File spoon-archives/marxism-general.archive/marxism-general_1996/96-12-18.142, message 5


From: Zeynep Tufekcioglu <zeynept-AT-turk.net>
Subject: M-G: Re: M-I: On the irrelevance of the Soviet Union
Date: Thu, 12 Dec 1996 03:46:07 +0000


I learned that Vladimir has replied to Hugh's quote in Malecki's post about
my post. This discussion has been going on in Marxism-International list,
but since Vladimir was interested, here is the whole post.



What the Soviet Union was is no longer a dividing line, it was in the past. 

A recent anectode might illustrate what I mean. The setting is a discussion
about political economy, a class taught by a comrade. The students come from
various political backgrounds, some none, some years of political struggle.
We were discussing how the discussion about the socio-economic character and
the social formation of Turkey was stiffled. It started in the 60s, was very
lively for a short time. Then it died down. So, here we were, almost 30
years after 1968, and 16 years after the coup, and everyone was having a
difficult time talking about Turkey. Why exactly was there not an
intellectual revolution on the scale that Germany witnessed in the 19th and
Russia in early 20th century not witnessed in Turkey, or in the survivor of
the Ottoman empire? Many other conditions were similar. What exactly were
the mechanisms of Turkey becoming a nation-state out of the multi-cultural
Ottoman Empires that commanded over areas with many different modes of
production. 

The "cultural revolution" in the 1920s and 30s also has meant that we no
longer can read the Ottoman Arabic script, and most of the vocabulary is
also different. As of 1960s, just as people on the left were discussing what
Turkey and her past was all about, the discussion died. Reason one, there
was fighting going on. It wasn't the time to think. Reason two, it was now
determined by whether you thought the Soviet or the China path (or Albanian)
path correct, not whether you thought Turkey was underdeveloped, or
semi-feudal or capitalist, or whether the working class had characteristic A
or B. The whole discussion stopped and realigned around Stalin's or Mao's
formulas. Some tried to surround the city from the countryside in a country
with almost no history of peasant uprising, and kept quoting Mao. Others
looked for the non-existent national bourgeoisie to make alliance with for
the cause of peace, as the official Soviet ideology stated.

So, a discussion continued and it was obvious that there was a serious lack
of fact-based analysis. Most of what we had was what had been developed
before 1970. 

A little while later, we were discussing the the "New World Order". My
friend was writing some crucial dates on the board, and at 1989 he said, the
year the Soviet Union started dissolving. It was the end of, "real
socialism, workers' state, state capitalism...", he just listed all the
adjective he could think of and asked the class whether anyone else had
anything else to call the Soviet Union. Anyway, he said "anyway, whatever it
was, ended and..", continued to explain the major dynamics of the post-89
world. Nobody bothered to get into a fight over what the hell it actually
was. China and the Soviet Union and Albania had pretty much suffered similar
problems. The people there were more interested in what to do now. 


>In the first place, historical pressures will "keep them alive", not
>voluntarist special pleading.

Right now, I have to admit that there is no pressure on us to "keep the
issue alive". None. There is so much more to discuss, and the lack of an
"official" guide is making the discussions and the actions much better.

>In the second place, unsolved problems of the transition to socialism are
>not irrelevant.

Well, that is certainly true. Yet, these won't really be solved by
projecting the lessons of the Soviet Union's failure (or successes) into the
future. Each country, each region has many aspects that are specific and
historically determined, and any future revolution will happen at least 80
years after the October Revolution. 

I think the Soviet Union has many lessons for the future. Yet, for example
the regime change in Iran also has many lessons for Turkey. Both
historically and geographically it is much closer, and it is a truly urban
based, proletarian supported/led revolution. What's happened in Nicaragua?
Cuba? Those are very important for us. Hell, what's happenning in Turkey?
The Soviet experience has many limits in terms of explanatory power.

>Or does Zeynep think the fall of the Soviet Union actually solved any of
>these problems? If so, which, and why?

If you ask me, the fall of the Soviet Union, freed the minds of people who
also knew what responsibility and progress was. Before, often, people who
rejected the Soviet Union seemed to wish for some ideal working class from
another planet come and have a nice and clean revolution. Most of the
"could-have-been / should-have-been" analysis of the Soviet Union was never
attractive to revolutionaries in the thirld world, who faced the prospect of
a revolution in a backward country. 

Yet the defensiveness of the Soviet Union also stiffled original analysis
and creativity. For better or worse, there is now that possibility. 

Zeynep



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