Thanks to Gabriel for articulating in such clear terms the difference between western/imperial/bourgeois Marxism and eastern/anti-imperial/proletarian Marxism and what’s at stake for the world.
@@buck13horn See? You use this distinction to place yourself in a position where its either rolling with the program or being a bad person. To you contradiction is an extrinsic relation between two positions that are identical to themselves and hence demonized/idealized - but dialectics is about recognizing contradiction as *internal*. That it what distinguishes it from worldview-dogmaticism.
FYI, if anyone's interested -- the image in the thumbnail, from the cover of Losurdo's book, is entitled 'Gods of the Modern World,' a panel from the mural 'Epic of American Civilization,' painted by Jose´ Clemente Orozco, 1932-34, in the campus library at Dartmouth College.
Great discussion. I'm in PSL here in the US, and mostly just think it's important to be active somehow. The party has excellent orientations and of course, nobody's perfect but I'm happy to at least be fighting the fight in some way and gaining organizational experience 🙂 thanks for all the work you do, I plan to get the book soon!
Completely agree with this attitude. Most western socialist orgs suck (including the PSL, DSA, IMT, etc) but we need organizational experience. The next generation of socialist orgs will hopefully be better than the garbage we’re presented with today, but we’ll definitely need organizers to make it happen
How do you evaluate what Caleb Maupin is doing, or Alexander Mckay in the UK. I am a senior journalist from India. I follow you avidly. I am thankful to you for introducing Lusourdo and Parenti. I have started reading them.
I don't know McKay, but many of us see figures like Maupin as a part of the trend associated with Lyndon Larouche -- ie white nationalism, eurocentrism, chauvinism and conspiracy theories that eclectically co-opt marxist language.
Politically, both re good. But also, both have real flaws. Caleb is an abuser and has done shitty things with org funds. And Alexander is a TERF, as are most people in CPGB-ML, because none of them ever looked into gender and such, and thus have no analysis beyond 'man in a dress.' Their material analysis is lacking.
Can't speak on McKay as I do not know his work. Regarding Maupin, it's pretty well documented he is an opportunist of the likes Rockhill alludes to. He's more aligned, even to a monetary extent, to a Duganist/4th position politics which is also the underlining "maga communist" ideology. So really nothing to do with Marxism in a practical sense.
@@kyledrumsthere is no “maga communist ideology”. It was a meme designed to kick start conversations about what a truly sovereign America might look like, liberated from Wall Street. What you describe as “Duganism/4th position” is already a conflation as far as Maupin (who has his personal faults to be sure) and the ACP are concerned. Both are trying to situate 21st century communism in the context of a multipolar world. I really can’t be done with sectarian gatekeepers. If you can name a single issue of substance you disagree with them on-specifically with regards to their positions on imperialism-then name it. Otherwise save it.
Speaking of Verso-their translations of Losurdo are unreadable. I ended up being thankful that they refused to translate Losurdo’s Stalin book because the amateur version on the internet I found was very lucid. I honestly wouldn’t put it past Sebastian Budgen et al of intentionally sabotaging Losurdo
Soviet Union was economically, politically under imperialist siege. The same western imperialist countries, starting from end of 1980s and after transferred their investements, industrial capitals, technologies to China. Actually China, right after the culture revolution had adopted a mixed model under state control, which was not socialist but also not capitalist like in the West. Like many third world countries at that period of time. As a matter of fact, China began to defend a Third Worldist ideology and political position. Let's not forget that Deng Xiaoping was accused and liquidated as a "capitalist roader" at the beginning of the Cultural Revolution. He was rehabilitated at the end of the Cultural Revolution. He was appointed to leadership first de facto and then de jure as well. Under the conditions imposed by the Cold War, the Soviet Union did not give up its socialist claims, despite its opportunist and revisionist approach. Wheras China has practically abandoned these claims. China's "Mao Zedong Thought", like the later thoughts of Deng Xiaoping and Zyang Zemin, provided it with theoretical and therefore practical flexibility from the very beginning. That's why Kosygin in Soviet Union could not become a Deng Xiaoping. However, the Soviet experience is the first and only experience of socialism. What is socialist in China today? China has a generalized, systemic commodity economy. In the political superstructure, there is a communist party management, including billionaire members, that claims to lead the country to socialism. The simplest definition of capitalism is a generalized commodity economy. The first volume of Capital therefore begins with the analysis of the "commodity". Yes, in the transition period of socialism, partial commodity economy practices such as NEP can be used. Lenin clearly said that this was capitalism and that a transition period that would not last long was necessary for the construction of socialism. However, China states that the program carried out in the country under the control of the Chinese Communist Party is a "socialist market economy". This is an oxymoron for purely ideological purposes. Today's practice is not "socialism with Chinese characteristics", but "capitalism with Chinese characteristics". The party's ideological distortion in question can be seen as a sign that this practice is not temporary, but will be permanent. A state-controlled market economy operates and seems likely to continue to operate. We cannot make decisions about China based on wishes. We have to be empirical without being empiricist. In this respect, claiming that today's China is more advanced and successful in terms of socialism practice than the Soviet Union is, first of all, unfair to the Soviet Union. One last note: When Ludo Martens made the restorationist assessment of the USSR during the Khrushchev era and its aftermath, and the counter-revolutionary assessment of the Gorbachev era he was correct. What was wrong on his part was that, as far as I know, he had not shown the same sharpness of vision when it comes to China. His blind Maoist support has eroded his Marxist-Leninist credibility. If he were alive today, he would probably claim, like many others, that China is socialist. I think it's legitimate for me to think that way.
