[Marxism] Re: US reveals its efforts to topple Mugabe

["Carlos Eduardo Rebello" <crebello@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Sayan Bhattacharyya:

"The question here is self-determination for the Zimbabwean masses.
Whatever the US's attitude is towards Mugabe, is irrelevant to that
vital question."

That's exactly where you - and many 1st. World leftists - seem to be in
error, unfortunately, Sayan. "The US", in this case, means _The American
bourgeoisie and its imperialist interests_, and whenever this entity throws
its weight around in the Third World, it will do so in a manner that will be
from the start _in denial_ of anything that could be called
"self-determination" for Zimbabwe or any other country. The fact that Mugabe
is in most probability a populist ruler trying to assert a measure of elbow
room from imperialist pressure by means that are certainly _not_
revolutionary - and may well be very repressive and corrupt - does not means
we should buy into the usual imperialist ideology for such cases, that's to
say the idea that peoples can be made "happy" _in spite of themselves_,
something in learnt in Trotsky's "Their Morals & Ours". If that means having
to put up with Mugabe for the time being, I must say that, unfortunately
again, as it may be, History is _not made to order_.

CR



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