******************** POSTING RULES & NOTES ******************** #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. *****************************************************************
Reply to Marv Gandall: You say you're doubtful concerning my professed wariness about apocalyptic pronouncements of the final crisis of capitalism. I, on the other hand, am still not clear from your reply whether you think a Keynesian revival by more enlightened sections of the bourgeoisie is a possible answer to neoliberalism--an answer more realistic than the prospect of renewed class struggle. Time was when certain factions of the bourgeoisie, and their political representatives, were more enlightened than they are today. The reasons for this are complex. Major reforms took place in the past against the backdrop of systemic challenge from revolution and/or profound economic crisis, but not always as a reaction to immediate threats of extinction. In epochs of crisis, sections of the bourgeoisie are more willing to stand back and give a wider latitude to middle-class social engineers concerned with such things as economic models and maintaining a floor on mass consumer demand. These are not such times. Today we face a capitalist regime that has taken shape in the decades-long absence of any systemic challenge, and is therefore disinclined to give an inch. The boundary between reformist and transitional demands shifts according to what the bourgeoisie considers acceptable. What may have been a perfectly realizable demand for reform in the 1950s can today appear as completely unrealistic within bourgeois bounds, and the difference between a reformist and a revolutionary approach to politics may concern not so much the demands themselves as the political methods by which one goes about fighting for them. The initial Syriza strategy of attempting to appeal to ostensibly more reasonable European bourgeois factions has revealed itself to be utterly bankrupt. This is because the cross of austerity to which Greece is now being nailed is not the result of one policy choice over other possible ones, but of the essence of contemporary European capitalism. In their post-Mastricht incarnation, the Eurozone and the entire EU are systematically designed to roll back living standards and exclude all important economic decisions from public scrutiny, debate and decision-making in the electoral arena . As (I believe) the head of the Eurogroup, Joren Dijssenbloem, reminded the Greeks, a country's financial obligations cannot be cancelled by an election. Tsipras's barnstorming tour of European capitals, aimed at cobbling together the French-Italian-Spanish anti-austerity axis with which he hoped to counter the Germans was a complete failure. Syriza therefore stands at a crossroads. It can either become the left face of austerity, or adopt far more radical, class-struggle methods. You point out that the failure of Syriza's initial gambit appears not to have registered with the majority of Greeks, and that, even if it has, a majority may still prefer remaining in the Eurozone and enduring austerity to getting out. This may be true, but the role of political leadership is actively to persuade the population to a certain course, not simply to reflect current moods. Can Syriza mount an effective campaign to persuade the people as to the necessity of the things that must be done, and the hardships that must be faced, to cease being the vassals of finance capital? Probably not without a political differentiation within Syriza itself, and a realignment of leftwing forces more generally. There are those within Syriza who are committed to remaining in the Eurozone no matter what (whom I suspect include Tsipras and Varoufakis, though I'm not completely sure), and those who are bent upon rolling back austerity, no matter what. A fight between these two tendencies, and perhaps a split, must take place before Syriza (or parts thereof) can be an effective campaigner for further radicalization. A leftwing realignment would also have to involve a fight against sectarians within the leadership of the KKE, who would simply prefer to write Syriza off as a latter-day popular front. A referendum on the Eurozone may eventually be necessary. But calling one without a left that is fighting for a definite program amounts to seeking an alibi in public opinion for surrender. In my opinion, the above is not an instance of far-left know-it-all trying to proffer detailed tactical advice from a distance of thousands of miles. The questions involved are ones of fundamental strategy, about which any serious Marxist is entitled to, and indeed should have, definite views. Jim Creegan _________________________________________________________ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
