Date: Sat, 04 Jan 1997 11:15:29 +0200 From: Patrick Bond <PATRICK-AT-niep.org.za> Subject: M-I: New issue of SA poli-econ journal, "debate" Received: from anthrax (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by anthrax.ecst.csuchico.edu (8.8.2/8.8.2) with SMTP id XAA00295; Thu, 2 Jan 1997 23:54:09 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <s2ccd739.033-AT-arup.co.za> Errors-To: mperelman-AT-facultypo.csuchico.edu Reply-To: pen-l-AT-anthrax.ecst.csuchico.edu Originator: pen-l-AT-anthrax.ecst.csuchico.edu Sender: pen-l-AT-anthrax.ecst.csuchico.edu Precedence: bulk X-Listprocessor-Version: 6.0c -- ListProcessor by Anastasios Kotsikonas X-Comment: Progressive Economics X-Mailer: Novell GroupWise 4.1 Date: Fri, 03 Jan 1997 09:54:09 +0200 From: Patrick Bond <pen-l-AT-anthrax.ecst.csuchico.edu> Subject: [PEN-L:8081] New issue of SA poli-econ journal, "debate" PLEASE CIRCULATE TO INTERESTED COMRADES... debate Voices from the South African Left Issue #2, January 1997 (If you are interested in subscribing, contact 029frb-AT-cosmos.wits.ac.za.) Contents and editorial follow: EDITORIAL1 TIME FOR WORKING-CLASS WOMEN'S LEADERSHIP Roseline Nyman5 TOWARDS A GRASSROOTS WOMEN'S MOVEMENT Rita Edwards12 *HOW ARE YOU?* D *AS YOU CAN SEE*; STEPPING STONES Anna Varney14 WHO ARE THE ZAPATISTAS? Bobby Rodwell15 ON RAMONA'S ROLE IN THE ZAPATISTA STRUGGLE Ursula Razo17 FEMINISM AND ZAPATISM Teresa Rendon19 SECOND DECLARATION OF LA REALIDAD the Frente Zapatista27 THE WORLD BANK'S STOP-START SA MISSION Patrick Bond30 ON THE IMF MANAGING DIRECTOR'S VISIT; DEBATING ALEC ERWIN Campaign Against Neoliberalism in South Africa37 WORLD BANK Kelyn Sole45 AFTER THE BAFFLED INTELLECTUALS Franco Barchiesi46 THE NATIONAL DEMOCRATIC REVOLUTION AND IMPERIALISM Chris Malikhane58 >FROM ASIAN TIGER TO AFRICAN LION? John Pape68 EXTRACT FROM THE TRANSITION IN SOUTH AFRICA Carl T. Brecker82 RESPONSE TO BRECKER Dale T. Mckinley88 RESPONSE TO MCKINLEY, SATGAR AND ZITA Aaron Amaral 96 PAGES FROM THE SOCIALIST COOKBOOK Darrel Moellendorf105 MASS EVENTS; HARDNESS; RED LAND Allan Kolski Horwitz120 TWO REVIEWS OF THE FILM LAND AND FREEDOM Andre Marais and Lucien van der Walt122 EDITORIAL To our readers, Our first issue sold out immediately, and for those who didn't manage to get a copy, we hope you'll bear with us. The many production and distribution kinks in our debut are being ironed out. Finances are remarkably healthy, thanks to untiring voluntary labour-power. There'll be many more debates, so join us. We are mindful, in the wake of the October visit by IMF czar Michel Camdessus - and just prior to another undemocratic national budgeting process whose aim seems to be spending cuts without regard to social costs - that government's waning rumours, dreams and promises directly reflect the spectre of globalisation. The hospital closures, halving of welfare benefits to women head-of-households, teacher retrenchments, downgrading of urban housing first to toilets plus bricks and now to pit latrines in segregated low-income ghettoes, and on and on, are all done in the name of Camdessus' 3% deficit/GDP nostrum. Here's the key paragraph from Thabo Mbeki's November ANC think-piece, *The State and Social Transformation*: *The Democratic Movement must resist the illusion that a democratic South Africa can be insulated from the processes which characterise world development. It must resist the thinking that this gives South Africa a possibility to elaborate solutions which are in discord with the rest of the world, but which can be sustained by virtue of a voluntarist South African experiment of a special type, a world of anti-Apartheid campaigners, who, out of loyalty to us, would support and sustain such voluntarism.* Never mind the ersatz Leninism that infects this document (and that will get a proper deconstruction in our next issue). The language, after all, is a flattering signifier that the South African Left, and particularly the gut anti-neolib instincts of labour and social movements, warrant an occasional caress by the country's next president. But the paragraph deserves political translation, so to borrow from Cosatu's November *Draft Programme for the Alliance*: *There has been pressure put on the government by both local and international business, and the media, to adopt economic policies in direct contradiction to those they were mandated to implement. The movement seems to be paralysed by the threat of globalisation and the investment strike of business.