File spoon-archives/marxism-general.archive/marxism-general_1997/marxism-general.9711, message 66


Date: Sat, 8 Nov 1997 03:55:53 -0500
From: malecki-AT-algonet.se (Robert Malecki)
Subject: M-G: Reply to Liam and Rob!


=A0

Bob wrote;
>> No Liam,
>>
>> It is just some of the leftovers of western Maoism. These days they are
>> still fighting about which wing of the Stalinist bureaucracy to capitulate
>> to. While at the same time deserting the Chinese Proletariat to join hands
>> with liberals and supporter of the Dali Lama along with their own
bougeoisie's..
>>
>> But, nothing is preventing you from presenting us with what sort of serios
>> questions that you would like to discuss. Just throw it out there and I am
>> quite sure you will get and answer.
>>
>> Warm regards
>> Bob Malecki

Liam replied!
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 Okay Bob I'll throw something out for thought.
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 I gather you're an adherent of Trotsky(?).I was looking for
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 references to the theory of social fascism post dating 1934. I
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 didn't come up with much.So here's the question.Social
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 fascism,a theory made famous by Stalin from 1928 to 1934,held
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 that social democracy and fascism were not antipodes but
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 twins.Since the social democrats were designated as only a
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 varity of fascism,and since just about everyone but the
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 Stalinists was some kind of fascist(a liberal-fascist or a
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 labor-fascist or a Trotsky-fascist),then it was impermissible=A0
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 for the Stalinists to engage in united fronts with any other
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 tendency against the fascists.No theory could have been more
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 helpful to Hitler in the years before he won power in
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 Germany.The Stalinists dropped the theory at some unpublicized
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 date in 1934 without bothering to explain why,and soon were
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 wooing not only the social democrats but also the capitalist
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 politicians like Roosevelt,whom they had still dubbed fascists
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 early in 1934.The obivous reason for dropping the theory of
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 social fascism was the need for the Soviet Union to defeat
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 fascist Germany in the Great Patriotic War,and Stalin realized
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 the exigency of the need to form alliances with the west no
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 matter distasteful.
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 Now before anyone gets out their flame thrower.Isn't there a
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 grain of truth in Stalins theory of social fascism,when viewed
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 in todays political light and circumstances?Do leftist parties
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 hurt themselves and their cause by forming(and supporting in a
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 limited sense)the Democratic party.As an example take the last
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 presidential race.Many leftist parties saw no other choice but
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 to support the aims and views of the Democratic party,why?Then
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 look at the Workers World Party which choose instead to run
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 it's own candidates.A futile wasted effort?Do leftists gain
>=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0 anything in supporting the Democratic Party?

Well Liam,

Interesting reply. In fact the answers to you second paragraph you have
already written in your description of the various "Zig-zags of the
Stalinist historically. So No, Stalin theory of "Social Facism" and its
mirrored reflexion in the turn towards the popular front are both completely
bankrupt..

I agree with you that the "Left" in America that calls for ANY kind of
support to the Democratic Party is dead wrong. But that does not mean that
Stalin was right on his theory of Social Facism. It only means that the
Democratic Party is not a reformist bourgeois workers party, but a bougeois
party, one of the twin parties of capitalism in America and deserves no
support what so ever in any kind of election. The Democratic party must be
destroyed just as the Republican party.

However after 1917 and including up to today their are times when
Revolutionary Marxists can and do advocate "critical support" to reformist
parties in the more classical sense of bougeios workers parties. (reformist
parties , usually of the Social Democratic model ) here in Europe who in
word had both Marx and Socialism written into theur programs and mass bases
in the trade unions but in practice had a pro-capitalist/pro-imperialist
leadership. Swedish Social Democracy/ the SP in Germany,France and not in
the least the old Labor Party of England..This tactic was used as and
instrument to seperate the base from the top and try to split these parties..

In fact there is a debate raging on the left now just about these specific
parties and their evolement after the demise of the Soviet Union and the
East European Stalinist deformed workers states through capitalist
counterrevolution.. However the American Democratic Party is not one of
these parties!
The debate centers around the shift by traditional Social Democracy to "New"
Social Democracy along the lines of Tony Blairs "New Labor" which has
deserted its union base historically to become a party that openly advows,
and adminsters the capitalist state and its program and whooing not the poor
and working class but the middle class..In other words a party much like the
American Democratic Party which is not a reformist workers party but a
capitalist party.

Most of the British Left in the last election called for a "critical" vote
for Tony Blair's Labor Party despite the fact that Blair was loudly
proclaiming to the world that he was out to destroy the unions, he supports
Thatchers anti-union laws imposed on the British Working class after the
defeat of the miners strike. He is for "law and order" and he is for a "new"
party much like the American Democratic Party which is a capitalist party
and not a reformist workers party. The International Communist League on the
other hand called for a "no vote" to any Labor Party candidate but gave
critical support to the Socialist Labor Party of Tony Scargill which split
from the Labor Party claiming that Blair has crossed the Rubicon. Now the
SLP is certainly not a Revolutionary Marxist Party but goes along the
traditional lines of old labor of returning at best to the good old days of
a utopian parliamemtry and peaceful way to "socialism" while also kniving
the workers in the back if necessary. But they are more subceptable to its
mass base in the unions and our tasks would be to expose these reformists by
setting the base against the top..

