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NEWS & LETTERS, March 2004Readers' ViewsREVOLUTIONARY BLACK DIMENSION John Alan's book, DIALECTICS OF BLACK FREEDOM STRUGGLES, demonstrates both the continuity of Marxist-Humanist thought, going back at least to the '40s, and its ongoing capacity to illuminate the fundamental liberation struggles of 21st century America. Seizing on the inseparability of race, class, and gender in the projection of a new humanism for our time, Alan offers the needed alternative to so many futile debates on the Left about which terms have priority and how they are related. The minute you treat them as separate moments, all the king's horses and all the king's men are no avail. Alan elegantly presents them together, at the same time showing how Black freedom struggles have always been and continue to be the central clue to American history. Only a crass theory of "special interest groups" could fail to see that the Black struggle is "the touchstone of the whole of American development." Thank you, John Alan. --Tom, Spokane, Wash. I look at DIALECTICS OF BLACK FREEDOM STRUGGLES from the perspective of the soured Iranian Revolution. The Iranian Left had a lot of discussions on nationalism during the revolution. We started with a discussion of Marx's essay "On the Jewish Question" as minorities came under attack by Khomeini. This book would have saved us a lot of time The Black question has an international dimension because, as this book shows, when Black people emancipate themselves it helps to create a new kind of human being everywhere. John Alan's book really compresses the great history of Black people against the way that history is used by Bush and other rulers. All non-Blacks, especially whites in the U.S., should read this book. --Iranian exile, Hayward, Cal. I don't understand your concept of "Black masses as vanguard." I don't see the idea of a vanguard party as an elitist concept. It is the consciousness of the working class. Just as the bourgeoisie has a general staff, the working class needs their general staff. The masses don't act mindlessly but those acts have to be put in context. Leadership can be along the lines of the masses. --Leftist, Berkeley, Cal. Our struggle is against racism and we see all problems in those terms. As we struggle we touch all other struggles. We have to fight racism first and unless we do, nothing else counts. --Longtime Black activist, Oakland, Cal. The revolutionary strivings of the Black masses seem to be seen only in N&L. Reality politics puts off the revolutionary idea and winds up having nothing to do with the aspirations of the masses. The call for a total uprooting that you see in the pages of N&L is what is truly realistic. --Retired, Detroit John Alan's book shows how the Bush administration, in appointing people like Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice to important positions, was using race as a symbol to cover over real problems. --Black student, San Francisco Race is a false concept in the sense that capitalism is a false concept and we don't have a grasp on how much it influences us and holds us back. Racism creates a monolithic view of Blacks. We are linked to Colin Powell in being descendants of Africa but we don't come from the same class and experiences. People ask what the Black community thinks about something and I ask, What Black community? There are many of them, all different. --Black woman, Oakland, Cal. AMERICAN CIVILIZATION ON TRIAL shows the historical context for understanding Black liberation struggles. The Left ignores that at its peril, as can be seen in the way the anti-war movements did not grasp the widespread African-American opposition to the Iraq war, and failed to build upon it. --Radical lawyer, Flint, Mich. HELP NEEDED I noticed in a recent issue someone incarcerated in Ohio asking for assistance in getting copies of your two new books on the Black struggles in the U.S. Someone may well have already come forward to pay for copies for him, but if not would you put the donation I'm enclosing toward helping with that, either for him or someone else who needs a donor? People on the outside know little of the lives of the incarcerated. There are so many injustices that it is impossible to work on all of them, except in a general sense like this. --Longtime reader, Canada MARXISM AND BLACK LIBERATION The article in Raya Dunayevskaya's Archives column in the January-February N&L was especially important to me because it showed that Blacks are not the only ones who suffer from discrimination. So do other minorities, like people from the Middle East now. It hit home when she pointed out that the later the bourgeois revolution, the more incomplete it is, because the class differences are more developed. That is something Third World revolutions have had to face. She is right that the unemployment