I wrote a book in 1977 about accumulation and crisis on Marx in Lima Peru enhancing Paul Mattick. I 'd like to join your sessions. It includes a David Yaffe text. I’ve been in labor unions consultancy and journaalism.
How is China communist (or socialist) in anything but the name of its ruling party? Earlier it was arguably an actual existing deformed worker's state. However, China has seen capitalist restoration given rise to a more state interventionist brand of bourgeois rule. Defending the limited democracy in HK and wanting to expand is a fully legitimate position from a Marxist standpoint. However, the weakness of the left and the organized working class resulted in a form of protest which had little chance of success and was conducive to capture by right-wing nativist elements with illusions in Western imperialism and in some cases directly instrumentalized by the latter.
Curious, has Professor Rockhill put out any responses to the criticisms leveled against him -- and on Zizek's behalf -- by Zero Books (Douglas Lain) and the Platypus Affiliated Society?
Douglas Lain and Chris Cutrone are the fish swimming in the water of Western Marxism. Their criticism reveals a failure to grasp the type of analysis presented here.
What have they said, other than continuing to illustrate the obvious fact that they are petty-bourgeois reactionaries working dutifully for the liberal propaganda industry. "Stalin bad" etc? I can't find anything from them other than the same old eurocommunist nonsense. Did you have a specific article or interview in mind?
I would like to see a response as well...I have followed the zero book/Zizekian readings for years and have always felt dissatisfied, almost felt dumb for not understanding the seemingly convoluted lines of thought and analyses ...thanks to Prof. Rockhill can now see through it all ..their analyses are deliberately convoluted ... Feels like a weight off my shoulders ...I am a professor of pure mathematics at a western University ... So I don't shy away from complex ideas...
I used to listen to Lain's UA-cam podcast since I knew little of the Frankfurt School. The more I listened, the more I realized it all seemed mental masturbation that in essence not only eschewed Marxism, it seemed completely an attempt to demobolilize any movement for organizing change. Lain and his guru Chris Cutrone, who unabashedly grins as Lain describes him as a genius and the Last Marxist, talk and talk and talk in gibberish thst is far from the field of clear thinking that Rockhill produces. I truly think they believe Marxism Is a failure and has no possibility of occurring in the world of "Capitalist Realism." I scratch my head wondering why each calls himself a Marxist. The last time I peaked in they spoke about the upcoming presidential election and had not one coherent piece of worthwhile analysis. I really don't know what their game us, unless it is meant to fracture the Left by misleading people who are seeking info on Marxism. It seems their obsession with Adorno and the Frankfurt School is doing what that school intended. To defang Marxism. I think they did a show talking about Gabriel, so their critique might be evidence of their disdain for truth that Rockhill speaks in this video.
However, Prof. Rockhill, even left - marxist figures favored by anarchist and libertarian socialist thinkers in the 20th century, for eg Karl Kosch who is quite popular with the left libertarians , also called themselves, in fact weren't they the first to call themselves 'western communists'... The decline of this 'anarchistic ' kind of western marxism caused I speculate by the imperial - capitalist 'theory' industry and making it bedfellows with post modernism is the real tragedy, and is quite another story vis a vis the the origins of its birth and early years
@@Somereasonstolive Sure. I'm speaking about what I have learnt from Noam Chomsky 's ideas. He too is critical of Eastern communism but not as a western communist but as an anarcho - syndacalist and libertarian socialist . Rockhill always portrays the major split in socialist movement as one between Eastern anti imperial socialism and western marxism which veered towards social democratism . He isn't wrong about this either. HOWEVER, there is another major split, the anti authoritarian faction of which too was anti stalinist that Rockhill never mentions. This was a split between socialism from above (Soviet Socialism or Marxist Leninism) and SOCIALISM FROM BELOW (Left communists, anarchists, council communists, democratic socialists - - - Pannekoek, Luxemburg, Kropotkin, Trotsky, BAKUNIN +++) These were the Norodniks in Russia. They lost out to Bolshevism. Chomsky, Finkelstein, Zinn, Goldman are descendants of these anti authoritarian socialists who were not cultural marxists of the kind of western communists of Frankfurt school. They were deeply invested in class and anti imperial struggles. This group included Karl Marx too. They wanted a real democracy, economic democracy, workers 'democracy, not state socialism. They perceived Soviet Union and Lenin to be a right wing deviation, bourgeois opportunism, betrayal of communist ideals but they lost to Bolshevism so nobody remembers them. My point was that a lot of the criticisms made by socialist ANARCHISTS about the state socialism of soviet Russia is similar to what the more anarchistic western communists have said BUT with the rise of critical theory and French post modernism, which is said to have been facilitated by US govt as a Non communist left, western marxism of this earlier kind increasingly became superstructural marxism like French Marxism of Althusser which is quite comfortable with western bourgeois democracy, just like Foucaultian post modernism etc
I believe Western Marxism to be a misnomer as 'western' or 'cultural' marxism is inherently irrational and therefore cannot be Marxism which always follows rational precepts. A classic example occurred in Western Australia during WW2. The WA State Government cl;aimed to be socialist, yet when the indigenous Australian population of WA's cattle stations took industrial action in order to sort out their employment conditions which were akin to slavery with payment in miserable doles of flour & sugar for compulsory work. The stations had been established on the traditional lands of Indigenous Australians who had to work lest they be evicted from the property. Whitefella station employees were paid wages but indigenous employees were not. The so-called socialist Labour Government provided troops to support the station owners clearing their stations of employees. These Indigenous Australians were shifted to an near desert, the Pilbara where they remained until the late 1940's after which Laing Hancock prospected massive amounts of iron ore in the Pilbara. The former traditional landopwners were uplifted and moved once more destroying clan structures that had been established for thousands of years. The so-called socialist of the government maintained that socialism was only for whitefellas. What better example of the irrationality & hypocrisy of western marxism could there be?
