[lbo-talk] An Age of Transition

James Heartfield Heartfield at blueyonder.co.uk
Sat Apr 26 18:41:19 PDT 2008


Shane Mage says forward to the "mutual ruin of the contending classes," but I am less sure that this is a programme that can encourage popular action.

The European Values survey is interesting in this regard. It finds that belief in environmentalism is extensive, but that when asked very few people would accept higher taxes to fix the environment. I have to say that I am not surprised. Pessimistic beliefs about the future of the planet are hardly likely to lead to progressive attitudes about the allocation of resources.

"Marxism sets out from the development of technique as the fundamental spring of progress, and constructs the communist programme upon the dynamics of the productive forces. If you conceive that some cosmic catastrophe is going to destroy our planet in the fairly near future, then you must, of course, reject the communist perspective along with much else. Except for this as yet problematic danger, however, there is not the slightest scientific ground for setting any limit in advance to our technical productive and cultural possibilities. Marxism is saturated with the optimism of progress." (Leon Trotsky, The Revolution Betrayed, New York, Pathfinder Press, 1972, p. 45)



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