www.newsandletters.org
|
|
Official Call for Plenum... to work out Perspectives for 2003-2004June 4, 2003 To all members of News and Letters Committees and Marxist-Humanists internationally Dear Friends, The aftermath of the war in Iraq presents humanity with a profound crisis. This is not alone because of the material devastation of Iraq (awful as that is) or because of the way the war provides an opening for the U.S. to attack other countries in the region and around the world. Most ominous of all is the way the lopsided scale of the U.S.'s victory, which was able to blunt much of the anti-war opposition, combined with the failure to project an emancipatory alternative from the left, is leading to a conflation of war with "liberation" that threatens to abrogate the very idea of freedom. If Marxist-Humanism is needed for anything at the present moment it is to help break through the ideological notion that masses of people can no longer free themselves from the horrors of imperialist war, totalitarian dictatorship, and terrorism through their own ideas and volition. To see how we can meet this awesome challenge calls for a full confrontation with objectivity unseparated from being deeply rooted in the entirety of the body of ideas of Marxist-Humanism as developed by Raya Dunayevskaya. I. The use of "smart bombs," satellite-guided missiles, and night-vision equipment made mincemeat of Saddam Hussein's army in a remarkably short amount of time. No less significant was the fact that the Iraqi masses did not try to defend Saddam Hussein's regime-a development that the anti-war movement largely failed to anticipate. The Iraqi masses instead celebrated the collapse of his genocidal regime. Yet as one recent report put it, "In the space of a few weeks, awe at American power in war has been transformed into anger at American impotence in peace." The joy felt by the masses of Iraqis over the collapse of Hussein's totalitarian dictatorship is giving way to growing resentment over the chaos and destruction wrought by the U.S.'s occupation of the country as a whole. This is reflected not just in the protests engineered by conservative Islamist tendencies that are trying to fill the political vacuum in post-Hussein Iraq, but also in complaints being voiced by Iraqis of virtually every political persuasion against the U.S.'s insistence on taking charge of everything from determining university appointments to deciding how the country's oil revenues shall be distributed. Even leaders of the Kurdish organizations which allied themselves with the U.S. during the war are complaining that the U.S. military's decision to run the country indefinitely and delay the formation of a national assembly and interim government may liquidate the autonomy the Kurds have enjoyed in northern Iraq for the past 12 years. Most significant are the concerns being voiced by Iraqi women, who are encountering efforts by secular and fundamentalist forces alike to restrict their rights. As one Iraqi woman put it, "The Americans say they brought us freedom. But freedom doesn't mean much to me without the chance to live my life." Since the end of the war the Iraqi masses have foiled much of the U.S.'s attempts to control post-war Iraq. The U.S.'s initial plan was to topple Hussein while keeping as much of the Ba'ath Party in power as possible and maintaining a centralized Iraqi state under U.S. control. Yet the subjective factor of resistance from the Iraqi masses has upset these plans. It is seen in large-scale street protests against the U.S.'s effort to recruit Ba'ath party officials to run the post-war police departments. It is seen in resistance by workers to efforts to "liberalize" the Iraqi economy at the expense of their jobs and livelihoods. And it is seen in widespread opposition by Iraqi women to efforts to block their access to education, political offices, and freedom of movement. Though the problems being encountered by the U.S. in post-Hussein Iraq are significant, we should be under no illusions about the long-term impact that Bush's war will have on the region and on the world as a whole. The rapid and overwhelming U.S. military victory in Iraq clearly gives the Bush administration an opening to intimidate and even invade other regimes. It has threatened to attack Syria if it does not follow U.S. dictates. It has issued new threats against Iran over its nuclear program and its support of Shi'ite groups opposed to the U.S. in southern Iraq. The Pentagon is also now providing aid to the Mojahedin Khalq group (even though the U.S. bombed its positions during the Iraq war because of its total support for Saddam Hussein's regime) in order to make use of the group for possible future military actions against Iran. And the Bush administration is leaving the door open to a preemptive strike against North Korea if it continues its pursuit of nuclear weapons. The U.S.'s imperial reach is hardly restricted to possible moves against these regimes. Not to be forgotten is U.S. imperialism's backyard, Latin America, where the U.S. is pouring military aid into Colombia and keeping a watchful eye on growing mass movements in Bolivia, Ecuador, and Peru. Even Brazil, where Lula has gone out of his way not to antagonize the U.S. since