Didn't anarchists later on during the second world war have to oppose the same imperial and war participation by soviet "socialists"? We cannnot deny the right wing deviation of soviet socialism either
Completely missing the fact that the fascist wermacht was at the red army’s front porch.. read on siege socialism to understand this more. Maybe your eyes will open.
Great lecture, but I really don't buy the argument for the invasion of Ukraine by Russia at 2:01:50. Even though I definetely get that US, NATO & allies have a significant part of the blame for the war, there's a few things I don't get. 1. I don't know if the "genocide of Russians in east Ukraine" is true, but even if it is, the 14 000 figure (20s after 2:05:41) is small in comparison to the total death toll of the war already, which seems to be anything from 100 000 to multiple hundreds of thousands total. 2. Also I don't think the criticism of a country's totalitarianism is really warranted when it's actively being invaded. Before the invasion, sure, I have heard that Ukraine was kinda totalitarian, (and coup'd by the US) but an invasion is going to make that part way worse just because effective defence requires "totalitarian" means, as all of us socialists should know. I don't think either of these is a serious reason for the war.
You make fair points. He could have better clarified what conclusion his evidence was meant to support. I think if you go back and listen again, you can see that he is not justifying the war itself, but rather assuring that, as marxists, we recognize that the impetus for the war comes from the western imperialist bloc, not Russia. That Russia would not be invading Ukraine if they were not first threatened by the NATO implementation of fascism in the nation's political system, which is explicitly Rusophobic (a la 2014 massacres) and pining for NATO membership/militarization. He did specify that one should criticize Russia, its capitalism, its bourgois national development project, and that there were motives beyond opposition to fascism (Russia obv does not care about totalitarianism, it's just PR). Not that Russia is doing anything good by invading Ukraine. Just that the west is ultimately the one who started this from behind the scenes. And that is an important distinction to make - in the long struggle for socialism, conflicts between capitalist nations need to be properly understood, lest we misjudge the operative dynamics in a given situation and bunk our entire analysis. The common ground bottom line is that the working people of Ukraine are being sacrificed to Russia by the west, whereas they may have otherwise developed "normal" relations. I say may have. I'm unsure of the extent to which Rusophobia has simmered in Ukraine, or for how long. These pieces may have been set in place since the end of ww2. Operation Gladio did pull heavily from Ukraine, after all. And the Soviets were menaced by the Ukrainian fascists since the USSR's inception.
This guy sounds good until someone speaks about anything he might consider "woke" then all of the sudden he's obviously got a chip on his shoulder. Pan-Africanism is about organizing African leaders nations and organizations to work together towards common interests without being defined or limited by the borders of drawn by colonialists. It's about forming a more unified cohesive and developed Africa that can resist being exploited by by imperialist nations (the US and Europe in particular) It isn't about African Chauvinism, most Pan-Africanists stand in Solidarity with South American liberation struggles and are favorable towards mutual development and belt and road projects with China. Most panafricanist leaders are openly socialists and speak about the importance of socialism and solidarity whenever they give speeches.
@@AnotherChampagneSocialist You have an incredibly uncharitable reading of his response. Within the first 5 seconds of talking he identifies there are two currents in pan-Africanism and that one is reactionary and one is genuinely proletarian.
@@阳明子 I think the first current he describes is extremely rare to the point that it is mostly a caricature that exists in the imaginations of reactionary Americans and Europeans, and that the tangent is more indicative of his hang ups about social justice than it is about panafricanism.
@kyledrums Does Adolph Reed say that, "Racism is not a useful measure of anything in American society", in his written work? (Even, as now Trump racistly disparages mostly _legal_ Hatian immigrants in Ohio.) Does Adolph poohoo & disparage the term "intersectionality" in his written work? Does Adolph use his terribly sxist phrase, "the wet panty people", in his written work, as he does in some of his YT-posted interviews? If so I won't bother. I already had a long email debate with Adolph years ago that I still retain a copy of his stupid convoluted _typewritten_ arguments. If Gabriel has someplace for me to post that online l will. I think that Adolph is popular among many whyte "Marxists", or the _extremely few_ fairytale POC "Marxists" who are hoodwinked into denial, because he tells them what they want to hear!...: 'Yeah you can forget about race...; it doesn't matter...; it's only fiction...; anyone, especially, Black talking about race is only engaged in "parochially divisive identity politics"...; & like whyte right-wingers say, "if we just stop talking about race, it will go away"...; it's really only about class!' I.e.: _Class_ essentialists. The fact that Oppression always creates, or cultivates, or allows a certain intermediary, managerial, or *comprador* class of POC (like yet another colonial example like the Euro-Western institutions' generally well-paid, elite & repressive Palestinian Authority as Israel's security subcontractors) to control, or mollify (allow a certain statistically "successful examples" of), the oppressed, does not deny that it can be class _and_ certainly race. Indeed race has historically & typically been used -- by the _capitalists_ -- to *divide* class. But many whyte leftists, especially many whyte "Marxists", can't hold more than 1 idea/concept in their head at the same time.
