Jerry, As far as I know all of the left in Britain with very few exceptions reject Lenin's position on the relationship of imperialism to the split in the working class movement. Most recently a talk given by Ben Fine at a local CSE group (7/2702) dismissed it cursorily: 'such propositions simply do not stand up to close scrutiny'. Admittedly he put over a caricature of Lenin's theory but never argued or proved anything. See his Globalisation and Development : The imperative of political economy - draft paper for a conference in Sheffield. I have given many examples of it being ignored in the analysis of the development of British imperialism in the articles I have written - http://www.rcgfrfi.easynet.co.uk FRFI section begin with 161. I also show how the ruling class clearly understood the relation. I intend to develop the argument. David Yaffe At 14:45 12/02/02 +0000, glevy@pop-b.pratt.edu wrote: >Re David Y's [6554]: > > > Marx wrote a critique of political economy not an abstract tract > > on economics. It was a critique not just of capitalism and the > > views of its most conscious representatives but also of petty > > bourgeois views in the contemporary working class/'socialist' > > movement eg Proudhon. Lenin carried on in this tradition - a > > tradition that seems to be sadly lacking today - > > despite the appalling state of both the world and the left > > movement. > >OK, what specifically are the petty-bourgeois views in the contemporary >working-class/'socialist' movement that are in need of critique today? > > > Lenin did advance our understanding on the relation of economics to > > politics in a rather challenging way in his pamphlet on > > Imperialism, as he himself makes clear in the preface. Marxists > > have been attacking his position ever since on the labour > > aristocracy or the two trends in the working class movement. But > > clearly there is a growing split in the working > > class movement between imperialist and oppressed nations and and > > increasingly within the imperialist nations themselves. Why this > > is found to be unacceptable is beyond me. Lenin, building on the > > work of Marx and Engels gave us a materialist understanding of > > this development - a very significant advance in Marxist thought. > > Can I recommend Imperialism and the Split in Socialism Vol 23 > > p105ff. This really is in the best tradition of > > critique of political economy. The position needs to be developed > > concretely in relation to today's circumstances. > >Are you suggesting that the critique of political economy needs to be more >concretely developed today as it relates to positions taken by >contemporary working class/socialist movements in relationship to >imperialism and imperialist wars? The inference, in other words, seems to >be that many contemporary socialists are 'soft' on the question of >imperialism. This is certainly not an inference I would reject -- but I'd >like to hear more about *which* groups, tendencies and authors (other than >the obvious ones, e.g. social democratic) you believe have this position. > >Another interesting question is whether imperialism as it >was characterized by Lenin in his pamphlet has been altered in >significant ways. E.g. Paul C, I believe, once raised this question in >relation to what he viewed as the contemporary (in)significance of the >export of capital from the imperialist nations. This would make for an >interesting thread -- 'how has imperialism changed since Lenin's time?' or >'has imperialism changed since Lenin?'. > >In solidarity, Jerry
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