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Editor: . . . I just want to make a sugges- tion. You ought to print a subscription C O R R E S P O N D E blank in every issue of ISR. You have one for a combination deal on page 16 N of the Winter 1960 issue, but whether you have a combination offer or not, you should always carry a sub blank, Editor: and never swerved from the policy of not just to encourage some reader to Since I took out my trial subscrip- the government. Also I can't under- subscribe but to induce a subscriber to tion a few months ago, from one of the stand your loyalty to Soviet Russia; send in a sub for a friend or acquaint- Socialist Trailblazers, I have found your binding yourself to a dictatorship (of the proletariat) seems to me the worst ance. By the way, do you have any magazine to be very thought-provoking possible blunder, as the situation now sub forms printed up? You should send and worthy of careful study. is you have given the word socialism a few to the persons already on your Fairly recently, however, I came across another publication. It was a a bad connotation, (it might be well if list, including myself. I could use a few, book defending both the present U. S. you changed the name completely). and I know I would use a sub blank government and the Eisenhower Ad- A good topic for another editorial every time I saw one in the ISR. No ministration, called What We Are For might be along the lines of the worker harm in trying, anyhow. Think it over. (Harpers, 1959). and automation, or the agricultural sit- uation, etc. At any rate the policy of Midwestern reader I must admit that this latter publica- your magazine seems the most impos- South Dakota tion has placed many of my former be- liefs in serious doubt, though I have sible thing I could imagine. Do YOU been unable to resolve many questions. know that if you told anybody (com- mon American) you were a socialist Editor: I am a student at Harvard, and I always try to get to the bottom of a or labeled any plan one based on so- Your last editorial states that "In question, no matter where this leads cialism, you might as well have told Western Europe revolutionary working- me — although, admittedly, this is not them you, or it, were anti-American, a class movements were prevented by the always the easiest course. I feel I have spy, a killer, a red and the big bad Stalinized Communist parties and the to do this, for if I try to push aside wolf for that matter? Stop slinging reformist Social-Democracy from finish- an idea without first satisfying myself mud and try and do something prac- ing off capitalism at the end of World of its error, it continues to reappear and tical. S. K. War II." haunt me. It seems to me that in order to justify I would be exceedingly grateful to Whitestone, N. Y. this point of view you must answer the you if you could analyze that book in the light of true socialism. If you could objection of the Communists that such do this, perhaps I could set my con- Editor: an overturn at the end of the war science once again at ease. Find enclosed twenty-five cents for a would have meant the beginning of Thank you very much, and please copy of your pamphlet Which Way for World War III. Moreover, the U.S. had forgive me for burdening you with Labor — Democratic Party or Labor a monopoly on the Atom bomb at that this problem. I send my best wishes to Part~? by Murry Weiss. time. you. First, I should like to explain how We cannot irresponsibly call for D. C. M.,Jr. I obtained a copy of International So- "revolution everywhere" without con- Newton Center, Mass. cialist Review, Winter 1960 . . . The sidering that we are living in a world other day a member of our Union came by the store to visit me and he said situation where revolution might mean Editor: he had read my letter [to the editor the total destruction of all parties. . . . If the ISR editors have finished of a local paper] . . . and during the T. J. chuckling (I think it was "happy" visit he told me about this magazine Brooklyn, N. Y. chuckling no less) maybe they will ex- and he gave it to me. plain why in their editorial they so Well when I noticed this advertise- militantly have seized on the nomen- ment about this pamphlet on a Labor Editor: clature "power elite" which is not ours Party it interested me very much be- and is intended by its proponents to op- I liked Cannon's article on American cause that is the very thing that I want pose the Marxist conception about rul- radicalism. It was a truthful account of to happen . . . ing class? T. M. M. what happened in the thirties. He is G. B. Denver, Colo. dead right in his central point, "The Detroit, Mich. radical movement of the thirties . . . has spent itself." I also go along wth the Editor: proposition that "the main forces of the Editor: Just a word of praise for the Winter new movement of American Socialist Upon reading your editorial, I was 1960 issue of ISR. As a lover of history, radicalism have to come from a new really shocked by the attitude you had I enjoyed immensely the article on John generation." taken. You have committed the tact- Brown. What I'm dubious about is that the less error of trying to tear down and You may like to know that when I organized left today will be capable of insult or disgrace everything (or some finish reading ISR I mail it to a friend attracting this new generation. of the things) that the American public in Holland who likes it better than any Cannon seems to think that the So- holds near and dear and feels just and other socialist publication. cialist Workers Party can do this job. rightly about. Rather than attempting Please send me the book —Eugene V. But I don't see any evidence that the to show him the great advantages which lie in socialism. Debs — the Socialist Movement of His SWP is attracting "the upcoming young Time— Its Meaning for Today. 25 cents. rebels." I would like to believe that it Perhaps you should study more closely Stamps enclosed for same. was but, as I say, I'm dubious. the now well established Labor party in England. It was established by set- P. C. H. R. G. tling the problems caused by capitalism Louisville, KY. Columbus, Ohio 34 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW Spring 1960 Volume 21 . No. 2 T 1 E by Farrell Dobbs w E ENTER the sixties amid changing political condi- tions that forecast the opening of a new and higher stage in the American class struggle. Events are pushing search for the right answer impels them, erratic though the course may be, in the direction of socialism. China has advanced along this road to the abolition of the unions away from support to capitalist political parties capitalist property relations and establishment of a work- and toward the formation of an independent labor party. ers state based on nationalization of the means of produc- This necessary turn in union policy, tion and the introduction of planned economy. Earlier so- which the union bureaucrats can't block cial overturns of a similar nature took place in Yugoslavia indefinitely, points in the direction of and across Eastern Europe. Together with the Soviet Union a fundamental showdown between labor these workers states now encompass one-third the earth's and capital. Although labor is by far surface and close to half of all humanity. Viewed in com- the stronger in potential class force, its bination with the colonial rebels elsewhere in the world victory in a showdown is not automat- they constitute a formidable anti-imperialist force. ically assured. In the long run class po- The power of the anti-imperialist forces is further Iit.ical consciousness will be decisive in strengthened by the great forward leap in Soviet scientific, determining the outcome of the battle. technological and military potential. American imperial- Today the capitalists have a big class ism no longer has the atomic monopoly and general mili- advantage, stemming from policies con- tary superiority with which it launched the cold war some sciously designed to serve their own in- fourteen years ago. A country that can send a rocket to terests at the expense of society as a the moon, as the Soviet Union has done, can also deliver whole. Labor stands in an opposite position; it remains rockets armed with hydrogen warheads against an impe- crippled by illusions that social progress can be made rialist aggressor anywhere on earth, including the United through collaboration with the enemy class. Despite grow- States, ing necessity, the unions have failed to develop an inde- These revolutionary advances on the world arena have pendent class policy in industry and politics; and they have brought a power stalemate which compels American impe- still to arrive at the anti-capitalist, pro-socialist outlook rialism to slow down its cold-war offensive and adjust its fundamental to a solution of society's basic problems. These diplomatic policy to a temporary, uneasy truce in interna- class needs can be met only when the workers unseat the tional relations. Although the imperialists try to use this capitalist-minded union bureaucrats — in short, labor faces act of tactical expediency to parade as peace lovers, they an increasingly acute crisis of leadership. have actually made no basic change in their foreign policy; There exists within the general labor movement a rev- on the contrary, they are using the lull in the cold war olutionary-socialist tendency capable of projecting the in- to intensify them preparations for hot war. dependent class policy the unions require. But this polit- The situation becomes doubly dangerous for world labor ically class-conscious section of labor has been thrust into because imperialist political deceit is accompanied by Stal- isolation from the workers through a combined attack by inist misrepresentation of the true state of affairs. Dressing the union bureaucrats and the capitalist witch hunters. Only Up old-line Stalinist policy in new verbiage, the Kremlin now are favorable conditions developing for fusion of the bureaucrats call for universal disarmament, peaceful co- revolutionary-socialist program with the mass power of existence and friendly competition between rival social the unions. orders. They dangle this line before the insurgent world An opening step toward such a fusion can be taken masses as a sure road to socialism by "gradual" means. through the presidential campaign of the Socialist Workers Reasonable though this approach may seem — and no party which is now getting under way. To understand why matter how great a popular response it may evoke — the the SWP campaign holds promise of gains which will help imperialists would never agree to such a course. The Stal- to strengthen class political consciousness among the work- inist bureaucrats understand this fact and they have shaped ers, let us examine the broad lines of social conflict devel- their real policy accordingly. What they actually aim for oping on a world scale and the political repercussions that is a deal with imperialism to divide the world into spheres result within this country. of influence with an agreement to maintain the status quo Across the globe peoples long subjected to imperialist ex- within each sphere. They are ready to help preserve cap- ploitation are rising up against their oppressors. They want italism outside the Soviet orbit in the hope this will enable to develop their own industries in order to raise their them to save their own privileged position in the area standard of living. They are determined to free themselves where they now rule. from foreign interference and decide for themselves what Stalinist policy runs directly counter to the needs of the economic and social order will best serve their needs. Their masses in the capitalist sector of the world and it clashes with the democratic aspirations of people within the Soviet Farrell Dobbs is the Socialist Workers party's candidate for President bloc countries. Workers' uprisings in 1956 against the Stal- of the United States in the 1960 elections. He was the SWP presiden- inist regimes in Poland and Hungary Iaid bare the basic tial candidate in 1948, 1952 and 1956. antagonism between the ruling bureaucracy and the masses SPRING 1960 35 within the workers states. In crushing the Hungarian re- rivals are stiffening their competition with American cap- volt the bureaucracy strengthened itself temporarily, but italism. In the one-time colonial preserves strong opposi- didn't win a permanent lease on life. The status quo can't tion to imperialist domination has developed; and in the be frozen indefinitely in the Soviet bloc countries; new po- case of Cuba a colonial revolt has flared up right on the litical explosions will occur and they will cause repercus- United States' doorstep. sions throughout the world labor movement. Instead of forging ahead toward unrestricted exploitation It is equally impossible to freeze the status auo for verv of the world, American imperialism finds its expansionist long in the countries under capitalist rule. The very forces drive slowed down, if not turned back. Still determined to that have acted to compel a slowdown in the imperialist achieve its objectives, the capitalist ruling class is using war drive are also operating to prevent any lasting social the cold-war lull for an attack on American labor to safe- stability under capitalism. Although the world labor and guard capitalist privileges nationally and to get into a colonial movements face a general crisis of leadership, this better position to drag the country into war. obstacle does not halt the struggles for social improve- Imperialist military adventures are not ruled out because ment. Mass action simply takes longer to gain enough of the horrible dangers in an atomic war. Truman risked momentum to break through the barriers and then it de- atomic war when he plunged the country into the Korean velops in distorted forms; but the masses keep asserting conflict. Eisenhower had no compunction about the war themselves. risks involved in a military occupation of Lebanon. The These trends upset the schemes of American imperial- bipartisan government at Washington continues the fantas- ism, making it more determined than ever to impose its tic military buildup, quarreling only as to whether enough will by all possible means, including war. The imperialist is being done. Generals and capitalist politicians openly belligerence stems from social contradictions within the advocate a policy of "limited" wars, disregarding the risk United States itself. Growth of the productive forces with- of triggering World War III. in the country threatens a deep crisis of over-production. Only the revolutionary advances abroad have prevented There is increasing danger of a severe economic slump a general war so far. These limited advances have allowed that would bring on catastrophic unemployment and lead precious time for the extension of class-struggle opposi- to a social explosion at home, unless the capitalist class tion to imperialism; but peace can be assured only when can expand its exploitation of peoples abroad. But one-third of the world market has been closed to the workers within the imperialist countries take independ- capitalist exploitation by extension of the Soviet bloc to ent class action against the imperialist warmakers. China and Eastern Europe. Elsewhere lesser imperialist An anti-war struggle of this kind can't be waged under the leadership of Stalinists, social democrats or union bu- reaucrats. In every case these misleaders of labor are shift- ing further to the right in their political line, abandoning any pretext of real socialist policies, if they ever had any. Published quarterly by the International A new leadership must take the helm before labor can 1 SocialistReview PublishingAssociation, 16 UniversityPi., New York 3, N. Y. Second get started on the class-struggle road to peace. classpostagepaid at New York, N. Y. In the United States the present capitalist attack on the unions begins to open the way for the rise of a leadership capable of projecting the policy labor needs. Changing Contents economic and social conditions should help the process CORRESPONDENCE ........................................................ 34 along. Within the framework of a series of boom-recession cy- THE 1960 ELECTIONS Farrell Dobbs ......................by 35 cles the country is drifting into economic decline. Even FIRST YEAR OF THE CUBAN REVOLUTION though a full-scale depression has not yet struck, the cy- by Henry Gitano 38 clical ups and downs in the economy are generating feelings of insecurity in the population. Many are being thrust di- DE GAULLE — A LESSER EVIL? rectly into personal economic crisis by the persistent rise by Shane Mage 43 in chronic unemployment which is spreading across wider AFRICA'S BID FOR FREEDOM by Frances James 46 areas of production; government figures for January show that over four million are now jobless during boom times. CASE HISTORY OF AN EXPERIMENT by Murry Weiss 49 The AFL-CIO predicts the present boom will slack off by July; and capitalist economists speak of a general economic THE FATE OF DEWEY'S THEORIES slump by 1961. For workers this will mean a sharp rise by William F. Warde 54 in unemployment, in many cases so prolonged that jobless benefits will become exhausted. BOOKS: Economically the workers are put in double jeopardy A Short Glimpse of because of bureaucratic misleadership in the unions: they Bert Deck the Long View ......................................by 58 are hurt by the crisis trends under capitalism; and they Movers and Shakers of History have no independent class program to defend their interests. by Jean Blake 59 The politically-bankrupt union bureaucrats support the im- perialist war policy and count on the arms program to (lass Struggle — American Style provide jobs. They look to the capitalist government for by Tom Kerry 60 social benefits through legislation and for help in collective Cabin'd, Cribb'd, Confined! bargaining with the bosses. To impose their false policy on by Constance F. Weissman 60 the workers, they strangle union clemocracy and connive with the bosses to suppress so-called "wild-cat" strikes. PERIODICALS IN REVIEW .......... Tim Wohlforth bv 62 Changing times are now beginning to break up these well-established forms of bureaucratic control over the Vol. 21 — No. 2 — Whole No. 151 unions. The bosses don't intend to allow the class peace so necessary to the bureaucratic policy. They are resisting, Murry Weiss..............................Editor not granting, concessions to labor; and the government is Managing Editor Bert Deck .............. backing them up in what is rapidly becoming a general B Karolyn Kerry ...... usiness ilfanage~ war against the unions. SUBSCRIPTIONRATES: U.S.A.andLatinAmerica, $1.25 year (four a The bosses are cutting production costs through automa- singlecopies,35cents;bundles, 5centsa COPY five copies issues: 2 for tion, speedup and other devices intended both to squeeze $ a ; or more.ForeignandCanada, 1.50 year (four issues) singlecopies, 35cents;bundles, 6centsa COPY five copiesor more. 2 for more out of the workers on the job and to whittle down 36 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW employment so far as they can. They resist wage demands Rising social tensions, generated by the twin threats of and chip away at the escalator clauses pegged to the cost- war and depression, are beginning to counteract conformist of-living index; without resorting as yet to outright wage pressures long imposed by the witch hunt. People in many cuts, they put the workers in a position where rising prices walks of life are asking searching political questions; they and stiffening taxes eat into their purchasing power. are thinking for themselves; and they begin to recognize Union demands are met by counter-demands calculated the need to fight boldly to maintain freedom of thought, ex- to tear down long-established job conditions and to weaken pression, association and action. union control generally. The bosses force strikes and drag In addressing people newly interested in socialist ideas it them out in a war of attrition against labor. Strike in- will be well to keep in mind the political circumstances surance, professional scab agencies and direct government under which their thinking has been previously condi- support to strikebreaking attacks are reappearing in new tioned. Take, for example, a person who came of age after forms. 1946. Throughout his adult life he has been subjected to On the political front the bosses use their Democratic an atmosphere of cold war, hot war and witch hunting. and Republican agents in government to hamstring the He has experienced or seen others experience periods of unions through anti-labor laws. They will probably go a temporary economic hardship in times of slump; but he little easy on demands for further laws until their stooges has at most, only hearsay knowledge of severe depression have got themselves re-elected in the fall. In the mean- conditions. time they have the new Kennedy -Landrum-Griffin law to A person in this position knows union life only under the work with; and among its many provisions hostile to labor domination of an iron-handed bureaucracy which preaches this law clears the way for open FBI intervention in the class peace, extols the virtues of capitalism and stifles unions. The future will see these imperialist political police democracy within the organization. He has little idea of attempting to give all of labor the same treatment they the tremendous power inherent in the working class; and have been dealing out to radical workers all through the he has had virtually no access to a true, complete history witch hunt. of past labor struggles which would help him to under- The basic shift in capitalist tactics undermines the posi- stand that power. tion of the union bureaucrats, discrediting their whole line To reach people who find themselves in this situation based on "labor statesmanship." In the long steel strike — it will be helpful to start from the big concerns in their which clearly revealed the changing class relations — the minds today and present the socialist answer to these prob- union ranks were ahead of the leadership in giving battle lems in clear language and comprehensible terms; then to the bosses. They won a victory in the sense that the go on from there to deal with even more basic political open corporation attack was halted temporarily. But the questions. By weaving in the class lessons to be drawn wage settlement was the poorest in years; the escalator from world labor history, a sense of class power and a clause was mangled; there was no reduction in hours with- deeper knowledge of sound class principles can be devel- out reduced pay to help safeguard employment; and the oped. contract terms open the way for the McDonald bureaucracy Groundwork can be done in this way to get across a to make "statesmanlike" concessions to the bosses on work basic class-struggle program: formation of an independent rules. labor party in opposition to the capitalist parties; labor sup- This experience illustrates the widening gap between bu- port to the civil rights struggle and promotion of a political reaucratic policy and the workers' needs; and the gap will alliance between the unions and the minority peoples; an become wider still when the next economic slump hits. economic policy designed to serve labor's needs; a working Mass protests against unemployment reached a post-war class policy to defeat the imperialist war conspiracy and high in the spring of 1959, a trend that forecasts an even attain world peace; a program to establish workers' democ- greater outburst next time there are mass lay-offs. The racy throughout the world labor movement; a socialist fight for an effective union policy in industry will intensify, perspective for the United States. along with labor demands upon the government for mean- These are the lines along which the Socialist Workers ingful social legislation. Life under capitalism will drive the party will conduct its presidential campaign. Vigorous ef- workers toward class-struggle economic and political posi- forts will be made to use every possible medium to reach tions. In the long run the union bureaucrats won't be able people becoming interested in socialist ideas and draw to stop it; but they can and will continue to inhibit and them closer to the movement. This calls for a strong turn- distort the labor struggle. out of active socialist campaigners and equally strong At the present stage of developments the task for social- financial support. ists remains primarily one of advancing a class-struggle If socialist-minded people throughout the country back the program for labor. This will help union militants to clarify SWP campaign to the best of their ability, 1960 can be their thinking and prepare a sound programmatic basis for made the best year for revolutionary socialism since the future action when the ranks decide to take union affairs the cold war began. into their own hands. In presenting their political analysis socialists should also pay close attention to developments in the mass movement as a whole. I Formation of the Negro Labor Council within the AFL- CIO implies action going beyond the announced aim to Subscribe fight for equal rights in industry and democratic rights in the unions; it may serve to stimulate more effective union International Socialist Review support to the general civil rights movement and thereby 116 University PIace, N. Y. 3, N. Y. sharpen both the Negro struggle and the class struggle, particularly in the South. The outbreak of student demon- Enclo;ed is $2.50 for my sub-:cription for the next strations against Jim-Crow lunch counters in the South eight imue~. gives further impulse to mass action in the fight for equal rights; and it marks a shift of initiative toward younger Negroes capable of greater militancy. Name ............................................................................. ... . Social ferment is increasing among youth on college cam- puses and in the high schools. Many are becoming rebel- Street ...................................................... Apt. No... .......... lious against conditions under the capitalist two-party sys- tem. They are searching for a new political course and, though they have not yet become socialist-minded, they City .......................................... Zone. ....... State ................ are willing to listen to socialist ideas. SPRING 1960 37 FirstYear of the Cuban Revolution "If you are afraid, go get yourself a little dog" is a popular saying among th'e masses of Cuba, who are now confident they can change the world by Henry Gitano H AVANA, "one of the wickedest cities in the world," the "Monte tions." Alongside the Cuban govern- ment's role, "declining economic activi- ties have also had an influence in Article 43 states that "whenever pos- sible the INRA (National Institute for Agrarian Reform) will promote agrarian Carlo of the Americas, a paradise of tropical joy," skyscrapers and luxurious moderating excessive demands." A cooperatives." To date, 485 cooperatives mansions, — this tourist c o n c e p t ion, starving people and a corrupt puppet have been established. Article 64 is never truly reflected Cuban life; for dictatorship provide an ideal atmosphere widely used to provide flexibility: "It behind the romantic postcards sold for for U.S. investors. is the interpretation of this Law that in the benefit of visitors existed the very Robert Taber's competent study of case of doubt, the decision should be in real misery of millions. "Castro's Cuba" in The Nation, Jan. 23, favor of the person working the land." A survey by the Cuban Catholic As- 1960, reviews the Island's history: The Law's objective is to break up the sociation in 1957, based on 2,500 rural "From Cuba's founding as a Republic plantations and put the land to use families, found that 60?Z0lived in huts in 1903 until Dec. 31, 1958, when the growing diversified crops. Cuba has with thatched palm roofs and bare dirt Batista regime abruptly collapsed, the been importing thirty per cent of its floors without running water or sanitary country was for every practical purpose food needs, according to Fortune maga- facilities of any sort. Kerosene lighting a U.S. colony, captive both economically zine, September 1959. Co-ops are to be was used by 70~0, with the remaining and politically . The greater part of the vehicle for eradicating malnutrition, 30'%. having no illumination at all. Basic its resources — sugar, mineral rights, providing employment and saving hard foods consisted of rice, beans and vege- public-utility concessions, cattle lands — currency for mechanization and indus- tables, with only 11% drinking milk, were controlled by U.S. capital. In such trialization. There is a central plan by 4'% eating meat, and 2?Z0 having eggs. circumstances, it can scarcely be doubted INRA outlining production quotas and The result was a caloric deficiency of that the succession of rapacious profes- resources to be expanded in every zone. 1,000 units daily. sional politicos who ruled Cuba during Chester Manly of the Chicago Tribune These figures are substantiated by the most of the half-century or so of its Press Service visited a CO-OP. "Los Cuban government's own 1953 census. republican existence were necessarily Pines is an impressive, modern, large- The census also showed that in rural the caretakers of a vast amount of scale agricultural operation . . the first dwellings, 96.5% had no refrigeration, American, rather than Cuban, wealth. tomatoes produced there were coming in 90.5% had neither tub nor shower and And whatever else he may have been, for boxing in a new packing plant for 8577. had no inside or outside water the dictator who fled to Santo Domingo shipment to the U.S. Near the packing piping. on the first day of 1959 was one of plant, work was in progress on a large Accentuating the poverty is the ter- these — a discredited, dispossessed cus- maintenance station for the tractor and rible insecurity. According to invest- todian of the Yankee dollar." other modern equipment used . . . The ment in Cuba, a U.S. Department of Batista's overthrow marked not the farmers have no land of their own but Commerce study of July 1956: end, but a beginning of a revolution will own and work the land collec- "The specter of unemployment affects which lashes out against imperialist tively . . INRA is starting to build all thinking on labor . . . Some affirm domination. The power of this revolution houses for the farmers. We visited a that unemployment normally reaches a can be best gauged by a sketch of the small group of unfinished concrete block total of one million; others that it economic and social changes it has houses and a warehouse full of excellent reaches a total of one and a half million; already accomplished. roofing material made from cane fiber and even the conservative estimates "Those who work the land shall own . . . INRA plans to build a canning range between 500,000 and 800,000." it," says the Land Reform Law, which factory at Los Pines . Two thatched This in a country of 6,500,000 in- was enacted on May 17, 1959 abolishing roof 'peoples stores' have been opened habitants. The "investment" study which latifundism (huge plantations). Land at Los Pinos, INRA also is building is "basic information for U.S. business- over 995 acres, or 3,300 acres if it is school houses and roads." men" notes a "distinct improvement has used for cattle, rice or sugar, is "in- Alan Levy, Louisville Courier-Journal occurred in recent years, however, in the tervened" (taken over by the govern- staff writer, wrote Jan. 2, 1960, "Every- atmosphere of labor-management rela- ment). The 1946 census showed that less where in Cuba, INRA experts are put- than 1.5% owned 467. of all farm land. ting the rich soil to its most efficient Landowners are to be indemnified with use. Property is methodically being Henry Gitano, correspondent of "The Mili- 20-year bonds carrying 4% ?i. interest. taken from the exorbitantly rich and tant," recently returned from a seven-week tour Compensation is based on the owners I used for CO-OPS. n Manzanillo, my wife of Cuba where he observed the profound evaluation for taxing purposes two years and I visited a fishing cooperative. The changes taking place as a result of the Agre- ago. So far over seven and a quarter 250 fishermen were building their own rian Reform. million acres have been expropriated. homes with unlimited aid from soldiers 38 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW La Cane, a Cuban revolutionary daily noted Dec. 13, 1959, "The Cuban Revo- lution is something entirely different as revolutions come. Previously revolu- tions were a dime a dozen throughout Latin America, and meant nothing at all to the people, just one man replac- ing another." In previous revolutions after those who lost power made their rendezvous with stolen funds deposited in foreign banks, another new regime fell under Wall Street domination. That explains the big smear in the American press and the threats by the U.S. government — the attempt of Cuba to rid itself of American economic ex- ploitation might be emulated throughout Latin America. As the New York Times admitted on April 26, 1959, "If we didn't have Latin America on our side, our situation would be desperate. To be denied the products and markets of Latin America would reduce the U.S. to being a second-rate nation and cause a devastating reduction in our standard of living . . Latin American raw mate- rials are essential to our existence as a world power." Uncle Sam has a beard, but he is hardly a Santa Claus for Latin America. Direct investments by the U.S. in Central and South America, increased TYPICAL PEASANT DWELLINGS UNDER BATISTA from $4.8 billion in 1950 to $9.1 billion in 1957. In addition holdings of U.S. and government architects. A small fac- men. A ruling on Dec. 22, 1959 author- corporate stocks in the same area, in- tory on the CO-OP was producing the ized the nationalization of all wealth creased from $296,000,000.in 1950 to blocks and bricks the fishermen needed. belonging to persons convicted of coun- $632,000,000in 1957.In Cuba, direct U.S. Other fishermen were building a fleet ter-revolutionary activities or who leave investments increased from $686,000,000 of modern fishing boats and a mother Cuba to evade trial or conspire from in 1952 to $850,000,000in 1957. ship that will receive and distribute the abroad against the Revolution. Cuba's note of Nov. 13, 1959 chal- fish that are caught." Nearly 3% mil- lion acres of expropriated land has been turned over to co-ops. World Wide 60, "Castro's Year of Power," NBC-TV Jan. 23, 1960reported: "Everywhere a CO-OP is established a school springs up. It may be in a new building, or an old one, but it is formed . . . This is a cooperative tobacco farm in Pinar del Rio Province. Tobacco is Cuba's second largest crop. This land now belongs to the workers . . . And these are new homes that have been built for the CO-OP workers. The same people who will live in these now live in thatched and palm-planked bohios. There are people in Cuba today moving into homes with plumbing who must be taught how to flush a toilet." Alongside the agrarian reform, 700 other revolutionary decrees have given American millionaires the creeping jitters. One law authorizes the Labor Ministry to take over any business which discharges w-orkers, goes bank- rupt or has a serious labor dispute. Law 635 creates a Cuban Petroleum Institute which regulates the refining and mar- keting of petroleum products. It is work- ing three shifts daily copying explora- tion data obtained by oil companies, whose files have been sealed and placed under armed guard. Other regulations confiscate all property that was stolen FARM-WOltKEliS 11OLS1AL 1X COOPERATIVE CUBA LIBRE BUILT or belonged to Batista and his hench- BY SOLDIERS AND '*VORKERS SINCE REVOLUTION SPRING 1960 39 I Ienged Washington's profession of phil- The Revolution is breaking the back not rent, but the monthly payment for anthropic interest. "In the last ten years of imperialist control and replacing it buying the house. Rentals were slashed the balance of payments has been ad- with an economy based on national in half. Ten partially constructed hos- verse to Cuba by more than a billion planning. pitals and six thousand new classrooms dollars . . . North American investments INRA spent $75,000,000 in 1959 and were completed during eight months, in Cuba have always been character- has a 1960 budget of $156,000,000.Tex- including more rural schools than in the ized by their extremely lucrative re- tile mills, charcoal CO-OPS, rice and previous 56 years. Student enrollment turns." In its editorial on the Cuban sugar mills are being sponsored by mushroomed from 660,000 in 1958 to note, the Nov. 15 New York Times INRA; also they are building boats in over 1,000,000 last year. The beaches conceded that "some of the things Dr. nationalized workshops for the fisher- have been opened up for the benefit of Castro says certainly merit examination men co-ops. It has become the sole all the people. (Sources: Transcript, . . . We cannot ignore Dr. Castro's buying and selling agency for beans, World Wide 60, NBC-TV. Jan. 22, 1960. charge that investments in Cuba have potatoes, fruits, eggs, coffee and min- Revolution Jan. 1, 1960). given 'the Cuban economy a semi- erals in Cuba's largest province, Oriente. The New York Times, Oct. 25, 1959 colonial character.' " Electric rates have been reduced by complains about the regime's "organiz- The Revolutionary Government's note 30%, public phone rates halved, medi- ing cooperatives, financing and manag- declared "its unvarying determination cines cut 207'o; 800 miles of new roads ing practically all the land in the to carry out . . . a program of deep built, 35 bridges constructed, 133,000 island." It is the introduction of eco- economic and social transformations in acres reforested by the army; $400,000, - nomic planning, the building and plow- the interest of the Cuban people and, 000 of stolen property confiscated from ing to smash hunger and unemployment, particularly its Agrarian Reform Pro- Batista henchmen. the tractors and bulldozers working 22 gram, which is indispensable for the Ten thousand housing units have been hours a day for the benefit of the Cuban industrial development, the social ad- completed, with a four-room apartment people, that Washington is aghast at. vancement and the consolidation of the going to those earning under $100 On Feb. 20, 1960, all private enter- democratic institutions of this country." monthly. The cost is $15.92, which is prise was placed under the revolutionary FORMERLY AGRAMONTE FORTl{ [;SS N() \\' 40 important economic and political entity . . . On the provincial level, the 26th of July Movement has been replaced by the army and the INRA. This is a com- bination of supreme importance to Dr. Castro as he busily shifts the base of his national support from the middle class to peasants, workers and soldiers in what seems to be the prelude to a class struggle." This shift towards building a new type of society results from the fact that the Cuban masses have been drawn into the revolutionary arena in ever greater number. The Federation of Cuban Sugar Work- ers has trained and armed 55,000 sugar workers in the interior "to defend the sugar crop." About 300 Havana Univer- sity students, including 80 girls, com- pleted their military training last month with a climb up Cuba's highest moun- tain, the 6,569 feet Pico Turquino. The New York Times, Jan. 16, 1960 reports "the sound of marching feet is echoing throughout Cuba . . . Students, workers and peasants are being trained and armed in every district of the Island . . . [they are] enthusiastically spending hours drilling. There are said to be about 35,000 militia members being trained in MEETING OF RICE COOPERATIVE CAMILIO CIENFUEGOS IN MATAN- Havana." On World Wide 60, Jan. 23, 1960 ZAS PROVINCE. JORGE EGANA, INRA DELEGATE (SEATED AT RIGHT) NBC-TV bemoaned that "one of the most frightening aspects of Castro's year of power is the people who are march- government's direct control with a cen- stunning blow to businessmen and bank- ing, not the least frightening is that tral planning board to "supervise and ers." they march voluntarily." coordinate" in order to "rebuild the Along with the shifting of Guevara, the Public Works Minister and the Min- While the people are being armed, general economy of the country." Che ister for the Recovery of Stolen Prop- the Army is fighting for the Revolution Guevara, president of the National Bank, erties were also replaced. The new with pick, shovel and tractor. This and part of the top leadership, hurled Cabinet members are expected to give writer, on a recent visit to Cuba, saw defiance at backers of "free enterprise" their fullest support to a high speed soldiers building houses for farm work- over Havana's Union Radio Feb. 5, 1960: "During the past seven years Cuba has agrarian reform program with the Na- ers, constructing roads, laying out drainage systems, reforesting the de- lost $450 million in reserves, that is, tional Bank saving hard currency for mechanization and industrialization; nuded land, farming on the CO-OPS;and more than nine times the reserves we Public Works stepping up its pace in building an entire school-city which held on Jan. 1, 1960 (reserves had building roads to transport crops; Recov- when completed will accommodate dropped to $49 million). This proves 20,000 children from the Oriente moun- that we were paying out of the nation's ery of Stolen Properties working to make itself obsolete by transferring tain range, where illiteracy and poverty reserves for the privilege of having a predominate. so-called free enterprise . . . That was seized properties to the INRA. Previous free enterprise during Batista's time . . . to this the moderate Labor Minister had Since soldiers work and the workers This is why some time ago I said that been replaced. The first president of the are armed, there is no need for military we are not interested in free enter- Republic Urrutia was forced out be- fortresses. R. Hart Phillips in her book, prise . . . Money cannot be given out cause he was too slow-moving and "Cuba: Island of Paradox," states that indiscriminately. We serve the Cuban hesitant. Major Huber Mates was sen- "Camp Columbia controls not only people and profits are invested in works tenced to twenty years imprisonment on Havana but the entire island and the beneficial to the nation . . . What the Dec. 15, 1959 for attempting to utilize government." Today Columbia's name Diario de la Marina [Havana's leading members of the Rebel Army against the has been changed to "Liberty City" and reactionary daily] advises in its editorial, Revolution. He had combined red-bait- its function has been reversed: from (that the country's policy must be an ing with acts to slow down the agrarian housing 30,000 soldiers of death it is open economy) then, is that we continue reform. being converted into a technical school. with a type of colonial economy. They Parallel with the shifting of power The fortress at Agramonte is already do not like the idea that the revolution- from middle class intellectuals who functioning as an educational complex. ary government has cut its colonial believed only in fighting dictatorship All the big army posts are being trans- links, both economically and politically." and making a place for themselves un- formed into educational centers. The road from the victory of the der the Cuban sun, to those who are There are cooperatives where workers bearded rebel army to Cuba's planned presently speaking in the name of the elect their own leadership. The Rebel economy has been marked by conflict. workers and farmers, the 26th of July Army does not salute. Committees from In a cabinet shakeup last Nov. 25, Movement has been relegated to minor the cooperatives discuss their problems Major Ernesto "Che" Guevara Was importance: making toys for children at INRA's regional headquarters, and named head of the National Bank, re- who have none, collecting funds for plan together with INRA technicians placing Dr. Felipe Pazos. The Times of arms and tractors. According to Tad how best to utilize the earth's poten- Havana reported Nov. 26: "The replace- Szulc in the New York Times Dec. 18, tialities. A worker at Bayamo, Nor- ment of Pazos by Guevara came as a 1959, INRA "has become Cuba's most berto Pantoja, told this writer, "the SPRING 1960 41 days that come will be good for us. The masses had the power to bring an open house for them and their Everything that is being done, is for the Revolution to its present stage, but bombings with Florida-based planes; it our benefit." As he guided me through they are not yet the supreme power; has armed and befriended Latin Amer- the countryside, everything was either for their strength is not yet conscious ican dictators while at the same time "de nosotros" or "particular"; if it had and organized. What political form will preventing Cuba from purchasing arms been intervened, it was "ours," other- replace the current de jure cabinet and for its defense; it has attempted eco- wise it was "private." Throughout Cuba, de facto INRA conferences? An entirely nomic blackmail, sabre rattling and outside of the wealthy sections of Mira- new type of state apparatus is needed if character assassination. But that is not mar and Varadero, the people identify the masses are to hold on to the power. the total picture. Castro's visit to the the Revolution as theirs. All authority would have to pass to U.S. last year demonstrated the friend- Castro has turned increasingly to the the revolutionary mass organizations, ship of sections of the American peo- workers and peasants as the govern- which elect their own representatives ple for Cuba's rebirth. The Negro press ment is faced with counter-revolution- and forge their own program. Other- has given favorable treatment to the ary opposition. Last Oct. 26, one million wise, the bourgeoisie can regroup, and Revolution (Pittsburgh Courier: Why is Cubans gathered on three days' notice take advantage of the vagueness of the it that "everybody is against Castro . . . after attacks by U.S. based planes. He "power" situation. Through some new but the people?"; Chicago Defender: drew class lines: "Because our Revolu- parliamentarism the privileged classes "There is no racial discrimination in tionary Laws have an adverse effect on will attempt to bypass the mass or- Cuba. That is a resounding and impor- privileged classes inside Cuba and out- ganizations and reestablish their former tant declaration." Cleveland Call Post: side Cuba, they attack us . . . Since alliance wtih Yankee imperialism. This "The Cuban people are shaping their they know that civilians with military will remain possible as long as the democracy.") Vitriolic attacks by the training could defend all they have question of power remains vague and American capitalist press have met with won for themselves, the old privileged uncertified. little success. Wall Street has realized classes are allergic to everything that is We observe that there is, as yet, no that while Cuba's revolution has the implied by the military training of working class party on the scene which backing of the people, direct interven- workers and farmers. On the other hand is consciously preparing the mass move- tion is not feasible, much as they would we believe that the best allies of the ment for 'this decisive step. The dis- like to land Marines and launch an soldiers are the farmers and workers . . . credited Communist party of Cuba Army of Cuban Pacification. An im- We are their targets but it is the abandoned its previous policy of support perialist-backed overturn, such as we revolutionary reform program that they to Batista only to adopt a policy of saw in Guatemala, is not in the cards oppose." unqualified acceptance of the status quo. at present. The Guatemala coup was Raul Castro, head of the armed forces, There are many happy conditions engineered successfully because the in attacking Mates said: "He speaks of which would favor the working class revolution had halted short of bold so- a Revolution which satisfies all inter- in power. Cuba's soil is exceptionally cial and economic changes; the work- ests at the same time. This would not fertile and level with a year around ing masses had been restrained by the be a Revolution. How can anyone con- growing season. What imperialism was Stalinists from undertaking such revolu- sider the exploiting latifundista the exploiting now offers opportunities for tionary measures and as a result the same as the exploited farmer?" expanding and diversifying agriculture people were in the background. The as well as utilizing the increased in- situation today is entirely different in The real power in Cuba today resides come to mechanize and industrialize. Cuba. In Cuba the revolution is show- in the workers and farmers who are The colonial revolutionary movement, ing its enormous democratic sweep armed and organized in cooperatives. the downtrodden of Africa and Asia The top leadership has been moving through the direct participation of the asserting themselves gives the Cuban masses in a social transformation that away from the vague middle class pro- freedom fighters natural international gram of the July 26th Movement. The has opened a new vision for the Cuban allies. people. They will not easily be pushed new organs of power are the army which works and the INRA which na- into the background. tionalizes and plans. The real top gov- In Cuba there are signs proclaiming: erning body appears to be the monthly INRA conferences where delegates from T HE world contest of the Soviet orbit in conflict against W'estern imperial- "If you are fearful, go get yourself a little dog." This epitomizes Revolu- tionary Cuba. Millions of the poor and the twenty-seven zones meet with top ism gives Cuba opportunities along the government leaders, while INRA itself line of the February 1960 commercial wretched who have been pushed around is fused with the army. agreement whereby the Soviet Union and exploited by Yankee imperialism Where is the Revolution going? The will buy 5,000,000 tons of sugar over a have acquired tremendous self-confi- social program of the Revolution has five year period and give Cuba a credit dence. This is the vitality of the men been hammered out on the run; Castro of $100,000,000 for the purchase of Soviet and women who are making a success- has, thus far, responded to the pressure agricultural and industrial machinery. ful revolution, conscious of their of the oppressed for whom the over- This world contest also restrains the U.S. strength, confident that they can change throw of Batista was a mere prelude State Department and Pentagon, who everything. to independence from hunger and de- must consider international repercus- gradation which was brought to them sions. Just as the Negro children in with the compliments of American Little Rock could find protection in the colonialism. Empirical actions have world's eyes focusing on them, so Cuba deepened the social revolution and dealt benefits from Washington's vulnerability COMING heavy blows to the imperialist control compounded by its whole rapacious of the economy. history in Latin America. Today, the real power is in the hands