inherent in the social crisis makes the proletariat more vulnerable to a fascist appeal against minorities. That archives column also showed that while a revolutionary like Lenin went back to Hegel to solve his problems he also looked to the Black situation in the U.S. and found a relation to the National Question he was dealing with. --Iranian exile, California Raya Dunayevskaya's column in the January-February issue made me appreciate Dunayevskaya's break with Trotskyism. While it was a ground-breaking work at the time, I feel that it lacked the full expression of Marxist-Humanism's idea of the self-developing Subject as Reason. I believe there were still some remnants of vanguardism and economic determinism that didn't show themselves in AMERICAN CIVILIZATION ON TRIAL, BLACK MASSES AS VANGUARD, a work that was fully Marxist-Humanist. I felt more care should have been taken in the "Editor's Note" to differentiate Dunayevskaya's thought before and after the founding of News and Letters Committees, to show readers the movement and development of her ideas. --Brown Douglass, Memphis It was remarkable to see how early Dunayevskaya, in the 1940s, anticipated the later Civil Rights Movement on the basis of Black proletarianization in the South and North. It was only in the l990s that historians began to catch up by exploring the roots of the Civil Rights Movement in Black participation in union organizing in the South. However, where Dunayevskaya saw the impetus coming from the self-movement of the Black masses, many of the historians put an undue emphasis on the role of the Communist Party in that organizing. AMERICAN CIVILIZATION ON TRIAL and DIALECTICS OF BLACK FREEDOM STRUGGLES show, on the contrary, the CPs betrayal of the masses, and the battle of ideas between different strains of Marxism. --Franklin Dmitryev, Memphis THE U.S. ELECTION 2004 The Youth column by Brown Douglass in the last issue, "On the limits of electoral politics," was written before Howard Dean started on his downfall. While showing why Dean gained so much momentum among the youth, he made good points that turned out to be true, especially the question of "anybody but Bush." We all know where just taking that ground can lead you. --Mooj, Chicago I noted that both presidential candidates, Dean and Edwards, used the expression of "two worlds" in America in talking about the growing chasm between the rich and the poor. Of course, they didn't follow that up with the proper corollary, that in order to correct that situation, what is required is the total uprooting of the capitalist system. --Old radical, Detroit Looking at the situation from here, it seems that Bush will win. My basis for that conclusion is the smashing of the Democrats in California, the intervention of Arnold Schwarzenegger against gay marriages, and the location of New York for the Republican convention. Given the close call in the last election, a Republican success in California would be sufficient to secure the defeat of the Democrats for a decade or more. Yet, even if the Democrats win, what will be the nature of that victory? In essence, the U.S. is and will continue to be a one-party Big Brother state. What then are we to do? We need to look at the advice of the Italian Marxist, Gramsci, who suggested that we should hope for the best but prepare for the worst. The only weapons we have are our thoughts and words. Let's organize to use them well. --Patrick, England THE MIDDLE-EAST SCENE The recent Iranian election for the parliament has shattered any hope for reform in Iran. The disqualification of about 2,500 on charges of disloyalty to the supreme leader means the minority conservative group known as the Council of Guardians has succeeded in closing the door on the aspirations of the Iranian masses for democracy. The masses have been brought face to face with the ruling clergy and can have no doubt that the reformist struggle of President Khatami has failed. What is also brought forward is the determination of the people to end the stage of unfreedom in Iran. --Manel, California The rapprochement between India and Pakistan promised reduction of nuclear warfare threats. It is welcome because the region is such a flashpoint. But the danger of a potential Islamist takeover of control is real and shows the weakness of piecemeal reforms which lead only to further entrenchment of bureaucracy. It is why Marxist-Humanism always shows the importance of the "two worlds" within each country. --Observer, Detroit LESBIAN & GAY MARRIAGE Our Governor Schwarzenegger is living up to his own caricature of a simple-minded body builder on steroids playing a cartoon character. Commenting on San Francisco issuing marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples on "Meet the Press" he said: "All of a sudden we see riots, we see protests, we see people clashing. The next thing we