Par for the course for PSL member Gabriel Rockhill and member of its Liberation School Editorial Collective. That is the Party for Socialism and Liberation, one of the two custodial groups that preserve the Sam Marcy variant of Trotskyite splinters. . A typical multipolarista, G.R. praises BRICS as if it were anti-imperialist. He can only see U.S. and Western monopoly capitalism, not the monopoly capitalist expansionism - imperialist, if you will - of China. . For fundamental political-economic analysis OF THE U.S., see The Hollow Colossus.
Let me guess - you base your opinion of China on Western media 😂 Just last year statefunded US media --VOA - had to admit the reports of what China is doing in Africa are not actually reports, but blatant propaganda. It's on their website, everyone can see it 🤷♂️
See the article China Plunders Congo, Exploits Miners - 'Anti-imperialists' Approve by Charles Andrews. No VOA , just ordinary business reports. Try going straight to facts instead of tilting against propaganda outlets.
How is China imperialist? And lets say China is imperialist, for the sake of the argument, why is this bad? While China is mainly unaligned, a multipolar world is generally a good thing for socialism. It gives emerging socialist countries allies and "enemy-of-my-enemy" trading partners to keep their populations from starvation. China is a massive power that I personally believe is the biggest bulwark against the threat of complete Western monopoly over the world. The fact is that "Chinese imperialism" is 9/10 times mutually beneficial and far better than US imperialism. Developing the 3rd world and creating a bloc opposed to the West is a generally a good thing.
Gee, Gabriel, I wish that Adolph Reed ever _did_ give answers as sophisticated as yours, but Adolph Reed only gives _boring_ , _rambling_ , _convoluted_ , _pseudo-intellectual_ , & often _infantile_ theories &, especially, "answers". Gabriel you are farrr more intellectually sophisticated than Adolph Reed, so please stop associating yourself with him & claiming that he said what you said. He _didn't_ -- & _hasn't_ . My one particular disagreement with your otherwise excellent answer, Gabriel, is that you &, of _course_ , Adolph Reed use the *_right-wing hijacked_* & *_weaponized_* so-called 'definition' of "identity politics", but not the _original_ , 1977 Combahee River Collective Statement definition of the term. Adolph also, of _course_ , infantilely poohoos the CRC creation of the term "intersectionality".
To defend Reed a bit, personally I find Reed's best medium is his written work and it's rather clear and coherent. But I can understand the perspective you shared when he's speaking publicly. Not everyone is the best at public speaking off the top of their head.
@@kyledrumsDoes Adolph Reed say that, "Racism is not a useful measure of anything in American society", in his written work? (Even, as now Trump racistly disparages mostly _legal_ Hatian immigrants in Ohio.) Does Adolph poohoo & disparage the term "intersectionality" in his written work? Does Adolph use his terribly sxist phrase, "the wet panty people", in his written work, as he does in some of his YT-posted interviews? If so I won't bother. I already had a long email debate with Adolph years ago that I still retain a copy of his stupid convoluted _typewritten_ arguments. If Gabriel has someplace for me to post that online l will. I think that Adolph is popular among many whyte "Marxists", or the _extremely few_ fairytale POC "Marxists" who are hoodwinked into denial, because he tells them what they want to hear!...: 'Yeah you can forget about race...; it doesn't matter...; it's only fiction...; anyone, especially, Black talking about race is only engaged in "parochially divisive identity politics"...; & like whyte right-wingers say, "if we just stop talking about race, it will go away"...; it's really only about class!' I.e.: _Class_ essentialists. The fact that Oppression always creates, or cultivates, or allows a certain intermediary, managerial, or *comprador* class of POC (like yet another colonial example like the Euro-Western institutions' generally well-paid, elite & repressive Palestinian Authority as Israel's security subcontractors) to control, or mollify (allow a certain statistically "successful examples" of), the oppressed, does not deny that it can be class _and_ certainly race. Indeed race has historically & typically been used -- by the _capitalists_ -- to *divide* class. But many whyte leftists, especially many whyte "Marxists", can't hold more than 1 idea/concept in their head at the same time.
Thanks to Gabriel for articulating in such clear terms the difference between western/imperial/bourgeois Marxism and eastern/anti-imperial/proletarian Marxism and what’s at stake for the world.
Almost like a safe and sound, dogmatic worldview, right?
@@PoetOfNoise Safe and sound for whom? Dogmatic about what?
@@buck13horn Safe and sound for those who'd like to know who the good and who the bad guys are and how to save the world apparently.
@@PoetOfNoise Better to not understand and oppose western imperialism and to not try to make the world a more livable place?
@@buck13horn See? You use this distinction to place yourself in a position where its either rolling with the program or being a bad person.
To you contradiction is an extrinsic relation between two positions that are identical to themselves and hence demonized/idealized - but dialectics is about recognizing contradiction as *internal*. That it what distinguishes it from worldview-dogmaticism.
Awesome to have Gabriel lucidly discussing an important subject with inspiration.