America's ruling class and its press of the armed revolutionary people, but representatives have threatened to cut this power remains to be consolidated Cuba's sugar quota, to reduce subsidies by by a necessary act. The top leaders have for Cuban sugar (which are provided said that this government is of the to benefit the inefficient American su- gar producers), to isolate Cuba through WILLIAM F. WARDE workers, peasants and students; what remains to be done is to certify this American economic and political in- reality, i.e., to make the mass revolu- fluence in other Latin American na- tionary organizations the legal form of tions. Washington has encouraged Summer Issue state power. Cuban criminals by making the U.S. 42 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW De Gaulle - a LesserEvil? You felt like "a bleating lamb ready for the slaughterhouse," said one French intellectual. It was easy to back the general; but how answer: What "if the fascist forces had been unleashed?" by Shane Mage o N MAY 13, 1958, a combination of Army officers and right-wing European residents seized control of and discrediting the De Gaulle regime in international politics. And it is equally clear that there is no military ism — from the sugar beet growers and moonshiners to the Algerian colons — who were very adept at rolling all the Algeria. The insurrection of May 13 led solution to be hoped for: the war can necessary logs to protect every special directly to the overthrow of the Fourth be ended only through negotiations with interest, no matter how backward or French Republic. Charles de Gaulle took those in control of the armed struggle, detrimental to the system as a whole. power as the "savior" of France. the leaders of the "National Liberation But De Gaulle, who has long been On Jan. 25, 1960 history seemed to be Front" (FLN) who have formed the closely linked to the house of Rothschild, repeating itself. Newspaper headlines self-styled "Provisional Government of has formed an authoritarian and "tech- screamed of an "uprising" in Algiers, the Algerian Republic" (GPRA.) nocratic'" government in which the in- with the French Army units stationed At the start of the Algerian revolution terests of the big banks and industrial there acting in complicity with the riot- the governments of the Fourth Republic corporations count for m"uch more than ing, armed civilians. But this time there refused to negotiate with the Algerian the interests of small businessmen was to be no Sixth Republic in the off- nationalists. At that time a socialist (whose representative, Antoine Pinay, ing: the "colons" surrendered sullenly. tendency, the "Algerian Nationalist was forced out of the government at the What had made the difference — De Movement" (MNA) was predominant in end of last year). Gaulle's "personality," or something the Algerian nationalist movement. Con- De Gaulle's colonial policy too, has more serious, more fundamental? cessions to Algerian nationalism, then, been that of the "modern" sections of The context of the present tumultuous would have opened the door to a social- French capitalism. Well before his re- development of French politics is the ist revolution in which French capitalism turn to power De Gaulle had openly effort of the Fifth Republic to liquidate would not merely have lost control of advocated a "liberal" colonial policy. the crushing heritage left to it by its the Algerian economy but would itself Today the great imperialist countries: predecessor. The Fourth Republic col- have been directly menaced. England, France, Belgium, the U.S.A., lapsed because of its inability to end the During the past four years however, have understood that colonialism is an Algerian war, and the coup de grace was the FLN, led by former right-wing Al- outlived, obsolete, and dangerous polit- administered to it by a combination of gerian politicians like Ferhat Abbas and ical form, giving rise to revolutionary fascists, gangsters, army officers, and M'hasid Yazid, has been able to gain movements. They have fully grasped the ambitious politicians (many of the con- complete control of the Algerian resist- fact that in the long run the western spirators fitting into several or all of ance movement. The methods it has used powers can hold on to their present these categories.) The De Gaulle regime to eliminate the MNA have been those dependencies only in partnership with , from its very inception has been faced of assassination and slander — but they a native ruling class similarly interested with the continuation of the Algerian have succeeded, thanks in large measure in the preservation of capitalism. This war and a built in conspiracy within to all-out financial support from the partnership, of course, requires the polit- itself. The "men of May 13," the repre- Arab States and political support from ical form of national independence. sentatives of the French "colons" who the Stalinists and their fellow travelers De Gaulle, since 1958, has laid the basis rule Algeria, have until now held posi- who have always considered the MNA for the independence of France's entire tions of power on all levels of the state. "semi-Trotskyist" and thus a major African empire, from Mauritania to The Prime Minister himself, Michel enemy. The victory of the FLN has Madagascar. De Gaulle's Algeria policy Debr6, was implicated in an attempt to meant safe bourgeois control of Al- can be understood only as an integral assassinate the commander-in-chief of gerian nationalism and thus dispelled part of his general colonial policy. the army in Algeria. As long as the the spectre of socialism. But before this policy could be im- fascist plotters kept their grip on the De Gaulle, though he used the Al- plemented De Gaulle had to get Algiers state apparatus, there could be no end gerian colons and their fascist friends under control. The softening-up process to the Algerian war. to come to power, is not in the least went through several stages. Immediate- But the Fifth Republic must end the bound to them. Under cover of "per- ly after taking power De Gaulle made Algerian war, which costs France almost sonal" rule, the Fifth Republic is the a triumphal trip through Algeria, as- two billion dollars a year, blocking the direct representative of the decisive sec- sured the "colons" that he had under- further modernization of the French tions of French capitalism. The Fourth stood them ("Je vous ai compris") economy and military establishment, Republic, was ruled by a parliament echoed the slogan "Algerie Fran~aise"; tying down the bulk of the French army, made up of representatives of all the then staged the completely falsified killing over 2,000French soldiers a year, special interests within French capital- "referendum" of Sept. 28 in which SPRING 1960 43 nearIy 100Yo of the Algerian Moslems supposedly voted "Oui" to the French Constitution. In November 1958, having made these commander-in-chief Challe and Special Delegate Delouvier told the correspond- ent of a German newspaper that Massu might have some interesting things to w HAT happened on Monday, Jan- uary 25, was simply this: the essential arm of the insurrection, the gestures to appease the Europeans of say, that would be worth publishing. "territorials," the Ortiz-Lagaillarde fas- Algeria, De Gaulle turned to the FLN Massu, all unsuspecting, spoke his cists, had been thrown into action some with an offer to negotiate "the peace "mind," and soon the "Suddeutsche two months too soon. The political of the brave." At that stage De Gaulle Zeitung" appeared quoting Massu as preparation was not accomplished, the was not in sure enough command or denouncing De Gaulle's self-determina- French fascists were unready for action, under enough pressure to offer any- tion policy and predicting that the the army officers had not established a Army would oppose any attempt to im- plan to unite their action to that of the thing more definite, and aIthough un- plement it. Before he knew what had Algiers "ultras." But there they were, dercover negotiations took place (GPRA "Premier" Ferhat Abbas met French hit him, Massu found himself under behind the barricades, blood had been Foreign Minister Couvre de Murville in temporary arrest and whisked back to shed, and De Gaulle had instantly de- Paris. nounced their "evil blow against Lausanne, Switzerland) there was no France." end to the war. The "uprising" that followed Massu's In the summer of 1959 the French removal was no surprise to those mem- In this situation the organizers of the high command initiated the "Challe bers of De Gaulle's inner circle who in plot had only two real choices: to ac- Plan" to concentrate the overwhelming the previous weeks had been cited in celerate everything and move imme- power of the French army in the the press as commenting on the de- diately to a coup, or to cut their losses, Kabylia mountains, stronghold of the sirability of "trouble" in Algiers in or- liquidate the adventure as quickly and FLN. Supposedly a new attempt to win der to let De Gaulle take special powers cheaply as possible. the war, in reality the place was de- (though he already had almost dicta- The first alternative, however, was signed to persuade the cadre of the torial powers) and put parliament to manifestly impossible. The "Army" in French army of the impossibility of a sleep for a year (though it could not a capitalist state is never an independ- military solution. have been said to be very awake in the ent and homogeneous social force, still Then on Sept. 16, 1959 De Gaulle first place). No doubt by pure coin- Iess is it the plaything of a few ex- made his key political move — the fa- cidence, this was exactly what De Gaulle tremist officers, no matter how highly mous offer of "self-determination" to did once the "uprising" had been placed. It is the decisive instrument of Algeria, followed on Nov. 10 by an ap- squelched. rule for the capitalist class and can never peal to the FLN leaders to come to Paris An informative journalistic account be permitted to escape from the hands and negotiate the application of the by M. and S. Bromberger, of the over- of that class. Of all modern armies, the self-determination. The response of the throw of the Fourth Republic was French army in thirteen years of unin- FLN was an acceptance "in principIe" entitled "The Thirteen Conspiracies of terrupted counter-revolutionary war in combined with a seeming rebuff — a May 13." Behind the events of Jan. the jungles of Indo-China and the negotiating committee was named con- 24-30 this year there were also a large mountains of Algeria has become an sisting exclusively of prisoners in French number of undercover plots — and this "ideal" breeding ground for all forms jails! In reality this response had no is perhaps the main reason why the of fascist ideology. Nevertheless, even other objective than to give De Gaulle true situation remained so mysterious in May 1958 the Army command was more time to get full control of the for the first days, producing among willing to side with the insurrection French administration in Algiers, for many observers a panic fear of an all- only after De Gaulle had covered it under no conceivable circumstances out fascist coup. with his full authority, and it threw its could the FLN name a genuine negotiat- full weight into the balance only when ing reality there were and still are, ing mission excluding its political leader it became clear that French capitalism fascist conspiracies involving high army Ferhat Abbas and its military chieftain was turning to De Gaulle, and then it and police officers, aiming at the over- Krim Belkacem. was under pressure of a mass movement throw of the De Gaulle government. of the European population of Algeria In December, two further develop- And although the Algiers "uprising" and faced with an inept and discredited ments fully set the stage for the d6noue- was the result, not of an attempted government in Paris. ment in Algeria. In a speech at St. coup, but of a governmental provoca- Louis de Senegal De Gaulle consecrated tion, it also became closely entangled In January 1960, however, the situa- the independence of the Federation of with these conspiracies. It has since be- tion had basically changed. Lagaillarde come clear that a serious attempt to and Ortiz did not speak for the mass Mali, the former "French West Africa." overthrow De Gaulle was (and perhaps of Europeans in Algiers. Their demon- Only fifteen months had passed since still is?) being planned for a precise strations rallied only 15-20,000 activists. Mali had gone from colonial status to date: the beginning of April when De The rest remained passive, and partic- "internal autonomy" — and now it was Gaulle would be visiting this country ipated in the general strike at the points to be independent! How long could and just before the arrival of Khrushchev of the guns of the "Territorial Militia." anyone expect Algeria to lag behind on his visit to France. An insurrection More important, vastly more important, the far more backward countries of tropical Africa? At the same time, in in Algiers, whose main forces would be the big capitalists in France are solidly provided by the "Territorial Militia," behind De Gaulle and, above all, behind Tripoli, the FLN after a three-week the paratroop divisions, and the openly his Algeria policy. The inescapable con- meeting reorganized its top leadership. clusion for the fascist core of army of- fascist political organizations (like the Dropped were the leaders oriented to- ficers was that an open coup would "French National Front" of the ex- ward Cairo or Peking — in full control brothel keeper Ortiz) was to coincide mean their isolation within the army remained the "Paris" and "Washing- with a wave of anti-Khrushchev demon- and a speedy disaster. ton" factions. strations to be organized in metropolitan But the alternative — submission to De Gaulle could now move to the France by the "Catholic Nationalist De Gaulle — was also decidedly unat- inevitable test of strength with Algiers. civic groups" of Georges Sauge. TO tractive. By his removal of Massu and The decisive point was the semi-Fascist "prevent civil war" the Army would be his "evil blow" statement De Gaulle Gen. Massu, military commander in was clearly moving for the first time forced to take complete power under to get thorough control of the Algiers Algiers, darling of the local "ultras" — the patronage of a "respected" figure army. Would not an easy victory and well known political idiot. It was like Marshal Juin and set up a "Gov- strengthen his hand and complete the not hard to organize Massu's downfall: ernment of Public Safety" like that demoralization of the "activists?" Thus, De Gaulle's representatives in Algeria, originally projected for May 13. although totally unprepared for a coup, 44 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW the officer-conspirators were unwilling This behavior was all that could be bv De Gaulle was a mave defeat for to submit: they sought a way out expected from the Communist and SO- tie French workers: t~at of De Gaulle through pressure and passive resistance. cialist parties which in their own respec- by a front man for the thugs Ortiz, The idea was crude and direct: instead tive ways had become supporters of Lagaillarde, etc., would be a complete of obeying orders to disperse the "in- De Gaulle after destroying the chance disaster. There is an answer to the surgents" the paratroop garrison of Al- to resist his seizure of power. But left- dilemma of "how to defend a capitalist giers fraternized with them while their wing socialists too shared in the flight. government that is certain to capitulate officers "warned" Paris that the "rebel- The editorial of Jean-Jacques Servan- to a military coup" and it is not a com- lion" would be ended only if De Gaulle Schreiber in L'Expres of Jan. 28 is a plicated one: the independent se2f-mo- abandoned his self-determination policy perfect illustration of this. bilizatkm of the working class. The ac- and generally capitulated to them. Servan-Schreiber begins by recalling tion of the Russian workers in August This, of course, was pure bluff in the De Gaulle's direct responsibility in per- 1917 against the Kornilov insurrection, absence of any intention to stage a petuating the "built-in conspiracy" he that of the German workers in 1920 coup — and De Gaulle was in position inherited from May 13. He then poses, against the Kapp Putsch, are only two to call it at any moment. Though he as a first step, the question "should of the many historical examples. waited for five days to do so, (partly, we support de Gaulle?" and responds, In his own way Servan-Schreiber is no doubt, to consolidate his command "The answer is as clear, as simple, as aware of this. At the moment of crisis of the "Ioyal" army units, but also to it was in May 1958 concerning M. he could only plead to De Gaulle to heighten the theatrical effect) when De Pflimlin. There is the present and there "choose" to resist, but a week later he Gaulle in his speech on Friday, Jan. 29 is the future." For the future he wishes looked back— and what he saw filled stated his definitive refusal to com- to maintain a principled opposition to him with panic: "It was not De Gaulle promise and ordered reliable forces the De Gaulles and Pflimlins and the who yielded before the blow from ,Al- from the "front" to take over from the capitalist system they represent. But giers, it was we. paratroops in Algiers the "revolt" was the present? There he has no choice "I do not speak symbolically of 'we as good as over. After swearing to die but to support the lesser evil, Pflimlin the left' or 'we the democrats.' I say to the last man (and woman and child, against De Gaulle, De Gaulle against very precisely, very concretely: you, whose bodies the heroes had asked to Lagaillarde. myself . . Were you immediately con- be added to their barricades) for "Al- tacted, mobilized, made active and ef- g'erie Franchise, " the "insurgents" sur- rendered meekly and ingloriously. In a quick follow up, some of the B UT is the answer that simple? Ser- van-Schreiber must immediately fective by a democratic organization of your choice (party, union, defense com- mittee, etc) ? Were you in contact with come to grips with the complete failure most notorious Army fascists, notably of Pflimlin. On that score he has no illu- friends, comrades, colleagues in order Colonels Godard and Bigeard and Gen- sions: to stop De Gaulle it would have to act? . . . eral Faure, were removed from their been necessary to call on the working "You and I, and everyone else were posts. The "Territorial Militia" was or- class, to form armed workers militias; pos!ng the questions: What will De dered dissolved. and the bourgeoisie was prepared to Gaulle say? What will De Gaulle do? Alain de Serigny, publisher of L'Echo face "anything but that! Reach agree- "But not the question: What will 1 d'Alger, and spokesman for the most ment with De Gaulle, compromise with myself do tomorrow morning?" ultra of ultra-colonialists, was arrested Massu and Salan, that at least would for his part in the conspiracy. French preserve the social order, avoid any "If the fascist forces had really been fascist leader Jacques Soustelle was great upheaval. Bu! to appeal to the unIeashed this time how would you fired from his cabinet position (Minis- people meant disorder, adventure, who have defended yourselves, how would ter of the Sahara and Atomic Energy). knows? The Popular Front." Note, you have grouped yourselves, how Overall responsibility for Algeria was in passing, how even the most "leftist" would you have armed yourselves? And given to the new Minister of Armed if you cannot answer these questions of French socialists, whether in the PSA Forces Pierre Messmer, who as High or the UGS, refer to the Poptdar F~ont . . . you were a bleating lamb ready for Commissioner in West Africa, had just as to the ultimate in revolutionary ac- the slaughterhouse." proved his qualifications for the Algeria tion. Even though Servan-Schreiber and The passivity of the French workers, job by his preparation of the independ- Bourdet (unlike the Stalinists) are at in large part caused by their stunning ence of Mali. times capable of an abstractly correct defeat of May 1958, is however, not to In sum, the diametric difference in analysis of the failure of two "Popular be counteracted by support to De Gaulle, the results of May 13 and Jan. 25 was Fronts" in the last twenty-five years, even only in the "present." Panic, even not at all the consequence of a fortui- in practice the Popular Front remains if it makes some things stand out more tous factor, the personality of De Gaulle, their political horizon. clearly, is a bad guide to policy. De however large a part the De Gaulle Servan-Schreiber's argument lands Gaulle is now moving to end the Al- myth may have played. The essential him in a hopeless contradiction: if in- gerian war, to remove the threat of a difference is that the weak Fourth Re- deed the capitalist government is bound fascist coup: but he is doing this solely public was incapable of carrying to capitulate since it cannot mobilize on a capitalist basis. through an effective policy in Algeria the working class against its own army, Peace in Algeria on the basis of a while holding the workers in check — what can be achieved by giving political deal between De Gaulle and Ferhat and that in the person of De Gaulle support to it, except to lull the workers Abbas, whether or not Algeria becomes there was an alternative available. The and thus aid in the victory of the nominally independent, would symbolize Fifth Republic is perfectt~ capable of "greater evil?" And if the government the failure of the AIgerian revolution, finding a capitalist solution to the Al- can master the rebellion without call- and could not satisfy the Algerian gerian war, has more than proven its ing on the workers, because it retains masses since the land and resources of ability to control the working class, and the confidence of the decisive sectors their country would remain in French there is no apparent alternative. of the capitalist class, then again what hands. Failure to understand this basic point is gained by supporting it in the In France, the De Gaulle regime is contributed powerfully to the ideological "present" except to disorient the work- likely to become even more authori- bankruptcy and political confusion dis- ers and undermine your own "prin- tarian, to move still further to the right. played (during the January crisis) by cipled" opposition for the "future?" Revolutionary socialists cannot give an virtually +all sections of the French But this does not in the least imply iota of political support to De Gaulle or radical movement which, panic stricken indifference about various possible gov- to the leaders of the FLN. The path to by the "Fascist menace," fled des- ernments on the pretext that all are socialism in France lies in resolute oppo- perately to De Gaulle as the only savior. capitalist. The replacement of Pflimlin sition to the "strong state" of De Gaulle. SPRING 1960 45 A B f f Will the West "lose" Africa the way it "lost" China? Expert capitalist observers are haunted by this question. They have good reason to worry by Frances James T HE "revolution of rising expecta- tions" in sub-Sahara Africa has Economic expansion in the Union of South Africa set the impressive record cially among the younger generation, of educational and cultural advancement, startled the world with its speed and of nearly tripling its industrial produc- has resulted in an enormous population scope. Within the last four years seven tion and more than doubling total na- shift. The size of the major towns in African countries have acquired formal tional output of goods and services in Northern Rhodesia, for example, was independence status. The enormous en- the first post-war decade. In the Belgian doubled from 1948 to 1950. John Gun- ergy released by Negro Africa's fight Congo there were only 4,200 industrial ther in 1957 estimated that forty mil- for independence has rocketed the "dark enterprises in 1947. Ten years later lion rural inhabitants were moving continent" into the brilliant orbit of the there were 21,000. Kenya petroleum away from "tribalism" toward urbani- mid-twentieth century's anti-imperialist consumption between 1950 and 1957 rose zation. movement. by 500 per cent and consumption of This growing proletarian force, living Arab North Africa has long been electric power rose by 1,600 per cent. in terrible poverty, suffering discrimina- seething with wars for national inde- Hydroelectrical projects of enormous tion and filled with hatred for the pendence; the Middle East is a whirl- capacity are planned or are already un- white-supremacist rulers, possesses some pool of anti-colonialist revolution; all der construction in almost every part unique qualities. Foremost among these of Asia, and indeed the entire world, of the continent. is its migratory character. has been struck with admiration and The construction of dams, of course, Migrant labor is established by forcing awe by the giant socialist revolution of is desi~med primarily to increase pro- the African into "native reserves," then 600 million people in New China; now duction of raw materials for export: demanding he carry a pass in order to Cuba has taken the road of revolution rubber, cocoa, cotton, peanuts, etc. But leave the reserve, work in mines, on against the U.S. capitalist colossus and it also affects subsistence farming on white settlers' farms or in industrial kindled new hope and self-confidence lands "reserved" for the African peo- centers. This is true even of the largest among the oppressed colonial people ples. Africa