If I understood Sam's comments correctly, he argues 1) it was Eurocentric
to expect a revolution in Germany in 1918-19, that 2) Lenin rejected Roy's
emphasis on the importance of the revolutions in colonial countries, and
that 3) the Eurocentric policy of the Comintern led to disasterous
alliances with the bourgeoisie in countries like China, Turkey and Indonesia.
1) Why was the perspective in 1918-19 on Germany wrong? The Comintern
blamed the failure on the Communist Party's poor leadership rather than
assuming the German working class were inherently reformist.
2) In fact, at the Third Congress (or the Second?) Lenin changed his
original position and endorsed part of Roy's approach on the colonial
revolution. I think that part of the shift in the Lenin's position was to
accept Roy's sharper formulation of how unreliable allies the colonial
bourgeoise classes were, and to clarify that the class struggle in these
countries had a different strategic framework than in the imperialist
countries. How is it Eurocentric to programitically codify the rejection of
the Second International's 'socialist colonial policy'?
3) I'm sure Sam is well aware of it, so I wonder why he ignores the
cardinal differences between the Stalinist policy of the Comintern in
China, Turkey and Indonesia and the 'Lenin-Roy' approach adopted by the
Third Congress?
Bill Burgess
At 11:42 PM 12/04/00 -0700, you wrote:
>
> Carrol wrote:
>> >
>> My objection to the label "eurocentrism" is not to its false application
>> -- all labels may be and are misused -- but to its redundancy. I claim
>> that there is no instance of its use in which it would not be more
>> accurate to speak of racism, of imperialism, or of racism & imperialism.
>
>No. Western Marxism has been full of Euro-centrism. Two of the greatest
>champions and fighters for socialist internationalism and against
>imperialism and racism--Lenin and Trotsky-- were Euro-centrists. After
>the events of 1918-19 in Germany, they moved away from this position
>realizing that the German working class had put its eggs in the soc-dem
>basket. If international socialism was to become an actuality, the
>impetus for it would have to come from the east and the south. Further,
>Marxists in the East and the South could not accept the fact that their
>liberation from colonialism would be achieved on the coat tails of the
>workers of Paris, London and Detroit.
> This view was summed up by the Indian communist M.N. Roy in his report
>to the second congress of the Comintern (1920-- which can be called the
>'third worldist' congress):
>
>"[Comrade Roy] defends the idea that the fate of the revolutionary
>movement in Europe depends entirely on the course of the revolution in
>the East. Without victory of the revolution in the Eastern countries,
>the Communist movement in the West would come to nothing. This being so,
>it is essential that we divert our energies into developing and
>elevating the revolutionary movement in the East and accept as our
>fundamental thesis that the fate of world communism depends on the
>victory of Communism in the East."
>
>This view can be found in Marx (and probably Engels) as early as 1853:
>
>"It may seem a very strange, and a very paradoxical assertion that the
>next uprising of the people of Europe, and their next movement for
>republican freedom may depend more probably on what is now passing in
>the Celestial Empire [China]...it may be safely augured that the Chinese
>revolution will throw the spark into the overloaded mine of the present
>industrial system and cause the explosion of the long prepared general
>crisis, which, spreading abroad will be closely followed by political
>revolutions on the Continent." *Revolution in China and Europe* New York
>tribune June 14, 1853.
>
>Lenin would have none of this:
>
>"Comrade Roy goes too far when he asserts that the fate of the West
>depends exclusively on the degree of development and the strength of the
>revolutionary movement in the eastern Countries. In spite of the fact
>that the proletariat in India numbers five million and there are 37
>million landless peasants, the Indian comrades have not succceeded in
>creating a Communist Party in their country. This fact alone shows that
>Comrade Roy's views are to a large extent unfounded."
>
>As if the balance of class forces depends on how many people have a card
>that says "member of the Communist Party"! And this after millions had
>taken part in anti-British actions--including general strikes-- in
>1920-1!
>
>Lenin's assistant Safarov commented:
>
>"...the Communist Parties of the imperialist countries have done
>extraordinarily little to deal witht he national and colonial question.
>Worse still, the flag of Communism **is used to hide chauvinist ideas
>foreign and hostile to proletarian internationalism**"
>
>
>Eurocentrism in the Comintern led to *disaster*.This Euro-centrism
>boiled down to two theses: the liberation of the world exploited by
>capitalism must be the result of socialist revolution in the West and
>world socialism ment the Europeanization of the world. Capitalism had
>not yet diffused out of Europe and developed in the East and South, so
>communists must align with the national bourgeosie because there is only
>peasants with no proletariat to make the revolution. This led to an
>underestimating of the revolutionary character of the national
>liberation movements (really an underestimating of the revolutionary
>potential of the peasantry
>) and a confusion between a particular national
>bourgeosie acting in an anti-imperialist manner and the communist
>movement in the same country acting in an anti-imperialist manner and
>acting against the
>national bourgeoisie. The Comintern supported the national bourgeoise
>instead of the indigenous communists. The end result was things like the
>support of the
>KMT in China leading to the 1927-8 massacres and the support of Mustafa
>Kemal in Turkey _after_ he had murdered all of the top communists there.
>Kemal murdered Turkish Marxists with weapons given to him by the
>Comintern. Same with the crushing of the Indonesian Communist Party in
>1926.
>
>Sam Pawlett
>
>
>
