Umsebenzi Online
Umsebenzi Online | Volume 15 No. 20 | 9 June 2016 In this Issue: . The SACP and opportunism do not mix. Sorry the DA, try elsewhere. . The question of method and theory: Framing a useful analysis of the character of the international context and balance of forces towards universal emancipation . International political landscape: Trends, dynamics and complexities Red Alert The SACP and opportunism do not mix. Sorry the DA, try elsewhere. http://www.sacp.org.za/pubs/umsebenzi/images/umsebenzi_hand.gif BY ALEX MASHILO This week the DA issued a statement calling on the SACP to vote with it on a motion to have Parliament set up an ad hoc committee to "investigate" allegations of "state capture". The DA's statement was opportunistic consistent with its character. Branding its so-called call walking the talk, the DA realised that it was left behind and sought to catch up by trying to grab headlines through the window. The objective the DA seeks to achieve, rather than a principled struggle, is to organise the type of theatricals it is now associated with in Parliament where it will dance to the media for coverage on the electronic and in the print media. The DA is lost in its catch up manoeuvres. It is moving in a right-wing direction that can only be reactionary, or counter-revolutionary, while on the other hand the SACP is advancing leftwards in a revolutionary direction. As opposed to the liberalism of the DA that is mixed with a conservative agenda to preserve white privilege acquired under colonial oppression including apartheid but presently masked and fronted in a black face, the SACP organises on the basis of advancing a revolution to eliminate the legacy of colonial oppression and its foundation of capitalist exploitation. The SACP is guided by the principles of democratic centralism, a dialectical combination of democracy involving among others freedom of thought and discussion and centralism involving essentially unity of and in action once a decision is taken. The SACP First Deputy General Secretary Comrade Jeremy Cronin correctly represented the SACP in an interview with the Business Day in response to the DA when he said: "First of all, the DA's call is not going to fly when it's directed at SACP members . because we are raising these issues out of concern for the ANC and for the ANC-led government and we are not doing it to grandstand in an opposition way, which we think is the DA's agenda... They certainly are not going to split ANC MPs who happen to be SACP members from the ANC caucus." He further emphasised that SACP members in their capacity as ANC MPs "would work 'loyally' within that caucus". Cronin further correctly pointed out on behalf of the SACP that the issue of corporate capture of the state, in political formations and trade unions was important and concerning and that the Party supports genuine efforts aimed at getting to the bottom of it. Notice the different in wordings. On the one hand, the SACP is talking about corporate capture, which the Party is strongly opposed to. Corporate capture is not limited to the state, by the way including the Western Cape provincial government and Cape Town metro where the DA is in charge. For example, it was in the Western Cape that the High Court in Case no: 17480/2014 set aside and ordered the re-evaluation of a R113.5 million tender to rehabilitate sewage in Cape Town. This was a corporately captured tender awarded by the DA-led government. On the other hand the DA is talking about "state capture" excluding the word corporate in "corporate state capture". This is not innocent ideologically, organisationally and politically. Several leaders of the DA from the head were recently exposed for not declaring in parliament the sponsorships they received from certain corporations in their internal party competition. In general, the DA as a whole is pushing for an agenda of a corporate capture in which the state is hollowed out and its role in the economy is curtailed in favour of private corporations running the show. The SACP, in line with our country's constitution, from the outset called for a judicial inquiry into corporate state capture. The DA was probably grandstanding in Parliament when the SACP made this call. The DA either did not notice the call or rejected it. What it wants now is to organise other platform to continue grandstanding to grab media headlines through a theatrical conduct and insults in Parliament such as honourable "pastor" Mmusi Maimane the black face of the DA saying at our country's esteemed constitutional court on 15 April that "Zuma must voetsek". The SACP and opportunism do not mix. Sorry the DA, try elsewhere. . Alex Mohubetswane Mashilo is SACP Spokesperson, and writes as a Professional Revolutionary The question of method and theory: Framing a useful analysis of the character of the international context and balance of forces towards universal emancipation BY ALEX MASHILO Much of mainstream analysis of the character of the international context or relations is led by news-like commentary. This can be attributed in part to the dominance of the ruling class of the regime of imperialism, its schools of thought and flows of information and the news that we are bombarded with from imperialist news agencies. It is not uncommon to be told that this or that leader is individually responsible for the fundamental social problems facing people in their country. Look at the governance and social anarchy Libya has become after Muammar Gaddafi was murdered and the country was destroyed by the United States and its North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) allies under the same pretext. The situation in that country has worsened. The bigger picture is that the U.S. and its Nato allies, advancing the economic interests of sections of their capitalist class, devastated not only Libya but many countries. Meanwhile, if we scratch the surface and dig deeper to the root of the problem, it is capitalist economic exploitation including colonialism and imperialism that is fundamentally responsible. The U.S. and Western Europe are in the main at the helm of this regime of oppression. In much of the so-called analysis that they spread, fundamental class inequality both in its national and international manifestations is