Digest (London) reports urban centers and in the technically throughout Latin America. that in Kenya (where production of more advanced areas in Kenya, the Un- No wonder gloom and foreboding cash crops on "reserved" lands was ion of South Africa, the mining areas characterize the mood of Western capi- prohibited until only recently) "there of the Central African Federation and talis~, spokesmen as they observe the has been something like an agrarian the Belgian Congo. turbulent African scene. "Can it be revolution." In one province scattered In Leopoldville only about twenty-one that Africa is going the way of China?" holdings have been consolidated "as a per cent of the working population has they ask. The question is highly perti- model for others . . ." broken with rural and tribal ties and nent. Modernization of agricultural methods is considered permanently city dwelling. What has brought about this change in Southern Rhodesia's African farms In the copper belt of Northern Rhodesia in sub-Sahara Africa? And what chance has resulted in production of eight to only sixty-five per cent of the workers do the African people have to realize fifteen bags of grain per acre where have their families living with them. their hopes and expectations? previously only two to three were pro- This semi-slave status of the African The political awakening of Negro duced. The production per acre on the worker was designed to prevent organ- Africa, first of all, is conditioned by European farms averages only four to ized resistance to the intense exploita- the economic boom of the last two dec- six bags. tion practiced by the white rulers. And ades. This boom has transformed the Modernization filters down into the for a time it had its effect. But today economic and social structure of a large most remote villages. Progressive chiefs the situation is altering. Workers with part of the continent at an almost un- begin to seek ways and means of putting experience in union and political strug- believable rate. The extent of the running water and electric lights in vil- gles periodically return to their villages change is indicated by the fact that in lage housing units. The economic boom bringing with them the new ideas of the post-War II years exports from brings with it the African's desire and militant freedom struggle. these countries have increased on the his constantly more forceful demand for Despite the difficulty of organizing average of four to five times their pre- a greater share in the continent's migrant labor and despite the added dif- war level. The investment of foreign wealth. ficulty of a segregationist policy of the capital in the last ten-year period By far the most important product official union movement, African unions reached almost six billion dollars. This of Africa's boom, however, is the growth have grown to an estimated one-half is approximately equivalent to the total of the working class — a social force million members. foreign capital investment in sub- that could unite the people and resolutely Moreover, the very nature of the Sahara Africa in a period of seventy lead the revolution to its logical goal— workers' problems — government-en- years — from the discovery of the Kim- the establishment of a Pan-African forced color bars, legal limitations on berly diamond mine in 1871 up to the Socialist United States. job upgrading, etc. — have compelled second world war. (London Economist, The demand for labor in the cities the unions to face political questions Dm. 13, 1958. ) combined with the expectation, espe- from the outset. This is why leaders 46 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW of the trade unions, like Tom Mboya, know full well that concessions often tion rises to the heat of open conflict, head of the Kenya Trade Union Federa- sow the seeds of bolder demands. Even capital tends to move out. This hap- tion, become leaders of the Pan-African the most elementary bourgeois demo- pened in the Central African Federation independence movement. cratic rights would mean the complete when the "emergency" was declared isolation and ultimate ruin of the and in the Belgian Congo concurrent colons. They fear the mass of the Afri- with the strike wave and "riots" of A FRICA'S industrial development was accelerated enormously by the war can people and can conceive of protect- ing their privileges only through ter- ror. The political and military strength January 1958. Still another problem for imperialism is the growing influence of the Soviet economy of the West. The economic and social impact of this process, com- of the colons in sub-Sahara Africa lies Union and China in Africa. The polit- bined with the influence of the colonial in the Union of South Africa where ically conscious forces in the independ- revolution at large, aroused hope and "apartheid" (complete segregation) pol- ence movement are wary of the Kremlin expectation among Africans that they icy is projected as the white man's and this is not due entirely to their too could build a new life and reap answer to African expectations. pro-American illusions. Many of them some of the benefits of industrializa- Increased colon power as an answer recall with bitterness the exhortations tion. These hopes, however, cannot be to the Freedom movement is pushing of Moscow to support the imperialist realized without uprooting the whole upward from the Union of South Africa democracies in World War II. They are system of colonialism and returning through East Africa and the Central still waiting for a little of this democ- Africa to the Africans. Thus the fight Federation of the Rhodesias and Nyasa- racy for Africa. for genuine independence. Thus the land. The colon power is attempting What the African leaders see imme- revolution of rising expectations. And to destroy the African movement of diately, however, is the contrast be- thus Western capital has acted as the Nyasaland through arrest of its leaders tween the role of the USSR in support- unwitting agent of its own downfall in (Dr. Banda and 500 others are now in ing UN recommendations on the racial Africa. prison). Britain sent troops to back up situation in South Africa and West The British, in their east and west the colons in the "emergency" of last Africa and the U.S. abstaining from African colonies, have long followed a year. voting until recently. Moreover, the policy of concessions to the rising in- The United States, with its "dollar Soviet Union has loaned money to the dependence movement to which the diplomacy, " i.e., economic control com- independent African states totaling ap- name has been attached: "Gradual Self bined with the granting of formal proximately the same as the U.S. loans Rule." This policy permits, when the political independence, presents itself at about half the interest rate. demand is strong enough, formal inde- more than any other single or com- The unfavorable situation confronting pendence without loss of capital to bined power, as the "new" liberal im- the U.S.-dominated cold-war bloc has British interests. British diplomats have perialism. Last year a special sub-divi- compelled it to "moderate" its tactics. explained that the secret of success of sion of the U.S. State Department was Premature attempts at solving problems this policy is to "give before the giving set up to handle African Affairs with by purely military means and naked is demanded." Today, there is not a Assistant Secretary of State Joseph C. terror have been curbed. This tactical single British colony that is not already Satterthwaite in charge. Official policy shift is of course closely linked to the "demanding." toward the Independence movement objective of gaining a new foothold for was stated by him as follows: imperialism by the use of two familiar The French held to the "French Un- "Insofar as these objectives are pro- devices: ion" policy with all power concentrated (a) Split and atomize the movement gressive, just, and constructive, insofar in the Paris government. Last year the and paralyze its capacity to act against as the methods employed to achieve the pressure of the colonial revolution the common foe. (b) Gain control over objectives are nonviolent and equitable, forced a change in policy to the concept our attitude — in accordance with our sections of the leadership by means of of autonomous republics within a nationaI history, character, tradition — economic pressure, bribery, threats, "French Community." Threat of with- concessions, blackmail and playing off should obviously be one of sympathy drawal of all economic aid, arms, police and support." (State Department press one segment against another. protection, technicians, etc., if a country release, Oct. 8, 1958. ) voted "non" to remaining within the Even such guarded words as these Community kept all territories except have brought a protest from European THESE imperialist ca~cu~ations have Guinea within French control. Already, powers and accusations that the U.S. is ~ the following basis in reality: The less than a year later, in the French encouraging the nationalist movement. African people are divided and frag- colony of Dahomey, African political Underlying the "free world" problems mented along religious, tribal, cultural leader M. Apithy's party passed a mo- of political control Iie the economic dif- and linguistic lines. Over 700 Ianguages tion demanding independence in 1960 ficulties of the boom-recession cycle of exist on the continent. Divide and rule and urging a referendum to consult the has been the age-old policy of the capitalism. The "slump" of 1957 re- electorate, and the Mali Government sulted in a ten per cent average drop colonial powers. They have allotted has made an official demand for inde- in raw material prices on the world powers in the "reserves" or labor con- pendence as soon as possible. market. The loss to Africa due to the tracts in the ports and mines to hand- In the Belgian Congo the political drop is estimated to exceed the total picked tribal leaders or chiefs. They movement of the Africans in Leopold- of U.S. and USSR aid to Africa for the fostered tribal loyalties and made these ville last January forced an end to the last five years. Copper production in loyalties economically significant. Be- old policy of Belgian "paternalism" and the Belgian Congo fell by fifty per hind "tribal" riots reported in the news moves toward future self-rule were cent, resulting in mass unemployment lie many jurisdictional disputes over conceded. So-called "riots" and in- in Leopoldville. work opportunities, land tenure and creased political debate, organization The consequence of periodic reces- other ecc.,omic issues. All these conflicts and conflict throughout the Belgian sions is by no means the sole economic are continuously sharpened and en- Congo have now won a promise of in- problem facing capitalism in its drive couraged by the white rulers. dependence and immediate self-rule. to "contain" the African revolution. Another factor that favors the suc- Imperialist attempts to control Africa Capital, in the form of government cess of the "new" imperialist policy is through concessions runs immediately loans and private investment for indus- the limited bourgeois and reformist pro- counter to the wishes of the white set- trial and development projects is seen gram and outlook of the present lead- tlers (colons) and mining interests. by the "free world" colonial "experts" ership of the independence movement. They, being a small minority holding as the only hope of maintaining political This weakness is strikingly expressed in political power over Africa's millions, control. Yet in areas where the revolu- the illusion that a formally "neutral" SPRING 1960 47 but in reality pro-American orientation In the eighteen-seventies when the formed the Zambesa National Congress in the cold war can serve the cause of European powers staked out their colo- which was almost immediately sup- the African freedom movement. Under- nial domains in Africa, no concern was pressed only to reappear as the United standably, the African leaders want the given to the social and political prob- Independence party. This party has aid of Western capital to help in the lems of the African people. Land tenure, just fused with a new split-off from industrialization and modernization language, tribal structure, religious the old Congress movement to form projects. The idea, however, that such groups, etc., were all ignored by the the United People's party which de- capital can be secured by commitments European land grabbers and are still mands "secession of Northern Rhodesia to line up with the cold-war bloc is, of ignored by them when labor needs have from the Federation and self-govern- course, a deadly trap which the capi- to be met in mines and on plantations. ment for Northern Rhodesia now by talist West has adroitly sprung on many For example, the Bakango people at Africans." occasions. the mouth of the Congo River were While these factors are not to be un- arbitrarily divided into territories con- derestimated and constitute a grave trolled by French, German, Belgian and THE issue of international trade-un- danger to the success of the struggle, British powers. Thus a narrow, "na- 1 Ion affiliation (International Con- there are important reasons why the tionalist" struggle, such as the struggles federation of Free Trade Unions, dom- independence movement resists atomiza- that established the present national inated by the cold-war bloc, versus tion and will not easily lend itself to boundaries in Western Europe, is not World Federation of Trade Unions, sup- piecemeal destruction. There are also at all congruent with the freedom and ported by the Soviet bloc, or "neutral- reasons why the movement is forced by independence aspirations of the Bakango ity") broke into open conflict last May the logic of its development to over- people who live in five separate coun- when Mboya called a conference in come the limitations imposed by its tries. Lagos, Nigeria, to form the first All- bourgeois reformist program and lead- The growth of a pan-African concept Africa ICFTU organization. It was at- ership. is reinforced by the fact that European tended by union leaders from twenty- As we pointed out, the economic ex- capital dominates the entire area. The one countries. K. Nkrumah who sup- ploitation of Africa by Western capital African miner sees little difference be- ported trade-union neutralism, coun- has had consequences far beyond what tween Belgian capital in the Congo or tered with the calling of a trade-union the capitalist intended. The growth of British capital in the Rhodesias and conference in Ghana at the same time. industry, the proletarianization and the African peasant gets the same vile This conference had delegates only urbanization of large sections of the treatment from European farmers from Guinea, Morocco and the United population have served to enhance the whether on British cotton plantations Arab Republic. interdependence of all areas of the con- in Uganda or on Portuguese peanut These programmatic and organiza- tinent. Thus the independence move- farms in Mozambique. They all repre- tional clashes reflect the strivings of ment tends from its earliest manifesta- sent European exploitation of African the African independence movement to tions to acquire a continent-wide scope natural resources and labor power for achieve clarity in its concept of where and perspective. the benefit of foreign capitalists. the struggle is going and how it is go- Here we witness not a mere historical ing to get there. The concept of pan- As modernization and urbanization repetition of the old "nationalism" that Africanism, so overwhelmingly dictated preceded the African National Congress shaped the modern countries of Europe by the course of Africa's historical movement sprang up around issues of in the course of their bourgeois revolu- development, still leaves open the ques- education, work passes and voting tions. In the concrete circumstances of tions: What class in African society can rights. The leadership of these Congress the combined historical development of realize a continent-wide organization of organizations, in their early stages, Africa, the tasks of the bourgeois rev- the economic struggle to industrialize came primarily from the tribal elders, and modernize? Can such a struggle olutions of the eighteenth and nine- chiefs, the educated elite and others be led to victory by any group that teenth centuries must be solved in the who served the interests of colonial isn't ready to break with the capitalist middle of the twentieth century. In the powers as a rule. exploiters internationally and take the light of the world pressures imposed on Today, when independence has be- road of building a planned socialist Africa, as well as the peculiarities of come the dominant and immediate issue, economy in Africa? the African national problem itself, the it is the leaders with a pan-African out- Those who would reject the socialist solution of these tasks requires an all- look that are winning aui+e rapidly a road for Africa on the grounds that continental scope. dominant position in the Congress move- Western capital is required to make The economic and technological prob- ment, the trade unions and in all ,Afri- progress, fail to take some weighty lems the newly formed independent can political organizations. The Accra facts into account. Western capital can- African states must face, illustrate this Conference of 1958 and the permanent not be obtained by political subservi- conclusion. Take the hydroelectric plant organization of the All African People's ence to Western capitalism without ac- projected for the Volta River in Ghana. Conference demonstrated that the ini- cepting exploitation. It would supply power to Ghana, Togo- tiative and the leadership in the imme- On the other hand, if through the land, Nigeria and the French community diate future lie in the hands of pan- promising development of the African countries of Dahomey and the Voltaic African leaders such as Dr. K. Nkrumah working class, a Marxist program and Republic. The plant on the Congo river of Ghana, Tom Mboya of Kenya, Tour6 leadership can be forged that will take will supply parts of the Belgian Congo, of Guinea, Dr. Banda of Nyasaland, etc. the road of socialist revolution — that Angola and the French equatorial coun- What is most important, however, is would indeed contribute immensely to tries. The problems of one-crop econ- not the momentary composition of the solving the problem of Western aid. omies — coffee in Kenya, cotton in leadership but the debates over pro- The African revolution, taking the Uganda, cocoa in Ghana — cannot be gram that are seething in the whole Chinese path of expelling imperialism solved by diversifying crops and de- politically active mass of the popula- and overthrowing the exploiters, would veloping internal markets within the tion. strike a mighty blow at world capi- narrow limits of each separate country. Last year the African Congress move- talism. It would speed the day when the Economic cooperation in broad areas is ment in Northern Rhodesia split over British, French, Belgian and American a technological necessity. Already tech- the question of militant mass action workers would establish their own nical assistance programs exist in sev- versus the passive-resistance methods power and thereby form an economic eral areas. Ghana-Guinea being a sig- of the old National Congress. Those and political alliance with Africa and nificant case among the newly inde- supporting the use of violence when with all the oppressed to build a world pendent states. necessary in the struggle for freedom socialist society. 48 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW Case History of an Experiment Why did "American Socialist" fold up? It could be cha rg'ed to a failure of nerve. But closer study yields some instructive lessons by Murry Weiss A FTER six years of publication, the American Socialist, a monthly mag- azine which made considerable impres- movement must make "fresh investiga- tions" into many questions including "a number of classic socialist assumptions and all efforts to test contending pro- grams in the laboratory of experience. Is this criticism too harsh? In de- sion in radical and student circles when [not identified]. But we never believed fense of Cochran, Braverman and Gel- it first appeared, announced December — we do not believe now — that the ler it can be argued that in their final 1959, "This is our last issue." In a Kremlin or the State Department were statement they profess optimism about. statement to their readers the editors the best mentors, overtly or covertly, the prospects of the sixties. "From a admitted that the decision to close up wholly or partially, for these re- number of signs," they say, "it would shop "stems from more than just fi- searches." Interpreting this Aesopian appear that the tensions which have nancial difficulties. " language, we take this as advice to stay built up in our society will lead to a What then were their political rea- away from both the Communist party new burst of political creativity in the sons? The editors of the American SO- and the Socialist Party-Social Demo- coming decade." We agree with that cialist felt that the promise of a favor- cratic Federation. forecast. But for Marxists the next able regroupment among radical forces What of the Socialist Workers party question is how should we prepare for in the U.S. had not been realized. In and the Trotskyist movement generally? the new upsurge? How can we help the absence of a radical upsurge, they You would never guess from reading the transmit to the young socialists of the explained, they never thought that a American Socialist that editors Bert sixties the precious lessons of more regroupment would result in a new Cochran, Harry Braverman and J. Gel- than a century of Marxism? Don't such socialist party. But they did hope "that Ier had spent the greater part of their tasks call for organized Marxist activity, it might be possible to start a modest adult life in the Trotskyist movement, even if it is reduced to the bare essential' educational society outlining a body of breaking from it only in 1954. Do they of running a mimeograph? ideas and approaches for a New Left if finally draw some kind of balance sheet The editorial trio apparently thought enough of the old radicals took the cure, on this experience in the final issue of of this — and excluded it: "Of course, rid themselves of their past misconcep- the magazine they founded? No. They the Left is by now too shrunken to tions, derelictions, and bad habits, and conclude their experiment as they began permit an~ continuing between the grew up to understand the requirements it — without an explanation, without a movements of the thirties and any mani- of the epoch." This was an illusion, they programmatic accounting. Like fleeting, festations in the sixties." (Our em- conclude, "In retrospect, we can see ghostlike birds of passage one could phasis.) What does this mean? If there- that the regroupment discussion of sev- say of them: "From nothing, through is no possibility of any continuity be- eral years ago had no chance. The de- nothing, to nothing." tween the radical movement of the cay had gone too far, and the atmos- Cochran, Braverman and Geller thus thirties and the coming movement of phere in the country was too forbidding end their magazine experiment with the sixties, then the next generation, to encourage a new beginning." ideological bankruptcy. Although they which will undoubtedly be called upon So what should be done now? The gratuitously include the whole socialist movement in this, they are really only to solve fateful problems, will be left. prospects appear dispiriting. "There are a number of possibilities open to us to speaking for themselves. To indict the hanging by itself; it will be excluded overcome our difficulties, but these add movement as a whole, it is necessary from the benefits of learning from the up to converting ourselves into still to do more than assert; it is necessary experience of the generation of the another messianic sectlet. We have re- to discuss points of disagreement, to thirties, in both their positive and nega- jected such a course in the past and we attempt to prove one's contentions. In tive aspects. do so now." Has the American Socialist other words, it is necessary to engage then nothing further to say? It seems in ideological struggle. not. "We have already exceeded the But this is exactly what the three life-span for non-institutional 'little editors have always refused to do, avoid- THEY are condemned to start from magazines' in this country and the time ing controversy by assuming a blas6 ~ scratch in considering such mighty has now clearly come to close up this manner: It is all too, too wearisome to questions as the failure of the working particular venture." squabble about ancient issues that in- class parties to stop the rise of fascism What of other publications or other terest no one but devotees of sectlets. in Europe; the failure of the labor currents in the radical movement? With all its appeal for the tired and movement to prevent World War II; Should readers of the American Socialist the demoralized, such posturing signi- the liquidation of the revolutionary- turn to any of these? The editors seem fies the abandonment not simply of socialist parties into class-collabora- embarrassed. They say that the socialist Marxism but of all science, all method tionist popular fronts in Europe; the SPRING 1960 4? rise of a bureaucratic dictatorial regime a part, of the story of the decline of working-class political struggle against