Re: Biel and Stiglitz

["M. Junaid Alam" <redjaguar@xxxxxxxxx>]

I am obviously not Crde. Proyect, but I would like to challenge some of
Crde. Oosterlynck's positions.

"I disagree however with his saying that only revolutionary violence can do
something to change this.  As far as Europe and the West in general is
concerned building a powerful counterhegemony through civil society will in
my opinion proove to be far more effective."Civil society is a highly
nebulous concept, often invoked as a panacea to the problems posed by
capitalism. What is the class composition and revolutionary character of
this 'civil society'? Composed as it is of middle-classlayers, center-left
intelligentsia, a sprinkling of NGOs and a motley crew of small disconnected
groupings, civil society alone will never withstand the power of
imperialism. It cannot even understand imperialism--take, for example,the
American 'anti-globalization justice movement'. It was paralyzed in the new
atmosphere of war and nationalchauvinism, because the opposition to
globalization was not solidly based on opposition to imperialism, but toa
specific, new tendency of imperialism in its economic and cultural aspects.
Banking on the support of a wavering middle-class which has not understood
itself at all as a class *for* itself--perhaps not even a class *in*
itself--seems utopian. Let us take the case of Venezuela. Here Chavez and
his program was saved, at least temporarily, from the reactionary coup by
two real, hardened forces: on the one hand,the impoverished masses, and on
the other hand, strategic military preparations by his special forces. "As
to Palestine and other suppressed developing nations, a degree of violence
seems to be necessary (although bombing campaigns are largely
counter-effective in the long run - this is a war that cannot be won by
either side), although building counterhegemony through global civil society
remains important. An example of this is the dynamic of the World Social
Fora, which will probably result in a Palestine Social Forum in the near
future.  In this way global civil society can be mobilized against US
imperialism."   This is far too vague a formulation, especially since
Palestine is neither a nation nor is it developing. Here, no number of
'social forums' is going to solve anything, such formations are way behind
in consciousness and capacity for action. I am referringto certain impending
developments in the Middle East, namely: the post-invasion plans of Iraq--
the occupation of that nation and then the full-fledged unleashing of Bush's
and the American Zionists' plan to take over the entire Middle East;
Sharon's schemeto expel the Palestinians into Jordan and aggrandize the
remaining portion of the Territories. The explosiveness of theseimperialist
maneuvers lies not in the response of 'civil society', but in the
undercurrent of anger and frustration in the Middle East itself,which is
what must be channelled and mobilized to challenge imperialism. This can be
confirmed from the negative side as well:consider the function of the Arab
comprador regimes and puppets, it is to suppress these elements; once these
are removed, once theirsocial function is undercut or exploded by a base of
mass anger, then it will be a nightmare scenario for Zionism and
imperialism."However, Marxist theory of power tends to be one-sided and
ignores the way power is all pervasive in human relations (anarchists are
far more sophisticated in dealing with these issues).  This helps to declare
why the real existing socialist countries tended to be authoritarian."To
this, I must politely object. If the 'one-sidedness' of Marxism "helps to
declare" the authoritarian nature of 'really-existing' socialist states,
then we must ask why Anarchist "sophistication in dealing with these issues"
has led to anarchism's 'really non-existent' presence;that is, its failure
to take root in any state as a force against imperialism at all in the 20th
century. Frankly this is not about sophistication, but the balance of class
force and conditions imposed by imperialism--socialist states were
encircled, underdeveloped, under constant attack.And in some cases, like
Chile 1973, and Nicaragua in the 1980's it was castrated from the start by
CIA destruction of the democratic process. So these are the
'really-existing' circumstances accompanying 'really-existing' socialism,
determined not by "sophistication" but by dialecticalmaterialism.Finally,"
To me, more work needs to be done in dealing with these issues and finding
ways to deal with them, otherwise revolutionary violence may well end up in
the same failed experiments as we have seen in the twentieth century."There
is no guarantee of success in revolution. There is however, certain
guarantee of failure in passivity.


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