[lbo-talk] (no subject)

[Chuck Grimes]

[WS:] Trotsky's main problem, as I see it, was oblivion to social
embeddedness when it comes to the proletariat. As many radical
intellectuals, he envisioned proletariat as a sheer force capable of
not only abolishing all social institutions, but creating new ones
from the scratch, according to a radical blueprint. In a way, this
concept of the proletariat is the collective equivalent of Musil's
"man without qualities."

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I understand and agree. OTOH, Trotsky organized and lead a prolitarian
army of conscripts. So he knew the Russian prols pretty damned well.
In the concrete he was not dealing with men without qualities. He was
dealing with men from different districts and regions and cities.

In other chapters he is very specific in his descriptions of the
conflicting political parties and their so-called leaders and their
interests.

I am reading him like I read War and Peace as a vast panorama of
Russian society at a particular time and place. It is a great
adventure.

CG