At 10:34 AM 27/08/2007, Louis wrote:
In the July-August International Socialist
Review, the theoretical journal of the
state-capitalist International Socialist
Organization, theres an article by Lee Sustar
titled What does Chávez have in store for
Venezuela? He asks rhetorically if Chávez is
correct in his recent statements that the ideas
of Marx and Lenin are outdated, and that private
property has to be preserved in a socialist
Venezuela? He also writes Chávez himself,
quoting the German revolutionary Rosa Luxemburg
out of context, declared that trade unions
should be subordinated to the socialist partyi.e., the PSUV.
When I asked Sustar to provide references for
these assertions, he replied with respect to the
first: It was on Alo Presidente, which you can
hear online. I have not been successful in
tracking this down. He also provided a link to
an article on aporrea.org by Miguel Angel
Hernández that began with this quote from Chavéz:
El Partido Socialista Unido de Venezuela
(PSUV) no tomará las banderas del
marxismo-leninismo porque es una tesis
dogmática que ya pasó y no está acorde con la
realidad de hoy
tesis como la de la clase
obrera como el motor del socialismo y de la
revolución están obsoletas
El trabajo hoy es
otra cosa, es distinto, está la informática y
la telemática, y Carlos Marx ni siquiera podía soñar con estas cosas.
Roughly translated, this says:
The PSUV doesnt call itself
marxist-leninist because it is a dogmatic
thesis that has passed and doesnt accord with
the reality of today
the thesis of the working
class as the motor of socialism and the
revolution is obsolete
the worker of today is
another thing, is distinct, is involved with
information and telecommunications technology
and Karl Marx could not have dreamed of these things.
Maybe curiosity killed the cat, but I am dying
to know what was between the ellipses in
Chavézs quoted remarks. It also might be
possible to make a distinction between Sustars
characterization of Chavéz saying that Marx and
Lenin were obsolete and his actual words, namely
that The PSUV doesnt call itself
marxist-leninist because it is a dogmatic
thesis that has passed and doesnt accord with
the reality of today. Calling oneself
Marxist-Leninist is pretty stupid in fact.
And, further, the comment about
Marxist-Leninist must be seen in the context of
the position of the PCV (Vzlan CP) which
officially rejected joining in the PSUV because
this was the time for the broad anti-imperialist
struggle whereas the (always later) struggle for
socialism would require a Marxist-Leninist Party.
I don't have the specific sources that
Louis is looking for but there are transcripts of
the 'Alo Presidente' programmes on line. One
recent programme (#287) from the state of Vargas
(devoted to the idea of socialist cities) was
described by ABN, the Bolivarian news agency on
22 July; there, he said roughly:
I respect deeply the thesis of Carlos Marx and
his great contribution to the humanity with the
discovery of socialism", affirmed Chávez from the
place where the first socialist city of the country is being constructed.
He added: 'I am socialist, bolivariano,
revolutionary. I respect the Marxist route, but I
am not Marxist. I cannot share that thesis
because that is a determinist vision of the socialism.
He remembered that Marx, deceived and
manipulated, got to approve the invasion from the
United States to Mexico and from England to India
because he thought that was the route towards
capitalism and that soon, as a product of the
development of the productive forces, would enter the socialism.
Under that argument, we, the backward countries,
never would arrive at the socialism because we
would have to wait first that they invade us,
that they develop us, and then soon to go to
socialism, the Chief of State explained while
she talked by telephone with a listener.
Yes, Marx gave some details about how to go from
capitalism to socialism, but that capitalist
system was very different from the wild
Capitalism of our days and, for that reason, the
socialism of today corresponds for us to detail it.
Jeesh! You mean that we have to do some concrete
analysis???? Of course, Marx wasn't a 'Marxist' either (nor was Lenin).
cheers,
michael
ps. re the 'working class': probably means the
organised-in-trade-union group (which some might
view as an aristocracy of labour in Vzla); it is
to be noted that he's communing with Negri (his
guest for the unveiling of the constitutional proposals) these days.
Michael A. Lebowitz
Professor Emeritus
Economics Department
Simon Fraser University
Burnaby, B.C., Canada V5A 1S6
Director, Programme in 'Transformative Practice and Human Development'
Centro Internacional Miranda, P.H.
Residencias Anauco Suites, Parque Central, final Av. Bolivar
Caracas, Venezuela
fax: 0212 5768274/0212 5777231
http//:centrointernacionalmiranda.gob.ve
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
