Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 11:48:04 -0400 (EDT)
From: Louis N Proyect <lnp3-AT-columbia.edu>
Subject: M-TH: A call for a moderated list


Dear Comrades,

I am initiating a discussion with you about the state of the
marxism-international list and more generally about what possibilities
exist for this type of forum in the future.

To start with, I met last week with some people at Monthly Review who are
very interested in including a discussion group on their Web Page. I have
volunteered my technical expertise to them and there is a strong
possibility that this project will move ahead. They are particularly
interested in using the Web as a tool to build a Fall conference on
globalization.

In the meantime that leaves the question of what to do next. Now I don't
rule out the possibility that some of you enjoy the rancorous atmosphere
on marxism-international right now and look forward to reading the latest
contribution from our vanguard party representatives. If that is the case,
I won't feel offended if you decide that I am exaggerating the problem and
stick with the status quo.

My view is pretty strong on these questions, however. I believe that M-I
has become a victim of the same sort of centripetal forces that destroyed
the old M1 list. The Stalin-Trotsky flame wars of February and March
weakened the list to the point where daily discussion has taken on the
sort of bizarre and repellent character that typified M1 in its death
throes. Flame wars are like real flames in the sense that they consume
oxygen. When the oxygen has been consumed, it is difficult to breathe. You
are left with a vacuum. That vacuum is now being filled by the posts of
people whose paucity of ideas is matched only by the zealousness with
which they express them.

Our problem is that highly dogmatic party members or supporters use this
medium as a way of recruiting bodies rather than advancing the broader
Marxist project. If they destroy the medium in the process of adding one
or two new members to their cause, this does not matter. One of the
reasons that people like Gary McLennan and I are so opposed to these types
of interventions is that we used to be party members ourselves and know
first-hand the kind of bad faith that underlies such "interventions".

The list as it is currently constituted will simply repel new folks who
have no interest in the sort of dogmatic and sectarian squabbles that take
place on a daily basis. This means that somebody like Teresa Ebert will
join the list for a day or two and run in terror from all of the bullshit,
which is what happened a couple of months ago. I met somebody named
Rebecca Sharpe from Australia at the Amherst conference last December and
urged her to join m-i. She split after a day or so in January, even before
things got really bad. This was an extraordinarily brilliant woman who had
given a paper on postmodernism and university administration, of all
things! At any rate, she cried out after a day or so, "How do I get off
this list".

Last summer when the Spoons Collective met in NYC, the mandate seemed to
be for a moderated list. Everybody was tired of the crap that got posted
on a day-in and day-out basis on M1 by people who viewed themselves as the
avatar of Trotsky or Stalin. The decision to have a list moderated by
quantity alone was seen as a means to an end. If these means did not
produce results, then other efforts would be tried. Unfortunately the M-I
moderators have not kept their eyes on the prize. Instead of worrying
about the sort of product that is now being created, they have cared more
about free speech issues. Unfortunately free speech is what is destroying
M-I.

The proposal that I am floating here is to start a genuinely moderated
list that has a number of guidelines:

1) The function of the list is to advance the Marxist project independent
of any narrow party or factional interests. There are a number of lists at
Spoons and on the Internet currently that function as parliaments where
different parties can battle with each other for hegemony. The culture of
this list will be more like the classroom than the parliament.

2) The "Russia" question and the related question of Stalin vs Trotsky has
a terrible polarizing tendency. In the effort to assign blame for who
destroyed socialism in the USSR and who is the sole agency for its
salvation, the two camps engage in crusades to persuade the leftist public
of their righteousness. These crusades very rapidly turn into trench
warfare where all other questions soon become forgotten.

3) These "other questions" are really what are key for Marxists in 1997
and they touch on the current class struggle. Unless Marxists begin to
understand capitalism in this epoch and in the societies we live in, there
is no possibility of social transformation. Current events should be as
important to us as they were to Marx and Engels in the 1850s as they wrote
about the problems of colonialism in India and China, or the prospects for
democratic revolution in Germany, etc.

4) We do not privilege any particular Marxist methodology. Those who
advocate an Althusserian structuralist approach, an Analytical Marxist
approach or a classical Marxist approach should be able to exchange ideas
in a frank but comradely atmosphere.

5) We expect contributions to the discussion to be serious and thoughtful.
There are no limits to the number of times that people post. All we ask is
that you think hard about the question under discussion before hitting the
enter key on your computer. While email is a powerful medium, the rapidity
of exchange can sometimes encourage underdeveloped ideas. Quality, not
quantity, should be our watchword.

There are some words that Marx wrote to Ruge in an 1844 letter that can
serve as our epigraph:

"But if the designing of the future and the proclamation of ready-made
solutions for all time is not our affair, then we realize all the more
clearly what we have to accomplish in the present--I am speaking of the
ruthless criticism of everything existing, ruthless in two senses: The
criticism must not be afraid of its own conclusions, nor of conflict with
the powers that be."

Please send me your comments. These guidelines are not the final word, but
simply a first shot at clarifying the purpose of the new list.

Louis





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