in the Soviet Union; the stifling of all the American radicalism in the fifties. the parties of the rich and the middle independence and revolutionary in- To understand the main features of class. tegrity of the Communist parties of the this group and what made them act as The American Trotskyist movement world by the Kremlin; the successive they did is therefore part of the prep- from the outset fought for this Leninist betrayals of reformist Social Democracy; aration for the future we have been view. In 1940 a petty-bourgeois opposi- the decimation of radicalism in America talking about. tion, reflecting the pressure of the on- due to supporting capitalist parties; the In essence Cochran and his followers coming war, sought to persuade the defeat of the militant and radical wing broke from the Socialist Workers party party to give up unconditional defense of the American trade-union movement in 1954 over the concept and role of a of the Soviet Union. The debate then and the rise of the present labor Leninist party. also turned on the Leninist concept of bureaucracy . . . The American Trotskyist movement the party. The anti-Leninist faction If the Marxist movement today does was founded in 1928 as part of the in- headed by James Burnham and Max not do everything in its power to trans- ternational struggle begun by Lenin and Shachtman felt itself "imprisoned" the mit such lessons, then it is indeed Trotsky against the rise of Stalinism. moment it sought to reduce key prin- bankrupt. And if one argues that The bureaucratic caste that arose in the ciples to mere phrases — good for times there's nothing wrong with Marxism Soviet Union of peace but not so good in war. displaced democratic but no humans in this country exist workers rule. In other countries the Cochran and the other editors of the capable of giving continuity to its body American Socialist were reared in the Communist parties were reduced to of thought, as Cochran does, it comes Leninist school and played a consider- servile appendages of the Kremlin. Con- to the same thing. A theory that resem- able role in building the Socialist Work- sequently, they were unable to measure bles some "truth" of the spirit world, ers party and defending its basic prin- up to their tasks in one revolutionary unconnected with any living tendency, ciples. They were an integral part of situation after another. is hardly a useful guide to action. the Trotskyist cadre shaped in hard The Leninist tendency, led by Leon Trotsky, carried on the chore of ex- struggles such as the one against the w HY accept such a nihilistic diag- nosis? It is not related to social reality but to emotional collapse. The pounding the theories of Marxism and Leninism against the systematic revi- sionism of the Stalinists and their un- ending falsification, slander, frame-ups, Shachtman-Burnham deserters. Their break, beginning in 1952, with the pro- gram, theory and tradition of the SWP understandably resulted in a severe in- ternal struggle. editors express despair at the incapacity and murder. In every crucial situation of the "old radicals" to rid themselves of in the world the cadre of Leninists, The Cochran group did not, of course, their past "misconceptions, derelictions, called "Trotskyists" by the Soviet bu- commence with an open declaration and bad habits," their inability to grow reaucrats, fouzht for revolutionary- against Marxism and against the Lenin- up "to understand the requirements of socialist ~olicies and painstakingly ist concept of the party. As Rosa the epoch." Wouldn't a Marxist begin by analyzed the causes of the defeats re- Luxemburg observed in 1899 in her explaining such phenomena in order to sulting from the Stalinization of the instructive essay against the reformist overcome them? Precisely what were Communist parties. revisionism of Eduard Bernstein: these "misconceptions, derelictions and on first by "To expect an opposition against bad habits?" In what way did the old scientific socialism, at its very beginning, the Left Opposition, which sou.~ht to generation fail to understand the "re- reform the Communist parties. and then to express itself clearly, fully and to quirements of the epoch"? And what the Frvlrth International, which was the last consequence on the subject of are these requirements? founded after the Third International its real content; to expect it to deny The American radical movement openly and bluntly the theoretic basis and the Communist parties adhering to showed great promise at the beginning it had lost all elementary revnlutionar~~ of Social Democracy [Marxism] — of the century; it became a powerful reflexes. The historical significance of would amount to underrating the power force among industrial workers in the this was the maintenance of +he con- of scientific socialism. Today he who thirties; then it suffered rout and de- tinuity of Marxism throughout the we- wants to pass as a socialist, and at the moralization in the fifties. How did the riod of Stalinist reaction. The new same time would declare war on misconceptions and derelictions (not to Marxian doctrine, the most stupendous generation that came to radicalism speak of bad habits) lead to this? found intact the most advanced scien- product of the human mind in the cen- Aren't the youth entitled to this wis- tific theory of the class strugqle. With- tury, must begin with involuntary dom? out this, Stalinism would have suc- esteem for Marx. He must begin by If the movement of the coming dec- ceeded not only in blighting the first acknowledging himself to be his disciple, ade is to succeed where the movement workers state with a police regime and by seeking in Marx's own teachings the of the thirties failed, such questions in wrecking mzmv promising revolu- points of support for an attack on the must be answered by the Marxists. This tionary ormortunities. but in burying latter, while he represents this attack will be demanded by young militants the socialist "memory" of the working as a further development of Marxian who will enter the ranks in the years class for decades to come. doctrine. On this account, we must, un- to come. concerned by its outer forms, pick out For the knowledge-hungry youth the sheathed kernel of Bernstein's the- TF s i I n g I turning to socialism this work of Marx- ory." (Reform or Revolution?) ism provides indispensable answers to most important ~-e:ept of The revisionists of the Cochran group their urgent questions. But the youth Marxism rescued from Stalinist revi- ran true to form in this respect. For will not find even a hint to the answers sionism is the need for an independent some time they held to ambiguous in the American Socialist. The editors party of the working class. Lenin de- formulas with double meanings which abandoned their project, bitterly skep- voted his life to advancing and refin- could be read different ways by dif- tical, disillusioned, without anything to ing this principle, bequeathing a rich ferent people. In the Socialist Wo~kers say to the future. legacy to subsequent generations. Lenin's party a minority is guaranteed full op- If this were merely the default of a key thought was that the party is the portunity to present its views but the few individuals, the subject would concrete manifestation of the program Cochranites were slow to spell out their hardly be worth pursuing. But there and the indispensable agency for giv- thinking. is much more involved. Important les- ing it life. Marxism would be palatable When they finally made their position sons can be learned from the evolution to many dilettantes and dabblers in more or less clear it went as follows: of the group that launched the Ameri- radicalism if it weren't so insistent upon Trotskyism was all right in its time but can Socialist. This evolution is itself converting its program into an organized the events of the postwar world have 50 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW upset the old Trotskyist conceptions. general strike in France in the summer against the regrouped and reinforced The Stalinists were able to lead a of 1953 indicated the workers' urge to labor bureaucracy. The Trotskyist saw revolution in China, they argued. In struggle. the CIO as the auspicious beginning of' Eastern Europe the Kremlin initiated Yet, through doctrinaire reasoning, the mass radicalization of the American a bureaucratically rigged social revolu- the Cochran group responded to these workers, requiring more than ever a tion. With Stalin's death, Malenkov and encouraging international developments revolutionary left wing and continuous. the other heirs of the dictator turned in a pessimistic and demoralized way. struggle against the capitalist-minded toward democratic reforms. Here in the Instead of seeing in these world revolu- labor bureaucracy. U.S. the Reuther wing of the labor of- tionary advances, whatever their form, The Cochran group was familiar with ficialdom is to the left of the workers a source of fresh confidence and in- this. Some of them were organizers in some respects. Now if revolutions, spiration, a verification of the theory during the rise of the CIO. But they however distorted, can be led by Stalin- of Marxism, they became disoriented. seemed to suffer from amnesia. They ists and without a Marxist program, The revolutionary advances took place looked at world phenomenon compar- and some labor bureaucrats are quite without first settling accounts with able in its main lines to their own leftist, who are we to say that it can't Stalinism. Therefore, they argued, experience as if it were utterly without happen that way right here in America? Trotskyism (or "the old Trotskyism") precedent. This reaction to the big world Then what's the point of insisting on had to be "junked" and everything re- events, which was really a way of caving the need for a Leninist combat party? thought from the beginning. As if in to isolation and prosperity-reaction Why make sacrifices for socialist ideals? Marxist analysis could be reduced to a resulted in a pen men flight from Marx- Why go through the ordeal of election simple logical sequence and its power ism, a new and awed attitude towards campaigns with limited forces? Why judged on how perfectly this sequence entrenched bureaucracies and a general put time and energy in party-building fitted the actual history of the destruc- throwing overboard of principles, pro- projects? tion of Stalinism! gram and — above all — "tradition." To understand this mood it is help- Instead of seeing the revolutionary Unfortunately, this is still not the ful to recall the social pressures at the advances as a premise for further whole story. Marxists are capable of time. The Korean War was still on. The progress of the international socialist withstanding pressures greater than McCarthyite witch hunt was mounting movement and therefore as a prelude these. To suffer such precipitous col- in fury. The trade-union bureaucracy to the mmt profound crisis of Stalinism, lapse one more impulsion was required: had been transformed into a direct they took the momentary appearance authoritative backing from within the agency of the cold war and was col- for the whole reality. The Communist Trotskyist movement itself. This they laborating with the FBI in hounding parties in China, Yugoslavia, etc., stood received from a most unexpected source, radicals out of the plants and unions. at the head of the movement, they rea- a source that should have remained Less dramatic, perhaps, but profoundly soned. Therefore, this brought into firmly against them, the group in the important in its effects was the trans- question the need for Leninist-type European Trotskyist movement in charge formation taking place in what had revolutionary parties in bringing about of the International Secretariat of the formerly been the most militant and a successful revolutionary change. Fourth International. advanced section of the American work- The consequences of such reasoning — This was an important test of the ing class. or, better, such emotional reaction — world Trotskyist movement since the could not but be devastating to a dis- assassination of its founder. The chal- heartened group in the U.S. If Stalinism, lenge of the Cochran group to the or labor bureaucracies in general, can basic ideas of Trotskyism raised a ques- A DOZEN years of war and arma- ments boom substantially changed act as the prime agencies of social change, why bother to build a Leninist tion of international importance: does the Trotskyist movement represent the the economic position and political out- party in the U.S.? Every effort involv- continuity of Leninism? Were the cadres look of the militant industrial workers of ing party building became intolerably assembled by Trotsky capable of carry- the thirties. This was supplemented by burdensome to them. ing on the work after his death? History the cold-war hysteria. The normal influx A section of the Cochran group was has answered these questions in the of youth into the radical movement was composed of trade unionists who had affirmative, we believe, but the answers reduced to a trickle. These were rough experienced in their own way some years for a revolutionary party, rough were not given without struggles. wear and tear. Beginning as militants on the nerves, rough on staying power In response to the new world develop- devoted to the socialist cause, these un- and on the composition of the member- ionists had become isolated and softened ments since World War II, the group of ship. The Cochran faction in the last with prosperity until they came to feel Trotskyist entrusted with the grave analysis reflected this heavy pressure that nothing "real" or tangible was left responsibility of co-ordinating the in- by falling into a mood of despondency in the Marxist program. They were ternational efforts of the Trotskyist and inclination to give up what seemed ripe for systematic adaptation to the movement, began to see "new features" like a lost cause. "reality" in the labor movement; that in Stalinism, not in the sense of its It might appear that the develop- is, to the powerful bureaucratic ma- decay but in its possibly playing a pro- ments of this period elsewhere in the chines that proscribe organized socialist gressive role under certain circum- world should have offset the pressures activity. stances. Ordinarily such new opinions bearing down on American radicals. In this the Cochran group was hardly guilty of innovation. During the rise of in the Fourth International and or- The Chinese revolution had gained a sweeping victory against imperialism the CIO almost every section of the ganizations like the Socialist Workers and its native supporters; in Korea its radical movement was ridden with the party which sympathize with it are sub- forces had held back the world's most opportunist disease of finding new vir- mitted to rigorous and fully democratic powerful imperialist army; in Eastern tues in the labor bureaucracy or the discussion. In the process differences are Europe capitalism had been replaced by equally fatal sectarian disease of "re- generally resolved without too much workers states even if via military-bu- je~ting" the CIO because it was headed difficulty. However, the incipient con- reaucratic action and without the in- by the bureaucracy. The American ciliationism towards Stalinism displayed dependent revolutionary struggle of the Trotskyist movement, however, retained by this European Trotskyist group, masses. In Western Europe powerful its Marxist balance. It stressed the dual which was headed by Michel Pablo, mass Communist and Socialist parties character of the development — the and trade unions still existed although enormous progressive significance of the greatly encouraged such groups as the capitalism had succeeded in regaining appearance of industrial unionism and Cochranites. On top of this Pablo used relative stability. Situations like the the new ground for struggle it gave his formal authority as secretary to en- SPRING 1960 51 courage and inspire the Cochran group major accomplishment, according to were saved. Despite the witch hunt, to more vigorous action along the course Braverman, in addition to the launching new recruits joined. By 1956 the party it had taken. of the American Socialist was "the deci- was able to swing into the presidential sion not to conduct a polemic with the election campaign in effective fashion. the SWP." In that same year came a test that u NDOUBTEDLY Pablo regarded Cochran with some hopes in 1954 as a possible American protagonist. This curious accomplishment meant a refusal to explain to militant workers, or anyone else, why they left the SWP, what the issues in dispute were, and on was to prove decisive in the further development of both the American Socialist group and the Socialist Work- ers party, if not every tendency in the Cochran, however, wasn't interested in what program they now stood. The rea- American radical movement. This was any subtle revisions of the Trotskyist son Braverman gave for such a suicidal the regroupment opportunity. program, once he had launched his fac- political course was that "the Trotskyist The faction led by Cochran made tionon acourse of split. Hewasn't inter- movement had wasted away so badly much of its eagerness to influence the ested in conciliation with Stalinism. As that there was absolutely no periphery— radical movement and its know-how in subsequent events showed, Cochran was 1 repeat and underline — absoZutelV no accomplishing this aim in contrast to moving away from Marxism without any circle of sympathetic opinion before the "old" Trotskyists who were much intention oftaking itstage by stage in the whom we had to wrestle with them. too rigid, inflexible and altogether too manner described by Rosa Luxemburg. Second, the point of view against which dead to play any role in this. However, But while he was forming his faction we would be pdemicizing is not a na- when the great shakeup of the Ameri- he was not averse to using the authority tural growth representing a trend of can radical movement came, following of Pablo for the moment to pick up opinion in the U.S., but a hothouse Khrushchev's famous revelations and support from Trotskyist workers in the product of sectarianism, and as such smashing of the Stalin cult, it was the U.S. intensely devoted to the concept of entirely without interest for any part of SWP that moved into the crisis, mapped internationalism. In fact, he couldn't American labor or radical circles, and out a flexible policy, began joint dis- have taken many of them with him in by that I mean any part . . ." cussions and common actions and — this his break from the Socialist Workers The empirical facts provided some is now admitted by the SWP's worst party without this assistance from justification for Braverman's explana- enemies — emerged from the regroup- Pablo. Under fire from the SWP major- ment process as the only gainer in rela- tion of why the American Socialist group ity, Cochran needed the cover and di- tion to either the radical movement or decided to make an anonymous entry on rect assistance supplied by Pablo. new forces. the stage of radical publications. His This is the bitter truth about what description of the SWP periphery at The capacity of a Marxist movement happened. It is a tragic irony that im- that time is not greatly exaggerated. to inspire a new generation of radicaI mediately after the split, the Cochran Nevertheless, the decision was a fatal youth is a decisive measure of its fresh- group was designated by the Pablo mistake and expressed in its way the ness, vigor and determination. Begin- leadership as the "official Trotsky ists" basic defect of the group which fore- ning with 1956 it was the SWP alone of in the United States. This probably gave doomed it to impotence. all the radical groups that attracted a the Cochran group some amusement. Any political group which conceals its dynamic youth movement genuinely in- They shortly explained to their Euro- programmatic origins (for whatever rea- terested in revolutionary socialist poli- pean allies that they hadn't the slightest son, be it "shrewd" tactical duplicity, tics and participation in the struggles of intention of playing such a game and in or the claim that no one is interested) young people both North and South, fact weren't much interested in further has broken with the most elementary Negro and white. correspondence. requirements of Marxism. Once the While we are on the point, we might discipline of programmatic accounting is add that Pablo's role in encouraging this tossed aside, a group becomes highly kind of a split-off from the Marxist movement in the U.S. was reproduced in vulnerable to impressionism, moods-of- the-moment, personal caprice and ar- T HE American Socialist group, in con- trast, displayed the obverse side of both France and England. The startling bitrary regimes. organic opportunism during the regroup- shift of the Lawrence group in England Laboratory proof of this is offered by ment period; namely, sectarian aloofness, and the Mestre group in France from the experience of the American Socialist snobbishness, a you-come-to-us-or-else Trotskyism to Stalinism demonstrated group. Having launched themselves as attitude, and, finally, an Olympian pro- that when a revisionist tendency is in a group solidly agreed on acting like nouncement on the eve of the big flight from revolutionary socialism, it is political amnesiacs unable to remem- shakeup that everyone's bankruptcy unwise to take surface adherence to the ber where they came from, the "1007'. barred anything coming of the whole phrases of Marxism for good coin. And solid" very soon discovered they had turmoil. The Cochran group proved it is fatal to provide such groups with disagreements. Did they then engage in utterly incapable of building a youth the cover of subtle arguments to facili- a serious internal discussion allowing following — and it must be admitted tate their transition to the camp of anti- each point of view full rights of ex- that if good journalism is sufficient they Marxism, as Pablo did. pression, as they were accustomed to in had every chance to succeed at it. The Pablo and his group did not follow the SWP? Of course not! That would American Socialist was well written Cochran. Undoubtedly they were even have been reverting to the habits of and well illustrated. It published in- surprised by its "sudden" evolution to sectarianism. Instead Cochran simply formative articles that took a general anti-Trotskyism. This did not say much struck the names of the dissident editors, socialist point of view. But it had no for the capacity of these leaders to including George Clarke and Mike theoretically grounded program and forsee and to prepare — and not to per- Zaslow, off the masthead, and threw a therefore no plan to organize a serious sist in repeating the same mistake large majority of the New York mem- movement. Thus it could not really because of prestige considerations. bership out of the organization. That's inspire new converts to socialism to Six months following the split of the living, nonsectarian politics! This split, work for the goals that inspired past Cochran group from the SWP, Harry too, was not reported or explained to generations of socialists. Braverman, one of its leaders, summed anyone. In the same conference, six months up its "achievements" in a speech pub- The Socialist Workers party, mean- following their split, the Cochran group lished in the June 1954 Educator, a while, repaired the breach left by the adopted a resolution, "Our Orientation." mimeographed publication. Braverman desertion. Younger members moved for- (This was never publicly distributed.) said: "We carried through the split and ward into positions of responsibility and "Our purpose," the resolution reads, "is re-formed our ranks in excellent order. leadership. A few retrenchments had to to bring our ideas into the mass move- We remained just about 100% solid," The be made but all the party institutions ment, and to gradually raise the con- 52 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW sciousness of the ranks to the historic theoretical struggle for Marxism, the own Cochran faction, the Lawrence tasks. But the last thing in the world we SLL has been selected as a target for group, back in 1953. They faced the should attempt is to inculcate the ranks witch-hunting. The British capitalist same problem as the American Trotsky- with the necessity of adopting our press and the right-wing trade-union ist in coping with destructive factional specific traditions, and impressing upon bureaucrats are displaying the keenest intervention on the part of Pablo. They, them the truth of all the evaluations alarm over the fact that the SLL has too, had to overcome the effects of a and proposals broached by Trotsky become an inspiring and attractive force split that was unnecessarily deep due from 1923 on." for radical youth, for trade-union mili- to Pablo's influence. Their success in All this sounds very broad-minded and tants, for the entire left wing in the overcoming the internal dispute in a realistic. In the atmosphere of the pros- Labor party. The SLL is in the fore- principled way, in strict accordance perity-crazed, McCarthyized, hysteria- front of every struggle to unite workers, with Leninist tradition, is what prepared ridden U.S. it gave the impression of students and intellectuals in the fight them to play their magnificent role having one's feet planted solidly a good against British imperialism, for with- today. * distance from immature sectarian non- drawing British troops from every part Historically England "mirrors" the sense. On closer examination you get a of the world, for ending the