Ta Domza From: Dominic Tweedie To: [email protected] Sent: Fri Jul 10 09:26:06 SAST 2009 Subject: [YCLSA Discussion] Re: the NP govt was more socialist than the ANC govt.
Cde Mxolisi, thanks for your reply in this vital discussion, First, it is not true that Lenin’s "Two Tactics of Social Democracy in the Democratic Revolution" offers two equal “socialist” options that people can choose from as if from a menu. Some people who have only read the title of this book do think so, I know. Maybe not you. But it is necessary to say that. The book is an attack on reformism, and a strong defence of the Bolsheviks against the Mensheviks. I am attaching some extracts from, and notes about, Lenin’s “Two Tactics” book to this e-mail. Cde Mxolisi, you take for granted that the working class is already in power. I am afraid that is not yet certain. But indeed it is a good question to ask. Whether it is so or not will become manifest in practice, but class struggle will still continue in any case, both before and after working class state power, and then multiple class interests will always be a factor, necessitating alliances. I don’t yet see what (class) alliance will be easily lined up to nationalise the mines. I do see that we can construct a class alliance for the nationalisation of Sasol and Mittal, especially if we do it as part of a plan to ensure low prices and good supplies of steel, fertiliser and fuel. Who would not put their hand up for those things, which the present bourgeois monopoly owners have failed to secure for the nation? Cde Wonder made a good point about the ANC YL being asleep when Telkom matters were in the public realm. One of the things I am trying to say here is that we must show that we know how to deal with the nationalisations that we already have, including Telkom, BRT, and the SABC. It is not necessarily clever to be gazing into a future where we imagine all the mines to be nationalised, while the nationalised enterprises that we already have, like the SABC, and Telkom, are even today busy going down the toilet as a result of our neglect. Domza, VC -----Original Message-----From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Mxolisi MlathaSent: 10 July 2009 08:59 AMTo: [email protected]: [YCLSA Discussion] Re: the NP govt was more socialist than the ANC govt. Comrade Domza If we say reform is reform and revolution is revolution we may create artificial boundaries of what occurs within a revolution. Let us take for instance the issue of the redistribution of land, it is a reform but can also be defined as a revolutionary reform depending on the content of the reform. This are issues that Lenin well tabulated in "Two Tactics of Social Democracy in the Democratic Revolution." It would be wrong to say we must first strenghten the working class organizations before we pursue the class interests of the working class, because apparently pursuing such interests will divert us from building working class organizations and by implication power. Is such power not about creating a working class orientated state? It is almost as if we are saying in the current context the working class cannot achieve any thing we must wait for socialism. I appreciate the useful examples that Domza gives about the experiences on nationalism in SA, but these are premised on the basis of the hegemony of bourgoesie class interests, true the fundamentals of the apartheid capitalist state are still in place. But does this mean a working class orientated movement that is in power cannot nationalise on the basis of its own terms. The latter refer to the detail and intent that such nationalization would be directed to. The tactical priority choices whether its Mittal first or not are all content issues that we can pursue which Domza infact seem to support if hes views are followed to the logical conclusion in this discussion. Mxolisi --- Sent from UnionMail Service [http://mail.union.org.za] --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
