Marxism, Zionism and the National Question
Three Time Periods (3/3)
In the era and dominance of capitalism, and of capitalist nation states, the idea that what should determine the attitude of Marxists is those conditions that existed at the time of its formation, out of feudalism, is reactionary nonsense. The whole point of the theory of historical materialism is that Marxists identify the path of social development determined by the changes in material conditions, and primarily the development o the productive forces, and social relations arising from them. Unlike the idealist, and the subjectivist driven by moral imperatives, the Marxist, having identified those processes, seeks to encourage their free development, and does so as a partisan of the progressive element within them, i.e. of the working-class. The idea, under these conditions, that every nation should have its own state is also reactionary and not at all the same thing as saying that each nation has an abstract right to such a state. It means dividing workers on national grounds, in a time when all of industrial development is driving towards their unification across national borders.
One of the means by which this was done was through the demand for cultural national autonomy, by which the different nations within a state would have control over things like their own education, and so on, thereby, undermining the existence of common standards across the state. Lenin discusses it in “Corrupting The Workers With Refined Nationalism”. A modern equivalent is things like faith schools, or demands for recognition of Sharia Law, and so on. On a wider basis, it is represented by the introduction of devolution in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, which, instead of reducing separatist tendencies merely exacerbated them.
Devolution or cultural national autonomy is not the same thing as regional autonomy, by which regional administrative areas are given widespread autonomy, as to how to operate, given the specific conditions in that region, but within the confines of single rules, regulations and so on established at a state level, which are then merely implemented.
“The class-conscious workers fight hard against every kind of nationalism, both the crude, violent, Black-Hundred nationalism, and that most refined nationalism which preaches the equality of nations together with ... the splitting up of the workers’ cause, the workers’ organisations and the working-class movement according to nationality. Unlike all the varieties of the nationalist bourgeoisie, the class conscious workers, carrying out the decisions of the recent (summer 1913) conference of the Marxists, stand, not only for the most complete, consistent and fully applied equality of nations and languages, but also for the amalgamation of the workers of the different nationalities in united proletarian organisations of every kind.”
“To the bourgeoisie, however, the demand for national equality very often amounts in practice to advocating national exclusiveness and chauvinism; they very often couple it with advocacy of the division and estrangement of nations. This is absolutely incompatible with proletarian internationalism, which advocates, not only closer relations between nations, but the amalgamation of the workers of all nationalities in a given state in united proletarian organisations.”
In contrast to this Marxist approach Zionism promotes this idea of cultural autonomy, separation and exclusivity to its highest degree in the creation of a separate and exclusivist Jewish state, and the violent separation of Jewish workers from the rest of the working-class in that process.
In Socialism and War Lenin notes, in relation to self-determination, in the context of seeking to create larger, multinational federations of states,
“The championing of this right, far from encouraging the formation of small states, leads, on the contrary, to the freer, fearless and therefore wider and more widespread formation of very big states and federations of states, which are more beneficial for the masses and more fully in keeping with economic development.
The Socialists of oppressed nations must, in their turn, unfailingly fight for the complete (including organisational) unity of the workers of the oppressed and oppressing nationalities. The idea of the juridical separation of one nation from another (so-called “cultural-national autonomy” advocated by Bauer and Renner) is reactionary.”
No comments:
Post a Comment