H-bomb future of the United States. Marxists different impression. After all, what tests, strengthening the socialist pro- have long felt that the American trade are these "evaluations and proposals gram of the Labor party and defeating unions will eventually follow the British broached by Trotsky from 1923 on"? the right wing's attempt to scuttle the example and organize a Labor party. They happen to be nothing less than party's stand in favor of public owner- The differences between the U.S. and the systematic exposition of the Marxist ship. Britain assure that such a development class-struggle policy for every situation The SLL is taking the lead in the fight will most likely occur at a far swifter of major importance in the international for full democracy in the unions, the tempo and depth in this country than workers' movement for more than a Labor party and in every aspect of it did across the Atlantic. We hope that quarter of a century. They happen to British life. The SLL has shown its when this time arrives — and it can be be also the Marxist evaluation of the fighting mettle in beating back racist relatively soon — the Socialist Workers causes for some major catastrophes such attempts to whip up a lynch movement party will prove itself capable of living as the working class falling victim to against Negro workers in London. up to the Marxist traditions as well as fascism, to pauperizing depressions, and Where did this magnificent movement the British Trotskyists have. To put such a second world war. come from? It is obviously without a ventures as the American Socialist un- All this is dismissed as simply out- trace of sectarianism or disdainful aloof- der the microscope, as we have tried to ward trappings, inner-group jargon, ness from the actual movement and life do in this post-mortem, is part of the family circle memories and old grudges of the working class. It is popular, necessary preparation. lingering from ancient factional squab- energetic and colorful in its public bles! But in the regroupment test this appeal. * Pablo has not disrdayedprecociousnessin absence of theory proved fatal. On the The real secret of the strength of the learning. He has persisted in sniping at the other hand the doctrines, methods and British Trotskyist despite all their successes, SLL is in its concern for the theoretical as if he were still fighting the battle of 1953- theory to which the SWP adhered gave basis of socialism, its "preoccupation," 54 and had hopes of turningup another Coch- another indication of how practical they if you please, with the "old disputes" ran. In the witch-huntingattack Onthe socialist really are. Labor League,Pablo has failed,up to thistime and its rejection of every attempt at at least, tu take a Public stand in defense of In their despairing "Statement to lightminded improvisation in the field the victims. This was not due to lack of time, Readers," the editors of American of principle. This is trl~e of the SLL and for he has busied himself with getting in touch SociaZist dolefully express the feeling with the few intellectualswho buckled under its leadership as a whole, both those the pressure.lie has even gone so far as to de- that what is happening in the radical who came recently from the Communist fend members of the Labor party who took an movement across the Atlantic in Britain party as well as the older Trotskyist equivocalstandon the witch-huntattack against is much superior to what is happening cadre. the SocialistLabor League. It is difficult to see in the U.S. "What has been done in what advantagehe sees in this for his faction The British Trotskyists prepared for in the Fourth International. It would seem Britain in the past two years," they say, more practical, and certainly a lot more prin- "was not and could not be duplicated the opening of the kind of opportunities cipled, for a leading member of the Fourth here." We don't know specifically what prevalent in their country today and International,whatever faction he belongs to, that will surely confront us in the U.S. to make clear which side of the Picket line the editors regard as hopeful in Britain. he stands on, above all where Trotskyismis But they are right in concluding that tomorrow, by struggling against their the Principaltarget. real progress is being made there. This, however, is a result of following the very course they turned their backs on. In Britain during the past two years a major group of highly qualified intel- lectuals and workers in the mass move- The Young Socialtd ment broke away from the Communist Please begin my subscriptionwith the specialApril issue which carries party. The break was programmatic, nation-wide reports on the sit-in demonstrationsfor integration. entailing thorough review and study of the very "Stalin-Trotsky dispute" which The Young Socialist Cochran and his collaborators put in the same category as the Dempsey -Tunney P.O. Box 471, Cooper Station fight. Among those in Britain who have New York 3, N. Y. broken definitively with Stalinism there has been impressive ideological ferment. Enclosed find $1.00 for a one year subscription. A significant group, having studied the programmatic issues to the end, turned toward fusion with the British Trotsky- Name ..................................................................................................................... ist. This resulted in formation of the Socialist Labor League, a group within Street .............................................................................. Apt. No. ...................... the Labor party and the unions dedi- cated to advancing the Marxist view. As 'an organizing center of both class- City ....................................................zone................ State ............................ struggle action by militant unionists and SPRING 1960 53 The Fate of Dewey'sTheories Conservatives blame the noted educator for America's lag in space rocketry. Are they right? A socialist examination of Dewey's theories in practice suggests the correct answer by William F. Warde D EWEY went wrong, not in what he proposed for the school itself, but in his lack of understanding of the at variance with the realities of the business civilization outside. Dewey was aware that the school provided only a fraction of the social influences at work upon the child's forces at work in American society and of the real rela- tions between the educational and the economic systems, development, and usually not the most decisive ones. The under capitalist rule. emotional responses, behavior and standards of city children For Dewey, education was to be the principal means for are shaped far more by circumstances in the home and correcting economic evils and attaining progressive political family, the neighborhood and the streets, by the social level ends. The school system was to serve as the major institu- they occupy, and by the media of commercialized mass tion for carrying the democratic processes initiated by the culture than by the classroom. James T. Farrell's Stud-s founding fathers to their logical conclusion. He fervently Lonigan and Richard Wright's Black BOV present two ex- believed in Emerson's prophecy: "Efficient universal educa- treme cases of this predominance of the external environ- tion . . . is the mother of national prosperity . . . We shall ment over the school. But processes similar to those depicted one day learn to supersede politics by education." by these realistic novelists for Chicago's South Side go on The transformed schools would remake American society in some measure among all parts of the juvenile population. in two ways. First, by bringing forth the most desirable The spotlight has been thrown on the "Blackboard Jun- attitudes in the student body, experimental education would gles." But children made miserable, resentful and rebel- create new generations of inquiring, equalitarian-minded, lious by poverty, malnutrition, discrimination, and lack scientifically oriented individuals. These in turn would in- of recreational facilities, are only the most obvious victims tervene in the solution of social, economic and political of the capitalist environment. The sharp contrasts between problems and remodel our culture after the pattern of their the intellectual habits, moral values and code of conduct school training and experiences. instilled in the schools and what they experience around Progressive teachers would thereby become the leaders of them generate deep uncertainty, confusion and frustration social advancement. By their guidance of the youth and among growing children in all walks of American life. their partnership with the parents in Parent-Teachers As- If children are treated as equals at school, they encounter sociations, they would convert the school into a central many gradations of poverty and wealth outside. If students powerhouse of democratic doctrine which would enlighten are taught to be mutally helpful, considerate and cooper- and energize the community and eventually the nation. ative, the first commandment of the acquisitive and com- "Education," Dewey declared in My Pedagogic Creed petitive world around them is "look out for number one." (1897), "is the fundamental method of social progress and Teachers prate about decency and kindness while the TV, reform." This key proposition exposes the fundamental flaw movies and comic books glorify crime, brutality and vio- in his position. He assumed that his aims of democratic lence. Honesty may be the best policy — but what about education could either be harmonized with those of the cap- the fixed TV quizzes? italist regime or, wherever these came into conflict, the democratized schools, their supporters and graduates would prevail against the forces of reaction. He staked the whole fate of progressive education and the future of American life on this assumption. H OW can education proceed with serenity and security when fears and rumors of war and H-bomb annihila- tion are ever-present? And the more enjoyable learning is In reality, the kind of education he urged went counter made in progressive schools, the more intolerable is the to the dominant traits and trends of capitalist development. monotony and drudgery of factory and office occupations The modes of life and learning inside the schools were afterwards. "A society of free individuals in which all, through their own work, contribute to the liberation and enrichment of This is the second of two articles. The firs+ was published in our Winter 1960 issue and dealt with the main features of John Dewey's the lives of others, is the only environment in which any theories of education. The author showed how the Progressive move- individual can really grow normally to his full stature. An ment in the field of child education resulted from the rise of in- environment in which some are practically enslaved, de- dustrial capitalism. The entire social structure and cultural pattern of graded, and limited will always react to create conditions the colonial period was destroyed and the theory and practice of that prevent the full development even of those who fancy education had to be revamped. The Progressive movement was an they enjoy complete freedom for unhindered growth," Dewey attempt of enlightened elements of the middle class to meet the wrote. The virtues of progressive education were counter- new social problems with a democratic educational system that would acted and corroded by the evils of the capitalist environ- have profound effects in creating a rational and harmonious social order. The article concluded with the question: Why haven't Dewey's ment. +heories been realized in practice? And why have they become a The liberal thinkers of the Progressive school found favorite target of reaction today? themselves in a dilemma whenever they bumped up against 54 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW these realities of capitalist life. On the one hand, they op- ican Education, pp. 127-128. The remnants of his own lib- posed any indoctrination in the schools. As advocates of eral conscience prompted Professor Riesman to remark that "the open mind," they said that children should not have "John Dewey, with his orientation towards problem-solving any preconceptions imposed upon them by their elders but as the principal basis of thought, and towards the school should be encouraged to inquire freely and arrive at their as a factor in the life of the community, would probably own conclusions. have regarded my view as an unwarranted concession to It was an enigma how neutral and impartial teachers in reaction." So it was. But the fact that the suggestion was neutral and impartial schools were to produce progressive- put forward in earnest indicates how much the capitalist minded students. After all, the "free intelligence" they steamroller has succeeded in flattening out the spirit of in- hoped to cultivate did not operate in a void or in a society quiry and the progressive's will to struggle. where everyone shared "a common knowledge, a common The "cowardice and hypocrisy" which so disturbed Pro- worth or a common destiny," as Dewey put it. Progressive fessor Beale has been saddled upon the teachers by the education had to make its way in a society torn by anta- actual overlords of their profession. State control once meant gonistic class interests. The disciples of Dewey could not liberating education from religious control; it now means in fact adhere to their angelic impartiality if they wished subordinating education to the upper classes who dominate to further the cause of progressive education. The progres- the government, determine the school budget and police sive educationists were in a small minority pitted against a its personnel. In 1922 the Brook2~n Eagle asked: "Why majority of teachers with orthodox views not only on edu- should public money be employed to produce teachers dis- cation but on most other matters. If they were not to be posed to break the established order rather than sustain it?" rendered impotent by conservatism, the Deweyites were The representatives of the money masters take care to in- forced to cast aside their assumed neutrality on disputed sure that the hand that writes the teachers' paychecks is issues and lead their students along the path of liberalism. the hand that rules the schools. Even their efforts to obtain reforms within the confines "Perhaps the most dangerous, because the most general of capitalism stirred up fierce resistance from the business and most subtle, control over teachers is that exercised by interests who insisted that the schools serve aims geared business," reported Beale. "Businessmen . . . dominate most into the operations of capitalist enterprise. Businessmen boards of school trustees whether private or public . . . wanted docile and trained personnel for their offices and Business's chief interest in the schools is the indoctrina- factories and voting sheep for their parties. They did not tion of pupils and teachers with concepts that will silence need independent, critical-minded individuals but standard- criticism of business and its methods and insure large pro- ized units who could function as interchangeable parts in fits for the future. Reforms, which might limit its profits, their organizations. must never be discussed in the schools . . . Men are so used They could no more tolerate free discussion and un- to confusing their own desires with fine principles that hindered consideration of social and political questions in most men seeking to control the schools in order to protect the classrooms than they could in the country at large. their business probably have really convinced themselves Teachers with unorthodox views were liable to infect the that this is an act of pure public service," he ironically younger generation. comments. Business, big or little, directly or indirectly, has the economic, political and propaganda power to exercise a I N THE 1920's Upton Sinclair wrote The Goslings and The Goose-Step which showed how subservience to Big Busi- veto over the whole realm of American education. For Dewey the schools came first, but education for the masses has no such priority for the plutocracy. During the depres- ness was bred and enforced in the schools. In the early 1930's the more respectable Commission on Social Studies sion businessmen slashed educational appropriations and in the Schools subsidized a study of freedom of teaching crippled the schools to save their own pocketbooks. Now- since the first world war by the prominent American his- adays, during the Big Boom, Congress passes a $40-billion torian Howard K. Beale. program for building highways because the Defense Depart- Here are some of his findings: School administrators were ment, steel, cement, auto and oil corporations were behind usually unsympathetic to the inquiry. They "are not in- it and then turns down any appropriation for schooI con- terested in freedom." Many teachers "care nothing about struction. Federal appropriations for education are at the freedom or a study of freedom and want only to draw their bottom of a budget of which two-thirds go for military salaries with as little effort as possible . . . The multiplicity purposes. Evidently guided missiles with atomic warheads of examples of fears of teachers about supplying facts is in are more important for capitalist survival than students who itself eloquent testimony of the lack of freedom in the might have critical minds. schools." Dewey looked to the educational system to lift American In conclusion, Beale exclaimed: "Can teachers who are culture, like a giant crane, to ever greater heights and lead cringing, obedient 'hired men,' cowards, and hypocrites the American people to a wider democracy, step by step, create citizens of courage and integrity? As the writer com- generation by generation. But the level of education cannot pletes this study, he is appalled by the extent to which be higher than the surrounding social structures permit. American teachers are dominated by cowardice and hypoc- Dewey loaded onto the institution of education more than risy. There are admirable exceptions. Yet almost univer- it could be expected to bear. The forward movement im- sally teachers teach not what they would like, but only so parted by his ideas proved considerably weaker than the much of it as they dare." backward pressures of the monopolist regime which kept This was said at the height of the New Deal when teach- dragging education down to its own level. ers had much more latitude in expressing liberal and even radical opinions than they have enjoyed since. Over the past twenty-five years the area of freedom has appallingly contracted. Today public school and college teachers, be- deviled by conformist, loyalty tests, and witch-hunts, are s O IT was that the progressive crusade registered such meager and disappointing results over the past half century. Today the exhilarating experimental ~lan of the the most timid, vulnerable and terrorized section of the early years has evaporated. ,About as much of the progres- middle-cIass intellectuals. sive proposals as can be accommodatedto the status quo has The situation of social studies teachers in the secondary been incorporated into current public school practice. But schools had grown so untenably oppressive that in 1954 the movement itself appears afflicted with hardening of the the noted sociologist David Riesman proposed "that social arteries, like the rest of contemporary liberalism. Enlight- studies be abandoned in the public schools, since they could ened educators are asking in bewilderment: where do we not, without more protection for the teachers, be taught with go from here? any candor or vigor . . ." — C c and Variety in Amer- w v r The evolution of the tstrictly experimental schoolsahas s SPRING 1960 55 been exceedingly ironic. These laboratory schools were to 'protest' schools, expressions of the parents' rebellion against serve as pilot plants where new methods would be evolved the regimentation of childhood," writes Rugg. "They were and tested and the ideals of progressivism would flourish. formed in the years of the nation-wide shift from the con- Instead they have become private precincts of a narrowing ventional practices and allegiances of the nineteenth cen- cult, almost exclusively patronized by the offspring of well- tury to the new ones of the twentieth. The parents were to-do parents dissatisfied with the public schools. They have themselves caught in a period of rebellion against the old not come closer to the community and the workaday world, ways of living and of hectic attempts to improvise new as Dewey projected, but grown more isolated and turned ones. It was natural that this same spirit of revolt and back upon themselves. improvisation should mark the work of these schools in these Professor Harold Rugg of New York University, himself first years. It was in the spirit of 'Try anything once and a leading light among the progressive educationists, de- see if it works.' I recall dozens of times when that phrase tected this retrograde tendency some time ago: "From 1942 was bandied about in the early days of the Lincoln School. to 1945 I spent forty-odd days in a score of older progres- It was educational innovation — not thought out, designed sive schools, choosing principally those that had the ad- experiment." vantage of many years of uninterrupted experiment under *** fairly continuous administration," he wrote in Foundations of American Education, pp. 19-21. "I saw some good teach- ers in action — occasionally true artist-teachers — who re- Disappointment with the fruits of progressive experi- spected their young people as Persons and carried on their mentation is one of the factors in the present widely dis- groups as societies of equals. I saw them reflecting the cussed "crisis of American education." Conservative spokes- American psychology of freedom and action — the young men are exploiting its shortcomings to discredit the entire people free to move about and talk, and each one expected venture of progressivism. The attacks of the anti-progres- to speak of what he sees in his own unique way . . . Their sives have increased in intensity over the cold-war period. climate of opinion was marked by a spirit of inquiry rather They have made Deweyism the scapegoat for all the than of dogmatism; teachers sent young people to sources failures of the educational system. Johnny, they cry, isn't and put responsibility on them for organizing material and taught to read, spell or figure. The schools are too full of for facing issues. Thus the old dissectional atomism of the "frills and fads." Deweyism is almost un-American and the mechanical school had largely disappeared and young peo- abettor of "a crawling socialism." ple were being offered a program in which total jobs, total It may be true that here and there overindulgent teach- enterprises, could be confronted and to which each could ers have placed too little emphasis upon the acquisition of bring as much of himself as possible. In psychological terms the elementary tools of culture and that this unbalance this was no mean achievement . . . in the curriculum needs correction. Dewey himself never "But . . something seemed to be missing in these schools. slighted the importance of the formal elements in instruc- A strange aloofness from society seemed to mark them . . tion but simply insisted that they serve the more informal They seemed afraid of forthright realistic dealings with the activities in a rounded educational development. actual conditions of their local communities; certainly they dodged most of the major controversial issues of the day After fifty years of creative study and innovation our people had found no effective way to incorporate youth into the actual design and operation of society; they are still T HE right-wing critics, however, want to do more than correct one-sidednesses. They aim to wipe out the 'Newf- angled notions" and go back to the old-fashioned ways. regarded as onlookers, as observers, — and unofficial at They urge a revival of the classical curriculum through that. This revealed itself clearly in the inability of the "The Great Books," the institution of more discipline and schools — except in two of those I have seen, where an uniformity, the reinstatement of the 3 R's as the core of excellent program is under way — to engage the young primary instruction, the inculcation of religion and moral people in socially useful work which is significant in their lessons. Their prescriptions would not only sweep away the personal lives." advances made under progressive tutelage. They would shift *** the responsibility for the failures of American education from the capitalist culprits to the liberal educators who did their best to improve the schools. At the bottom of Dewey's naive and almost magical belief American education cannot "go back where it came from," in the omnipotence of education in relation to the rest of either to the absolete traditional methods or to the Utopian social life was the implicit and unexamined assumption that premises of the original progressives. It has to move to progressive education could find everything necessary to higher ground, taking off from the ideas and achievements realize its aims within the existing social system. He shared of Dewey's school. this outlook with the entire Populist-Progressive mass move- "To educate on the basis of past surroundings is like ment which tried in vain to smash the stranglehold of the adapting an organism to an environment which no longer monopolies upon American life, on the assumption that it exists. The individual is stultified, if not disintegrated; and could manage