On Jul 23, 2010, at 8:18 PM, Joseph Catron wrote:
> An ISO response to Doug. Thanks to Louis Proyetc.
>
> http://www.isreview.org/issues/72/gasper-crisis.shtml
My two favorite parts of this rather weak piece:
> While the far right obviously grew as a result of the Depression, eventually seizing power in Germany, Spain, and Austria, the left also grew in many European countries, and there was nothing inevitable about its ultimate defeat. In Germany, the Social Democratic and Communist Parties had millions of supporters, and in the election of November 1932, the last genuinely free vote before Hitler took power, their combined support was several percentage points ahead of the Nazis.
Gosh. Talk about missed opportunities!
> The tragedy was that the two left-wing parties were fatally divided and unable to agree on a common strategy to defeat the far right in the streets as well as at the ballot box.
Which is supposed to be a refutation of my point? If you think the 1930s were a good time for the European left, you need to have your head examined.
> Similarly in Spain the left grew significantly. It eventually lost the civil war as a result of major conflicts between the different left-wing parties Perhaps no one has written about the relationship between economic booms, slumps, and political consciousness with more insight than the Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky[...]
Ah, of course. Now we're getting to the nub of it in ISO-land, aren't we?
Doug