know, there is injured or dead people." He echoed the handful of social conservatives who did protest, calling issuing licenses "anarchy." Our neighbors who have lived together for years were part of the now thousands who got married in order to publicly declare their affection and commitment to each other. They joined hundreds of others to queue up in lines many blocks long waiting patiently for a chance to fill out forms for the marriage license bureau. If this is anarchy, I wonder what orderliness looks like. --Neighbor, California The atmosphere in the City Hall is so joyous with the over 3,800 gay and lesbian marriages so far that this is called "the Winter of Love" in San Francisco. --Observer, San Francisco VANGUARDISM Congratulations on the demystification you are doing on the retrogressive nature of so-called progressive movements, which is articulated by elements of the vanguardists over here. The Left's flirtation with fundamentalism has damaged much political progression in the European Social Forum. The Left right now is unable to take a total view, let alone discuss human liberation. Global Resistance as an organization is now politically defunct for that reason. --George, Britain KOSOVA DEBATED ANEW Together with my sub renewal, I enclose an article from another journal I subscribe to, NEW UNIONIST. It concerns the great power oil pipeline machinations in the Balkans. The reason I'm sending it to you is that in it the Kosova Liberation Army appears in the role of cat's paw to the U.S and British imperialists. I was surprised when some five years ago, you were promoting the KLA as the answer to the plight of the Albanian Kosovars. While your arguments were very logical, I found it hard to imagine these nationalists and bandits being the solution to any problem. Now it appears that they dwell in the same cesspool as the CIA, Al Qaeda, the British secret service and other such agents of terror and imperialism. --S.K., Massachusetts Editor's Note: There has never been any credibility to charges that the KLA was a tool of the CIA, Al Qaeda, or any other global terrorist network. The KLA--while it existed--was an armed movement that became recognized by the vast majority of Kosovars as their best defense against genocide. The U.S. State Department did characterize the KLA as a "terrorist" group, a term later adopted by some on the Left. Those leftists, including the NEW UNIONIST, who promote this term have a lot to answer for. As we said at the time, "When the Left cannot even extend support to those facing genocide, it has forsaken its ability to say anything meaningful about human liberation... Perhaps no event since the Hitler-Stalin Pact of 1939 has shown how total is the ideological pollution in the Left." People can read for themselves our analyses of the situation in Kosova by ordering "Kosova: Writings from News & Letters, 1998-1999" for $3.50 from us. TOTALITARIANISM Tom More's essay on "The fate of totalitarianism: Marxist-Humanism in conversation with Orwell, Sartre, and Adorno" (January-February N&L) was difficult reading, but his gist was clear: a one-dimensional view of totalitarianism leads you to either tail-end Stalin or support U.S. imperialism, as does Orwell, who maintained the view that it cannot be fought. Raya Dunayevskaya opposed all forms of totalitarianism earlier than those other thinkers did, and always saw a pathway out in the mass struggles and aspirations for total freedom. --Dan B., Michigan In his essay, More asks a lot of questions about Sartre and Adorno distancing themselves from the actual movements of their day. He calls it a degenerated form of "second negation." The way the dialectic can be truncated is made very clear in this article. A worker would appreciate seeing the way the Hegelian dialectic is not separated from everyday concerns of workers in their movement. Negation of the negation can be truncated in many different ways. Yet Marxism is Hegelianism, despite all the epigones. Marx tried to make that point in his writing. --Htun Lin, Oakland, Cal. More says that the absolute of capitalism can't be separated from new beginnings coming from below....He says that the subject is going to emerge. Yes, it will. But he leaves out the question: What happens after? The absolute as new beginning is based on asking that question. Why did Poland accept globalized capitalism after Solidarity or the Iranians get stuck with a theocracy after their revolution? The absolute negativity that is in the movement is not fully comprehended in what is new. I think Tom More fudges the question by adding "the standing possibility of retrogression notwithstanding." Instead of seeing the question of "What happens after?"