Recommend them The Red Pen or Dessalines instead. Western Marxism is better not receiving any traction at all. Fucking dogmatist Piece of shit!
Recommend them The Red Pen or Dessalines instead. Western Marxism is better not receiving any traction at all. Fucking dogmatist Piece of shit!
That analysis does not consider the chllenges of the labour aristocracy which is the western bourgoise proleteriat at large? Like how they are going to succeed where people before them have failed? (ProbablyKaffe on twitter touches on the kind of analysis at minimum that needs to be considered). Simply spouting poverty statistics isn’t sufficent material analysis; for example how you going to counter Christian reaction in USAmericans? Analysis isn’t these people are poor and therefore they are ripe - Cesair dismantled that last century. None of that analysis even begins to really consider why any of those groups would benefit from the fall of USImperialism. In fact it is an argument that the loot of imperialism should be shared more equitably.
https://redsails.org/amiga-o-enemiga/
Is Che wrong?
Since protest don’t work and reactionary unions aren’t worthwhile what do they have to offer? Electoralism? I am not USAmerican, why is it on me to offer solutions your country’s problems that have a ripple effect on everyone outside? How come they don’t pick up the phone and call organisations of the global south on how they managed?
(Forgot to add that book just deserves the biggest fucking eye roll for socdem politics masquerading in ML aesthetics. Socialism isnt “better welfare state”)
Alright, this is a much more substantive conversation. Appreciated. Let me address your points in order.
On the labour aristocracy: You’re right that this is a real theoretical challenge. But the idea that the PSL’s analysis doesn’t consider it is false. Their program literally opens by grounding everything in an international assessment, and it treats the U.S. working class as “but one section” of a global one. That’s the exact framework needed to understand the labour aristocracy, not a dodge of it. The real disagreement here isn’t whether the bribe exists (it does) but what to do about it. Your position seems to be that the entire Western working class is bought off permanently; the PSL’s is that the bribe is real but eroding, and the most oppressed sections (Black people, other oppressed nations, immigrant workers) are the ones whose material conditions align with dismantling imperialism. That’s not ignoring the labour aristocracy; it’s a strategic differentiation within the working class.
On Che: You asked “Is Che wrong?” No, but his 1954 essay doesn’t back you up the way you think. He identified exactly the mechanism you describe: imperial super-profits create a temporary quiescence. But he also wrote: “I insist that we cannot demand that the working class of the North look past its own nose. It would be useless to try to explain, from afar… that the process of internal decomposition of capitalism can only be deferred for a while longer, but never stopped.” And, crucially, he singled out Black people as “the germ of the first serious rebellion.” That’s not an argument to abandon the whole U.S. working class. It’s an analysis that the contradictions will eventually crack, and the break will come from the most oppressed. That’s exactly the orientation PSL takes. You’re citing Che as though he argues the Western proletariat is an eternal reactionary bloc. He doesn’t.
On Césaire: He dismantled the idea that poverty alone makes people revolutionary. Agreed. But PSL isn’t arguing “these people are poor, therefore they’re ripe.” Their 2005 assessment defines class by relationship to production, not income brackets. Césaire was a communist who saw the proletariat and the colonial question as linked problems, not one canceling out the other. Using him to argue that any attempt to organize in the imperial core is reformist doesn’t track with his actual politics.
On the book: I haven’t read Socialist Reconstruction yet, so I’m not going to defend it chapter and verse. From what I understand, it’s an attempt to sketch what a socialist government would actually do in its first decade: concrete plans around housing, health, employment. You’re calling that “socdem politics.” But the Bolsheviks’ program had bread, peace, land: immediate, concrete demands. Having a transitional vision that speaks to material needs isn’t social democracy; it’s strategy. The alternative is just gesturing at global revolution while refusing to say anything about what society here might look like after a seizure of power. That’s a rhetorical stance, not a political one. Also, you haven’t read the book either, so dismissing it with an eye roll is cheap.
