OK I’m really not invested in relitigating the USSR, I don’t believe that differences in interpretations, often sourced totally differently, add up to a fundamental theoretical and political difference between mls and left socialists. The tasks before us are clear. I can’t fairly condemn bad behavior by any ML sect any more than I can condone bad behavior by any Trotskyist sect. The people who are committed to the work of socialism, building disciplined cadre, formation of a workers party, opposing colonialism and imperialism, building coalitions or entering authentic worker movements are being taken up by both our tendencies, as well as principled anarchist comrades.
But the industrialization of Russia leading up to 1936 was not a mass movement, it was a forced march. Perhaps necessary, mistakes were inevitable and being in a position to make these drastic but necessary changes is unenviable. But I just can not buy the idea that the Soviets of the late 1930s are proletarian in nature. 1936-1938 was the height of mass purges! How the fuck is the working class supposed to develop an independent working class movement with a literal gun to our head?
The only acceptable explanation is the shocking buy in for the purges across such a huge swath of Russian society. So, if it wasnt brutal dictatorship, then it was mass hysteria. In neither case is this a more progressive and rational society.
Granted, we are in the prewar period, with the greatest existential threat to progress festering practically next door. I’m not saying there aren’t reasons. I’m saying that as far as a proletarian character to the state, it just isn’t in Russia in this period. There’s concrete structural and historical reasons it isn’t there, I’m not really passing judgement so much as stating what I see as fact. International proletarian class hegemony was being strangled, and the imperialist fascist powers finished us off. The international industrial proletariat was the only thing that lent prole legitimacy to the Russian project, but even it had become deeply compromised by the extremely pro-Stalin loyalist Comintern. The third world and international socialism was all but abandoned.
In my estimation you can either say 1. The purges didn’t happen (they did) or 2. they were necessary. And maybe they were. But where I break left with my Trotskyist comrades is at Kronstadt. I think we can make arguments that these atrocities were necessary, that without them something much worse would have occurred, which I think bears out historically. But I just can not be convinced that there is a dominant proletarian character in a society carrying out mass murder/mass purges. The working class does not desire war and death, that is what the capitalists want for us. And I don’t believe that a state carrying out purges and mass executions is doing so in the interests of the international working class. And I think our movements are actually worse off because of them.
But thank you as always for the considerate and well informed response!
OK I’m really not invested in relitigating the USSR, I don’t believe that differences in interpretations, often sourced totally differently, add up to a fundamental theoretical and political difference between mls and left socialists. The tasks before us are clear. I can’t fairly condemn bad behavior by any ML sect any more than I can condone bad behavior by any Trotskyist sect. The people who are committed to the work of socialism, building disciplined cadre, formation of a workers party, opposing colonialism and imperialism, building coalitions or entering authentic worker movements are being taken up by both our tendencies, as well as principled anarchist comrades.
But the industrialization of Russia leading up to 1936 was not a mass movement, it was a forced march. Perhaps necessary, mistakes were inevitable and being in a position to make these drastic but necessary changes is unenviable. But I just can not buy the idea that the Soviets of the late 1930s are proletarian in nature. 1936-1938 was the height of mass purges! How the fuck is the working class supposed to develop an independent working class movement with a literal gun to our head?
The only acceptable explanation is the shocking buy in for the purges across such a huge swath of Russian society. So, if it wasnt brutal dictatorship, then it was mass hysteria. In neither case is this a more progressive and rational society.
Granted, we are in the prewar period, with the greatest existential threat to progress festering practically next door. I’m not saying there aren’t reasons. I’m saying that as far as a proletarian character to the state, it just isn’t in Russia in this period. There’s concrete structural and historical reasons it isn’t there, I’m not really passing judgement so much as stating what I see as fact. International proletarian class hegemony was being strangled, and the imperialist fascist powers finished us off. The international industrial proletariat was the only thing that lent prole legitimacy to the Russian project, but even it had become deeply compromised by the extremely pro-Stalin loyalist Comintern. The third world and international socialism was all but abandoned.
In my estimation you can either say 1. The purges didn’t happen (they did) or 2. they were necessary. And maybe they were. But where I break left with my Trotskyist comrades is at Kronstadt. I think we can make arguments that these atrocities were necessary, that without them something much worse would have occurred, which I think bears out historically. But I just can not be convinced that there is a dominant proletarian character in a society carrying out mass murder/mass purges. The working class does not desire war and death, that is what the capitalists want for us. And I don’t believe that a state carrying out purges and mass executions is doing so in the interests of the international working class. And I think our movements are actually worse off because of them.
But thank you as always for the considerate and well informed response!