From: Carrol Cox <cbcox-AT-rs6000.cmp.ilstu.edu>
Subject: Re: M-I: Reformism concrete vs. abstract  (Ben replies to Gary MacLennan)
Date: Wed, 8 Apr 1998 09:38:56 -0500 (CDT)


Ben writes:

>                What I think that many on M-I fail to understand is that
> the abysmal state of the communist movement is due to the bankruptcy and
> degeneration of "communist" theory as it is understood by so many.

	What I think that Ben Seattle fails to understand is that the
bankruptcy and degeneration of "communist" theory as it is understood by
so many is due to the abysmal state of the communist movement: by the
"communist movement" meaning social conditions under which "decently
sizable" numbers of workers are engaged in struggles which make so that
theoretical exchanges among communists have resonance among workers in
struggle. Ben's focus on an electronic context for the working out of
theoretical issues of reform and revolution postpones indefinitely the
creation of such a context, and thus empties that extremely important
theoretical struggle of significance. 

	Ben may well have the necessary empirical knowledge of the
conditions under which such theoretical struggles have achieved resonance
in the past, and he may therefore be in a position to abstract from that
history a convincing set of criteria for identifying in the present and
future the contexts in which such theoretical struggle will *again* become
relevant. But these are "may be's." There is nothing in his posts to date
on this topic to indicate that he has given any consideration at all to
this problem, which might be imaged as the problem of first finding a
speaker's platform before beginning to spout.

My thesis, and I think that despite (perhaps ultimately important)
differences in emphasis, Gary, Lou, and I share this thesis, is that the
material conditions under which such a theoretical struggle *can* occur
simply do not exist in the present. (Note: I not say that that
struggle ought not to occur; I say that even if everyone on m-i agreed
with Ben the discussion still would not in fact occur and can not,
regardless of intentions of those involved, occur.)
	

> Until this theoretical crisis is resolved--sincere and well-meaning
> activists will often be learning the hard way and repeating every
> mistake that has gone before.

Ben is a well-meaning activist who has lost his way by failing to
understand the theoretical principles governing the relevance or
possibility under giving conditions of engaging in any particular
theoretical debate.

Carrol



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