On electoralism, unions, and “what do they have to offer”: The PSL runs candidates as a way to inject revolutionary ideas into mass consciousness, not because they think elections are the path to power. They do labor work in difficult conditions. You dismiss this as “reactionary unions aren’t worthwhile” and “protest doesn’t work.” Okay. What’s your concrete alternative, concretely, for building revolutionary capacity in the imperial core? “Pick up the phone and call Global South organizations” is a fine suggestion, but it’s not a strategy for building a pole of organization here. If your entire position is that nothing can be done and the only real agency lies outside the imperialist countries, just say that openly. At least then the implications are clear: no organizing here will meet your standard because you’ve already decided it’s impossible.
I don’t know who probablyKaffe is, however, I’m aware there’s a specific political tendency that argues most Western workers are labour aristocrats and therefore no revolutionary movement can arise from within the imperialist core. That’s a coherent position, but it’s not the only Marxist position, and you’re presenting it as if it’s settled truth and anyone who disagrees is a social democrat in Marxist drag. The PSL’s line is that imperialism’s contradictions are sharpening in a way that objectively erodes the material basis of the bribe. Whether they’re right or wrong is a debate worth having. But you haven’t actually argued that point with evidence. You’ve just asserted they’re wrong and slung terms like “socdem” at a book you haven’t read.
So here’s the bottom line: I’m not a PSL member, and I’m not asking you to be uncritical. But if your criticism is that they haven’t done the analysis, the analysis exists and I’ve linked you to it. If your criticism is that their program doesn’t solve the labour aristocracy problem to your satisfaction, the answer is that nobody has “solved” it; they’re organizing through it, with a clear-eyed view that the U.S. working class is divided and its most oppressed sections are key. If your alternative is to argue that the entire Western proletariat is hopelessly bought off and the only revolutionaries are outside, then you’ve chosen a form of revolutionary pessimism masquerading as rigor. That’s fine, but don’t pretend it’s the only possible Marxist conclusion. Che certainly didn’t.
I think we should end this here. This is the problem with vibes based marxism. There’s no substantive critique, just feel-good sports-based groupism.
The rest of the post is not a reply to you because you give the impression of being completely fucking disingenious - you’re accusing me of not reading a book which you posted as proof as a retort against my critcisms against PSL, which you now say you haven’t read youself and then have the gall to call my comment as cheap for - get this - not reading the book
For anyone else lurking: the book is an excellent insight into the problems of the PSL. I thoroughly recommend everyone who is interested in understanding why US domestic politics is so lacking is to read how a self purported ML party considers itself. You can easily search it on annas-archive if the pdf copy difficult to download elsewhere.
Broadly speaking the book describes some of the ills of capitalism, mainly illusions to corporatism, and then says socialism will help provide a better welfare state. It prefaces it by attempting to establish its Marxist credentials for example by naming some of Marx and Engels works. This is not an ML book: it offers nothing that a social democrat who has read marx could not offer. Kautsky was better than this a century ago. This is at best a Kautskian party. Even its advertisment quotes Cornel West’s praise of it as some sort of badge of honour.
An ML analysis would at least consider, actual class analysis (afterall the book is called socialist reconstruction):
Actual ML analysis will tackle difficult questions, not just say there are difficulties and hope for the best by reaching popularity first somehow. And you know have at least give an impression of a political campaign of an actual understanding of capital beyond corporatism
So have you read the book or just skimmed it? You haven’t exactly said one way or the other. It’s interesting that saying you haven’t read it would get this kind of response. I said I didn’t read it, twice. I said it when I linked it. I inked it because you said they did no analysis. I provided you a list of analysis. The book is easy to get, I’ve had it on my digital book shelf for a while now. I think we are done here since it seems like you’re not interested in having a conversation, just a platform for you brand of pessimism. That’s fine, you should start a blog if that’s what you’re looking to do.
So now the accusation is skimming rather than not reading to the standard you have not set from someone who has not even read it. And you still have not read it but feel confident that what they did counts as ML analysis. If there’s any consolation is that your brand, as you put it, of Western hubris is really common.