capitalism more fairly than the capitalists. the course of progress is blocked," Dewey once wrote. Those Dewey's exaltation of education as the prime solver of in quest of a fresh approach to the problems of American social problems was a direct translation into general theory education should heed these words. of the aspirations of the rising middle classes who looked The conditions which confront the present generation are to the education of the younger generation as the justifica- vastly different from those at the beginning of the cen- tion of their own struggles and sacrifices and as the guaran- tury when Dewey first put forward his ideas. The change- tor of progress. The immigrants envisaged their sons be- over from colonial and rural to urban and industrial life coming lawyers, doctors, dentists, professors or successful which so preoccupied him has not only been completed; the business men — and their daughters marrying such prizes — countryside itself has become modernized and mechanized. achieving higher social status along with financial security. The mighty influences of corporate wealth, the rise of The native-born workers likewise cherished the hope that organized labor, and the contest between these two giant education would enable their children to raise themselves social forces dominate our national life, including that of out of the working class. the middle classes wedged in between them. The world The specific demand for the innovations of progressive arena is the stage of a prolonged struggle for supremacy education came, however, mostly from middle class intel- between a capitalism in retreat and the advancing forces lectual circles who were not very radical in their political of socialism. outlook but were keenly cognizant of the deficiencies of The old social fabric is rotting and collapsing and a new traditional schooling. "These (Progressive) schools were one is being woven before our eyes. Any theory of educa- 56 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW tion which refused to take these fundamental features of our the problem from the other end. They tried to reform the era as its starting point would be divorced at its root from educational system before and without effecting a thorough- sociaI reality and sterilized at its source. Dewey maintained going reorganization of the social system. Consequently their that education must be socially and practically useful — experimentation did not yield the promised results. and what is more useful than a correct understanding of the Looking back in 1956 to the hopes expressed by Dewey economic and class forces operating around us and their in 1899 that" the schools would remake society, Professor effects upon the educational process? Riesman observed that the opposite had come about. The Dewey himself learned from the experiences of the Pro- schools and colleges had become so pressed into conform- gressive movement and drew certain conclusions from them. ity that they could no longer act as a countervailing force In the thirties he came to recognize that the schools in and against the predominant trends of their environment. of themselves could not be the prime instrument of social Does Dewey's vision of democratically functioning schools change. "It is unrealistic, in my opinion," he then wrote, in a free and equal society have to be given up, as reac- "that the schools can be a main agency in producing the tionaries demand and despairing liberals fear? The guiding intellectual and moral changes, the changes in attitudes and principles of his educational policy remain the most viable disposition of thought and purpose which are necessary for cultural creation of the defunct Progressive movement. the creation of a new social order. Any such view ignores Their admirable objectives cannot be achieved within the the constant operation of powerful forces outside the school framework of an increasingly monopolistic, militaristic and which shape mind and character. It ignores the fact that despotic capitalism. But they can be realized under a work- school education is but one educational agency out of many, ers' democracy such as the socialist movement aspires to and at the best is in some respects a minor educational build. force." — Sociul Frontier, May 1937. To link the future of progressive education with the pros- He advocated that progressive education associate more pects of socialist revolution in the United States is almost closely with the labor movement. He had earlier taken the as repugnant to our liberals as to the conservatives who initiative in organizing the teaching body into unions and combat them. They hope to gather the harvest in the field was one of the founders of the American Federation of of education without first ploughing up the social soil. Teachers. He called upon teachers to "ally themselves with And yet American history shows how much a successful their friends against their common foe, the privileged revolution of the people can do for educational progress. class, and in the alliance develop the character, skill and The First American Revolution made possible free uni- intelligence that are necessary to make a democratic social versal public education in this country. The Civil War order a fact." cleared the way for the rapid expansion of the public schools and shattered the Southern slave stronghold of il- u NDER the impact of the Great Depression he took the further step of proclaiming his belief in socialism. His socialism was of the Norman Thomas type: a vague ideal literacy and backwardness, even though integration has still to be won in its public schools over seventy-five years later. Immediately present, however, is the Russian example dramatized by the launching of Sputniks and Luniks. Here is the most spectacular illustration of the tremendous im- of justice, equality and democracy which would ensure the material welfare of everyone in the community and the pulsion revolution can give to education in backward spiritual self-realization of the individual. It hovered on countries. the borderline of liberalism and socialism. He rejected scientific socialism which taught that the in- dependent struggle of the working class for power was the only way to abolish privilege and parasitism and achieve real democracy. This cut straight across his own middle-class, "superclass" outlook. Neither in his politics nor A MERICANS regard themselves as the most advanced nation on earth. This cocksureness has suddenly been put in doubt. The complacent rulers of the country have his educational theory would Dewey admit that the dif- been jolted into the realization that they have fallen behind ferences between capital and labor could be deep and ir- the Soviet Unicm in military and space technology. Admiral reconcilable. He tried to prevail upon both capital and labor Hyman Rickover and others bitterly blame Dewey's philo- to subordinate any specific class interests to some more sophy for the failure of the schools to produce enough comprehensive national interests, hoping that intelligent, technical and scientific personnel to keep up with the Soviet forward-looking members of all social strata could and racketeers. would unite in a common endeavor to democratize America. But the challenge of Soviet education ought to convey a Some of his left-wing followers abandoned the original quite different message to the American people than it injunction of the progressive educators that the teacher and does to the monopolists and militarists who are primarily the school should abstain from taking sides on controversial concerned about preparing for World War 111.It is a force- issues and openly proclaimed the need for active alignment ful warning that our schools are far from fulfilling their with the forces working for a new social order. Among function of preparing the youth for this age of nuclear these was Professor George S. Counts of Teachers College energy, space exploration, automation — and the transition who wrote a book in 1932 with the challenging title: Dare from capitalism to socialism. the School Build a New Social Order? "In America we have buiIt many wonderful school build- More recently a tendency called Reconstructionism, headed ings, and we have put more of our teenagers in the custodial by Theodore Brameld of New York University, has come care of the high school than has any society in history," forward. It stresses the duty of educators to prepare stu- says Edward U. Condon, past president of the American dents for a voluntarily planned society. However, its theo- Association for the Advancement of Science. "Nevertheless reticians disagree on what this new society is to be like and we have an uneasy feeling that this enormous educational how it is to be attained. apparatus is not doing as much as we feel it ought to do. One thing is certain. The big business masters of America Too large a proportion of our high school graduates are know what they want: schools which serve their "free en- unable to read and write English; almost none have a mas- terprise" profit system. Their opponents ought to be equally tery of any foreign language; the overwhelming majority clear about what kind of replacement is required for a are quite illiterate about mathematical reasoning and are suitable education in this modern world. ill at ease even with arithmetic; very few have any dis- Horace Greeley, the radical editor of the N. Y. Tribune ciplined grounding in the basic principles of any science." before the Civil War, wrote in his Hints Toward Reforms: But the most alarming educational lag is not in the "Before Education can become what it should be and must natural sciences, as Admiral Rickover and Professor Condon be, we must reform the Social Life whence it proceeds, state. It is in the social sciences. Marxism and socialism, whither it tends." Dewey and his fellow progressives tackled (Continued on page 61) SPRING 19613 57 B A S G o t L V by Bert Deck THE LONG VIEW OF HISTORY,by William ical sphere and thereby a political road cernible pattern which describes the F. Warde. Pioneer Publishers, New back to support of American capitalism. manner of that movement; an extended York City. 1960. 64 pp. 35 cents. Warde, alone of the whole group, went period of slow evolutionary progress ac- on to absorb fully the Marxist approach companied by a growth of internal con- These lectures were originally given to social reality and is able to bring to tradictions; the development of an ir- by William F. Warde at the West Coast a new generation the valid achieve- reconcilable conflict between the forces Camp in September, 1955. The pub- ments of a previous period of intel- striving for a higher level and those lishers should be commended for re- lectual upsurge in the United States. which wish to hold society back; the vic- printing them in their remarkable Pio- "Many people," the author notes, "be- tory of the progressive forces through neer Pocket Library series. came frightened by the immensity of a revolutionary "leap" shattering the At first glance it would seem that the tasks, or crushed by adversity to old social structure and the reconstruc- the author had set himself an impossible the point of losing their moral and in- tion of the social organization on a new task: tellectual backbones, and losing sight and higher plane. "I propose first to trace the main of the main line of social evolution . . . There have been three such "leaps" line of human development from our This 'lost generation' has forgotten, if in human history since the advent of remote animal ancestors to the present they ever learned. the supreme lesson civilization: from slavery to feudalism; when mankind has become lord of the of both world history and American from feudalism to capitalism; and now, earth but not yet master of his own history. This is that the forces making we are participating in the most signif- creations, above all of his own social for the advancement of mankind have icant leap of all, the transition from system. After that, I will deal with the overcome the most formidable obstacles capitalism to socialism. central course of evolution in that spe- and won out in the end." American history shows the same cific segment of society which occupies The anti-scientific view presents his- lawfulness, the same logical relation- the bulk of North America and rep- tory as a mish-mash of unrelated ac- ships between its various stages. resents the most developed form of cap- idents. Those holding this view may ac- We have already experienced two rev- italist society." cept lawful progression or ascent in olutionary leaps forward: the War for From the first vertebrates to the com- natural history, but deny it for social Independence and the War Between ing American labor party is the scope history. The social, material source of the States. Each of these cataclysmic of this essay by William F. Warde, who this denial of science is quite apparent. events was the end product of an is no stranger to readers of the Inter- . It-would be impossible to maintain "that evolutionary accumulation of irrepres- national Socialist Review. The boldness the established capitalist regime in the sible internal conflicts. Each permitted of this venture would, in any case, de- United States embodies the highest at- a social reorganization which allowed serve "A" for effort; but happily, the tainable mode of life and an unsur- for a more rapid growth of the pro- results match the daring of purpose. passable type of social organization" if ductive forces. Each in turn set the Warde was part of that promising all of history disclosed but one absolute: stage for a new and higher struggle group of young intellectuals who, in the law of continuous change and pro- which prepared for the subsequent de- the early thirties, attempted to break gression to ever higher stages of social velopment. through the ideological restrictions of organization. The "long view" dictates that an American pragmatism and achieve the The idea, that American capitalism understanding of American society to- Marxist "long view of history." The is the happy final chapter of human day requires that we analyze its con- group included such notables as Sidney history, is but a repetition of the pre- tradictory aspects and seek in them Hook, James Burnham, Dwight Mac- judice prevalent in both feudal and the main spring for the next leap for- Donald, Vincent Sheean and others of slave societies. Without a scientific or ward. Any other approach means to that calibre. However the rise of the "long view" of history it is impossible turn one's back on history, on science, Stalinist dictatorship in the USSR, the for peoples at a given stage of culture on reason itself. approach of World War II, the working to relate their past with their future; Marxism has not only the distinction class defeats and the fascist victories, thus they accept their present as given of applying scientific method to the stu- demoralized and routed almost the en- and unchanging. dy of all human history but it uncov- tire group. Each of them, in his own History not only shows that mankind ered the internal mechanism in mod- way, "rediscovered" the more primitive has moved upward from level to level ern society which is preparing the evolu- method of pragmatism in the ideolog- but also indicates that there is a dis- tion of man on to the higher stage of 58 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW socialism: the class struggle between gether with the rate of growth of the probably the biggest single factor in the the working class and its direct op- working class movement on a world loss of Communist Party influence in posite, the capitalist class. scale, the balance of forces has been the Negro vanguard. Warde places our contemporary his- steadily shifting, despite all oscillations, The influence of non-capitalist ideas tory in an international context. "The more and more toward the side of the in individuals such as A. Philip Ran- movement for the advancement of cap- working class power. Nothing what- dolph, Paul Robeson and W.E.B. DuBois italism which dominated world history soever, including imperialist war, the are treated as aberrations rather than from the 16th to the 19th century has Taft-Hartley Act, McCarthyism, have as serious factors in the development of been succeeded by the anti-capitalist been able to stop this basic momentum their thought and expression as lead- movement of the socialist working class of the U.S. labor movement." ers. in the 20th century. This is the central We can expect that this evolutionary He gives no serious consideration to line of world social development in our process will, as before, culminate in a the ideological struggles in which the time." revolutionary "leap." And, as before, the vanguard was involved. "They dis- After noting the growing strength of leap will come totally unexpected to agreed . . . about the wisdom of work- the American labor movement the most. "The Long View of History" dem- ing through political parties, about es- author concludes, "Reviewing this coun- onstrates that a socialist America is not tablishing an independent Negro aboli- try's history from 1876 to 1955, to- so distant as it might appear. tionist press, and even about the pace of the campaign . . . Indeed the pro- pensity for divisions in its leadership, combined with apparently irreconcilable wranglings over ideologies, had already exhibited itself in Negro America be- M a S o H fore the Civil War." o h No mention is made of the wealth of evidence which exists in the written record of the challenge by the Negro vanguard to the author's basic thesis: by Jean Blake the essential health of the American democratic tradition. His dismissal of the ideological dif- THE NEGRO VANTGIJARD, Richard Bar- by whites and prominent Negroes upon ferences in the vanguard as "wrangling" dolph. Rinehart & Company, Inc., their development; local and regional and a "propensity for divisions" is quite New York. 1959. 388 pp. $6.95. advantages and, so far as the data per- significant: Either Bardolph discounts mit, some tentative conclusions about the capacity of Negro leaders to think Richard Bardolph, a professor at the the development of the selective mech- independently, since ideological differ- Women's College of the University of anisms and social climate that favored ences are certainly present among North Carolina at Greensboro, recipient their rise." white leaders also; or, as is more likely, of Ford and Guggenheim Foundation He then examines briefly a few of the author has a limited capacity for fellowships, and author of articles and the most typical according to his cri- understanding and dealing with ideo- book reviews in many professional his- teria, and one or two of the exceptions logical questions generally. torical journals, wrote this book be- "that prove the rule." Nevertheless, the volume of reading, cause, as he says: The author concludes that in the early discussion and thought on the question "The time has come to lodge the period such factors as family, accept- by Bardolph does result in some inter- Negro movers and shakers of American ability to whites, degree of whiteness, esting contributions to an understand- social history more firmly in the record, economic advantages, etc., tended to ing of the Negro problem in the United and to assemble, while they may still determine status and emergence as lead- States. be discovered, the scattered and elusive ers, but changing conditions have made For example, his examination of the facts about their social origins." the decisive factor individual ability origin and role of the Negro Christian His criterion for selecting his list of since opportunities are no longer limited church notes the reasons that many persons included in the Negro vanguard by race. Negro leaders in the past as well as is candidly stated in his Prologue: "I The "message" of the book, which today have been ministers. Negro have been at great pains to minimize the publishers quote on the jacket, is church leaders, unlike isolated leaders my subjective judgments, for I have "a testament of hope, a reaffirmation in the professions, education, art and tried to assemble a list of those persons of the writer's belief in the essential two-party politics, had. more direct ties who appear most prominently in the health of the American democratic tra- with and opportunities to win support written historical record." His theme is dition." from a mass base. The Negro church af- that the central tendency in the evolu- The author's selection of evidence to forded opportunities for development of tion of the Negro, like the rest of support this thesis, fails, therefore, to talents, barred elsewhere by race dis- American society, has been the "devel- go beneath the surface of the birth, crimination. opment of an order in which status was education and occupation and connec- A noted forerunner of Bardolph in determined by achievement, not ascribed tions with whites or other Negro leaders. the study of the vanguard, George by birth or caste." He ignores completely the develop- Plekhanov, wrote in The Role of the Bardolph proceeds as follows: He lists ments in the class struggle and the ac- Individual in History: the most celebrated Negroes in U.S. his- tions of the masses, even the Negro "A great man is great not because his tory chronologically for three periods masses, as the framework within which personal qualities give individual fea- — 1770 to 1900, 1900 to 1936 and 1936 leaders emerge. He mentions only in- tures to great historical events, but be- to 1959 — divided into categories: reli- cidentally a few fragmentary highlights, cause he possesses qualities which make gious leaders, educators, artists and en- like the Montgomery bus boycott, the him most capable of serving the great tertainers, business and professionals, March on Washington movement and social needs of his time, needs which etc. He makes some generalizations some statistics on population compos- arose as a result of general and par- about "their family backgrounds, their ition changes. And he fails even to men- ticular causes. Carlyle, in his well- early economic and community environ- tion the monumental conflict within the known book on heroes and hero-wor- ment, educational influences; the role Negro movement during World War 11 ship, calls great men beginners. This of accident, sources of motivation, the over the policy of subordination of the is a very apt description. A great man importance of contacts with sympathetic Negro struggle to the war effort — is precisely a beginner because he sees SPRING 1960 59 further than others. He solves the sci- class citizenship, at a time when the time was in the mushrooming railroad entific problems brought up by the pre- resolution of the American Dilemma is industry. The railroad baro=s spread ceding process of intellectual develop- our major domestic preoccupation, and their greedy tentacles over the whole ment of society; he points to the new when all our people need, as never be- of American economic life. They swin- social needs created by the preceding fore, the knowledge and insights that dled the investor, squeezed the farmer development of social relationships; he inform sound judgment and prudent and trampled on the worker. takes the initiative in satisfying these decisions." The American capitalist class, en- needs." But an analysis of Negro leaders that gaged in the bloody process of primitive Bardolph shows some intimation of this fails to examine their ideas and the accumulation, were insatiable in their view in his Prologue where he states: class-struggle context which gave rise greed and merciless in their disregard "Especially important is the distin- to these ideas can provide only a limited of the most elementary human rights. guished Negro's place in current discus- understanding of the role of the Negro Beginning with the economic crash in sions of the race's capacity for first- vanguard. 1873 the railroad tycoons repeatedly slashed wages and worsened conditions to maintain a high rate of dividend pay- ments on generously watered stock. The rest of the employers followed suit. C S — A S t m The author records that: "By late 1873 even skilled craftsmen could be hired for board alone." When the rail- road bosses announced another ten per by Tom Kerry cent cut for June 1, 1877, it was more than flesh and blood could stand. A spontaneous strike movement erupted 1877: YEAR OF VIOLENCE, by Robert V. rich continent to ravage and they set and soon swept through all the major Bruce. Bobbs-Merrill, New York City. about systematically to pillage and railroad centers. Police, special deputies, 384 pp. $5.00. plunder its wealth. Some of America's company thugs, vigilantes, militia and greatest family fortunes — Rockefeller, finally federal troops, were called upon According to the publisher's blurb, the Morgan, Vanderbilt, etc., etc., — date to smash the strike. Lacking organiza- author spent "over two years of inten- from that era. The stockjobbers, land- tion and leadership the strike was sive research and a year and a half of grabbers and money changers bought broken. writing," to complete this book. He up city officials and state legislatures; From an historical point of view the should be commended for the research. they named Governors, Congressmen 1877 strike movement established a The facts speak more eloquently than and Senators; the federal government number of memorable firsts. It was the the author whose understanding of the in Washington was at their beck and first strike to achieve national scope; events is shallow and whose interpreta- call. the first in which federal troops were tion is colored by a definite class bias. In 1876 the northern capitalist class, used as strikebreakers; the first in The class prejudice of the author is ruling through the Republican party, which the anti-labor injunction was most marked in the use of a derogatory betrayed the Negroes in the South and introduced as a strikebreaking weapon. terminology. Contrast, for example, the terminated Reconstruction for a deal Despite the author's bias the book con- sensitivity of labor historian Samuel with the Democrats which landed Hayes tains much factual material of interest Yellen who wrote in his introduction in the office of U.S. president. The to the student of American labor strug- to his book: American Labor Struggles, greatest concentration of capital at the gles. "eXC@ in a few instances, I have used the word 'crowd' rather than 'mob' be- cause of the dubious application of the latter by newspapers." With Bruce it's the other way around. In his summary chapter, Bruce pro- jects his interpretation of the 1877 C C C a events onto the railroad strike of 1894, and says "With the outbreak of the Pullmm Strike in 1894, memories of '77 came rushing back. Many of the old in- by Constance F. Weissman gredients were there: railroaders on strike in twenty-seven states and terri- tories; a call for a general strike at Chi- MEMOIRS OF A DUTIFUL DAUGHTER, by While later gaining fame as a cham- cago; tramps, hoodlums, depression un- Simone de Beauvoir. The World pion of women (Th; Second Sex) she employed and teenagers stirring up Publishing Co., Cleveland and New never resented being a girl. She en- trouble; fine July weather bringing out York. 1959. 