***A Bolivarian Reply to some unfair criticisms of Chavez: ***
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Re: ''The incurable flaw of the Left seems to be its weakness forleadership cults. Apparently the global left has forgotten thehorrors of Stalinism and Maoism.''
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Reply: The basic assumptions of this comment are innacurate. Hugo Chavez isnot ''like Stalin'' or ''Mao''. The Bolivarian Revolution has not established a dictatorship. There is absolute freedom of speech, movement and the press in Bolivarian Venezuela.
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Re: ''It is no longer capable of differentiating between grassrootscontrol and bonapartism (i.e. rule by a strongman).''
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Reply: The propaganda that Chavez is a ''stongman'' comes from the neo-liberal, pro-Bush opposition: The Escualidos. Chavez is a democratically elected president who presides over a socialist democracy in construction. The aim of the Bolivarian revolution is to achieve a situation where the people of Venezuela will be the rulers of their own destiny: personally and collectively.
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Re: ''The global left fools itself, furthermore it contradicts itself by thinking that following nationalist strongmen is the way to bring about a global ecologically sustainable socialistdemocracy.''
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Reply: Chavez is not a ''stongman''. He is the democratically elected leader of the people of Venezuela. The Nationalism of the Bolivarian revolution is a positive type of nationalism because it aims to empower Venezuela against United States imperialism.
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Re: ''The leadership cults around Mao or Stalin in the past; Castroand Chavez today all have a common denominator: The suppression of critical thinking in favor of the BIG LIE – whatever it might be, nomatter how absurd.''
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Reply: There is no ''supression of critical thinking'' in Venezuela. There is absolute freedom of the press and absolute freedom of speech, more so than in the United States or the European Union. In Bolivarian Venezuela the right to free expression is extended to the poor and those socially excluded under neo-liberal capitalism.
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Re: ''Honest socialists and other progressive people are focusing so much on the apparently ''anti-capitalist'', ''anti-Yankee'' rhetoric emanating from Telesur and Chavez's various media performances...that they are not looking at Chavez critically.''
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Reply: Denunciations of U.S. Imperialism and global neoliberalism are not just ''rethoric''. The Chavez government ACTS politically, economically and diplomatically on its words to serve as a counterpoint to U.S. domination over Latin America. The media performances come from the opposition media, whose style of journalism is yellow.
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Re: ''The Multinationals still control the economy, the rich continue to become richer at the expense of the poor, the projects related to the so-called `'empowerment'' of the urban and rural poor are no more than localized experiments, there is corruption, there is rampant crime, street children. The `'Cogestion'' (i.e. workersco-management) projects are a scam. The workers never really manage anything. The `'workers management'' meetings are staged for the benefit of visitors and TV cameras.''
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Reply: These are lies. Yes, there is a private sector but it is taxed and regulated. The State and NGO sectors have a proportional influence over the Venezuelan political-economy. There is no private sector dictatorship as in the United States. Poverty and unemployment have been reduced consistently since 2004 while economic growth per annum has been 5 to 8 %; these facts are recognised by the World Bank. There is a crime and corruption problem, but the Bolivarian government is in the process of implementing policies to counter these phenomena. No one has said that the Bolivarian Revolution is ''perfect''. There is plenty of crime in the United States and in the European Union. There are 'Misiones' (i.e Social Programs), in place to provide services to street children and the homeless. The Cogestion program is not ''stage managed'', the workers have direct imput into production in Alcasa and PDVSA. This situation did not exist under the previous neoliberal capitalist regime.
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For Bolivarian perspectives on Venezuela visit: http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/
2 comments:
Hugo Chavez and the Dialectics of Social Change - A Debate:
http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/02/07/18359122.php
http://austin.indymedia.org/newswire/display/35290/index.php
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I want to clarify that I am a socialist who is in agreement with Karl Marx. I am not a "marxist". Karl Marx is on record as stating that he was not a "marxist" either. "Marxism" is an ideology. Karl Marx defined all ideology (secular or religious) as forms of false counciousness.
You wrote: "There is no formula. Class conflict has no formula. Analysing and restructuring "relations of production" has no formula. A formula is a set of rules that is the same for every situation."
If there is no formula then the project of Marx would make no sense. Restructuring the relations of production implies a process. The political-economy ceases to be capitalist while becoming socialist. There is no such thing as "a moment". Process is everything. Movement. To cease to be capitalism while becoming socialism it is necessary that the working class be empowered to lead that transformation. The necessary condition for socialism is working class power. The sufficient conditions are (a) objective capitalist crisis and (b) widespread subjective anti-capitalist counciousness among the working classes. Venezuela today meets the sufficient conditions. Clearly, the Enabling Act was granted to the wrong agent of transformation. In the hands of a State committe of public safety that would be separate from the working class, the Enabling Act becomes an obstacle and not an aid to the emergence of socialism.
I wrote: This formula was precise and specific: Socialism can only emerge from the direct and independent exercise of collective political power by the organised working class.
You replied: "This is not a formula. It is a general observation which says nothing about intermediary stages or limited circumstances, the real grist that goes into the revolutionary mill."
Like I commented above, Venezuela today meets the sufficient conditions for a socialist transformation. The same is true of Bolivia.
