[DEBATE] : Re: Raymond Suttner on Joe Slovo's intellectual legacy

[Peter Waterman]

Russell:

I'd like to hope that your first passage below is tongue in cheekie:

'Surprising that nobody's responded to the Suttner thing on Slovo. 
Ridiculous
to complain that that Marx never lived in Africa. Surely the essence of
Marxism is after all its universalism?'

It is the assumption that a mid-19th century White, Male, European thinker 
could produce universal truth that has led to so much criticism of Marx and 
Marxism!

It has also led to that subservience to the Thinker and the Text which 
prevented Third World Marxists from developing their own independent 
historical, dialectical and emancipatory thinking. With the exception of one 
or two exceptions such as the 'Peruvian Gramsci', Jose-Carlos Mariategui.

Today, thanks to capitalist globalisation, the possibility arises for 
developing a universalism which is not a particularistic universalism (one 
claiming from a certain position universal value for partial truths).

However, it seems to me that this is unlikely to be the work of one person, 
one school, one place, one position. It is more likely to be a matter of a 
constructive and respectful dialogue of emancipatory tendencies - one which 
will certainly cede a major place to Marxism but not as some kind of Moses 
of emancipatory thought. There were forerunners and there are present-day 
emancipatory thinkers (some owing little to the Big M).

P



Peter W

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Russell" <grinker at mweb.co.za>
To: "debate: SA discussion list " <debate at lists.kabissa.org>
Sent: Friday, August 04, 2006 1:39 PM
Subject: [DEBATE] : Re: Raymond Suttner on Joe Slovo's intellectual legacy


Surprising that nobody's responded to the Suttner thing on Slovo. Ridiculous
to complain that that Marx never lived in Africa. Surely the essence of
Marxism is after all its universalism?

What is interesting from Suttner's piece is evidence of how little impact
Marxism (even in the distorted nationalist forms later peddled by its
Stalinist varietals) seems to have had on some of the old SA Party's most
militant cadres. This was of course an international problem - not just one
in Africa - and probably largely to do with the relative youth and lack of
experience of  the leadership of the various national organisations during
the twenties when the international movement still had healthy instincts.
And when the Comintern and Cominform made their various opportunistic
nationalist turns in search of local credibility, they usually only
succeeded in reinforcing parochialism and local nationalist tendencies.
These turns included pandering to some of the worst abberations of national
sections, including anti-semitism and male chauvinism.

While I haven't had the opportunity to read his bits of the debate, Suttner
would thus appear to have it 100% wrong in criticising the Party's Marxism
for not being African enough. The real point was probably that it wasn't
sufficiently rigorous or able to offer a way forward to local militants that
seemed better than their traditional rituals.

If anything, there's a hint that Suttner may have joined a growing group of
individuals whose disillusionment with radical nationalism and third world
Stalinism has led to a dalliance with indigenism and notions of tribal
authenticity. Indigenism has typically also been taken up by some in the
anti-globalization movement and environmental organisations opposed to
large-scale development projects. It could be argued that by turning to the
cause of indigenous peoples, such activists substitute a romantic
alternative to failed forms of development-oriented Third World nationalism
to which they once adhered.

But maybe I've got him totally wrong.

- Russell

 ----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Sean Jacobs" <tintinyana at gmail.com>
To: <debate at lists.kabissa.org>
Sent: Tuesday, August 01, 2006 9:27 PM
Subject: [DEBATE] : Raymond Suttner on Joe Slovo's intellectual legacy


Date: 1 August 2006
From: Raymond Suttner
        History Department, University of South Africa
        <raymond.suttner at vulamasango.co.za>

I find Peter Limb's enquiry very important.  At this very moment the SACP is
in my view drifting into a worse crisis than the ANC, one of
deideologisation, as the General Secretary trots after Zuma wherever he
leads.  The succession question is ousting all other issues of concern.
This makes it all the more important to assert, whether as scholars,
activists or whatever, the importance of ideology and of thinking and
rethinking about politics.  This is obviously a good time to rethink the
legacy of Joe Slovo.

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