not treated firstly as a problem. Secondly, it is as if it has no material basis in the system of economic organisation that they are pushing by all means and manifestations in race, gender, spatial or geographic dimensions, politics and the entire sphere of social relations. An analysis designed in that way does is not framed from the standpoint of a materialist examination of economic organisation, its contradictions and the role it plays in shaping social relations, including politics. Conversely, where it does so it is not for the befit of the billions of the world's exploited but essentially for the class of their capitalist exploiters. Some quarters in this analysis focus merely on what are in fact the surface outcroppings or consequences of the economy but considering them in isolation from it. In addition, international relations are conceived by others for instance as events taking place in other countries, continents and global regions, excluding our own. The national context is mostly treated as if it is not part of the international context. To address these methodological distortions and shortcomings, the present intervention employs Karl Marx's 1845/6 'A critique of the German Ideology', the 1848 'Manifesto of the Communist Party' by Karl Marx and Frederic Engels, Vladimir Lenin's 1916/7 'Imperialism, the highest stage of capitalism', and Antonio Gramsci's 1971 Selections from Prison Notebooks. The theoretical thread from these great works give us the basic instruments to frame a more scientific, that is materialist, analysis of the character of the international context or relations, including the balance of forces. In the Communist Manifesto, Marx and Engels correctly state that: "Though not in substance, yet in form, the struggle of the proletariat with the bourgeoisie is at first a national struggle. The proletariat of each country must, of course, first of all settle matters with its own bourgeoisie". Related to this proposition, in the chapter titled the 'State and Civil Society' (pages 498-499), in his Selections from Prison Notebooks Gramsci states that the point of departure in struggle is national, yet the perspective, the line of development, is international. He writes: "...how, according to the philosophy of praxis (as it manifests itself politically) - whether as formulated by its founder [Marx] or particularly as restated by its most recent great theoretician [Lenin] - the international situation should be considered in its national aspect. In reality, the internal relations of any nation are the result of a combination which is "original" and (in a certain sense) unique: these relations must be understood and conceived in their originality and uniqueness if one wishes to dominate them and direct them. To be sure, the line of development is towards internationalism, but the point of departure is "national" - and it is from this point of departure that one must begin. Yet the perspective is international and cannot be otherwise. Consequently, it is necessary to study accurately the combination of national forces which the international class [i.e. the proletariat, broadly speaking the working class, in party terms the Communist Party] will have to lead and develop... The leading class is in fact only such if it accurately interprets this combination - of which it is itself a component and precisely as such is able to give the movement a certain direction, within certain perspectives". The importance for the working class to wage and intensify class struggle, in this instance nationally in every country, cannot be overemphasised. By national or nationally, also referred to as domestic or domestically, included are places - the local or community level, the regional or district level connecting together associated localities, and the provincial level in case of existing provinces similarly connecting together associated regions or districts. This involves, in particular, welding together the struggles grounded in each one of these places into one national struggle including in its international aspect. The processes of this struggle take place in all important sites of social activity and power, in production and exchange, in ideas, arts and culture, in and outside of the state, etcetera. Similarly, when analysing international relations, the very national geography from which the analysis is conducted must not be left out. In the same way as the national struggle involves a connection of local, regional or district and provincial level struggles, the international struggle also involves, or otherwise emanates from a connection of national struggles. In this sense, at least, a comprehensive analysis of international relations must include what is going on within one's own national milieu. The international context is not, strictly speaking, made up only of what is going on in other countries, continents and global regions, but in ours too! An analysis of its character and direction must be grounded in this reality. The connection and impact or the influence between what is going on in other countries, continents and global regions on the one hand, and what is going on in our own countries, continents and global regions on the other hand therefore constitute a critical unit of analysis in international relations. There is a long standing question whether the international context determines or conditions the internal - that is the national or domestic context. The answer can only be dialectical. It must be dynamic in both ways, sensitive to the realities of the intercourse between and within the two and taking into account that what happens in a country is geographically located at the same time and broadly speaking within the world as one whole. In the same way as the answer has to pay attention inside a country on what is coming from outside it, it has to pay attention, too, outside that country in its universal surrounding on what is coming from inside it. The answer cannot therefore ignore the impact of the state of class struggle nationally in a given country on the international context or the influence of the latter on the former. It is important to appreciate this including in the context as stated from Gramsci of those national aspects that are "'original' and (in a certain sense) unique" that