Re: AUT: Re: Palestione, Israel and other ghettoes

[Scott Hamilton <s_h_hamilton@xxxxxxxxx>]

Tahir wrote:

>Therefore even if a secular, democratic Palestine in
>place of >Israel could
be achieved (by the bourgeoisie I must stress), a real
>achievement, we would
immediately struggle against that too.

This claim can be concretely tested by looking at the
many countries where a national bourgeoisie has been
put in place after the removal of colonialism or an
occuppying power. In country after country, we can see
that a national bourgeois government is a disaster,
ptting back struggle for years if not decades.
It is a disaster for practical and ideological
reasons. On the practical level, such a government
inevitably cracks down on the workers and peasants on
whose backs it climbed to power. It does this because
it cannot reconcile the democratic rights that
national capitalism it is supposed to underwrite with
the superexploitation of semi-colonies by imperialism.

South Africa is a good example: there workers and
students are regularly killed by state security
forces, and strikes and now even protest marches are
being made harder and harder to hold (witness the
recent Earth Summit). As a semi-colony being
superexploited, South Africa cannot afford to allow
its workers and citizens democratic rights. Winning
pay increases, or even, in many cases, holding onto
jobs, would threaten superprofits. So would putting
more money into education, or urban renewal. People
cannot be allowed to organise for these demands.

The second attack that comes from a bourgeois national
government in place of colonialism or occupation is
ideological. Again, South Africa is a good example:
the fact that the ANC and Mandela are really only
hitmen for the IMF has taken a full decade to really
catch on amongst the SA workers and peasantry. It's a
bit hard to rebel against your hero, especially when
the 'revolutionary' left is saying he'll improve your
lot and set you up for socialism in the future.

Across the Third World, the great anti-imperialist
mobilisations of the 70s and 80s were defeated by the
cooption of leadership of the struggles by capitalism,
which turned them into national bourgeoisies
administering the extraction of superprofits. This is
true even in my country, amongst the various Maori
tribes who have 'settled' land claims with the
government and launched themselves as companies on the
proceeds.


Cheers
Scott





=====
"Revolution is not like cricket, not even one day cricket"

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