In a certain sense the tactic of critical support is connected and countered
posed to the Stalinist third period of "Social fascism, but also the zig zag
of the turn to the popular front. Both political dead ends that led to great
historical defeats.. Marxists in Germany were calling for a United Front in
action with the Social Democrats including the top in order to battle German
fascism in the streets and in the factories. This concretely means full
freedom to critize and unity in action against the fascists..This while
Stalin was blocking with the facists, helping to put them in power and then
along with the Social Democracy was destroyed when Hitler came to power.


When Stalin made the turn towards the popular front he went to the mirrored
reflexion other end of his opportunist and politically bankrupt line. Thus
the popular front which in practice meant "unity" with everybody including
the deadly enemies of the Proletariat the bougeois parties. Against this the
revolutionary Marxists argued that only and independent workers movement
against all wings of the bourgeoisie is correct. No to the popular fronts.
Because the piopular fronts in fact tied the workers to the bougeoisie, just
as the preceding period of "Social fascism" tied the workers to the Nazi's..

Both of these lines by the way are directly connected to the Stalinist
bureaucracy line on building Socialism in "one country" and the tactics
applied internationally were more in relationship to this then anything
else. Plus it effectively destroyed the third International of Lenin and
Trotsky..

If you are really interested in the discussion about critical support. Then
ofirst anybody calling for a vote for the American democratic party (a
bougeois party) is not a revolutionary Marxist. And the discussion on
critical support of reformist workers parties is now becoming a central part
of revolutionary regroupment and all kinds of fake leftists and centrists
who insist on putting and old and entirely correct tactic of critical
support to reformist bougeois workers parties and pasting it on an entirely
new situation that has developed since the demise of the now dead Stalinist
Soviet Union.

In fact this will be one of the KEY questions among others which devide the
Bolshevik Leninists/Trotskyists and the rest of thr pretenders who try to
sound or claim they are Marxists but can not apply nor analize living
reality and how it is necessary to adapt tactics in regards to the new
situation..There is a great article on line now which delves into the
situation in England on this question now up and running at my homepage. If
you go their and push on the Spartacist button and then the "Workers Hammer"
button you will find a long article addressing this problem and the left in
Britain. In fact many of the parties who slaviously tail Blair's "new" labor
are the same people who are tailing the LP in America and their pro
democratic party and trade union bureaucracy line..

In fact this discussion ties into another discussion going on here at
present in the form of Rob's worship of jumping into the working class,
putting on blue jeans, and going to the local pub and drinking a beer with
the poble! His line albeit, i think just a bit romantic coming from him,
because I don't have to go anywhere I am a poor and working class person and
have been here all my life. But the point is that this tendency to worship
and experience the workers as they are rather then intervening as communists
to explain what Communist and class concious militants are for and creating
a vanguard in the class which can show the way out..In fact Robs line in a
way is connected to a turn towards the class in the worst possible WAY and
that is by tailing them politically..

Correct if I am wrong Rob. But I as a Communist militant worker would fight
amongst my fellow workers for the politics I fight for here and before on
the M-I list until the Neo_Stalinists and Mensheviks purged M-I so that they
could have a cozy little corner to clap each other on the back and agree to
disagree. Which comes to my last point to Liam. Do you support the
bureaucratic bans that now the M-I has imposed on the list. Did you know
that many people were expelled and banned from the list for just arguing the
points that I take up in this letter while such charming people devote their
time to sending in the latest Times article on India or discussing all kinds
of things about who was right and who was wrong for expelling whom on the
Lenin list or trashing people with lies and slanders as they still do over
their without letting people reply to their slanders..

In fact the moderater of M-I who held in the axe is just a supporter of the
Stalinist third period politics and he his applying it to the "Trotskyists"
and others in a very concrete way by banning and expelling them..And they
are doing it with the suppport of the Mensheviks who want to build a "United
Front" in order to stop a free and open discussion of our differences.

As the Trotskyists are banned from M-I I will have to reply to your other
interesting article on envionment here in another letter today..But on
principle do you think that Trotskyists or anybody in the workers movement
should be banned from M-I? Or do you support this kind of organizational
manuvering by the Stalinists who fear more then anything the Trotskyists
whom they are forced to stop not by debate but by bans!

Warm regards
Bob Malecki
-------------------------------------------------------
Check Out My HomePage where you can,

Read or download the book! Ha Ha Ha McNamara,
Vietnam-My Bellybutton is my Crystalball!

And Now the International Communist League Page!
Just push on the "Spartacist" Button.

Or Get The Latest Issue of,

COCKROACH, a zine for poor and working-class people.

NEW! "RADIO TIME"  In cooperation with Straitfacts, Bob
Malecki will be giving occasional reports to Straitfacts
Radio audiences in the United States. Text for these
reports now on line.

http://www.algonet.se/~malecki

-------------------------------------------------------




     --- from list marxism-general-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---

   

Driftline Main Page

 

Display software: ArchTracker © Malgosia Askanas, 2000-2005