being elected President earlier this year, is being viewed with concern by members of the Bush administration. At the same time, the administration is using its victory in Iraq to press ahead with the development of a new generation of nuclear weapons. Last month the House and Senate approved Bush's request to repeal the Spratt-Furse amendment, which prohibits the development of nuclear weapons with an explosive force of less than five kilotons of TNT. The Bush administration wants to be able to develop such weapons for use as "bunker busters" against a number of potential adversaries. The administration is proceeding with plans to produce the first new U.S. nuclear weapons since the 1980s, even as a host of states-from China to Pakistan and India and from Iran to North Korea and beyond-seek to augment or develop nuclear arsenals of their own. No less important than such material factors is the war's _ideological_ impact. The Bush administration was certainly aware of the massive anti-war sentiment that emerged this year, not only overseas, but within the U.S. as well. The U.S.'s massive use of military might against Iraq was not only intended to bring down Saddam Hussein, but also to provoke speechless wonder at the inability of _any_ power to put up any effective resistance to such a devastating onslaught. The sense of powerlessness and dependence generated by the U.S. war on Iraq is not only intended for foreign consumption; it is also aimed at convincing the American public that there is no alternative to the present form of society and political affairs inside the U.S. Numerous domestic realities reveal the deteriorating state of living and working conditions in this country. Bush's ability to push through his latest tax cuts for the rich comes in the midst of a recession-bound economy that has lost over two million jobs since 2000. State governments are experiencing the most severe fiscal crisis in half a century. According to the National Council of State Legislatures, state governments cut $50 billion in health, welfare, and education benefits in 2002, while another $26 billion is expected to be cut this year (the $75 billion in total cuts roughly corresponds with the cost so far of the war against Iraq). The overall economic situation today is more dire than at any time in the last ten years. At the same time, Bush is nominating the most reactionary judicial nominees of any president in U.S. history (including Ronald Reagan), which threatens to undermine everything from affirmative action to abortion rights. And an array of domestic spying and harassment, from INS attacks against immigrants to the USA PATRIOT Act and the "Terrorism Information Awareness program" (a renamed version of the Total Information Awareness program headed by John Poindexter) is undermining democratic rights and liberties at home even as Bush calls for "democracy" overseas. There surely is widespread dissatisfaction with these conditions inside the U.S., as especially seen from recent protests by Black and Latino youth to defend affirmative action and in the strikes by communications and hotel workers against declining wages and mushrooming health-care costs. A successful war does not necessarily silence such discontent, as Bush Sr. learned after the first Iraq war when a declining economy made him a one-term president. However, the present Bush administration is trying to prevent such a repeat of history by making the "war against terrorism" and the strengthening of the national security state a _permanent_ feature of the U.S. political landscape. That this is no idle threat is born out from the fact that the war against Iraq has _increased_ the threat of terrorist attacks by fundamentalist forces. The Iraq war has provided new opportunities for Al Qaeda and other reactionary groups to reinvigorate their terrorist networks, as seen from the recent bombings in Saudi Arabia and Morocco. Even Senator Richard Lugar recently stated that U.S. policy in Iraq is in danger of "creating an incubator for terrorist cells and activity." The possibility of a continuous war between U.S. imperialism and Islamic fundamentalist terrorism presents the liberation movements in this country with a serious challenge-one that will become even graver if another terrorist attack occurs inside the U.S. As we saw from September 11, 2001, few things strengthen U.S. rulers more than such attacks-just as Bush's imperial arrogance in invading other countries with overwhelming military force provides a recruiting ground for terrorists. The threat we face today is that of a vicious circle of terrorism and war in which both sides, for all their mutual animosity, end up reinforcing each other's reactionary power. What can be done to break out of this vicious circle of imperialist war and terrorism? What can Marxist-Humanists do to help the movements against war, racism, sexism, and capitalist globalization project an alternative to this situation? Few questions are more crucial for us to concretely grapple with in this period. II. First, we must emphasize what _not_ to do. We must not focus all our energy and opposition exclusively on attacking U.S. imperialism, even though it remains the sole global superpower and the force responsible for so