Re: [lbo-talk] Reforms (was Welcome to the Chávez revoluti on...)

Yoshie Furuhashi critical.montages at gmail.com
Fri Nov 17 23:10:20 PST 2006


On 11/17/06, Paul <paul_ at igc.org> wrote:
> Doug H. writes:
> >According to Tariq Ali, Chavez says that this is not an era of
> >revolution, so all they can accomplish right now are left social
> >democratic reforms. Anything stronger would be, as the Leninists used
> >to say, adventurist. I think he's right. There's neither popular
> >support or a welcoming international environment for the overturning
> >of property relations, and anyone who tried it would be quickly
> >destroyed.
>
> Isn't the key to distinguish among the movements and reforms that Tariq
> seems to be grouping together as "left social democratic" ? (and help
> change them for the better!)
>
> Some of these movements argue "this far and no further" and plan
> accordingly; others try to use their practical achievements to raise our
> sense of vision.

It's clear that within the Bolivarian Revolution both types of people exist. Michael A. Lebowitz put it:

<blockquote>"Another part, though, is that all the supporters of Chavez are not necessarily in agreement with the socialist direction. In the concluding chapter of my new book, one of the things I talk about is that there is significant opposition within the Chavez camp to the advance of the revolutionary process. Some people talk about Chavism without Chavez. Far more significant is the group of people who want Chavez without socialism; who don't want to see self-management and co-management within the enterprises; who don't want to see communities making decisions at the local level; who want to retain the power to make decisions from above, both because of their own economic interests — and corruption is a major problem here, it is part of the tradition — but also because they don't want to lose the power to engage in clientalism. (Coral Wynter & Jim McIlroy, "Challenges for Venezuela's Revolution," 10 November 2006, <http://www.greenleft.org.au/2006/690/35839>)</blockquote>

For a broad movement like the Bolivarian process, the question is also about a balance of forces inside the movement. -- Yoshie <http://montages.blogspot.com/> <http://mrzine.org> <http://monthlyreview.org/>



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