There is no "intermediary stage" between Capitalism and Socialism. The "intermediary stage" argument is a Social Democratic argument (i.e Kautskyan). History proves that the social democratic "middle way" quimera leads right back to capitalism. The only way that socialism can emerge is with the working class exercising direct power to reshape the political-economy. The political structures of the Burgeoise State have to be dissolved or transcended. Marx understood this in lieu of the Paris Commune events of 1871. I grant you that the Venezuelan Constitution of 1999 is a very advanced and progressive document, but the Bolivarian Republic that is based on it is still very much a capitalist state. I do not see the "limited circumstances". With the exception of Mexico and Colombia, all of Latin America is up in revolt. This is precisely the time to be bold in Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua. The United States is bogged down in the Middle East.
You wrote: "First you say Marx provides a "formula" for achieving socialism,then start pontificating on dialectics and "process." THEY ARE OPPOSITES!! It is precisely because dialectical processes (like natural evolution) move in unpredictable ways, different for every circumstance, that formulas are rejected by Marx and Engels as "utopian."..."
Dialectical process is what provides context to and illustrates the formula proposed by Marx. The dialectic of ceasing to be while becoming is a process of transformation (this applies to persons, societies, natural evolution, etc). It is dynamic. "Moments" do not exist. I grant you that the material universe is subject to the influence of chaos (i.e. "the gaping void" of unpredictability andrandomness), but that does not change that x=x. The working class equals the working class in every human society variable. In the specific conditions of Venezuela and Bolivia the sufficient conditions are there for it to lead the transformation of the political-economy towards a democratic socialism. By "formulae" Marx and Engels not only meant "utopians", they also meant the reformist approach of the Chartists and other (proto-)social democrats in their times.
You wrote: "These parties DON'T control parliament, so you're not even talking about the real world! Chavez was elected through the institutions of bourgeois democracy, and is bound to act within the parameters of the existing constitution. His every move is watched like a hawk by his imperialist enemies, ready to pounce on anything they can make propaganda against (as they're doing with the Enabling Act)."
The Bolivarian and Pro-Chavez parties are the majority in the Parliament. The numbers prove it. If you mean that it being an arm of the bourgeois democratic State that administers capitalism, the parliament is there to protect the interests of property per-se, I agree. But, given that anti-capitalist counciousness is widespread among the working class and allied social sectors and that the United States is bogged down in the Middle East. I see no reason to not radicalise the situation (at least) by giving the UNT the power to preside over the nationalisations. This could be done "legally". The Parliament could change the laws to allow for it. The opposition is never going to agree to anything the Bolivarian movement proposes, so from that perspective ( and given the Chavez does not care about public perception management), might as well grant power to the UNT congress or some working class equivalent.
You wrote: "Elsewhere you complain about how the Enabling Act
"appears" to the bourgeois media as dictatorial; now you propose arbitrarily and unconstitutionally handing over the same powers to an unelected body, a pro-Chavez union that was created by Chavez himself in opposition to the larger, anti-Chavez, CNT. How would THAT play in the bourgeois media?? Could Washington wish for a greener light for attacking?"
The UNT is larger than the old CTV. The old CTV is today an empty shell. The CTV is kept "alive" with CIA/AFL-CIO funding and functions as a yellow "union". The UNT on the other hand is a democratic structure. Its leadership was democratically elected by the rank and file. There are different factions inside of it. A Chavista faction, a syndicalist faction and Marx-oriented faction. The syndicalist and Marx-oriented factions have representation in the leading echelons. It is they that should be empowered. These people are the leading elements (in terms of counciousness) of the Venezuelan working class. The Bourgeois media will always be hostile to unions of any kind. They are hostile to the idea of unions per se. I do not care about their opinion.
You wrote: "Rubbish! I'm taking a marxist position because I recognize that things must proceed according to concrete circumstances, and that in this case they must proceed cautiously, within narrow parameters, or be overthrown by a vastly more powerful set of reactionary forces. A marxist can and does support Chartist positions if those are the most progressive positions available at the time."
If you agree that things "must proceed" then you agree that transformation is a process. The concrete circumstances are that the sufficient conditions for socialism are there. What is missing is the necessary condition (i.e working class power). I do not see the "vastly more powerful set of reactionary forces". The Venezuelan opposition is in disarray. Bush is bogged down in the Middle East. The State Department wrote off Latin America last year, except for Colombia and Mexico they cut their loses. This is why the Sandinistas ara back in power in Nicaragua and why anti-neoliberal indigenista leaderships took over Bolivia and Ecuador. This is precisely the time to be bold and seize the day.
You wrote: "Just because the working class is not being directly empowered by the Enabling Act today, it is therefore prevented from being empowered in the future?"
The idea that socialism will come "some day" in the future if we settle for some adjustments in the rate of exploitation today is a classic social democratic notion. I am not interested in better wages or profit sharing, I want to abolish wage slavery and profit.
You wrote: "I'm familiar with the Dalai Lama's affirmative statements about marxism, his desire to blend it with Buddism. But that blend could never be marxism in any way that Marx would recognize (materialism blended with karma?!!), and quoting him as an authority on "the congruence of means and ends," as you do, is profoundly un-marxist."
Karl Marx is on record as saying he was NOT a "marxist". The first representation of dialectics in human history came from the dharmic concept of Karma. Karma is primitive dialectics represented in metaphysical language. The symbolic representation of dialectics in this context is the dancing goddess Shiva - who governs the eternal CYCLE of creation and distruction. Georges Hegel developed his neo-Platonic version of Dialectics after studying the concept of Karma and Hindu mysticism. Karl Marx based his version of dialectic philosophy on that of Georges Hegel. The difference is that Karl Marx posited that the agent of universal transformation is not a Goddess (as is proposed in dharmic mysticism); or appeal to an eternal neo-Platonic FORM (as was proposed in Hegelianism); but rather Marx proposed that the agent of transformation was the Working Class Man.
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