much global destruction. A one-sided opposition to U.S. imperialism that fails to seriously oppose Islamic fundamentalism or dictatorial regimes like that of Saddam Hussein's or North Korea's will not move us forward. It only plays into Bush's hands by enabling him to present U.S. imperialism as the agency for promoting "liberty" and "democracy" throughout the world. The tendency to focus everything on a critique of U.S. imperialism while having little or nothing to say about its reactionary critics has become especially predominant today-precisely because the U.S. has such unmatched power. The problem with focusing everything on a critique of U.S. actions is not only that it leaves the anti-war and other movements open to tail-ending state powers who may oppose (for whatever reason) U.S. war moves, as France and others in the UN did this year. The problem is deeper. Such an approach diverts attention from the way U.S. actions are rooted in the nature of globalized capitalism. Imperialism is not the product of a cabal of right-wing ideologues who have managed to take control of the Bush administration. Imperialism is the expression of a determinant stage of capitalist production. It can be stopped and uprooted only by calling into question the nature of the capitalist system as a whole. What Rosa Luxemburg wrote in her _Junius Pamphlet_ in the midst of World War I is as true now as in 1915: "Imperialism is not the creation of any one or of any group of states. It is a product of a particular stage of ripeness in the world development of capital, an innately international condition, an indivisible whole, that is recognizable only in all its relations, and from which no nation can hold aloof at will." The fact that world politics is no longer defined by a _series_ of state powers contending for world domination, but by a _single_ superpower-the U.S.-does not negate the need to oppose _all_ forms of unfreedom, _wherever_ they are found. On the contrary, it only makes such a perspective all the more necessary. As imperative as it is not to fall into one-sided critiques of U.S. imperialism, it is just as imperative to oppose the notion that the U.S. has suddenly become the catalyst for promoting "democracy" in the rest of the world. To do otherwise only feeds into the rulers' ideological pollution that masses of people cannot free themselves from dictatorial regimes but need the intervention of an outside force, the U.S. military, to do it for them. Such a standpoint closes off the projection of what is sorely needed-the notion that a new society can be created by working people, women, oppressed nationalities and youth through their own self-activity. Indeed, the failure to project a concept of a new society that transcends capitalism is the gravest lack facing today's anti-war movements. By a new society Marxist-Humanists mean a _total_ uprooting of the very fabric of this racist, sexist, class ridden society-that is, the abolition of capitalist value production through the creation of new human relations based on the unity of mental and manual labor. Marx's humanism remains for us the measure of any effort to create a new society. That is why we insist: what distinguishes a Marxist-Humanist response to imperialist war and terrorism is not just that we oppose both sides of the conflict but that we take responsibility for projecting a vision of a new society that transcends capitalism. What the founder of Marxist-Humanism, Raya Dunayevskaya, projected at the height of the Cold War remains the fundamental task and perspective for us to concretize today-namely, "To the barbarism of war we pose the new society." For Marxist-Humanists, standing for a new society does not simply mean being for practical struggles for a new society once they arise. Standing for a new society also means theoretically discerning the elements for creating a new society _before_ such struggles arise. As the Constitution of News and Letters Committees puts it: "The necessity for a new society is clear from the working people's opposition to war. That opposition is based on a vision of a new society in which they, to a man, woman, and child, control their own lives. Any opposition to war, which is based on less than this, must end in capitulation to the war mongers." Opposing the U.S. drive for permanent war does not mean isolating the Empire's working parts and disabling them one by one. That leaves untouched what masses of people are hungering for but which radical theoreticians and parties are doing little to address-the projection of a comprehensive alternative to existing society. Instead of saddling the movements from practice with all the responsibility for meeting that task, we need to confront our philosophic and organizational responsibility for doing so. The fact that this year's pre-Plenum discussion period corresponds with the 50th anniversary of the philosophic moment that led to the birth of Marxist-Humanism-the 1953 "Letters on Hegel's Absolutes"-provides us with an opportunity to become much more concrete about how we can meet this challenge. In viewing this breakthrough with eyes of today, we can be greatly aided by the new edition of _Philosophy and Revolution:from Hegel to Sartre and from Marx to Mao_ (Lexington Books, 2003) and the collection _The Power of Negativity: Selected Writings on the Dialectic in Hegel and Marx_ (Lexington Books, 2002), which contains an array of writings by Raya Dunayevskaya on the significance of the philosophic moment of Marxist-Humanism. As our work this year in completing the Marxist-Humanist Statement on the Black Dimension has shown, the perspective of "To the barbarism of war we pose the new society" is integral to the philosophic moment of Marxist-Humanism. This can especially be seen from the difference between what C.L.R. James called "the dialectics of the party" and what Raya Dunayevskaya projected as "the dialectics of organization and philosophy." In his 1948 _Notes on Dialectics_ James sought to explore dialectics as part of developing a new relation between spontaneous struggles and revolutionary organization. As he wrote in commenting on Hegel's _Science of Logic_, "We have to get hold of the Notion, of the Absolute Idea, before we can see this relation between organization and spontaneity in its concrete truth." However, his _Notes_ said little about the Doctrine of the Notion (which Hegel called "the realm of subjectivity or freedom") and even less about the Absolute Idea. But he did have a lot to say about organization. A mass party fighting bureaucracy became his universal: "You know nothing about organization unless at every step you relate it to its opposite, spontaneity. It is meaningless without that co-relative, its Other, tied to it." In sum, James posed spontaneous mass struggles embodied in a mass party as the _absolute_ opposite of the elitist vanguard party. Though James aimed to rethink the relation between spontaneity and organization through a study of Hegel, he leaped to an organizational conclusion without working out the fullness of the dialectic. Everything got reduced to the _form_ of organization, while the need for a _relation_ between spontaneous mass struggles and a philosophy of liberation was left aside. A very different approach was developed by Dunayevskaya in her 1953 "Letters on Hegel's Absolutes." She there concentrated on the last chapters of Hegel's _Science of Logic_ and on the final three syllogisms of Hegel's _Philosophy of Mind_, which no Marxist had previously explored. By the end of the letters she was no longer concerned with what James called "the dialectics of the party"-that is, defining the right _form_ of organization. A historic breakthrough occurred as she dove deeply into Hegel's concept of "absolute liberation" at the very end of the _Science of Logic_ and in the the section on "Absolute Mind" in the _Philosophy of Mind_. In grappling with the concluding paragraph 577 of the _Philosophy of Mind_-where Hegel writes "it is the nature of the fact, the notion, which causes the movement and development, yet this same movement is equally the action of cognition"-she saw a philosophic anticipation of the end to the division between mental and manual labor. As she later wrote, "It becomes necessary to stress here, over and over again, that I had not a word to say about the Party or the Soviets or any form of organization. On the contrary, here is what I then concluded: 'We have entered the new society'" ("On the Battle of Ideas: Philosophic-Theoretic Points of Departure as Political Tendencies Respond to the Objective Situation" [1982], in _The Power of Negativity_, p. 240). The 1953 Letters gave birth to the new concept that the task of a revolutionary organization is neither "to lead" the masses through "the party" nor simply to foster the development of spontaneous forms of mass organization but to philosophically project a vision of a new society which the movements from practice are implicitly reaching for. As Dunayevskaya wrote on June 6, 1987-the very last words we have from her pen- "'Dialectics of the Party'...was turned in my hands to be Dialectics of Organization and that meant not only both Party and Spontaneity but the New Society" (See "1953: The Philosophic Moment re: Organization, and therefore also re: Paper," in _Supplement to the Raya Dunayevskaya Collection_ Vol. 13, microfilm no. 11001). III. This year we need to concretize this perspective for all of our philosophic and organizational work. We have made a beginning on this with our classes on "Negativity and Freedom: Philosophic Alternatives to Capitalism, War and Terror." Though they are still ongoing, it's clear that the classes led to important philosophic growth. We suggest that comrades share their presentations with the organization in this summer's pre-Plenum discussion bulletins. At the same time, because of the need for philosophic projection to become inseparable from heightened organizational consciousness, we request that local organizers' reports also be submitted to the discussion bulletins so that the organization can evaluate how it has lived up to its perspectives over the past year. The need for the inseparability of philosophy and organization will permeate each of the reports given to this year's Plenum... -The Resident Editorial Board |
|
Home l News & Letters Newspaper l Back issues l News and Letters Committees l Dialogues l Raya Dunayevskaya l Contact us l Search Published by News and Letters Committees |