a class in order to direct or lead must understand respectively in their originality and uniqueness. In other words, it is important to appreciate the international aspect of the national context and the national aspect of the international context as well as the nature, character and the result of the intercourse in respect of each one of, and between the two. Let us briefly reflect on the preceding point with the aid of the SACP's 2016 Workers' Day message that has a particular useful characteristic in this regard. Among others the Party's message reflects on a particular relationship between domestic and international realities: "We cannot effectively deal with established monopoly capital, we cannot defend our South African national sovereignty in the face of an external imperialist agenda if the parasites inside our economy have weakened the South African Revenue Services, or undermined the developmental mandate of an Eskom, or an Armscor, or an SAA, through their plunderpreneuring activities. The struggle against corporate capture of our democratic state is a necessary struggle to defend our people, our democracy, our constitution in the face of imperialism and monopoly capital." One of the principles expressed in this position is that problems that originate from within can either weaken internal capacity to confront or can serve as the routes of entry for external threats. Otherwise those problems can serve both dangers. Conversely, the strengths that develop within, including dealing with internal problems successfully, can boost national capacity in the struggle to confront external threats. They can help close the routes of entry against those threats. Let us continue reflecting on this dialectic from a point of view of a related unit of analysis as materialised in the decisive nature of the role of production in our analysis. In 'A critique of German ideology', Marx states that: "The relations of different nations among themselves depend upon the extent to which each has developed its productive forces, the division of labour and internal intercourse. This statement is generally recognised. But not only the relation of one nation to others, but also the whole internal structure of the nation itself depends on the stage [or in context state] of development reached by its production and its internal and external intercourse". In the same vein or related to point, in the Communist Manifesto Marx and Engels state that the working class must, after winning the battle of democracy and organising itself both as ruling class and the state (i.e. the state in whose hands the working class must centralise capital and means of production), "increase the total productive forces as rapidly as possible". The importance of an analysis of the state of productive forces points to the significance of the economy and the analysis both of its role and consequent social relations including politics in national development and, as Marx correctly asserted, in international relations. Key interventions developed in this approach include Lenin's thesis 'Imperialism, the highest stage of capitalism' and the Great October Socialist Revolution that took place in Russia in 1917. The first socialist revolution did not take place in an advanced capitalist country but in Russia. At that time capitalism was backward in Russia compared to the United States or Western Europe. Lenin's thesis and the Russian Bolshevik Revolution reflected the dynamic nature of internal and international discourses and the connection between the two including its strong and weak links. Russia was a weak link in the imperialist chain which had its strong links mainly in the U.S. and Western Europe. The Bolshevik Revolution broke the weakest link in the imperialist chain. But to achieve the breakthrough, the revolution was based on consistently building sufficient strength of power nationally in Russia. In other words the egg shell was broken from inside. Something new was born out of it, bringing about changes in the environment that had its own share of contradictions in conditioning the egg's surrounding. The newborn revolution in Russia, that is nationally, was thenceforth developed to become an international platform of the world's counter-hegemonic struggle against imperialism. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics built by the revolution became the international centre of support for national liberation movements and struggles to overthrow colonialism across the world. The above also demonstrates the relationship between the national aspects of the international struggle and the international aspects of the national struggle (both part of the broader class struggle), the importance to deepen the struggles in our own countries (nationally) and to support other revolutionary struggles as we fight on and after our own victories. Lenin's thesis and the Bolshevik Revolution introduced a new theoretical proposition in Marxist thought. A breakthrough in the struggle of the exploited working class against the class of capitalist exploiters in the international line of development towards the emancipation of the oppressed is not bound to happen first in an advanced capitalist country. It was after this breakthrough, thus not only his vanguard theory of the organisation of the Communist Party, that Marxism, as named after Marx, the main theoretician but working together with Engels, was developed into Marxism-Leninism. The Wits University Professor Emeritus Eddie Webster was very much right in Cast in a Racial Mould: Labour Process and Trade Unionism in the Foundries that Marx's analysis of the revolutionary role of the working class was not an article of faith but a materialist account of the contradictory nature of capitalist development. In the same vein, as Marxism-Leninism demonstrated, Marxism as a theory or science is not an article of faith but a materialist account of the real state of society. Its development has to be as constant as the change it studies and seeks to change! Although strictly speaking not all Marxist as indicated below but nevertheless related in analysis (e.g. as Carlos Martinez Vela puts it in his 2001 essay 'World System Theory', "From Marx, Wallerstein learned that the fundamental reality is social conflict