FYI, if anyone's interested -- the image in the thumbnail, from the cover of Losurdo's book, is entitled 'Gods of the Modern World,' a panel from the mural 'Epic of American Civilization,' painted by Jose´ Clemente Orozco, 1932-34, in the campus library at Dartmouth College.
Thank you! I really wanted to know.
Gabriel is always truly appreciated! 💥🔥👍
Absolutely essential analysis, explains so many contradictions and distortions, great
Great discussion. I'm in PSL here in the US, and mostly just think it's important to be active somehow. The party has excellent orientations and of course, nobody's perfect but I'm happy to at least be fighting the fight in some way and gaining organizational experience 🙂 thanks for all the work you do, I plan to get the book soon!
Completely agree with this attitude. Most western socialist orgs suck (including the PSL, DSA, IMT, etc) but we need organizational experience. The next generation of socialist orgs will hopefully be better than the garbage we’re presented with today, but we’ll definitely need organizers to make it happen
Thankyou so much for your explanation prof Gabriel, thankyou so much,⭐
How do you evaluate what Caleb Maupin is doing, or Alexander Mckay in the UK. I am a senior journalist from India. I follow you avidly. I am thankful to you for introducing Lusourdo and Parenti. I have started reading them.
I don't know McKay, but many of us see figures like Maupin as a part of the trend associated with Lyndon Larouche -- ie white nationalism, eurocentrism, chauvinism and conspiracy theories that eclectically co-opt marxist language.
Politically, both re good.
But also, both have real flaws.
Caleb is an abuser and has done shitty things with org funds.
And Alexander is a TERF, as are most people in CPGB-ML, because none of them ever looked into gender and such, and thus have no analysis beyond 'man in a dress.'
Their material analysis is lacking.
Can't speak on McKay as I do not know his work. Regarding Maupin, it's pretty well documented he is an opportunist of the likes Rockhill alludes to. He's more aligned, even to a monetary extent, to a Duganist/4th position politics which is also the underlining "maga communist" ideology. So really nothing to do with Marxism in a practical sense.
Alexander McKay is brilliant.
@@kyledrumsthere is no “maga communist ideology”. It was a meme designed to kick start conversations about what a truly sovereign America might look like, liberated from Wall Street. What you describe as “Duganism/4th position” is already a conflation as far as Maupin (who has his personal faults to be sure) and the ACP are concerned. Both are trying to situate 21st century communism in the context of a multipolar world. I really can’t be done with sectarian gatekeepers. If you can name a single issue of substance you disagree with them on-specifically with regards to their positions on imperialism-then name it. Otherwise save it.
rockhill is great because he speaks with so much clarity
This is a timely analysis.
Gabriel is awesome, the lagged captions not so much. They inhibit watching the video but minimizing the window and its a fantastic event.
incredible as always
Speaking of Verso-their translations of Losurdo are unreadable. I ended up being thankful that they refused to translate Losurdo’s Stalin book because the amateur version on the internet I found was very lucid. I honestly wouldn’t put it past Sebastian Budgen et al of intentionally sabotaging Losurdo
How about Freedom Road?
Soviet Union was economically, politically under imperialist siege. The same western imperialist countries, starting from end of 1980s and after transferred their investements, industrial capitals, technologies to China.
Actually China, right after the culture revolution had adopted a mixed model under state control, which was not socialist but also not capitalist like in the West. Like many third world countries at that period of time. As a matter of fact, China began to defend a Third Worldist ideology and political position.
Let's not forget that Deng Xiaoping was accused and liquidated as a "capitalist roader" at the beginning of the Cultural Revolution. He was rehabilitated at the end of the Cultural Revolution. He was appointed to leadership first de facto and then de jure as well.
Under the conditions imposed by the Cold War, the Soviet Union did not give up its socialist claims, despite its opportunist and revisionist approach. Wheras China has practically abandoned these claims. China's "Mao Zedong Thought", like the later thoughts of Deng Xiaoping and Zyang Zemin, provided it with theoretical and therefore practical flexibility from the very beginning. That's why Kosygin in Soviet Union could not become a Deng Xiaoping.
However, the Soviet experience is the first and only experience of socialism. What is socialist in China today? China has a generalized, systemic commodity economy. In the political superstructure, there is a communist party management, including billionaire members, that claims to lead the country to socialism.
The simplest definition of capitalism is a generalized commodity economy. The first volume of Capital therefore begins with the analysis of the "commodity". Yes, in the transition period of socialism, partial commodity economy practices such as NEP can be used. Lenin clearly said that this was capitalism and that a transition period that would not last long was necessary for the construction of socialism.
However, China states that the program carried out in the country under the control of the Chinese Communist Party is a "socialist market economy". This is an oxymoron for purely ideological purposes. Today's practice is not "socialism with Chinese characteristics", but "capitalism with Chinese characteristics". The party's ideological distortion in question can be seen as a sign that this practice is not temporary, but will be permanent. A state-controlled market economy operates and seems likely to continue to operate. We cannot make decisions about China based on wishes. We have to be empirical without being empiricist.
In this respect, claiming that today's China is more advanced and successful in terms of socialism practice than the Soviet Union is, first of all, unfair to the Soviet Union.