--which we have to answer now before the revolution--explicitly within the movement from theory to practice and our concept of the absolute. The ability "to hear the voices from below" and a "penetrating explanation of our current world-historic situation" is good but not good enough. The dynamite of the dialectic needs to be expressed in and for itself as the opposite to all forms of totality that hem us in. --Ron Brokmeyer, California HEARING WORKERS The article by Georgiana on "Misery of health cuts" in the last issue was selected by the striking workers of Vons, when I showed them that issue of N&L, as the one which "says it like it is." Workers always hear their own voices clearly when a writer speaks their language. --Manel, Los Angeles Our California Nurses Association dues were raised to fight a rival union, SEIU. I'm glad the two unions finally reached a "mutual cooperation agreement" as Htun Lin described it in his column in the January-February issue. But wouldn't you think the money would now be used to give the union more of a presence at the wards and clinics? That is not the case. We won the right to have quality of care monitored by our union, but the liaison positions created to ensure it are spread too thin. The union either exists to fight for its members in the workplace or it is nothing. --CNA nurse, Oakland, Cal. At the Local 640 warehouse workers union meeting at East L.A. College, the workers have asked the union leaders to prepare the union to vote for a $10 surcharge in union fees for the emergency fund, to be used in case they have to join the striking supermarket workers. While they say the new talks between the union and management are a hopeful sign, they noted that the union has approved $1 million for house and rent payments for striking members. The striking supermarket workers need everyone's support because they are really holding the line for all of us in our fight against the "free fall" of human conditions everywhere today. --Supporter, Los Angeles 'MAD COW' & CAPITALISM The article on "mad cow disease" in the January-February N&L really brought out the way the capitalist food industry tries to turn animals into machines and treats them accordingly. But the sentence, "Disease is an unintended consequence of a system that disrupts natural cycles, subordinating everything to the drive for ever-expanding production," is misleading. Disease has always been part of the natural cycle: wolves prey on weak, sick caribou, feeding themselves and indirectly contributing to a healthier herd. Disease may kill off individuals but benefit a species, or harm one species but benefit the environment as a whole. Disease in the context of capitalism plays a very different role. I'd like to see Marxist-Humanists explore its ramifications in greater detail. The analysis of its commodification can help us realize how totally capitalism perverts life on earth and how total is the needed uprooting. --Susan Van Gelder, Michigan WOMAN AS REASON The "Woman as Reason" column in the January-February issue was striking in that the new constitution in Afghanistan challenges those who thought they knew what democracy meant. This new constitution denies rights to their own citizens, notably women. That was also the case with the U.S. constitution, which was based on a compromise that allowed slavery and gave slave owners the right to represent the slaves as three-fifths of a human being. The Afghan constitution comes from those whom the U.S. has armed, and who are now writing the meaning of democracy in Afghanistan as they see it. It makes it clear that the only genuine support for democracy comes from the "second America" together with the "second Afghanistan." --Women's liberationist, California I believe what is plaguing this country now is that those in control are trying to restore the boundary between man and woman. Bush wants to make America a "man again" which I would interpret as making Americans brutal. The line between being a man and woman supposedly makes a man more "masculine" and a women more "feminine." But what does it mean that one of the U.S. troops being brought up on charges in Iraq for mistreatment of POWs is a woman? All being equally brutal is not what would make us all human. --Correspondent, Oakland, Cal. WHAT JUSTIFIES BUSH'S WAR? The N&L January-February lead analyzed well what the joy of the Iraqi masses at the capture of Hussein meant--and what it does not mean. Hussein's downfall cannot justify Bush's war on Iraq. Kevin Michaels showed just how phony Bush's attempt at justification is. His aura is wearing very thin. Deficit spending reveals the new state of U.S. imperialism, as it amasses capital from Europe and Asia. --Longtime N&L supporter, Michigan YOU CAN BUY NEWS & LETTERS AT THESE BOOKSTORES • Fourth Avenue Smoke Shop, 832 SW Fourth Ave., Portland, OR 97204 • Left Hand Book Collective, 1200 Pearl St., Basement, Boulder, CO 80302 • Solidarity Books, 8404 Springhill Ct., Indianapolis IN 46260. |
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