tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post2596096799760488107..comments2024-01-19T04:00:42.885-05:00Comments on Permanent Revolution: Trotsky on Ukraine: lessons for today Alex Steinerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09128453587484101609noreply@blogger.comBlogger19125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-45047728899477939692016-04-29T03:26:32.337-04:002016-04-29T03:26:32.337-04:00You can go to the contact form on the website or a...You can go to the contact form on the website or as an alternative you can email us directly at<br /><a href="mailto:revolutioninpermanence@gmail.com" rel="nofollow"> email us here </a>Alex Steinerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09128453587484101609noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-38277495722442178962016-04-28T17:45:10.548-04:002016-04-28T17:45:10.548-04:00Another point. I read your analysis of wsws positi...Another point. I read your analysis of wsws position about the iraq war. And i missed a political and economical analysis of the so called islamists. What is their social base in our time. It is clear that these groups are not just revivals of the past with another social structure.<br />Unfortunately no left group is interested in this question nor gives a dialectical and materialistic explanation of this phenomenoun in our time.<br />Besides, what do you think about tactical collaboration even with not reliable groups if they really fight ?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-10178442105600196702016-04-28T14:36:13.218-04:002016-04-28T14:36:13.218-04:00It might be insightful nevertheless it is importan...It might be insightful nevertheless it is important to notice that Zizek who claims to be in the tradition of marxism is not a marxist.<br />His explanation of materialism has nothing to do with dialectic materialism and causes confusion.<br />I would like to discuss more about philosophical problems with you. What forum you use for this ?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-36902755353864327992016-04-27T17:54:25.190-04:002016-04-27T17:54:25.190-04:00I see.
Regardless of whether you think Zizek is ...I see. <br /><br />Regardless of whether you think Zizek is a Marxist or not, is Zizek's observation not insightful? <br /><br />Alex Steinerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09128453587484101609noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-70039216322691364132016-04-27T15:00:25.026-04:002016-04-27T15:00:25.026-04:00Sorry
But you quote Zizek in the article. I asked...Sorry <br />But you quote Zizek in the article. I asked you because I think that Zizek is not a Marxist.<br />I wonder why you mention Zizek. His comment on ukraine is nothing that was dicovered by him.On the other hand i agree with you critique of wsws. Thank you.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-13228019999934030732016-04-26T01:46:08.103-04:002016-04-26T01:46:08.103-04:00It is odd that your are asking about Zizek in a po...It is odd that your are asking about Zizek in a post about Trotsky's views on the Ukraine. But since you asked, here is a link to the audio of a lecture that one of our supporters gave at a Left Forum a few years ago on the very topic:<br /><br /><a href="http://forum.permanent-revolution.org/2011/04/left-forum-presentations-critique-of.html" rel="nofollow">Left Forum presentations: 'A critique of Lacanian reductionism in the work of Slavoj Žižek'</a>Alex Steinerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09128453587484101609noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-43916972736864877212016-04-24T14:36:01.787-04:002016-04-24T14:36:01.787-04:00Hello
I would like to know how you stand to Zizek....Hello<br />I would like to know how you stand to Zizek. Do you think he is a Marxist ? Thank you.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-34040647599543726002014-06-05T16:45:18.011-04:002014-06-05T16:45:18.011-04:00We wrote a critique of the SEP's analysis of t...We wrote a critique of the SEP's analysis of the changed role of the unions as a consequences of globalization in our earlier book length polemic, <i>Marxism Without its Head or its Heart</i>. I would refer you specifically to Chapter 5 of that document, the section titled,<br /><i>Marxism and the Unions: the Evolution of a Correct Analysis</i> starting on page 129, and the following section,<br /><i>Rationalizing Abstentionism</i><br />starting on page 132. Here is the link to that chapter:<br /><a href="http://www.permanent-revolution.org/polemics/mwhh_ch05.pdf" rel="nofollow">http://www.permanent-revolution.org/polemics/mwhh_ch05.pdf</a><br /><br />I would especially direct you to our critique of North's "philosophical" rationalization for abstentionism in the unions, namely his contention that the very form of unionism imposes a bourgeois content on its struggles. With such a rationale any movement of the masses that in some way falls short of the finished forms of socialist consciousness and