One last note: When Ludo Martens made the restorationist assessment of the USSR during the Khrushchev era and its aftermath, and the counter-revolutionary assessment of the Gorbachev era he was correct. What was wrong on his part was that, as far as I know, he had not shown the same sharpness of vision when it comes to China. His blind Maoist support has eroded his Marxist-Leninist credibility. If he were alive today, he would probably claim, like many others, that China is socialist. I think it's legitimate for me to think that way.
I wrote a book in 1977 about accumulation and crisis on Marx in Lima Peru enhancing Paul Mattick. I 'd like to join your sessions. It includes a David Yaffe text. I’ve been in labor unions consultancy and journaalism.
Excellent analysis
How is China communist (or socialist) in anything but the name of its ruling party?
Earlier it was arguably an actual existing deformed worker's state. However, China has seen capitalist restoration given rise to a more state interventionist brand of bourgeois rule.
Defending the limited democracy in HK and wanting to expand is a fully legitimate position from a Marxist standpoint. However, the weakness of the left and the organized working class resulted in a form of protest which had little chance of success and was conducive to capture by right-wing nativist elements with illusions in Western imperialism and in some cases directly instrumentalized by the latter.
Curious, has Professor Rockhill put out any responses to the criticisms leveled against him -- and on Zizek's behalf -- by Zero Books (Douglas Lain) and the Platypus Affiliated Society?
Douglas Lain and Chris Cutrone are the fish swimming in the water of Western Marxism. Their criticism reveals a failure to grasp the type of analysis presented here.
What have they said, other than continuing to illustrate the obvious fact that they are petty-bourgeois reactionaries working dutifully for the liberal propaganda industry. "Stalin bad" etc? I can't find anything from them other than the same old eurocommunist nonsense. Did you have a specific article or interview in mind?
I would like to see a response as well...I have followed the zero book/Zizekian readings for years and have always felt dissatisfied, almost felt dumb for not understanding the seemingly convoluted lines of thought and analyses ...thanks to Prof. Rockhill can now see through it all ..their analyses are deliberately convoluted ... Feels like a weight off my shoulders ...I am a professor of pure mathematics at a western University ... So I don't shy away from complex ideas...
I used to listen to Lain's UA-cam podcast since I knew little of the Frankfurt School. The more I listened, the more I realized it all seemed mental masturbation that in essence not only eschewed Marxism, it seemed completely an attempt to demobolilize any movement for organizing change. Lain and his guru Chris Cutrone, who unabashedly grins as Lain describes him as a genius and the Last Marxist, talk and talk and talk in gibberish thst is far from the field of clear thinking that Rockhill produces. I truly think they believe Marxism Is a failure and has no possibility of occurring in the world of "Capitalist Realism." I scratch my head wondering why each calls himself a Marxist. The last time I peaked in they spoke about the upcoming presidential election and had not one coherent piece of worthwhile analysis. I really don't know what their game us, unless it is meant to fracture the Left by misleading people who are seeking info on Marxism. It seems their obsession with Adorno and the Frankfurt School is doing what that school intended. To defang Marxism. I think they did a show talking about Gabriel, so their critique might be evidence of their disdain for truth that Rockhill speaks in this video.
Oh wow, I haven't seen those. I'll have to check them out!
WE ARE THE PEOPLE OF EARTH
🌏🌎🌍✊
However, Prof. Rockhill, even left - marxist figures favored by anarchist and libertarian socialist thinkers in the 20th century, for eg Karl Kosch who is quite popular with the left libertarians , also called themselves, in fact weren't they the first to call themselves 'western communists'...
The decline of this 'anarchistic ' kind of western marxism caused I speculate by the imperial - capitalist 'theory' industry and making it bedfellows with post modernism is the real tragedy, and is quite another story vis a vis the the origins of its birth and early years
could u elaborate more on ur idea?
@@Somereasonstolive Sure. I'm speaking about what I have learnt from Noam Chomsky 's ideas. He too is critical of Eastern communism but not as a western communist but as an anarcho - syndacalist and libertarian socialist . Rockhill always portrays the major split in socialist movement as one between Eastern anti imperial socialism and western marxism which veered towards social democratism . He isn't wrong about this either. HOWEVER, there is another major split, the anti authoritarian faction of which too was anti stalinist that Rockhill never mentions.
This was a split between socialism from above (Soviet Socialism or Marxist Leninism) and SOCIALISM FROM BELOW (Left communists, anarchists, council communists, democratic socialists - - - Pannekoek, Luxemburg, Kropotkin, Trotsky, BAKUNIN +++) These were the Norodniks in Russia. They lost out to Bolshevism. Chomsky, Finkelstein, Zinn, Goldman are descendants of these anti authoritarian socialists who were not cultural marxists of the kind of western communists of Frankfurt school. They were deeply invested in class and anti imperial struggles.
This group included Karl Marx too. They wanted a real democracy, economic democracy, workers 'democracy, not state socialism.
They perceived Soviet Union and Lenin to be a right wing deviation, bourgeois opportunism, betrayal of communist ideals but they lost to Bolshevism so nobody remembers them.
My point was that a lot of the criticisms made by socialist ANARCHISTS about the state socialism of soviet Russia is similar to what the more anarchistic western communists have said BUT with the rise of critical theory and French post modernism, which is said to have been facilitated by US govt as a Non communist left, western marxism of this earlier kind increasingly became superstructural marxism like French Marxism of Althusser which is quite comfortable with western bourgeois democracy, just like Foucaultian post modernism etc
And why would anyone want that.
