[Marxism] Shachtman and "Third Camp"

["Wayne S. Rossi" <felianan@xxxxxxxxx>]

--- Tom O'Lincoln <suarsos@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Shachtman, Draper and the ISC called the USSR, China and then Cuba
> ?bureaucratic collectivist?. This concept does contain serious
> ambiguities, for if Cuba is neither socialist nor capitalist but
> something else altogether, how do you decide whether it?s more or
> less progressive than capitalism?

...

> On the other hand the ISO does call Cuba state capitalist. This is
> neither ?buried? nor has it posed any dilemmas so far. If the ISO can
> defend a capitalist Iraq against US occupation, why can?t it do the
> same for a capitalist Cuba?

To butt into the conversation:

This is something that, as a fairly young (24) socialist and a general
admirer of Hal Draper's work, that has been bothering me quite a lot
lately.  I find myself strongly drawn to Draper's idea of a quite
openly Marxist revolutionary democratic socialism, "socialism from
below" incorporating Marx and Engels, and Debs and Luxemburg, as well
as Lenin and Trotsky - all people who I read and for whom I have great
respect.  And I do share Draper's overall contempt for the "really
existing crap" of both sides of the divide.

But I cannot process the "third camp" tenet of Shachtman's left period.
 These are people who understood Leninism and the need to be opposed to
imperialism; what is more imperialist than the United States?  This
analysis clearly did a lot of damage to those who stayed loyal to
Shachtman in his "State Department Socialist" period.  The Soviet Union
did not have to be defended on a class basis; the regime did not even
have to be defended.  Anti-imperialism in and of itself is a sufficient
ground to stand against any aggression from the United States against
another nation.  How is it that such an analysis was not in the minds
of Draper and his fellow travelers, especially after Shachtman so
brutally moved to the right?

-Wayne

--------------------------------
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