National Question, Otto Bauer, etc (was Re: [Marxism] Re: Is the struggle to unify China an expressionof"Great Han chauvinism" today?

["Carlos A. Rivera" <cerejota@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Louis Proyect" <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>


> Basically, the question of self-determination has lost this dimension in
> Marxist circles, even in the Trotskyist movement. It has become more of a
> Wilsonian approach in which the right to self-determination is seen as an
> absolute. I don't think this is warranted.

> More to the point, there has been little in the way of *concrete*
> examination of the national question.

What about the long-lost stuff by Otto Bauer, the Bundists etc.

In Puerto Rico and Cuba, they are quite studied, and across the board (ie
from the social-democrats to the trots to the anarchists).

Yet I have seen little mention of them outside of the more intellectually
inclined in my left of origin. Whats up with that?

And of course, the whole body of  MZT/Maoism is preocupied precisely with
the concrete examination of the national question.

(a nod to Carrol Cox on the use of Maoism, who I didn't ignore, but rather
tend to agree with on this question, even if my use of "maoist/maoism" is an
off-hand catchall to describe modern anti-revisionism)

You might disagree with the theoretical conclusions or the practice of this
whole melieu, but ignoring it when some of the most vital revolutionary
movements (Phillipines, Nepal, Naxahalite) in the world come from this
tradition, is disingeneous.

The national question has failed to be addressed *concretely* mostly by
ossified Trotskyist imperialist-country sectarians who want to
reforge/rebuild/reconstruct/refound/etc the Fourth International as the
International Vanguard Party of the World Proletariat (or some variation on
the theme), and who go an accuse even the more anti-nationalist groupings in
the third world of "nationalism" for working with the left-nationalists on
some concrete anti-imperialist struggles.

Besides them, even the Mandelist have done some thoughtful stuff on national
liberation and self-detemrination.

As for me, this right is so sacred, I could say I am a self-determinist as
much as a communist. Thing is I don't extend this righ to settler colonies
or to opportinunist nationalism.

sks



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