internationalism is thereby deemed unworthy of the intervention of Marxists. Such is the logic sectarian abstentionism. This explains why, although the the original analysis of the changed role of the unions as a result of globalization is mostly correct, the conclusions drawn from it are exactly the opposite of what a revolutionary who seeks a road to the masses should be advocating. Much the same could be said for the SEP's discussion of the national question. The main theoretical justification for their repudiation of the right of nations to self-determination can be found in one chapter of their document on globalization,<br /><a href="http://www.wsws.org/exhibits/slreply/part6-1.shtml" rel="nofollow">http://www.wsws.org/exhibits/slreply/part6-1.shtml</a> <br />and is written in the form of a polemic against the Spartacist group. And while much of the critique of Spartacist is justified, there is one response from Spartacist (quoted in the SEP document) that hits the nail on the head:<br />"But what do the Northites tell the Mexican workers to do until the mass of workers in the US move to overthrow the capitalist system? The answer is effectively nothing. By counterposing an abstract conception of socialist internationalism to the actual struggles of the workers, rural toilers and oppressed peoples, the Northite tendency inexorably puts forward a defeatist line toward these struggles..."<br /><br />The theoretical conclusion drawn from the SEP's analysis is once more that because the bourgeois content of nationalism has shown itself to be ever more reactionary as a result of globalization, therefore there is no longer a need for revolutionary internationalists to be sensitive to the right of nations to self-determination where that slogan is appropriate. Again the "philosophical" core of this sectarian politics rests in identifying the forms themselves within which the struggles of the masses are organized as somehow subordinating those struggles to a bourgeois and reactionary content whether those forms are a union or a nation. But this is to fetishize the forms and miss the dynamic possibilities that emerge when a conscious leadership intervenes in a struggle whatever its initial forms. And this amounts to forgetting the whole point of revolutionary leadership - which is to build a bridge to the consciousness of the masses.<br /><br />Alex SteinerAlex Steinerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09128453587484101609noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-9812843661445450272014-05-31T13:03:27.966-04:002014-05-31T13:03:27.966-04:00Since your relationship with the WSWS is a central...Since your relationship with the WSWS is a central aspect to your history, and you are at the moment championing the right (not advocacy I assume) of national self-determination, I would be curious on your take on their decision in the 90's to renounce that historic position of the Marxist movement, along with writing of the trade unions as working class organizations, since supposedly the globalization of the world economy had decisively transformed the content of the previous Marxist positions on these questions.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-24953860776159267912014-05-30T01:25:48.037-04:002014-05-30T01:25:48.037-04:00“Pat formulas don't solve concrete tasks” is a...“Pat formulas don't solve concrete tasks” is a sub-head for one of Trotsky's articles on Ukraine. He had in mind the kind of argument you are making. International working class unity is an objective, not a program. You could apply this “pat formula” to any number of problems: abortion rights, gay marriage, the fight against racism etc. - we don't need policies to address these problems, everything will be resolved through the “pat formula” of the international unity of the working class.<br /><br /><br />Lenin and Trotsky's position on self-determination of oppressed nations was NOT an “adaptation” to the Social Revolutionaries: you assert this without any evidence.<br /><br /><br />I never said my goal was the unity of the Ukrainian working class. Nor did I ever say that I was a supporter of Ukrainian nationalism. Like Trotsky, my goal is an independent socialist Ukraine as part of a United Socialist States of Europe. I argued that the only way that could ever come about was through uniting Ukrainian workers around a socialist program.<br /><br /><br />In other words, the unity of the Ukrainian working class is a means to an end – and specifically a means to combat nationalism, both of the Ukrainian and Russian variety. I also argued that no one else on the radical left has any other idea of how to fight nationalism in Ukraine (on both sides of the political divide), and that applies to you as well.