382 pp. $5. joyed her position as the older daughter crowds; dozens killed in rioting." It is from this kind of an amalgam "I was and I would always remain, in a middle-class family, secure in her that the author derives the title of his my own master," writes Simone de Roman Catholic faith which protected Beauvoir about her childhood. Born in her from fear of death as a child, and book which comes enclosed in a lurid Paris in 1908, her childhood was happy convinced her of her immortality. dust jacket depicting a raging con- flagration with figures of the "mob" and secure. "Sheltered, petted and con- In the bourgeois environment, in dancing about in the flames. The year stantly entertained by the endless nov- which the family belonged, the con- 1877 was indeed a year of violence — of elty of life, I was a madly gay little tradiction between religion and patriot- frightful, murderous violence, directed girl." Yet in her twenties, she was to ism put national values before Catholic against the working people by the min- write in her diaries, from which she virtues. "At an early age I was indoc- ions of capital; and of workers goaded reconstructed her autobiography, "I was trinated . . . to make a clear distinc- beyond endurance to militant resistance. cabin'd, cribb'd, confined! I felt suf- tion between God and Caesar and to With the end of the civil war the focated, I was eating my heart out, I render unto each his due; all the same, Northern capitalists set out to garner the wanted to hammer my head against it was most disconcerting to find that fruits of victory. There was an entire those prison walls." Caesar always got the better of God." 60 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW She decided that religion was for purely ties, or even interest in the people the Revolution which would feed all spiritual matters. around her, in the world at large, in the starving people on the earth. I She received a shock at confession politics, or especially any relationship retorted no less peremptorily, that the when the priest to whom she was con- with men. Having logically fought out problem was not to make men happy, fessing her spiritual "sins" interrupted the battle against religion and her fam- but to find the reason for their exist- with a scolding about her behavior in ily, she still had to learn how to partic- ence. She looked me up and down: 'It's school. "I gazed with horror upon the ipate in the world as a free person, not easy to see you've never gone hungry, ' impostor whom for years I had taken one bound by the invisible bonds of she snapped . . I realized that she had as the representative of God on earth; bourgeois-Catholic conditioning. classified me as a 'high-minded little it was as if he had suddenly tucked up bourgeois,' and this annoyed me . . . I Fortunately for her, her father lost his cassock and revealed the skirts of believed that I had freed myself from his money, Because she would have no one of the religious bigots; his priest's the bonds of my class . . ." dowry and hence could not marry in robe was only a disguise; it covered an Americans are surprised to find in bourgeois French circles, the only alter- French literature that many of the old busybody who fed on gossip." native was to be educated to make a heroes and heroines are radicals; how- Even when she became a university stuflent she dared not tell her parents living. Her brilliance finally brought ever Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter that she had been an atheist for many her into the circle around Jean Paul tells the story of another aspect of years. Actually her intellectual break Sarire. French life: the steeping of the young with the church was of little help in The author was later to become a in conservative property-preserving pre- mitigating her own confusion and de- radical. One of the interesting anec- cepts of behavior. spair in growing to maturity. Although dotes in a book filled with illustrations How one woman freed herself in a a brilliant stu~ent at the university, so of honesty in self-evaluation is about mighty struggle, told in a rapid, com- imbued was she with Catholic restraints her meeting with Simone Weil, who told pressefl, highly readable style with great ani inhibitions that she was prevented her, "in no uncertain tones that only honesty and without self-pity, makes from any participation in student activi- one thing mattered in the world today: an absorbing book. q The Fate of Dewey's Theories 90 (Continued from page 57) curriculum would aim to give children such a grasp of science, technology and the productive processes that they which in one form or another are taken as guides by the could take their places without difficulty as active citizen- majority of mankind today, are taboo in our schools. School- producers of a cooperative community. And there would children and college students are not given a fair chance be plenty of places for them to fill which would develop to learn the fundamental facts about the profit system and the powers and skills they acquired in school. class society they live in and little objective information Experiments in teaching techniques would be systemat- about the socialist alternative to it. They are as much the ically encouraged and improvements adopted as speedily as victims of obscurantism in this vital field of knowledge as possible. The schools, not the advertisers and private mo- the students of feudal times who were forbidden by the nopolies, would be the first beneficiaries of new technical Church and State to inquire into the discoveries and teach- devices like television. Unharrassed by overwork and anx- ings of the new physical science. ieties, fathers and mothers would have the time, energy The Soviet educational system and its methods need not and inclination to participate with their children as partners be taken as a model for uncritical emulation. It has ac- in their educational progress. complished great things in liquidating illiteracy, spreading The ideal of democratic schools serving a democratic culture, training professional, technical and scientific work- society, which inspired Dewey's philosophy of education — ers. But it remains regimented, formalized and authoritarian. schools where scientifically formed and informed intelli- Between 1923 and 1933 Dewey's experimentalism con- gence cmomotes freedom. eaualit~ and woswess — would siderably influenced the Soviet schools through the Com- ~hen b~come the guide to ev~ryday practice_. missar of Education Lunacharsky. These innovations were uprooted under Stalin. By the late thirties school uniforms, strict teacher control, formal pupil-teacher relations and formal classroom procedures, organization and discipline were reintroduced and persist to this day. ontheMarch Negroes D ESPITE this retrogression in educational methods, the impetuous advances of Soviet education offer an anti- cipation of the immense opportunities that could be opened — A Frenchman's ~eporf on the up for educational progress under a socialist government in American the rich United States. The younger generation would be treated as the most precious of social assets and from infancy to maturity its needs would receive the highest priority. Freed of the crush- I By Daniel Guerin $1.50 (cloth) ing burdens of the military budget and the restrictions of profiteering, the government of the working people could $1.00 (paper) allot all the resources and human energies required for a vastly expanded educational program. This would be a PIONEER PUBLISHERS keystone of its economic and cultural planning. The work of the head would be united with the work of 116 University Place New York 3, N. Y. the hand from the start of the educational process. The SPRING 1960 61 States by an Axis victory? Surely this line in the Middle East. Describing was part of the reason why Great Iraq, where the CP stood within Britain's cause was 'our' cause in the inches of establishing worker's power, periodicals war . . . ." Gardner brilliantly sums up the eco- Deutscher says, "In the summer, the Communist offensive was suddenly nomic forces which brought an end called off — on urgent demands from Moscow, where reports about the rising i to the Great Depression but only at the cost of embroiling the U.S. and the world into another colossal war: revolutionary temperature of Iraq had caused alarm. Khrushchev refused to "American leaders had to face Ger- countenance a Communist upheaval in Review man and Japanese opposition to their goals . . There is no attempt to state Baghdad — he feared that this would provoke renewed Western intervention in the Eastern Mediterranean, set the — by Tim Wohlforth — here that the New Deal wanted or promoted American entrance into the Second World War. Instead the evidence Middle East aflame and wreck his policy of peaceful coexistence." Khrushchev ac- complished this switch in the Iraq CP shows that Administration leaders tried line by direct intervention. "A bill of FROM OUT OF THE ACADEMY to convince the Axis powers that 'lib- indictment against the Iraqi Communist The intellectual resources of the eral' trade programs and the Open Door leaders was drawn up in Moscow and radical movement in this country are were more productive of international well-being than Axis bi-lateral,ism. But the Party was ordered not merely to not very large. Intellectuals that are make its peace with Kassem but to sur- active radicals have many pressing de- the New Deal would not back 'down in render unconditionally with only a min- mands on them and little time for the face of threats to liberal trade and the Open Door. Thus the clash became imum of face saving . . . Since the far- scholarly pursuit. There are some off days in the middle 1920's when radical and semi-radical intellectuals inevitable." Stalin ordered the Chinese Communists who are so situated in the universities This confirms the revolutionary so- to serve as the 'Koumintang's coolies,' that they are able to devote themselves cialist view of World War H as an im- no Communist Party has ever been ex- more fully to scholarly pursuit. While perialist war flowing out of economic posed t.o quite as abject a humiliation." most of their work has limitations, rivalry. Needless to say the author's reservation that the U.S. did not want The general outline of this develop- almost all of it has value. The Marxist ment was sketched by Shane Mage in movement should utilize what is valu- war is not important for no country ever wants war. Each country would his article, "Will Another Deal at the able in this work in order to add to Summit Bring World Peace?" in the its understanding of the modern world. prefer for the enemy to peacefully bow Summer 1959 issue of the Young So- out and allow it to dominate the world. It is with this view in mind that we cialist. In this article, written prior to But, since the enemy wishes the same approach Studies on the Left, a scholarly the events Deutscher describes, Mage of it, "the clash became inevitable." journal published by radical graduate said: "For the sake of 'coexistence' students largely from the University of Khrushchev agreed to use the CP of Wisconsin. (See the February Young Iraq to contain the Arab revolution Socialist for a discussion of the strength 7HE KHRUSHCHEV IKE LIKES within capitalist limits. " and weaknesses of this publication. ) Part of this same pattern, Deutscher It is difficult to get from the press — points out, is Khrushchev's support to By far the most important article in left or right — a realistic picture of the De Gaulle's Algerian policy, a view this new journal is, "From New Deal Soviet Union and the role of the which with great difficulty Thorez to New Frontiers: 1937-1941" by Lloyd Khrushchev regime's policy in world af- forced upon the French CP. Also sig- Gardner. The author contends that fairs. The capitalist press, liberal, con- nificant was Khrushchev's refusal to "when the recession of 1937-1938 struck servative and reactionary, invariably support China in its border dispute with down the superficial progress of the conjures up the image of a Red Ogre India even though the latter country New Deal," the Roosevelt Administra- aiming at enslaving the world through has been acting more and more as a tion, "forsook viable domestic remedies a Kremlin-directed world revolution. u. s. tool. and readied itself for the pursuit . The social democrats repeat the Red of world frontiers as its solution to the Ogre myth of the capitalist press, add- Perhaps the most thought-provoking crisis of the 1930's." In other words contribution of Deutscher in this article ing only a bit of friendly advice to the when Roosevelt was unable to save the is his view of China's reaction to the U. S. State Department on how to com- capitalist system through domestic re- Khrushchev-Eisenhower love-match. bat the Ogre more effectively. The Com- form he turned to world economic Peking feels, "that in pursuing his sum- munist party presents us with an idyllic domination. Among the foremost advo- mit diplomacy Khrushchev has been picture of a Soviet policy which at one cates of a turn to what we socialists needlessly sacrificing revolution in Asia and the same time champions socialism call imperialism was none other than and had come close to betraying prole- and wins the warm friendship of the Henry A. Wallace, according to Gardner. tarian internationalism," according to worst enemies of socialism. This search for foreign markets Deutscher. In concluding, Deutscher Isaac Deutscher in the Jan. 21 issue strikes an interesting historical note: brought the New Deal into sharp con- of Repo~ter, ignores both myths and flict with the Axis powers who were "In all these differences there is stuff considers the actual role of Khrushchev's for a grave controversy in which one attempting to establish economic foot- line in world politics. holds in Latin America and to freeze may see reproduced, in a new context, out American interests in Europe and Deutscher's thesis is that under the some of the motifs of the Trotsky- Asia. Gardner quotes the Henry Wal- slogan, "we are fighting for the preser- Stalin controversy of the 1920's." lace of this period: "I think we ought vation of the international status quo," In this historic struggle Trotsky urged to face the fact that with Hitler con- the Sta]inist movement everywhere is that the USSR continue the policy it trolling the exports, imports and ex- being tamed to the needs of the detente conducted under Lenin of supporting the changes, it is impossible to get an ade- with the West. In Italy, he notes, the coming to power of the working class quate flow of exports from the United CP greeted President Eisenhower with in other lands. The victory of the work- States." Gardner concludes from this: the chant, "We too like Ike" and the ers in Western Europe was important, "Could there be any doubt that the Communist parties of the other Western he felt, not only in itself but as a solu- Administration and the business com- European countries followed suit. tion for the isolation and economic munity would accept self-containment Even more disastrous was the impact backwardness of Russia. unless it was forced on the United of Khrushchev's peaceful coexistence Stalin, by contrast, formulated his 62 INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST REVIEW "socialism in one country" thesis. He mand for "Hands Off the Imagination" the Chinese. 'murderers.' and all sorts subordinated the Communist parties in — which provided the spark for the of other dirty names in public . . . The all countries to the diplomatic maneu- Hungarian Revolution. The crushing of quickest way for the Chinese Reds to vers of the USSR through which he the Revolution in Hungary and its ebb be accepted at the U.N. is for her to sought, in vain, to establish "peaceful in Poland was accompanied by reinsti- become as potent a mass murderer as coexistence." This is still the funda- tution of thought policing of culture — the pious Christian nation that ii:st mental issue facing the Communist although not as thoroughly as p~eceding used the ghastly atom bomb against movement: should socialists struggle the Revolution. mankind." seriously for socialism or should they The reorganization of the shattered On PoliticalAction: "When will the prop up the existing capitalist regimes and reduced American CP by the average Negro wake up to the fact the hoping that these regimes will be Stalinist old guard is also being accom- two party system is a farce? In the "friendly" to the USSR? It is to panied by a policing of the artists; and realm of civil rights and social justice Deutscher's credit that he spotlights this is the meaning of the anti-Main- the two party lines are the same . . . these issues in a journal which is widely stream move. We understand why an The Negro must transform his vote in- read. authoritarian regime in power which to a new independent political force rules in the interests of a privileged . . . If the two major parties want our bureaucracy cannot tolerate free expres- votes, we must demand that they earn MAINSTREAM ON THE BLOCK sion anywhere — even in the field of them." poetry. What we learn from the Main- On the Labor Movement: "The only It now seems clear that the Com- stream controversy is that a Stalinized avenue to a higher standard of living munist party has decided to axe Main- party out of power which does not in the South is labor unions . . . It is stream. Mike Newberry declares in the determine its own policies, but slavishly time for labor to roll up its sleeves Jan. 3 issue of the Worker, "The progres- support those of the Soviet bureaucracy, and enter the arena of combat politics sive movement is hardly now large likewise cannot tolerate free inquiry . . . The labor movement as a whole enough to support such a rarefied, spe- within its ranks or periphery. Only has nothing to lose by establishing a cialized magazine, not at this time. " those who determine their own policies labor party and entering its own slate The reasons for the CP's campaign and are not alien to the working class of candidates . . ." against Mainstream and the way in have nothing to fear from free inquiry which it has been conducted give us an in the arts or any other field. " On ColonialRevolutions: Oppressed insight into the relationship between We will hate to see Mainstream go — peopleseverywhere are demanding hu- Stalinism and culture. What is espe- even with all its weaknesses. The rad- man dignity and the right of self-de- cially interesting is that this relation- ical movement is too culturally starved termination. The darker colonials are ship seems to be as true of a little iso- moving toward freedom. The American to blithely allow any cultural institu- lated Communist party in the world's Negro must identify himself with the tion to be destroyed. Possibly others most powerful capitalist nation as it is new world order . . . Any struggle any- feel likewise and the CP will not be of Stalinism in power. able to accomplish its goal. where in the world for freedom is re- lated to the American Negro's struggle It all began with a love poem titled for human dignity. The fight in Africa, "Morning Departure" by Hershel Horn THE CRUSADER Cuba, South America and Asia is one which appeared in the July Mainstream. and the same fight." Mike Gold, Worker and People's World Evelyn Sell. a frequent contributor columnist, utilized this poem to launch to the International Socialist Review, a hatchet job on Mainstream for print- has been following The Crusader, a RANDOM NOTES ing "unintelligible, irrational, deathly small mimeographed newsletter pub- stuff, the metaphysics of an expiring lished weekly in Monroe, North Carolina, The Nation continues to be the most class." Mainstream, seeing in Gold's by Robert F. Williams. Evelyn sent us stimulating liberal periodical published attack an attack against the whole pub- the following comments on this inter- in this country. We read Ira Wolfert's" lication, printed in its October issue a esting publication along with some "Monster in the Mine" in the Jan. 2, stirring answer to Gold, "Hands Off the typical extracts from it: 1960 issue and the story still haunts us. Imagination" by John Condell. Condell "The past decade presented a bleak Here is a realistic, well-written, moving" attacks Gold's ruminations as being terrain to many American radicals and bit of fiction which makes abstract "nothing but a barrage of reactionary militants. During this same past dec- terms like "automation" breathe with infantile leftisms." (See "Clean Up That ade, however, the militancy of the life . . . The Winter 1960 issue of AnviZ Poetry" by L. P. Wheeler in the Jan- Southern Negroes stood out as an in- is no longer missing in action. The last uary 11, 1960 Militant for a good run- spiring and instructive exception to the issue of this sporadic annual was Win- ning commentary on the controversy. ) general rule of hesitancy and fear. ter 1959. Interestingly, this publication, It soon became clear that Gold's at- "The Cmsader is of particular value an unofficial organ of the Young Peo- tack was officially inspired by the CP, to those removed from the actual social ple's Socialist League, calls itself "a for suddenly the Worker opened its battlefields in the South who want to student socialist magazine." The cur- pages to the controversy and, through get a feel of what is going on in the rent issue does not contain a single the agency of Mike Newberry, "de- minds and lives of the front line com- article written by a student — or for fends" Mainstream only to open an batants. The thirty-five year old Wil- that matter anyone under 30. The only even more sinister attack, putting into liams brings to its pages the lessons socialist article in the magazine is "The. question the whole character of the taught him as a Negro born and bred Two Souls of Socialism" by Hal Draper, magazine and suggesting that it is a in the South, as a Marine, as a Detroit a rather good attack on the "socialism luxury today. It is clear that the CP, auto worker and as a president of a from on top" viewpoint, e.g., those who to the extent that it is able, is now local NAACP branch." run the party Draper belongs to . . . proceeding to deal with Mainstream as Here are some typical quotations Venture, a rather obscure publication of" they did with the Daily Worker — let it culled from several issues of the the Student League for Industrial Dem- die of financial strangulation (a process Crusader: ocracy (SLID) came across our desk which they helped organize) and then On U.S. ForeignPolicy: "We see by recently. It is put out by graduate stu- replace it with a completely tamed the papers that Red China has been dents who seem to be more preoccupied creature of their own. barr;d 'from the universal. respectable, with "fighting Communism" than even But the Gold-Mainstream controversy august body called the United Nations the State Department is. If you are in- ,brings to mind other memories: the They say exponents of the land of terestd in a junior New Leader this rebellion of the intellectuals — their de- M"a~k Parker and Emmett Till called is your meat. SPRING 1960 63 Build Your Library . — by Leon Trotsky by James P. Cannon Diary in Exile: 1935 4.00 The Death Agony of Capitalism The History of American The Third International After (Transitional Program) by Trotskyism (cloth) 2.75 Lenin (cloth) 4.00 Leon Trotsky .25 (paper) 2.00 (Paper) 2.50 The Suppressed Testament of The Struggle for a Proletarian The RevolutionBetrayed Lenin by Leon Trotsky .25 Party (cloth) 2.75 (cloth) 3.00 by The Kiro\. Assassination Leon Socialismon Trial .50 (paper) 2.00 Trotsky .25 America's Road to Socialism .35 First Five Years of the Com- The I.W.W. — The Great Antic- The Road to Peace .25 munist International ipationby James P. Cannon .25 Eugene V. Debs: The Socialist The I.W.W. — The Great Vol. 1 (cloth) 3.50 Anticipation .25 Vol. 2 (paper) 3.00 Movement of his time — Its Meaning for Today by James Eugene V. Debs (the Debs Cen- Stalin's Frame-Up System and P. 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