Did you read the book?
Yes. It’s a few years old, to the point when you first said it I thought it may have been a different book ie did they have more to say since that book was written, I looked it up realised it was same book and edited my comment to reflect what I felt about it in brackets. When looking up what a party is about I try to look up what’s closest to their equivalent of a manifesto and this came up as reading material. From what I gather whatthey have been doing since really has not really been promising but if this project is the best US has to offer then for the sake of the rest of the world I hope I am really really wrong.
Thank you for a direct answer. See its good to know this type of information before engaging. I always try to be up front with what I have read and what I haven’t. You presented your position without even mentioning what you’ve read. That would have saved both of us a lot of time, don’t you think?
Yeah, fair enough. Thank you
You seem to misunderstand the point of the book. PSL’s analysis is that people in the US are so thoroughly propagandized against socialism that they have no idea that the mounting crises facing our class do have solutions, but that those solutions only exist outside of the neoliberal framework that totally dominated all political discourse. It never purports to be a theoretical work on how to achieve revolutionary change, because that is not its goal. Rather, its goal is to convince people that socialism is worth fighting for because it is actually equipped to address their needs. But the PSL’s position is that a revolutionary reorganization of society is a necessary precondition to achieve this, and agrees that ML organizing principles are the means to achieve that.
The problem with social democrats is not that they, too, advocate for a society that offers more favorable conditions to the workers. The problem is that they reject the necessity of a worker’s state and are content to build welfare off the ill-gotten gains of imperialist extraction. The PSL absolutely rejects this.
No work can address every aspect of every debate. That’s a ridiculous standard, and if you attempt to meet it you will fall short every time. It’s entirely disingenuous to dismiss PSL as revisionist or socdem based on one piece of literature just because it is not attempting to present a framework for achieving revolution.
Right, so what does the PSL propose to do where revolutionary parties before them have failed to do? They purport they are an ML party, not another socdem, so is there an actual answer to this, ie what’s the susbtantive scientific approach on offer? And if that’s too hard to answer (it shouldn’t be, it’s the lowest bar for every ML party but let’s make it even easier), have they at least said was wrong with these previous revolutionary parties ie what was wrong with their political theories given they have failed?
The PSL recognizes that the workers movement was so thoroughly defeated and dismantled in the US that the masses lost any sense of connection to the actual history and lessons of worker struggle. The PSL sees its task as reinjecting revolutionary Marxism into mass struggle, but also that ultimately the masses will need to learn these lessons by experiencing essentially the same failures of previous movements which have been erased from mass consciousness. The PSL cannot directly teach these lessons or directly manufacture the conditions to activate revolutionary potential, but it has an opportunity to reach more and more people as they experience the failure of other methods.
https://liberationschool.org/theory-and-revolution-addressing-the-break-of-ideological-continuity/
Ultra-leftists are quick to complain that PSL’s tactics are clearly not “producing revolution”, as evidenced by the continuation of imperialist rule in the US. But despite all of their supposed superior analysis, they fail to put forward a specific agenda that can accomplish that task, let alone actually carry it out themselves. In other words, why should anybody listen to a bunch of belligerent assholes on Twitter (as you have literally suggested), if they haven’t even done the bare minimum of organizing a more effective alternative? Is the PSL building an organization that is up to the task of carrying out a revolution? Who knows? But at least they are building an organization, and one which is explicitly ML.
No we are not anywhere near about “producing a revolution”. We are at the level where the PSL cannot even offer a substantive analysis of failed revolutionaries before them and the lessons they have learned in an attempt to become successful this time.
I mean why call themselves ML if you can’t even do this.
Which “belligerent asshole” are you even talking about? I pointed to one twitter channel about class analysis and then you have twisted into whatever the fuck you wanted it to be in a non-defense about the PSL.
“At least they’re trying” is the most pathetic call of the privileged westerner. Where’s the science in that.