>On the other hand, Louis, I don't know how realistic it is to expect in these
>days that the working class can be armed to smash the structures of
capitalism,
>whether they are at the national or global level, either. In the not so near
>future, maybe. But any such attempt now in my country would find the Turkish
>Army, which is immersed in imperialism up to their ears, ready to smash them
>and it is highly unlikely that the army will side with the revolutionaries
any
>time soon. Obviously, this is just one example.
I was being a bit provocative in my formulation. I was simply trying to
reinforce certain principles found in "State in Revolution" that tend to
get lost in the mish-mosh of world systems theory, etc.
>However, my problem is that my people and I are suffering badly and we need
>some remedy soon.
I am very close to a Turkish student in the USA who gets regular reports
from her parents in Istambul. Things are certainly bad. But we need to
destroy false illusions in order to move forward. I have been corresponding
with an Iranian student who expressed a similar sense of frustration about
the gap between the enormous suffering felt right now and the far-off,
remote ideal of socialism. Since the art of politics is knowing what has to
be done *next*, our efforts should be focused on the immediate class
struggle and not blueprints for a socialist society. That is in fact what
Marx said.
Louis Proyect
Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org