among materially based human groups [i.e., according to Marx, classes]; the concern with a relevant totality; the transitory nature of social forms and theories about them; the centrality of the accumulation process and competitive class struggles that result from it, a dialectical sense of motion through conflict and contradiction), other key interventions based on an analysis of the state of development of productive forces and broadly speaking the economy and the role it plays in national and international relations include dependency and world systems theories. The structuralist dependency theory came into currency among others via two essays in 1949, one by Hans Singer and another by Raul Prebisch, then an economist at the United Nations Commission for Latin America. It concluded that the capitalist core of countries that either colonised or economically dominated the other world countries enriched themselves by exploiting the latter's resources and constituting them as their periphery. In the same vein, but from a Marxist perspective, Andre Gunta Frank's 1966 'The development of underdevelopment' concluded that developed countries were developing themselves by means of under-developing what then became underdeveloped countries. Frank correctly moved off the ground by emphasising that: "We cannot hope to formulate adequate development theory and policy for the majority of the world's population who suffer from underdevelopment without first learning how their past economic and social history gave rise to their present underdevelopment". The world system theory brought to currency from a macro-sociological perspective in this discourse by Immanuel Wallerstein in his 1974 The Modern World System: Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins of the European World Economy in the Sixteenth Century looked at the world economy as a "total social system". Wallenstein defined a world system as a world economy, "a social system... that has boundaries, structures, member groups, rules of legitimation, and coherence". "Its life", he asserted, "is made up of the conflicting forces which hold it together by tension and tear it apart as each group seeks eternally to remould it to its advantage. It has the characteristics of an organism, in that is has a lifespan over which its characteristics change in some respects and remain stable in others". The category semi-periphery located in the capitalist world system between the core and the periphery exhibited some characteristics of both without necessarily fully resembling either. Countries in the semi-periphery were seen as attempting to "improve" their relative position in the system. At that time, the Soviet Union was seen as "external" to system in terms of categorisation at that time. The dialectic of motion through conflict and contradiction and its transitory nature introduced a number of changes in the above categories, doing away with some, not all, features and bringing in new developments. This has to be studied in its and must remain at all times faithful to the constant state of change in terms of which what was, is not necessarily what is, either in part or whole. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union all of its components firmly became part of the capitalist world system. The "external" in the world system theory referring to the Soviet Union as a category was since then no more. Another important point is that the dissolution of the Soviet Union did not come only, or purely, or exclusively from outside (i.e. international) contradictions pushed by imperialist countries but also from internal contradictions. There can be no doubt that, internally, problems in the state of development of productive forces had their own share of role, in addition in their intercourse with the prevailing character of the international context leading to the dissolution. >From the preceding points it is clear that one cannot develop a comprehensive analysis of the character of the international context, including the balance of forces, as with the national context and its relationship with the international context, without paying attention to the state of development of, and the role played by productive forces. Productive forces encompass all the forces that keep the economy moving and develop it. They include production capacity and capabilities, such as skills and know-how, the calibre of the instruments of production, equipment and tools, machines and technology, weapons of war included, developed by or available to a nation. Therefore an analysis of the strength of production and the amount of resources drawn out of it by a nation or available to it for deployment both in national development and international relations cannot be over-emphasised if one wishes to appreciate and develop a contribution in shaping both. It is from the development of productive forces and broadly speaking the economy that international relations such as trade between and across nations and value capture from production and the flows of trade emanate. It is inconceivable, for instance to argue, by way of an example, that presently the balance of forces in the unfolding exploitative and hostile international context is tilted in favour of the countries that have underdeveloped productive forces and weak economies including a weak position in terms of property relations such as ownership and control. The way forward by Marx and Engels in the Communist Manifesto for the historically oppressed once ascending to the position of power after winning the battle of democracy to develop the total productive forces as rapidly as possible cannot be overemphasised. In our case for example the second radical phase of the national democratic revolution, including transformation of the base structure of our economy through industrialisation, manufacturing expansion and diversification as well as addressing the problems of primarily inequality, unemployment and poverty, should have been implemented outright from the 1994 democratic breakthrough! In fact, rather than a South Africa's peculiarity and necessary strategic task, the second radical phase of democratisation as a revolutionary process and social transformation is an international struggle that all countries in the former colonised