Re: Revolutionary Party Building: Take Power or Die!

["Ulhas Joglekar" <ulhasj@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I find this exchange interesting. This reminds me Lukacs, who
believed that the actuality of revolution was presupposed in Lenin's
ideas on the party building. See Lukacs' Lenin: A Study on the Unity
of His Thought, in which Lukacs says,"the Leninist form of organization
is inseparably connected with the ability to forsee the approaching
revolution." p.29. Also "Had the historical predictions of Mensheviks
been correct, had a relatively quiet period of prosperity and of the
slow spread of democracy ensued, in which -at least in backward
countries - the feudal vestiges of 'the people' has been swept aside
by the 'progressive' classes, the professional revolutionaries would
have necessarily remained stranded in sectarianism or become mere
propaganda clubs." etc. p.26

I also agree about the need for a theory of transition to socialism.

Ulhas

----- Original Message -----
From: João Paulo Monteiro <jpmonteiro@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, April 21, 2000 3:22 PM
Subject: Re: Revolutionary Party Building: Take Power or Die!


>
>
> Julio Pino wrote:
>
> >  Therborn's point was that revolutionary parties are
> > children born of crisis, and that they either seize the moment (and the
> > hour and the day) and win over a large segment of the working class or
they
> > will suffer arrested development. Unless they grow in large numbers
rather
> > quickly oblivion awaits. (Curiously, ever since I can remember, the
CPUSA
> > has claimed a membership of 15,000! The RCP 500, the SWP "less than
1,000"
> > and so on) I remember one veteran of the 1960s telling me this could be
> > broadened into a historical law: revolutionary parties that fail to take
> > state power in their founding generation tend to die. Think about it:
> > Lenin, Fidel, Ho, Mao, Kim Il Sung, and Tito were all first-generation
> > revolutionaries. Can you think of a single example of a revolutionary
party
> > that took power having outlived its founders? Of course it can persist,
and
> > even recruit, but when has it ever gotten a second chance to make
history?
>
> Experience tells us that either you have a mass party or a revolutionary
> organization. You cannot have both in one, for a period extending into the
> decades, in a capitalist society that has its reproductive (and
integrative)
> mechanisms in perfect shape. So, on the long run, the dialectics of
> revolutionary praxis will always reach a breaking point. You will either
pursue
> a revolutionary anti-capitalist line totally detached from the everyday
> developments of real class struggle or you will end up enmeshed in a web
of
> institutionalized compromise.

Joao Paulo Monteiro:
>The problem with the political program is that it must be supported by a
THEORY
> of the transition from capitalism to communism. Without a coherent theory
of
> the transition, we can only have programmatic opportunism. The old
dichotomy
> between a "minimal program" and a "maximum program" could be surpassed by
a
> transitional strategy à la Trotsky, whereby a batch of advanced reformist
> objectives could be put forward as a rallying cry and a test on the
adaptative
> limits of capitalism. The result would be to convince the working masses
of the
> necessity of overthrowing the system altogether, by revolutionary means.
The
> problem is that, without a coherent and rigorous theory of the transition,
we
> cannot articulate an adequate transitional program.
>
> I have done a few rough sketches of what a transitional theory could look
like
> in broad and very imprecise lines. I have had news that more gifted
comrades
> are working on it. But, on the whole, its very dispiriting to see that so
> little of our already diminutive forces are concentrated on this most
decisive
> of tasks.
>
> Dialogue on communism and transition can be found here:
> http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/6446/Communism.html
>
>
> João Paulo Monteiro
>