Date: Tue, 15 Oct 1996 19:49:59 -0500 (CDT)
From: ty reynaldo r <z969609-AT-oats.farm.niu.edu>
Subject: Re: Western factory workers...faceless and docile?


Dialectic thinking is not the exclusive domain of western thought in 
general or of western Marxism in particular.  The dialectic method is 
omnipresent in many ancient Asian philosophies (I'm sorry I can't talk 
about African or indigenous American cosmologies).  Taoism, the writings 
of Sun Zi (Sun Tzu) on the Art of War, and others are replete with 
examples of dialectics.  

Mao Zedong did not only use western Marxism but had developed his 
philosophy based upon the influence of Chinese philosophy as well.

On Wed, 16 
Oct 1996, donna matahaere wrote:

> 
> >Louis Godena
> >
> >PS: I'm already finding this damnable 3-post rule to be a nuisance.   While
> >we're on the subject of "retreat"--be they workers or intellectuals--some
> >mention should be made of Marx/Engels and their unfortunate theories of
> >African and Oriental ignorance and superstition.   Without ever formally
> >systematizing it,  Marx and Engels came very close to having two distinct
> >theories of history,  one for Europe,  the other for the Rest.    In the
> >West,  all class-endowed societies are in the end said to be unstable and
> >bound to perish through their own contradictions,  so guaranteeing eventual
> >salvation;  in the East,  genuine stagnation is possible and obtains,  as
> >does the primacy of coercion over production,  which inhibits the liberation
> >of mankind through growth of productive forces and the consequent
> >adjustments of society.    So the East,  in a real sense, can only be
> >liberated by the West.    This continuing Eurocentrism of Marxist thought
> >(Satre,  remember, considered the dialectic to be a European
> >specialty--though extended to others by a sort of *mission dialectisante*)
> >may account for some of the moral/historical alienation from it that we are
> >witnessing in the developing world,  and which forms the gist of Zeynep's
> >admirable post.
> >
> >L.G.
> 
> This is an International-list-thing right? I am glad L.G. brought this up
> even as an aside. It speaks volumes about the connections between marxism
> and colonial imperialism. It seems to me that terms like 'working-class'
> that are assumed to be just-there disguise a much larger reality. Reading
> some of the posts I can't help but be reminded of a sort of old world
> nostalgia for a time when the subaltern was easily identified and
> oppression was framed in simple language as us/them a situation that then
> justified its own production. I also wonder at the those connections
> between colonialism and the industrialisation of Europe, and ensuing
> workforce? What is the relationship between workers freedom and the
> position of indigeneous peoples under colonialism?
> 
> donna
> 
> 
>