Re: Soviet balance sheet

["Rosser Jr, John Barkley" <rosserjb@xxxxxxx>]

Wojtek,
     Arguably there has been an exacerbation of ethnic
nationalism in the FSU since 1991.  But your remarks about
ethnic relations in the USSR are a bit off.  It may be that
the early Bolsheviks truly transcended ethnicity, with the
multi-ethnic Lenin himself exemplifying the multi-ethnic
"Homo Sovieticus."
      But under Stalin this was hardly the case.  The
republics were based on ethnic identities.  Some were more
favored than others.  Those that were severely suppressed
(Chechens, Crimean Tatars, Uniate Ukrainians, Volga
Germans, Jews late in his regime, among others) did not
have such experiences out of a social desire to "break up
ghettos" but to suppress groups who were identified as
anti-USSR or anti-Stalin, as a group.  In some cases the
groups were removed en masse from their homelands to other
areas, usually in Central Asia. This is called racism.
     Also, especially as time went on, and in spite of
Stalin himself being from an ethnic minority (a
Georgianized Ossete), the upper reaches of the nomenklatura
ruling elite increasingly became dominated by ethnic Great
Russians.  Would we consider a WASP-dominated and
assmiliting US a paragon of ethnic relations, even if this
were being done in the name of socialism?
Barkley Rosser
On Tue, 31 Mar 1998 09:48:53 -0500 Wojtek Sokolowski
<sokol@xxxxxxx> wrote:

> At 06:55 PM 3/30/98 -0800, Anders Schneiderman wrote:
> >At 08:35 AM 3/28/98 -0800, Michael wrote:
> >>Also in the Balance Sheet, we might include Stalin's brutal, but
> >>relatively effective policy of suppressing/repressing ethnic hostilities.
> >
> >I don't see how you'd put that in anything other than the minus column.
> >First off, it's hard to see how slaughtering or interning people is a plus.
> > Second, this strategy was ultimately a failure:  once the repression
> >stopped, the old ethnic tensions flared right back up again.
> >
>
>
> That is true only if you assume that ethnic hostilities ultimately reside
> in human psyche, as bourgeois ideology wants us to believe.  If you assume
> that ethnic conflicts are the sole product of social relations (or which
> relations of production are a major part) - then the only logical
> conclusion is that the social relations under the Soviet system did NOT
> generate serious ethnic conflicts, but the re-introduction of
> market-schmarket style bourgeois relations immediately re-ignited those
> conflicts.
>
> The biggest lie about conflicts in the x-Soviet empire, disseminated by the
> Anglo-American propaganda machine, is that those conflicts have ancient
> ethnic roots.  In fact, they have been re-introduced to the region, after
> being nearly extinct under the "communist" rule, by the ruling elites
> struggling for power.
>
>
> As far as Stalin's social integration policies are concerned, I see nothing
> wrong with attempts to eliminate ethnic enclaves and ghettos.  I wish the
> Yanks did the same thing instead of cherishing "cultural diversity"
> (translation: Black ghettos, White suburbs).
>
>
>
>
> Wojtek Sokolowski
> Institute for Policy Studies
> Johns Hopkins University
> Baltimore, MD 21218
> sokol@xxxxxxx
> voice: (410) 516-4056
> fax:   (410) 516-8233
>
> Opinions expressed above are those of this writer only.  They do not
> represent the views or policies of the Institute for Policy Studies, the
> Johns Hopkins University, or anyone else affiliated with these institutions.
>
>
>

--
Rosser Jr, John Barkley
rosserjb@xxxxxxx