I believe Western Marxism to be a misnomer as 'western' or 'cultural' marxism is inherently irrational and therefore cannot be Marxism which always follows rational precepts.
A classic example occurred in Western Australia during WW2. The WA State Government cl;aimed to be socialist, yet when the indigenous Australian population of WA's cattle stations took industrial action in order to sort out their employment conditions which were akin to slavery with payment in miserable doles of flour & sugar for compulsory work. The stations had been established on the traditional lands of Indigenous Australians who had to work lest they be evicted from the property. Whitefella station employees were paid wages but indigenous employees were not.
The so-called socialist Labour Government provided troops to support the station owners clearing their stations of employees. These Indigenous Australians were shifted to an near desert, the Pilbara where they remained until the late 1940's after which Laing Hancock prospected massive amounts of iron ore in the Pilbara. The former traditional landopwners were uplifted and moved once more destroying clan structures that had been established for thousands of years.
The so-called socialist of the government maintained that socialism was only for whitefellas.
What better example of the irrationality & hypocrisy of western marxism could there be?
settler colonial "socialism" is just fascism
What about the Black Alliance for Peace
❤️
Didn't anarchists later on during the second world war have to oppose the same imperial and war participation by soviet "socialists"? We cannnot deny the right wing deviation of soviet socialism either
Completely missing the fact that the fascist wermacht was at the red army’s front porch.. read on siege socialism to understand this more. Maybe your eyes will open.
Great lecture, but I really don't buy the argument for the invasion of Ukraine by Russia at 2:01:50. Even though I definetely get that US, NATO & allies have a significant part of the blame for the war, there's a few things I don't get.
1. I don't know if the "genocide of Russians in east Ukraine" is true, but even if it is, the 14 000 figure (20s after 2:05:41) is small in comparison to the total death toll of the war already, which seems to be anything from 100 000 to multiple hundreds of thousands total.
2. Also I don't think the criticism of a country's totalitarianism is really warranted when it's actively being invaded. Before the invasion, sure, I have heard that Ukraine was kinda totalitarian, (and coup'd by the US) but an invasion is going to make that part way worse just because effective defence requires "totalitarian" means, as all of us socialists should know.
I don't think either of these is a serious reason for the war.
You make fair points.
He could have better clarified what conclusion his evidence was meant to support.
I think if you go back and listen again, you can see that he is not justifying the war itself, but rather assuring that, as marxists, we recognize that the impetus for the war comes from the western imperialist bloc, not Russia.
That Russia would not be invading Ukraine if they were not first threatened by the NATO implementation of fascism in the nation's political system, which is explicitly Rusophobic (a la 2014 massacres) and pining for NATO membership/militarization.
He did specify that one should criticize Russia, its capitalism, its bourgois national development project, and that there were motives beyond opposition to fascism (Russia obv does not care about totalitarianism, it's just PR).
Not that Russia is doing anything good by invading Ukraine. Just that the west is ultimately the one who started this from behind the scenes.
And that is an important distinction to make - in the long struggle for socialism, conflicts between capitalist nations need to be properly understood, lest we misjudge the operative dynamics in a given situation and bunk our entire analysis.
The common ground bottom line is that the working people of Ukraine are being sacrificed to Russia by the west, whereas they may have otherwise developed "normal" relations.
I say may have. I'm unsure of the extent to which Rusophobia has simmered in Ukraine, or for how long. These pieces may have been set in place since the end of ww2.
Operation Gladio did pull heavily from Ukraine, after all. And the Soviets were menaced by the Ukrainian fascists since the USSR's inception.
This guy sounds good until someone speaks about anything he might consider "woke" then all of the sudden he's obviously got a chip on his shoulder. Pan-Africanism is about organizing African leaders nations and organizations to work together towards common interests without being defined or limited by the borders of drawn by colonialists. It's about forming a more unified cohesive and developed Africa that can resist being exploited by by imperialist nations (the US and Europe in particular)
It isn't about African Chauvinism, most Pan-Africanists stand in Solidarity with South American liberation struggles and are favorable towards mutual development and belt and road projects with China. Most panafricanist leaders are openly socialists and speak about the importance of socialism and solidarity whenever they give speeches.
Dr. Rockhill identified two strains of Pan-Africanism one he critiqued and one he supported. You may have missed his full answer at 1:54:46
@@阳明子 He started out with a reactionary response then settled into a more rational one afterwards.
@@AnotherChampagneSocialist You have an incredibly uncharitable reading of his response. Within the first 5 seconds of talking he identifies there are two currents in pan-Africanism and that one is reactionary and one is genuinely proletarian.
@@阳明子 I think the first current he describes is extremely rare to the point that it is mostly a caricature that exists in the imaginations of reactionary Americans and Europeans, and that the tangent is more indicative of his hang ups about social justice than it is about panafricanism.
@@AnotherChampagneSocialist It's a historical tendency popular in academic circles and mutated into forms like afropessimism.
Robinson Lisa Martin Jennifer Young William
@kyledrums Does Adolph Reed say that, "Racism is not a useful measure of anything in American society", in his written work? (Even, as now Trump racistly disparages mostly _legal_ Hatian immigrants in Ohio.) Does Adolph poohoo & disparage the term "intersectionality" in his written work? Does Adolph use his terribly sxist phrase, "the wet panty people", in his written work, as he does in some of his YT-posted interviews? If so I won't bother.
