On 4/11/21 1:25 PM, Jerry Monaco wrote:
I agree but I think this doesn’t grapple with the main problem of Zinoviev’s and Trotsky’s concerns. How do you build an International that doesn’t fall into the betrayals of the Socialist International? How do you create an program of international solidarity within a socialist movement with democratic /and/ revolutionary ideas, with internal revolutionary discipline /and/ equalitarian practice that is not cult like and doesn’t rely on constant excommunication. In simple words, how do we have revolutionary discipline */and/* democratic practice within each party /and/ within an international party as a whole? Such international revolutionary discipline and democratic practice must not just be between parties as corporate constituents but within the whole international. That is true if we are to build a real international organization with solidarity in practice.
Keep in mind that Trotsky and Zinoviev considered the Comintern to be based on democratic centralism. This meant that the leading body in Moscow would have the same kind of power to discipline or expel not only members in other countries but entire parties. The worst application of this hierarchical method was the expulsion of Paul Levi, who wrote a scathing attack on the German CP that had organized a totally idiotic ultraleft uprising in 1921. Unless Levi went public, the masses never would have learned of his critique. Lenin, of course, voted for Levi's expulsion but had qualms about the Comintern and the organizational methods it was adopting. He wrote:
"At the third congress in 1921 we adopted a resolution on the structure of communist parties and the methods and content of their activities. It is an excellent resolution, but it is almost entirely Russian, that is to say, everything in it is taken from Russian conditions. That is its good side, but it is also its bad side, bad because scarcely a single foreigner--I am convinced of this, and I have just re-read it-can read it. Firstly, it is too long, fifty paragraphs or more. Foreigners cannot usually read items of that length. Secondly, if they do read it, they cannot understand it, precisely because it is too Russian...it is permeated and imbued with a Russian spirit. Thirdly, if there is by chance a foreigner who can understand it, he cannot apply it...My impression is that we have committed a gross error in passing that resolution, blocking our own road to further progress. As I said, the resolution is excellent, and I subscribe to every one of the fifty paragraphs. But I must say that we have not yet discovered the form in which to present our Russian experience to foreigners, and for that reason the resolution has remained a dead letter. If we do not discover it, we shall not go forward."
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#7916): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/7916 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/82013043/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. -=-=- Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/8674936/21656/1316126222/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
