[Marxism] Socialist Scholars Conference: Observations

[Chris Brady <cdbrady@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I had lived in New York for about 15 years before I even heard of the
Socialist Scholars Conference.  But that has a lot to do with who I was
had changed.  I had been more of a playboy artist.  But I married, and
became a dad, and foundered on the shoals of making ends meet when it
mattered to more than me.  I never read the Communist Manifesto until I
went back to school, a night school offering at Brooklyn College.  A
very poor, physics grad student from Uttar Pradesh first turned me on to
MR: "You never knew of this!  Astounding!"  The first Gulf War also
assisted in my radicalization process-that war was, I thought,
transparently absurd.

I was thrilled to find this congregation of academics concerned with
socialism.  At first.  My anticipatory enthusiasm was diminished by the
reality of experience.  As Louis alludes, there was much learned
discussion of agency but no agency, argument about movements but no
moves, etc.  I considered that to be an encapsulation of theory from
practice in the real world, that is the scholarly consideration of
socialist theory and theory of or about socialism, but no intelligent
direction of such theory into practical pursuits.  In other words, the
Conference was a contradiction.

I think now though that my expectations were too great, that I did not
take into consideration the context: New York City, end of the 20th
century, collapse of the USSR, etc.  I have also read and thought much
over the past decade about the work of Noam Chomsky and Michael Parenti,
for example, and Howard Zinn, about how incisive their observations, how
well documented their analyses, how popularly couched, that is, how
accessible to people in their form they made their material-that in
itself mattered to the masses.  There are parallels with the Socialist
Scholars Conference.  As well as reading their works, I made it a point
to hear these learned scholars speak.  I have met each of them
personally, briefly, superficially.  Invariably, whenever they go before
an audience and deliver a lecture that critiques imperialism, at the end
during the question session someone from the crowd gets up and asks them
"What is to be done?"  Some plead, like acolytes: "Oh, Great Sage, tell
us what to do!"  It's like these individuals seem unable to think for
themselves.  Some, of course, make rhetorical their questions, because
they already have the Answer, and have come only to drop their sect's
boilerplate into the assembly.

I believe, that is I suspect, that if these high-profile popular
scholars and speakers were to deliver an effective formula for
revolution they would be promptly dispatched, neutralized, or borne off
from operative contact.  Chomsky, for example, has been able to
criticize the establishment for years because he is not really a direct
threat.  The record indicates that if one were actually to succeed in
mobilizing action against the dominant order, one would be put down like
a mad dog.  Thus the head is located away from the hands.

One bit of profitable wisdom I learned at the Socialist Scholars
Conference, again thanks to my Indian friend, was to wait until Sunday
to buy any books.  Impoverished students learn to hang around for when
publishers begin bundling up their merchandise, and are more than happy
to lighten their loads for less than the previous price for their wares.

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