* Thus our themes for this issue easily reflect contemporary concerns. Given that women continue suffering inordinately at the hands not only of patriarchs but also of local and global fiscal control freaks and sado-monetarists, Roseline Nyman begins this issue with a plea for working-class leadership within the women's movement and, more generally, greater attention to poor and working women's issues. The sentiment is concretised by Rita Edwards, who describes the recent emergence of a women's group in the Western Cape. In Mexico, similar strategy sessions are underway, and we are proud to have several articles about gender struggles and Mexico's campaign against neoliberalism. Bobby Rodwell introduces the Zapatista movement, followed by a tribute by Ursula Razo to Ramona, a brave indigenous Mayan leader who in October - when she was thought to be terminally ill - led the Zapatista delegation to a congress in Mexico City and was immediately hospitalised for a kidney transplant operation (which was successful), notwithstanding an extraordinary state military presence aimed at halting Zapatista geographical and political expansion. Next is an article written for debate by Teresa Rendon, an academic and gender advisor to the Zapatistas, on how the indigenous people's struggle in Chiapas relates to historic demands by women - both organic and bourgeois-feminist. In addition, the Zapatistas update their own call for international networking of progressive forces. It is now well accepted that globalisation as a concept was first decisively contested from below by the Zapatistas three years ago, and it is good to now observe similar stirrings in South Africa. Patrick Bond's review of World Bank endeavours helps explain why progressives must think globally and act globally, not because of massive new loan programmes, but because of the pernicious grip that Bank-think seems to have on Pretoria. And this widening of progressive vision is indeed underway, as solidarity relationships burgeon with democratic forces stretching from Chiapas and El Salvador to Nigeria and the occupied Western Sahara to occupied East Timor (and we expect, Burma too). On economic terrain, we celebrate the formation of a *Campaign Against Neoliberalism in South Africa* that has helped move both popular analysis and concrete struggle to a higher stage. We were all happy to hear the discordant tenor that rang throughout the Camdessus visit, what with protests in Johannesburg and Cape Town, straightforward hostility from ANC parliamentarians, the Cosatu and Sanco decisions to cancel two scheduled photo-opportunity meetings, and public statements antagonistic to the IMF by the SACP, Sasco, Women's National Coalition and National Progressive Primary Health Care Network. CANSA also takes this opportunity to expand upon a debate with Minister Alec Erwin, begun in the Mail and Guardian in October. To ensure we not only campaign, but also develop a rigorous perspective on globalisation, contributions from Franco Barchiesi and Chris Malikhane provide differing theoretical and political perspectives on intellectuals, imperialism and traditions of anti-capitalist analysis. Comrade Franco points out flaws in contemporary academic engagement with these subjects, while Comrade Chris advances political economic debates within Sasco using an argument that winds its way from Lenin to Amin and onwards. The two are divergent with respect to language, angle of argument and political conclusions, and by printing these we honour the Left's capacity to move on more than one conceptual and practical plane at a time. Following this is an empirical argument from John Pape that we not get hung up on following South Korea to an export-led future, and indeed for the Left to read more carefully the reasons for that country's recent industrialisation. Looking now to local political theory, we include an excerpt from Carl Brecker's pamphlet on the need to revive the Permanent Revolution thesis, followed by a reply from a Communist Party organiser, Dale Mckinley, who posits that we need not falsely dichotomise permanent revolution with the National Democratic Revolution. Aaron Amaral (of the International Socialist Movement) argues against what he insists is a reformist defence of the RDP, as staked out by Mckinley, Langa Zita and Vishwas Satgar in our first issue. Darrel Moellendorf then takes us >from socialist agency to socialist economic principles, by considering the choices of various blueprints that we as activists and strategists must surely grapple with one day. Jumping to an earlier era, we encounter a celebrated film by Ken Loach, Land and Freedom, about the Spanish Civil War. We expect readers will have seen this by the time of our publication, but if not the two reviews here by Andre Marais and Lucien van der Walt provide an incentive. Cultural production remains critical to the Left's development, and again we are providing poems by Anna Varney, Kelwyn Sole and Allan Kolski Horwitz that contribute to the resurgence of progressive politics in South Africa. Finally, our solicitation of contributions remains imperfect. Although gender is one of our themes this issue, and although we are strengthening our commitment to drawing out arguments by leading black - especially African - intellectuals and activists, there is a long way to go before we'll claim to have made progress. We want to conclude by asking for your suggestions on our next issue (the theme of which, already the subject of hot debate, is *Intellectuals in Retreat*). And please keep in touch with us by e-mail (at 029frb-AT-cosmos.wits.ac.za or pbond-AT-wn.apc.org). This will allow us to include you in an experimental mass-editing discussion forum list, where journal contributions will be shared. We are serious about this, so join us! The Johannesburg Collective --- from list marxism-international-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
Display software: ArchTracker © Malgosia Askanas, 2000-2005