After Robert Brenner wrote his attack on dependency theory in the 1977
NLR, the impact was immediate. Marxists in the academy found the appeal
to return to a class-based Marxism very seductive, especially among
Latin American specialists. The Marxist-oriented journal called Latin
American Perspectives became consumed with debates between supporters of
Robert Brenner and Andre Gunder Frank almost immediately and the summer
and fall issues of 1981 were combined to discuss the Dependency and
Marxism debate.
Unfortunately, the archives of Latin American Perspectives are only
available to those with a subscription to JSTOR, but I have selected two
fairly representative items from the two sides for your review.
John Weeks, a supporter of the Brenner approach even though he does not
mention Brenner by name (others do), contributed an article titled “The
Differences Between Materialist Theory and Dependency Theory and Why
They Matter”. Before presenting his article and my interspersed
articles, I want to offer some personal reflections even though their
relationship to the matter at hand might seem tangential.
In 1990 I organized a debate on behalf of the NY Nicaragua Network just
prior to the Nicaraguan elections that would result in the FSLN being
voted out of office. It was not hard to figure out that Paul Berman was
the ideal candidate to speak against the FSLN. This Village Voice
self-described anarchist (he now calls himself a liberal) had been
writing attacks on the FSLN for a number of years, all in the spirit of
casting the Sandinistas as enemies of true working-class socialism.
Berman evolved into a cold war type liberal subsequently and gained some
notoriety as a “leftist” supporter of George W. Bush’s wars in Iraq and
Afghanistan. Our good friend Richard Seymour has a chapter on Berman in
his forthcoming book from Verso that I am awaiting with bated breath.
For the pro-FSLN perspective, I gave Michael Moore a call and he was
more than happy to debate Berman. Just a year or so earlier Moore had
been fired from Mother Jones for refusing to print one of Berman’s
hatchet jobs on the FSLN and was looking forward to a chance to nail
him. Although I cannot remember exactly why we decided not to go with
Moore, we instead extended an invitation to John Weeks on the advice of
NACLA, the journal on Latin America that had not yet degenerated into
the kind of mixture of civil society bullshit and State Department
liberalism that fills its pages today.
Berman spoke first and was obviously well-prepared, even if his ideas
were bogus.
When Weeks began to speak (I was chairing the meeting), I was astonished
to see that he did not have anything written down and just “winged it”
for 15 minutes. The gist of his presentation was that the FSLN was no
different than the PRI in Mexico and there was never any reason for
imperialism to be so determined to overthrow it. He characterized it as
bureaucratic and mildly social democratic, etc. In other words, in
accepting our invitation to defend the FSLN, this knucklehead did not
have the common decency to state that he was some kind of ultraleft
opponent of the FSLN. Following the meeting, a group of us headed over
to a nearby bar where a savvy veteran of the Central America solidarity
movement whispered to me that Weeks was some kind of Maoist.
The reason Weeks was so dismissive of the Sandinista revolution was that
it was not “class” oriented enough for him. There were far too few
industrial workers in the vanguard and far too many small ranchers and
members of the “informal economy” to satisfy the litmus test of those
who had mastered their Grundrisse.
The main difference between the dependency theorists and those
influenced by Brenner was over the question-in my opinion-whether
national oppression was a viable category in Marxist terms. I have
written about this at some length here and invite you to have a look at
some point.
full: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/marxism_class/message/280
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