<br /><br /><br />You throw around the term Pabloite without any explanation: this is just invective. As for having our heads in the 1930s, your head seems to be with Luxemburg in the 1910s but that doesn't bother you at all. I argued that the historical past has come to life in Ukraine and that all the political factions have embraced their history, except the Marxist left. I might add that it was the Pabloites who coined the phrase, 'Junk the old Trotskyism'; your remark about having our heads in the 1930s is nothing more than a variation on that old Pabloite theme.<br /><br /><br />I couldn't care less about whether you were chagrined (!!?) or not. In my response to Mitchel I'd referenced an article on Makhno and a book of articles by Lenin and Trotsky on Kronstadt. You didn't address this material, and so I simply registered my disagreement with your bald assertions. Invoking Victor Serge for a bit of name- dropping proves nothing.<br /><br /><br />FrankFrank Brennernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-90995635998590707522014-05-30T01:21:47.633-04:002014-05-30T01:21:47.633-04:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.Frank Brennernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-44379922573400845082014-05-29T04:23:57.366-04:002014-05-29T04:23:57.366-04:00Frank,I know that Lenin and Trotsky disagreed with...Frank,I know that Lenin and Trotsky disagreed with Luxemburg. I agree with Luxemburg on the issue of "national self determination." Their slogan was an adaptation to the position of the Social Revolutionaries. <br />Yet all three agreed that nationalism must be subordinated to the priority of international working class unity. When you say your goal is the unity of the Ukrainian working class, you are NOT speaking as a follower of Trotsky, Lenin, OR Luxemburg.<br />The analogy here that must be drawn is NOT to Trotsky's defense of Ukrainian nationalism in the face of the Stalinist bureaucratism. You Pabloites need to get your heads out of the 1930s. The analogy, as I hinted before, to be drawn here is the use of Ukrainian nationalism by the German imperialists to garner support or at least confusion for their stealing the Ukraine from the Soviet Union in 1918. "out of the slogan of Ukrainian self-determination," wrote Rosa, "came the German bayonets." So, now, the bayonets of NATO and the U.S. (and our energy corporations, hell bent on selling fracking-derived gas to the Europeans) crawl out of the same nationalism.<br />As for Makhno and Kronstadt, am I supposed to be chagrined that you don't agree with me? Sorry, I'm not, but incidentally, my position is that of Victor Serge, who knows what he was talking about--ThomasAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-20780127758201076052014-05-28T16:03:05.283-04:002014-05-28T16:03:05.283-04:00My focus was the same as Trotsky's. Like many ...My focus was the same as Trotsky's. Like many others who claim to admire Trotsky, you ignore the substance of his article. I also make it very clear that opposition to annexations is NOT the same as support for Ukrainian nationalism, but you ignore what I wrote (and all that Lenin wrote on the same subject). By the way, Trotsky and Lenin pointedly disagreed with Luxemburg on the issue of self-determination of oppressed nations, and I think history has proven them right. <br /><br />That being said, there is a difference between Ukrainian nationalism and Russian nationalism. To ignore that difference is to ignore centuries of oppression of Ukraine under czarism and then under Stalinism. Russian nationalism has always been bound up with the imperial ambitions of the Russian elites; Ukrainian nationalism is a contradictory expression of resistance to national oppression. Trotsky says that Ukrainian history is rich in experiences of the wrong way of fighting that oppression. The job of Marxists is not to ignore that oppression but to help Ukrainian workers, youth and intellectuals find the RIGHT WAY - via an independent socialist Ukraine. <br /><br />Finally I don't agree with you about Makhno and Kronstadt.<br /><br />FrankFrank Brennernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-79715487572745286192014-05-28T03:45:53.865-04:002014-05-28T03:45:53.865-04:00To focus so exclusively, as the Brenner does, on n...To focus so exclusively, as the Brenner does, on national self-determination for the Ukraine, for the unity purely of the Ukrainian workers, is not in the tradition of Leon Trotsky, V.I. Lenin, and certainly not in the tradition of Rosa Luxemburg. The unity of the entirety of the international working class is what is at stake here and what we should be fighting for. The sole focus on unity for a single nationality—especially when it comes at the expense of RUSSIAN “national self-determination,” (which would also just a conceivably unite the RUSSIAN working class, including Russian workers in the Ukraine, as well as an awareness of the role of U.S. imperialism "crawling out of the egg shell of" 'Ukrainian nationalsim'--is a trademark of today’s Pabloites, <br />As for the Makhno and Kronstadt, they were deplorable errors, resulting from the growing bureaucratization of the Soviet Union and Trotsky's uncritical partipation in it, at the time. I don't see why these problems with his and the Bolsheviks' military-bureaucratic behavior should lead us to overlook his great legacy in the main.