[lbo-talk] The end of Stalinism was a good thing (was Thatcherism)

[Gail Brock]

The Soviet Union and the West conspired to agree that the Soviet Union practiced "communism" and debated about which was better for the working class (as in the Khrushchev-Nixon kitchen debates).  The West claimed that capitalism produced more for everybody.  After the fall of the Soviet Union, Western elites no longer had to deal with a potentially competitive model, and suddenly discovered implacable rules of economics which inevitably lead to the impoverishment of the working class.  The U.S. busted unions and quit allowing any productivity gains to go to the workers.  European elites announced that the pampering of workers would have to cease, though my sense is that they have not been as successful as the U.S.  The rate of economic growth in third world countries dropped to less than half what it had been during the Cold War.  Meanwhile, imperialism carried on nicely under the rubric of the war on drugs and more recently the war on terror.

Militarism is bad.  Cold War was bad.  But the collapse of the Soviet Union has not appeared to be good for the world's working class.

________________________________
c b <cb31450 at gmail.com> on Mon, April 19, 2010 12:52:14 PM
wrote

 Reducing the militarization of Soviet society as with Krushchev's and
Gorbachev 's reforms was a good thing for the world's working class.
The fall of the Soviet Union was a good thing for imperialism.

CB
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