being
> a more democratic and
> productive system than capitalism. These issues are
> still with us, at least
> in theory; there's always the possibility we could
> unexpectedly have to
> confront them practically, and some aspects of this
> discussion can help
> illuminate how to organize people around the
> immediate issues you discuss.
> It depends really on how these discussions are
> conducted and knowing when to
> move on, which is what I think your post was aimed
> at.
>
> MG
>
>
>
>
>
> ___________________________________
>
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