I have been intermittently following this discussion from outside. Of
course, watching Lou P perform is an out-of-body experience at any time, but
I have been puzzled by the strange passions in the current discussion of
development theory and the rise of capitalism, thinking that the untensity
of it was characteristic of academic debates in a way that was
uncharacteristic of LP. Not that intensity is uncharacteristic, but why
about early modern history? Now I think I understand. For Lou, and a certain
sort of Marxist, everything is not what is is, but is something else.
I in my naivete thought that Bob Brenner was writing about the rise of
capitalism in 17th century Europe. Turns out, he's really G.A. Cohen, or
maybe G. Plekhanov, in disguise, and he's really writing about current
revolutionary struggles, or even more insidiously, defending a stagist
version of historical materialism that justifies opposing third world
liberation struggles and political quietism. Foolish me, for not seeing
that. Likewise with Hill and Hobsbawm. And, presumably, Thompson too: could
they be writing about their ostentiable subjects, respectively, 17th C
English history (and in Hill's case, mostly intellectual and religious
history, how this is "stagist" or even development theoretic beats me), 19th
C world history *mostly), and 19th and 18th C labor and radical history? No.
They are writing in an Aesopian way about contemporary politics! Actually,
this may be partly true about Thompson, who chose his early subjects
(Morris, the radical English working class of the Fr Rev generation) as a
way of attacking his CP past; Hill, too, whose more recent interest in
Milton and "the experience of defeat" has obvious expernal referents.
But, and this is a big but, it is a deadly insult to these writers, and to
Brenner too, to say that their historical work is to be assessed not in
terms of its value as an adequate account of its purported subjects, but
because some can extract (good or bad) inspiration for some other events
that occurred years or centuries later in another part of the globe. Fact
is, if they want to write on contemporary politics, they are more than
capable of it, Brenner too, who does actively and often, and (in my view)
rather well; Thompson did, bitterly and brilliasntly; Hobsbawm does.
And my broken hand is acting up, I can;t write any more.
--jks
>
>Michael channeling Ellen Meiksins Wood:
> >debates about it, would survive. I very much doubt that he would
> >have
> >appreciated attempts by "friends" to stifle discussion of his
> >ideas.
>
>Look, Comrade Wood. The problem is not you. The problem is Brenner. He knew
>that Blaut was raising hell all over the Internet. Brenner received copies
>of many of the germane posts, but never deigned to answer Blaut on any of
>these mailing lists, including PEN-L. He must have been afraid of being
>shown up. Perhaps you should sub to PEN-L so we can get a chance to review
>the errors in your ATC article, particularly with respect to the Irish
>question.
>
>Whether or not you descend from Mt. Olympus, I do plan to get back to your
>ATC article after I've had a chance to do a little detour on "dependency"
>theory, which was attacked in a side-bar in Brenner's NLR article from
>disco days. It helps to put things into context to understand these fights
>with ECLA, Furtado, Cardoso, Cuevas, Laclau et al. (I should mention that
>Mexico, where Cuevas operated from, was never friendly to "dependency"
>theory. It appears that the major luminaries on the academic left were
>refugees from Franco's Spain. The stagist ideological fountains they drank
>from were presumably the same as those from which Christopher Hill and E.J.
>Hobsbawm partook.)
>
>The more I look at the whole debate and the better I understand the
>participants and where they are coming from, the better equipped I am to
>take the "orthodox" Marxism of people like Brenner, Genovese and Laclau
>apart.
>
>Fundamentally, the debate is about "stages" with the "orthodox" side
>attempting a very sophisticated version of Marx's 1850s Herald Tribune
>articles. We are dealing with a poorly theorized early version of
>historical materialism that gave utterance to such formulations as "The
>railways system will therefore become, in India, truly the forerunner of
>modern industry." When formulations such as this were generalized in
>Kautsky's Marxism and then enshrined in the Comintern,
>Marxism--particularly in Latin America--had to struggle to define itself as
>a revolutionary current. Castro said that unless the revolution was
>socialist, it would fail. Whatever errors A.G. Frank has made over the
>years, this was his original belief as well, no matter what risk of
>"autarky" (Brenner's infelicitous term) was incurred.
>
>What could have provoked Brenner's attack on the MR dependency theorists,
>who took their cue from Sweezy and Baran? Was it how to interpret 15th
>century British society or was it a need to supersede the kind of "third
>worldist" orientation expressed in this 1963 call by Sweezy and Huberman
>after returning from Cuba?
>
>"The only possible revolution in Latin America today is a socialist
>revolution.
>
>"The notion that there is a powerful national bourgeoisie in these
>countries anxious to break away from US domination . . . is unfortunately a
>myth.
>
>"There can be no doubt that Latin America needs and is ripe for socialist
>revolution, not at some distant date in the future but right now.
>
>"We did not meet a single serious leftist in Latin America who is not an
>ardent supporter of the Cuban Revolution . . . There is just one thing that
>worries them, the extent to which Cuba in resisting the US, may have fallen
>under the domination of the Soviet Union."
>
>Long live this kind of dependency theory.
>
>
>Louis Proyect
>Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/
>
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