[Marxism] Location Information

[Ilyenkova@xxxxxxx]

1. How did you get interested in Marxism?

I come from a working class Irish-Catholic background in Boston-- schools, 
parish, the whole 12 stations. My father and relatives were hardcore telephone 
union people so I was always aware of class oppression in a narrow sense. Until 
the Tet Offensive in early 1968 I supported the war in Vietnam and had 
contempt for the Vietnamese fighters, and the pacifist peace movement too. Then 
in 
early 1968 Tet rocked my world. I started to read about the *enemy* and talked 
about the war to returning vets in my neighborhood. 6 months post Tet I was 
convinced "we were on the wrong side." This lead to making connections with 
racial oppression as the Panthers, AIM, Young Lords etc grew. I got active in 
the 
movement and joined a small group at college where we did local organizing in 
blue collar Brockton, Mass. After the student strike in May 1970 we looked for 
a national group to join. The YSA/SWP came to our antiwar university, sold 
literature and gave a class in Marxist economics using Mandel's brief 
"Introdction to Marxist economic theory." Peter Camejo spoke on the mass action 
perspective for the movement. I thought the SWP offered the most lucid 
perspective 
both for organizing mass opposition to the war and for building a movement that 
could challenge the imperialist roots of war, racism, poverty and class 
oppression. We went to Boston for forums and most of us joined. The happiest 
day of 
my life was when I was accepted as a member and comrade.

2. How do you respond personally and politically to the apparent âtriumphalism
â of the system today, the so called âEnd of History?â

As recently as 1999 there was an aura of âtiumphalistâ gloating over the 
combined âdeath of Communismâ and the long boom of the â90s, and this was 
demoralizing, especially since the immiseration in the former USSR and the 
âEast-bloc
â countries was so horrific, Cuba was squeezed badly by loss of trading 
partners and aid, and 3rd world countries lost the leverage they formerly got 
from 
the existence of the USSR. Since then the speculative bubble has burst, 
interimperialist competition has reemerged, the US has embarked on nasty 
neocolonial 
wars, and living conditions of people the world over have plummeted. On the 
other hand, a massive global movement against the war has emerged, the 
Venezuelan masses are moving, and local struggles against neoliberal capitalism 
rage 
everywhere. âEnd of History.â Say what?

1. Books that Iâve read that others may find useful?
All the classics of Marx and Engels.
Trotskyâs Revolution Betrayed and The History of the Russian Revolution 
(Pathfinder Unabridged ed.)
Mandelâs âIntroduction to Marxist Economic Theoryâ (the mini version is 
still available as an intro to the 2 vol edition).
Felix Greeneâs The Enemy
John Gurleyâs âChallengers to Capitalismâ
Cheâs âMan and Socialismâ
Franz Mehringâs Biography of Marx (has a great chapter on Das Kapital with 
the sections on vols 2&3 written by Rosa Luxemburg).
Harry Magdoffâs books on Imperialism are essential.
Leninâs âState and Revolutionâ and âImperialism: The Highest Stage of 
Capitalismâ
Alan Woodsâs âReason in Revoltâ (an excellent updated exposition of 
Engelsâ
s Dialectics of Nature).
Ernest Mandelâs books âBureaucracyâ and âTrotsky: The Alternativeâ 
(1990s)
George Novakâs âDialectical Logicâ
All Ken Loachâs films.

4. What are the political conditions in the region of the world you live in?
Metro Boston is a land of SUVs, cell phone cradling soccer moms with 
Kerry-Edwards bumper stickers and prep school or Ivy emblems on their 
windshields, and 
a huge Zionist prescence. With Zinn, Chomsky, Cambridge et al thereâs lots of 
rad-lib stuff and the perennial Spart prescence to spice things up. The UJP 
has chapters in most municipalities, but between the dominant ABB  and left-DP 
liberalism there's a suffocation of independent left debate (Chomsky esp. is a 
past-master at control for you anarchists!!). Boston as a whole, including 
the legendary "Southie" has been undergoing major gentrification in the last 
decade. Boston still has a large working class prescence but it's expressed 
largely as white, male, building trades types in opposition to the "yuppies." 
Actually, Damon and Affleck captured this well in "Good Will Hunting." The SEIU 
janitor strike 2 years ago was basically a total bust for too many reasons to 
go 
into here.

5. What are your political activities?
I've been active in union struggles since the late 70s at the now closed Fore 
River Shipyard. Presently, I serve as an E Board member for my Local when the 
leadership isn't purging me for "disloyalty" (i.e. defending the members and 
the Union). I was active in CISPES in the 80s and in forming the TA union at 
UMass-Amherst. I work with the UJPs in Arlington and Cambridge (in my own town 
of Newton, the Chapter dissolved itself into the Kerry campaign-- That's 
Howard Zinn's group). In UJP I push the independent mass action approach; they 
sit 
the fence between demonstrations and Kerry. In general, however, even before 
the DP primaries the UJP has been averse to anything but "preaching to the 
choir" forums before dwindling audiences. It's pretty pathetic, really. So 
mainly 
I focus on trying to influence people at work and trying to figure out whether 
being president of my AFSCME local is worth it ("Can we get another step 
added to each grade in return for the higher copays, please sir?").
I
I'm doing this because others have been so generous. And maybe this will be 
of some help to someone. I know Joe Ds was to me.






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