----- Original Message -----
From: Carrol Cox <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Wednesday, January 03, 2001 4:47 PM
Subject: Re: [CrashList] Bond, Harvey, Jones [reprise,from Marxism-list 12-May-1998 ]
>Mark's original proposition is neither correct nor incorrect but incoherent.
Perhaps the emphasis then is on the word
"advising" after all we all know its a waste
of breath unless the criticism is genuinely
reciprocated. (please see further below)
As Marx
argues near the end of _Wages, Price and Profit_, a working class that does not
struggle
to maintain and advance its conditions under capitalism "*degraded to one level mass
of
broken wretches past salvation*. . . .By cowardly giving way in their everyday
conflict
with capital, they would [my emphasis] certainly
disqualify themselves from the initiating of any larger movement." So when Mark argues
that "Social justice under capitalism is a chimera" he is wholly correct. But when he
goes
on to argue that "Advising people to pursue it is simply a way of avoiding the truth"
he
simply gives up the battle to overthrow capitalism. Whatever political goal one
pursues,
reformist or revolutionary, legal or illegal, peaceful or violent, one cannot fight
the
battle without raising an army. And without exception all anti-capitalist armies come
into
being in the process of the struggle for social justice (however much a chimera)
within
capitalism."
To accept Mark's argument as conclusive is to replace struggle with aimless ranting at
evil. I suggest a literary parallel to Mark's approach would be the magnificent
speeches
in Shakespeare's history plays of the wives and mothers of the dead or Lear's "I'll do
such things as ...." No you won't, not without a working class army raised and
hardened in
the struggle for social justice and workers' rights. And the facts so finely
articulated
on this list will become _a_ central concern of such an army, but _never_ become _the_
organizing principle. - Carrol
We can certainly say that working class
people find themselves caught up in legal
battles both great and small for a life time
long all the while knowing full well that
qualitive changes only come about in the
cataclismic events like those of 1917.
Bill.
_______________________________________________
Crashlist resources: http://website.lineone.net/~resource_base
To change your options or unsubscribe go to:
http://lists.wwpublish.com/mailman/listinfo/crashlist