world should have advanced immediately after attaining their "national independence". The double inverted commas underline the fact that as a result of not achieving the objectives of the second radical phase the independence attained is incomplete. By and large former colonisers and imperialist countries retained economic control in these countries that must unite in pursuit of the second radical phase of their democratic revolutions not just as a national but an international struggle! . Alex Mohubetswane Mashilo is SACP Spokesperson, and writes in his capacity as a Professional Revolutionary International political landscape: Trends, dynamics and complexities CHRIS MATLHAKO AND WALTER MOTHAPO Former president of the ANC Oliver Tambo when asked by a journalist on the political situation in the country upon his return to South Africa after more than thirty years in exile responded by saying "South Africa is dancing a foxtrot dance of one leg forward and one leg backward'. This caption which referred to the country's political stagnation at the time, could as well be used to make a synopsis of the international political scenario at this juncture. Since contemporary history of the world could be traced from the East to the West and vice versa, we could reasonably say the world has shifted from bipolar to unipolar politics but with peculiar complexities. The collapse of the Soviet Union makes it even complex to analyse the world politics and forces at play but certainly what we know is that the imperialist U.S and its allies haven't retreated instead they have heightened and exerted their cultural, political, military and economic dominance of the world. Despite some socialist breakthroughs and advances especially in Latin America, capitalism remains rampant and responsible for most of the world's woes and economic disparities. The three main dangers facing the world today now according to the Cuban academic professor Esteban Moreno-Dominquez are 'hunger, military aggression as well as environmental destruction'. Hence the UN's Sustainable Development Goals are emphatic on preservation of the earth and its natural resources both in the developed and developing nations without distinction; unlike it was the case with the recent Millennium Development Goals. This is because inequality among the haves and the have-nots and its effects in all parts of the world; is rapidly increasing with wealth concentration in few hands. This leads to civil unrest and military violence both of which lead to destruction of natural resources. Exaggerating the situation is that the financial multilateral institutions such as the IMF, World Bank, WTO and rating agencies wield more power, recognition and influence in determining global economics more than any other UN and global institutions such as the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), ILO and few others. Further, the left movement internationally is not yet coherent and this gives room for a widened ideological vacuum, leadership and ideological alternatives. This ideological vacuum breeds extremist and fundamentalist rebel movements such as Boko Haram, ISIS and the likes not to mention locally the EFF who bear the same resemblance but coupled with fascism and corroboration with the West both of which are masked by "populist and false left wing rhetoric". This phenomenon of a quest for developmental finance versus credit rating hits hard on developing economies as it borders on undermining their sovereignty which is reminiscent of "structural adjustment programmes". Right now South Africa is at the mercy of rating agencies on its economic and developmental future as our Treasury Department borrows about R173 billion per annum. As such our local macro politico-economic dynamics is in one way or the other shaped by these external global factors. This is because the ratings agencies would prescribe certain neo-liberal programmes and policies to be followed in order to improve our ratings. Privatisation of State Owned Entities for an example is always at the lips of rating agencies. Our contention is that much as capitalism is still a dominant system in the world and will remain so in the foreseeable future the crisis facing humanity could not be solved by such an inhumane system. Capitalism is inhumane, in a sense that the crux of capitalism is anything devoid of people. People and humanity come at the tail end of a capitalist system. Part of the triumph of the Cuban Revolution is that people are at the centre of the societal fabric and development. We assert that the struggle in general is dialectical and so is the international march towards the socialist paradigm. Amidst this perceived hopelessness there is a silver lining in dark clouds, such as the more than fifty years of resilience by the Cuban Revolution, the rapidly rising China and other Socialist orientated governments that remain defiant to the neoliberal, colonial and ever imperialist West agenda. Evoking OR's 'foxtrot dictum "we can logically deduce that the US cannot lead the world no matter its desperation but equally the international left isn't yet ready, organised and well-oiled to lead global politics". The question is what is the resolution of this global quagmire coupled with direction in terms of strategy from materialist and dialectical perspective? Actually the question is, "What is to be done" as Lenin once asked. We will revert back to this question after briefly scanning the international political landscape as it unfolds. . Chris Matlhako is SACP Central Committee member and Secretary for International Affairs. Walter Mothapo serves as a member of the Party's sub-committee on International Affairs. Umsebenzi Online is the online voice of the South African working class -- UMSEBENZI ONLINE IS THE VOICE OF THE SOUTH AFRICAN WORKING CLASS _____________________________________________________________________ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Umsebenzi Online" group. To unsubscribe from this group, just send email to [email protected] For more options, archives, pages and files, visit the group web site at http://groups.google.com/group/umsebenzi-online?hl=en --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Umsebenzi Online" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
