Always quick to label someone sectarian, L.P. links to his post that is sectarian to the maximum. He argues by quotations, does nothing to establish that his snippets are not selective, and leaves us devoid of materialist analysis of the economy under tsarism.
"The problem in Russia was industrialization. It was obvious by comparison with England, Germany, France, and so on. In 1917 there were three million workers among a population of 145 million. The working class was concentrated in large factories (one thousand workers or more) to a greater degree than the United States. Still, eight out of ten people were peasants, and 30,000 large landowners exploited them. The capitalist class was incapable of leading a revolution against the tsar, hoping instead to win a place alongside the land-based aristocrats in a reformed monarchy. Then industrialization could proceed over a span of fifty years, similar to Japan after the so-called Meiji Restoration. Although a few tsarist officials were of similar mind, notably the police-state expert Peter Stolypin, the regime did not budge. The working class made the 1917 revolution and proceeded to tackle industrialization run by the working class for the benefit of the working people." (The Hollow Colossus, p. 167f.) _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