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-16056897400574694512014-05-28T00:53:50.948-04:002014-05-28T00:53:50.948-04:00[Part two of response to Mitchel Cohen's comme...[Part two of response to Mitchel Cohen's comment]<br /><br />4 I don't see how I “downplay” the role of fascists in Ukraine. Their murderous manipulation of the Maidan protests, the dangerous precedent of their positions in the interim government, the outrage they perpetrated in Odessa – all are discussed. What I argued, however, was that the fascists were not the MAIN danger, at least for now, in Ukraine. The presidential election just held in Ukraine seems to confirm my reading of the situation. My point was that the fascists were not yet a mass movement, and that it was wrong-headed to exaggerate their importance. The victory of Petro Poroshenko is certainly a victory for a Ukrainian oligarch, but not for Ukrainian fascism. The two fascist parties, Svoboda and Right Sector, polled about 3 percent, according to one report I read. They might do better in the upcoming parliamentary elections, especially given the virtual absence of a Ukrainian left, but I still think this latest election result is indicative of how MARGINAL the fascists are, for now at least. I think the real problem is not my downplaying of the importance of the fascists but rather the EXAGGERATION of their strength by most of the radical left. I think that exaggeration is directly connected to the blind spot about the unity of the Ukrainian working class.<br /><br /><br />5 I don't think your analogy to Vietnam clarifies anything. You say that the tactics of the imperialists supposedly over-run their strategies so that the strategies become “secondary to stopping the war (and mass murder) at all costs.” This isn't a dialectical conception of tactics and strategy. Instead it harkens back to a deeply discredited politics: Popular Frontism. Stop the war “at all costs”. Stop the fascists “at all costs”. But HOW exactly do we stop the fascists? The Popular Front was never very good at answering that question: in practice it meant alliances with bourgeois forces that ended up divorcing the fight against fascism and war from the fight against capitalism, with disastrous consequences. In Ukraine I would suggest that a crucial part of the answer as to how to stop the fascists is – the UNITY OF THE UKRAINIAN WORKING CLASS.<br /><br /><br /><br />6 I'll deal briefly with the kitchen sink stuff you throw in: Russia hasn't been any sort of a workers' state since the collapse of the Soviet Union. References to Kronstadt and Nestor Makhno are boilerplate anarchist rhetoric against Trotsky. For anyone else not totally wedded to that rhetoric, I would refer them to this article on Makhno: <a href="http://www.isreview.org/issues/53/makhno.shtml" rel="nofollow"> http://www.isreview.org/issues/53/makhno.shtml</a>.As for Kronstadt, there are library shelves full of material. For anyone interested in the Bolshevik perspective (which in my view effectively counters anarchist accusations), Pathfinder put out a compilation of articles by Lenin and Trotsky in 1979 that can still be gotten second-hand. Some of this material is available on the Marxist Internet Archive.<br /><br />Frank BrennerFrank Brennernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-24297045177246316122014-05-28T00:49:12.178-04:002014-05-28T00:49:12.178-04:00This comment has been removed by the author.Alex Steinerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09128453587484101609noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-34737854231205241962014-05-27T19:04:08.852-04:002014-05-27T19:04:08.852-04:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.Frank Brennernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-3022560996397409802014-05-27T18:57:19.627-04:002014-05-27T18:57:19.627-04:00Note: This response is in two parts because of the...Note: This response is in two parts because of the size limitations imposed by Blogger on comments. This is part one.<br /><br />Mitchel:<br /><br /><br />I'm sorry you found my article unsatisfying, but I doubt that any article written from a Trotskyist perspective – which is, after all, what I was trying to do – would have met with your approval. (By the way, I suggest you re-read Vogt-Downey's article, “Whither Ukraine?”: you'll find the same 'unsatisfying' outlook there.)<br /><br /><br />As to specifics:<br /><br /><br />1 It's wrong to say my article focuses “barely a whit” on the role of Western imperialism. I state explicitly that the Western powers are the aggressors and that their strategic aim is to weaken Russia. Are the Western powers “the driving force”, as you put it, behind the events in Ukraine? I would say the economic crisis of world capitalism is the real driving force. Within that context imperialist conspiracies play an important role, but what is fundamentally setting the agenda is the collapse of the Ukrainian economy and the stranglehold of the oligarchs.