From: "David Bedggood" <d.bedggood-AT-auckland.ac.nz> To: marxism-general-AT-jefferson.village.Virginia.EDU Date: Wed, 21 May 1997 10:56:34 1200+ Subject: M-G: Congo: Marxism versus empty abstractions - PO Peru and Malecki make mincemeat of Proyect on Zaire so I will try to be brief. Proyect bases his case against the Trotskyists on Zaire on his belief that we don't analyse the concrete reality. That we don't consult the "economic or social statistics the way Lenin or Trotsky did when they wrote about Czarist Russia". What we offer, he thinks are "empty abstractions". Isnt it interesting that Proyect thinks that Lenin and Trotsky were writing just about Russia, just as Proyect today cites "facts" about Congo-Zaire in isolation? This reveals Proyects schematic view of history in which there are separate nations slotted onto some tracking system which go through different stations in sequence. This is social imperialism shared by the labour aristocrats of the imperialist countries. It says to workers in the semi-colonies, follow us, we will give you civilisation, first bourgeois democracy, then when we judge you ready, socialism. In reality what Lenin and Trotsky revealed was that Russia was a capitalist semi-colony in the imperialist world system. The imperialist super-exploitation of Russia made it the weakest link despite the fact that its working class was small, new and lacked strong organisations and culture. The Mensheviks hated Trotsky and Lenin for this because it shifted the locus of revolution from the West and the "best" and made it uncivilised and uncultured. They got their revenge by stifling the German Revolution and isolating the Russian revolution. Now Proyect wants to isolate and stifle the Zairian revolution in advance because it does not meet the menshevik criteria of a fully developed proletariat. He rejects the theoretical tools developed by Lenin and Trotsky which prove that despite its small size and relative backwardness, the Central African workers could lead the poor peasants to a socialist overturn. This is no surprise as Proyect and others on these lists regard the Russian revolution as premature because the Russian working class was too small and got decimated. Proyect does not understand that the Bolsheviks always recognised that the Russian revolution would fail unless it was rescued by a European or a "Far Eastern" Revolution. The same goes for Congo-Zaire today. Proyect cannot see that the rebellion in Zaire was as product of imperialism, and more specifically the emergence of US influence through Mandela's regime and Museveni's regime in Uganda. That Congo-Zaire is a bastardised nation of many nationalities and ethnic groups which are spread across central Africa. That the Tutsi now control the state in Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and are the main local backers of Kabila. This complex concrete reality can only be understood by applying the theoretical elements of the theory of "combined and uneven development" and "permanent revolution". Far from being "empty abstractions", these theories allow us to fill in the many determinations which go to making up the concrete reality of Central Africa today. They allow us to combine an understanding of the ethnic mix and the ethnic elites which are competing as comprador agents for imperialism in central Africa, with the class composition of the WHOLE of central and South Africa. Just as Mandela, Museveni and Kabila are one side of the equation, so are the masses in all of their various social relations on the other side of the equation. So the outcome of the struggle does not reduce to an "empty abstraction" i.e. "facts" about the number of workers in Zaire, but the dynamics of class struggle in the whole of central and South Africa and beyond that the class struggle in the imperialist countries. In the final analysis, Proyects argument is classic menshevism. It always blames the failure of revolution on the weakness or unreadyness of the working class instead of the bankruptcy and betrayals of the petty bourgeois "socialists". If you want to see how our analysis pans out into a programme for revolution which does not depend on any one individual, at any one point in the world, with or without liquor, then read the latest resolution of the LCMRCI on "The Downfall of Mobutu and the New World Order in Central Africa". Dave [for permanent revolution and on this list] > Does this sound like anything that Hugh or Bedggood have ever produced on > this list? Now, I don't claim to be the incarnation of Trotsky as they do, > but I have tried to remain faithful to this approach of detailed class > analysis when I have written about Cuba, Nicaragua, Costa Rica or the > United States on this list. Thses are countries that I have direct > experience with or have studied in some depth. The reason that Hugh and > David don't take this approach is that their Marxism is the Marxism of > slackers. Rather than consult economic or social statistics the way that > Lenin or Trotsky did when they wrote about Czarist Russia, they are much > more comfortable dispensing opinions. Opinions are worth very little. > Whatever they write about former Zaire will consist of empty abstractions. > "The working class should do this. The peasants should do that." This is > not Marxism. It is the sort of idle chatter one can hear in student or > bohemian neighborhood bars in any large city. "The working class should get > its act together and take over the government. That's what I say. Blimey. > (Bartender, another Fosters for me and my mate.) And that's what Trotsky > said. Hiccup." > > > > > --- from list marxism-international-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu --- > --- from list marxism-general-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
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