I already had a long email debate with Adolph years ago that I still retain a copy of his stupid convoluted _typewritten_ arguments. If Gabriel has someplace for me to post that online l will.
I think that Adolph is popular among many whyte "Marxists", or the _extremely few_ fairytale POC "Marxists" who are hoodwinked into denial, because he tells them what they want to hear!...: 'Yeah you can forget about race...; it doesn't matter...; it's only fiction...; anyone, especially, Black talking about race is only engaged in "parochially divisive identity politics"...; & like whyte right-wingers say, "if we just stop talking about race, it will go away"...; it's really only about class!' I.e.: _Class_ essentialists.
The fact that Oppression always creates, or cultivates, or allows a certain intermediary, managerial, or *comprador* class of POC (like yet another colonial example like the Euro-Western institutions' generally well-paid, elite & repressive Palestinian Authority as Israel's security subcontractors) to control, or mollify (allow a certain statistically "successful examples" of), the oppressed, does not deny that it can be class _and_ certainly race.
Indeed race has historically & typically been used -- by the _capitalists_ -- to *divide* class. But many whyte leftists, especially many whyte "Marxists", can't hold more than 1 idea/concept in their head at the same time.
Par for the course for PSL member Gabriel Rockhill and member of its Liberation School Editorial Collective. That is the Party for Socialism and Liberation, one of the two custodial groups that preserve the Sam Marcy variant of Trotskyite splinters.
. A typical multipolarista, G.R. praises BRICS as if it were anti-imperialist. He can only see U.S. and Western monopoly capitalism, not the monopoly capitalist expansionism - imperialist, if you will - of China.
. For fundamental political-economic analysis OF THE U.S., see The Hollow Colossus.
Let me guess - you base your opinion of China on Western media 😂 Just last year statefunded US media --VOA - had to admit the reports of what China is doing in Africa are not actually reports, but blatant propaganda. It's on their website, everyone can see it 🤷♂️
See the article China Plunders Congo, Exploits Miners - 'Anti-imperialists' Approve by Charles Andrews. No VOA , just ordinary business reports. Try going straight to facts instead of tilting against propaganda outlets.
How is China imperialist? And lets say China is imperialist, for the sake of the argument, why is this bad? While China is mainly unaligned, a multipolar world is generally a good thing for socialism. It gives emerging socialist countries allies and "enemy-of-my-enemy" trading partners to keep their populations from starvation. China is a massive power that I personally believe is the biggest bulwark against the threat of complete Western monopoly over the world. The fact is that "Chinese imperialism" is 9/10 times mutually beneficial and far better than US imperialism. Developing the 3rd world and creating a bloc opposed to the West is a generally a good thing.
Gee, Gabriel, I wish that Adolph Reed ever _did_ give answers as sophisticated as yours, but Adolph Reed only gives _boring_ , _rambling_ , _convoluted_ , _pseudo-intellectual_ , & often _infantile_ theories &, especially, "answers". Gabriel you are farrr more intellectually sophisticated than Adolph Reed, so please stop associating yourself with him & claiming that he said what you said. He _didn't_ -- & _hasn't_ .
My one particular disagreement with your otherwise excellent answer, Gabriel, is that you &, of _course_ , Adolph Reed use the *_right-wing hijacked_* & *_weaponized_* so-called 'definition' of "identity politics", but not the _original_ , 1977 Combahee River Collective Statement definition of the term. Adolph also, of _course_ , infantilely poohoos the CRC creation of the term "intersectionality".
To defend Reed a bit, personally I find Reed's best medium is his written work and it's rather clear and coherent. But I can understand the perspective you shared when he's speaking publicly. Not everyone is the best at public speaking off the top of their head.
@@kyledrumsDoes Adolph Reed say that, "Racism is not a useful measure of anything in American society", in his written work? (Even, as now Trump racistly disparages mostly _legal_ Hatian immigrants in Ohio.) Does Adolph poohoo & disparage the term "intersectionality" in his written work? Does Adolph use his terribly sxist phrase, "the wet panty people", in his written work, as he does in some of his YT-posted interviews? If so I won't bother.
I already had a long email debate with Adolph years ago that I still retain a copy of his stupid convoluted _typewritten_ arguments. If Gabriel has someplace for me to post that online l will.
I think that Adolph is popular among many whyte "Marxists", or the _extremely few_ fairytale POC "Marxists" who are hoodwinked into denial, because he tells them what they want to hear!...: 'Yeah you can forget about race...; it doesn't matter...; it's only fiction...; anyone, especially, Black talking about race is only engaged in "parochially divisive identity politics"...; & like whyte right-wingers say, "if we just stop talking about race, it will go away"...; it's really only about class!' I.e.: _Class_ essentialists.
The fact that Oppression always creates, or cultivates, or allows a certain intermediary, managerial, or *comprador* class of POC (like yet another colonial example like the Euro-Western institutions' generally well-paid, elite & repressive Palestinian Authority as Israel's security subcontractors) to control, or mollify (allow a certain statistically "successful examples" of), the oppressed, does not deny that it can be class _and_ certainly race.
Indeed race has historically & typically been used -- by the _capitalists_ -- to *divide* class. But many whyte leftists, especially many whyte "Marxists", can't hold more than 1 idea/concept in their head at the same time.
@@kyledrumsPlease see my reply now apparently YT 'hidden' under "newest" comments.
nails it at 21:15 Lenin was looking to make a revolution.