<br /><br /><br />2 I disagree that my article focuses too much on annexation. I think I made it abundantly clear that my focus was on THE UNITY OF THE UKRAINIAN WORKING CLASS. I argued that no annexations has to be a bedrock position for Marxists on Ukraine because this is essential for cutting through nationalist hysteria on both sides and allowing for appeals to CLASS consciousness. If you have another proposal for how Ukrainian workers can be united, I'd be interested to hear it. From my reading of the radical left coverage of the Ukraine crisis, this issue registers “barely a whit”.<br /><br /><br />3 Workers' self-determination … hmmm. Nice phrase but I'm not sure what it means. Marxists talk about class consciousness, a rather more precise concept. Most American workers voted for Obama, no doubt before that many American workers voted for George Bush – is this workers' self-determination? I'm all for workers determining their future, but I'm not for oligarchs manipulating workers for their own ends. I suspect that a good deal more of the latter than the former is going on now in the Donbas. I drew an analogy between the possible breakup of Ukraine and the actual, tragic, breakup of Yugoslavia. Is that precedent relevant? I think it is, and if you disagree, you need to explain why. My claim is that the breakup of Yugoslavia was a terrible blow to the cause of working class liberation, and the same would hold true for the breakup of Ukraine.Frank Brennernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2062509833711600070.post-69066325776449103822014-05-23T20:41:10.354-04:002014-05-23T20:41:10.354-04:00An interesting but ultimately unsatisfying (to me)...An interesting but ultimately unsatisfying (to me) prelude to an analysis. Why "unsatisfying"? Partly because it focuses barely a whit on the IMF/NATO/Global Capital forces behind the break-up of the Ukraine (see Michael Hudson's article for a healthy antidote!), and too much on Russian annexation, as though that's what Russia is actually doing outside the Crimea, and as though that -- and not the U.S. -- is the driving force behind the events in Ukraine.<br /><br />(Question: You refer to Russian imperialism here, as though it is a given. At what point did the "deformed workers state" become "imperialist" and how are you defining that term, which should not be thrown around so loosely, seems to me, as you're doing, or you end up with an analysis that leads to wrong leadership strategies for the working class.)<br /><br />Unsatisfying because you do not (and I believe cannot) "solve" the conundrum of what if the working class, acting in its own self-determination, decides that it <i>wants to be part of Russia</i>, as occurred in the Crimea, and may occur elsewhere -- not that Putin wants those other areas to beg him to annex their areas! In other words, what happens when in its own self-determination the working class in a particular area decides to do something that you -- YOU, Frank Brenner and Alex Steiner -- are opposed to?<br /><br />So much for the much ballyhooed "right" of self-determination without qualifyer, eh?<br /><br />Fascism is indeed a huge issue, and even though I agree with you about the need to unite the working class to fight the oligarchs (and the fascists aligned for now with them), you nevertheless downplay the horrific doings in Kiev. If fascists -- yes, real Nazis -- had not taken the reins of a number of government ministries, the goings-on in the Ukraine would not carry anything near the current "charge". But then again, the U.S. government and global capital would not have been successful, either, in prompting and taking over the Kiev government without them. So that mind game really carries no weight in reality. At some point the tactics used by the IMF and NATO threaten to over-run consciousness of the longer term strategies of capital, just as they did in Vietnam and elsewhere, where the crimes were just so horrific, widespread, and constant that the strategies of the U.S. government (and those in Vietnam opposing it) became secondary to stopping the war (and mass murder) at all costs.<br /><br />Finally, you ignore Trotsky's awful role in the Ukraine following the Russian Revolution. While I believe Trotsky to be extremely prescient with regard to the beginning stages of Nazi Germany in the early 1930s, in 1919 thru the early 1920s his analysis was not quite so refined, and his positions were exactly the opposite than the ones you promote here, with regard first to Kronstadt and then to the Ukraine, where Nestor Makhno and other rural-based forces who fought alongside the Red Army were ultimately smashed by Trotsky when they tried to enact the very self-determination that you espouse.<br /><br />I'll add on a few more points later, but I do urge you to read Marilyn Vogt-Downey's article on Ukraine, and also Michael Hudson's. I've compiled them on my website at www.MitchelCohen.com.Mitchel Cohenhttp://www.mitchelcohen.comnoreply@blogger.com