File spoon-archives/marxism.archive/marxism_1994/94-11-30.000, message 63


Date: Thu, 03 Nov 1994 02:28:29 EST
From: Pete Bratsis <aki-AT-cunyvms1.gc.cuny.edu>
Subject: RE: the degenerated workers state and yugoslavia




Tom,

I did not know who wrote the message I responded to because you did
not identify yourself at the end of it.  Yes, we are in the same 
department, but that has never stoped us from arguing.

While you may be right in noting that it was an effect of imperalism that
brought about Yugoslavia to begin with, it does not in and of itself 
explain the current situation nor should it discount the culpability of the
current actors.  Furthermore, it is the same 'enemy of my enemy is my friend'
logic that you evoke when you say any attack on Stalinism is a defence of 
imperalism that has resulted in many of the devastating effects of Western 
interventionism in Chile, Vietnam, Cuba, Haiti, Greece, etc.  I see no
implicit or explicit support of imperalism by attacking Stalinist regeims, 
even ite derivitaves - such as the one in Yugoslavia.

I recognise that you do not want to discount the role of nationalism in all
of this and that you do not want to defend the Serb's.  But, by down playing
of this and that you do not want to defend the Serb's 'ethnic cleansing' any
more than you want to defend the Croat's in all of this. But, by discounting
the role of domestic agency in all of this - you are obscuring the current
antoginistic positions of the principle agents and, in turn, reproducing the
kind of discourse that legitimizes and produces the power relations the allows
for such ethnic conflict to come about.  Nationalism needs a nationalist 
historiography, nationalist political phil., map makers, etc. - arguing that
Yugoslavia was an artificial entity produced by imperialist western powers 
does nothing to stop the blood shed.  It contributes to the identies and 
legitimizing arguments that nationalists of all side depend upon to make
their actions desirable.

Peter Bratsis.



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