OscailtNational Self-Determination, Internationalism, and Libertarian SocialismOnce more on the subject of national liberation2017-11-11T02:20:39+08:00Anarkismoanarkismoeditors@lists.riseup.nethttp://www.anarkismo.net/atomfullposts?story_id=30659http://www.anarkismo.net/graphics/feedlogo.gifCuban anarchism & national liberationhttp://www.anarkismo.net/article/30659#comment166492017-11-11T02:20:39+08:00WayneThe following was sent to me by a Cuban-American radical, in response to my arti...The following was sent to me by a Cuban-American radical, in response to my article:<br />
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At the time of the Cuban war of independence (1895-1898) the Anarchist influenced Cuban tobacco workers in Tampa and Key West did not want to support it. It was José Martí who finally convinced them otherwise. In the process, Martí acquired a greater understanding of the "social question" as a result of his contact and discussion with those workers.<br />
agree with allhttp://www.anarkismo.net/article/30659#comment166502017-11-11T02:36:56+08:00mazen kamalmazI agree fully .. I think that class approach is a little ideological or even dog...I agree fully .. I think that class approach is a little ideological or even dogmatic one .. Of course , I don't think that prisons guarded by local or native guards will be any better that those guarded by any occupation army .. As Wayne told , North Korea and ISIS are the most "independent" states today , but North Korea is a paradise for the Kim's only not for any other "North Koreans" ... And we can argue whether black dictators were any better than white ones ... I always enjoyed the stuff that put both those living in Kremlin with those living in Moscow' slums or concentration camps , in "united one group" of people , one "class" ( in the case of Bolsheviks ) or one "nation" ( in the case of the Czar ) , etc .. Better not to have prisons and police at all than just changing the color or the nationality of those "guys" .. Salute , WayneCouncil Communists on National Liberationhttp://www.anarkismo.net/article/30659#comment166542017-11-15T20:45:25+08:00Victor OspreyExcellent summary Wayne. Council communists, for all their virtues, usually adop...Excellent summary Wayne. Council communists, for all their virtues, usually adopt a total rejection of support to national liberation struggles, and historically speaking, have probably been more consistent on that point that anarchists. Paul Mattick basically seemed to see these struggles as irrelevant (and fashionable to leftists he strongly disagreed with) because they could not objectively issue into socialism, and was happy to resort to a few Luxemburg quotes to prove his point. At least that's what I remember from a piece he wrote in the American Socialist, available online. Perhaps I'm being a little unfair. <br />
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While Luxemburg, Bukharin, Radek, Pyatakov, etc, and many others may have been more correct in the abstract from the point of view of achieving socialist ends in their opposition to national liberation, practically speaking, the results of this approach were dubious at best. To take one example - many Bolsheviks in Ukraine (including Pyatakov, who was from Ukraine but saw himself as politically and culturally Russian) essentially held Luxemburgist views. The consequences of denying the importance of Ukrainian national independence - putting aside the obvious military exigencies of the civil war, where ideology was not always the central factor - and in which Ukraine was a central battlefield - saw the Bolsheviks essentially view Ukraine in military terms. This was also partly a legacy of viewing Ukraine as 'Little Russia', viewing Ukrainian nationalism and the nationalist movement as being driven by just a few isolated intellectuals with no connection to the workers and peasants, Ukraine not being a 'real' nation, etc. Often, their Luxemburgism, even if sincere, looked more like the reassertion of Great Russian chauvinism. <br />
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They didn't properly address this issue, despite the initiatives of individual Bolsheviks on this question, really until the party that had been formed out of Ukrainian Left SRs - the Borotbist Party, which had genuine mass peasant support and had a vision of a kind of decentralised Soviet structure and village autonomy - was admitted into the Ukrainian Bolshevik Party in 1920 I believe. And the revolution was already on the retreat by then.