Dialogue with DSA

I was a charter member of DSA in 1982. A Trotskyist like me (at the time) considered their social democratic orientation to be rather tepid, but there was an interesting DSA local in nearby Princeton (Cornel West, who was teaching at PU, was a member) and not much else in the area to join. I veered off ideologically in 1987 after reading Building the Green Movement by Rudolf Bahro. I stuck with DSA for a couple of years beyond that trying to influence them in a Green direction, but that phase didn’t last too long because DSA was fading in impact and the Green Party was ascending.

Then DSA had a revival after Bernie 2016. So I re-joined, back to trying to influence them toward a Green direction. Below are snippets of dialogue from over the weekend:

SW: Lessons learned over the last century and a half suggest that transcending capitalism won’t involve revolution or the chimerical idea of “the working class owning and democratically controlling” the industrial-state polity and economy.”

> This is a bold claim that needs to be proven and shouldn’t be treated
> as self evident. Many would look at the last century and a half and
> come to the opposite conclusion. That capitalism can’t be evolved
> into something less destructive, you need to overthrow it. And if the
> working class isn’t in the drivers seat, shit goes off the rails.

Will we need another century and a half to notice that there has not been a single successful-enduring implementation of the full socialist idea:
. social rather than private ownership of the bulk of society’s productive assets
. a democratically planned economy
. achieved via historically conscious “class-for-itself” revolutionary action by the proletariat

The paradigm shift in thinking (“Rethinking Marxism”) is starting to recognize that it will never happen under conditions of the modern socio-economic Leviathan (the over-complex, over-developed, over-centralized industrial state). In order to democratize, we’ll need to decentralize toward a world of more locally-oriented bioregional commonwealths. Marx said nothing along these lines. He was all for centralization and the misguided, unsustainable trajectories of industrial modernity. He was wrong in his interpretation of human history (“progressive development”), wrong about the primary agency (and process) of social change, wrong about the ultimate destination (“the next higher stage”).

Marx had the original insightful critique of the capitalist system. We can appreciate that. But, beyond it, the mystique surrounding Marxism has been a major factor in the stagnation of leftism in our time. Why cling to an erroneous nineteenth century ideology?

https://www.fifthestate.org/archive/281-march-1977/marx-good/

> I’d like to see you debate John Bellamy Foster about Marx.

We’d be talking past each other.

I’d say: “Sure, Marx mentioned capitalism’s hyper-exploitation of the environment in addition to hyper-exploitation of labor. Is that such an enormous insight? At the root of Marxism is a faith in historical progressive development … when the truth is that it’s been leading us in a misguided direction. Our ‘development’ has been destroying habitat for millennia. And what has it brought us? People are no happier in 2022 than they were right here on Turtle Island in 1491. If we’re no happier and we’ve paved paradise to put up a parking lot, then ‘development’ has been a disaster.”

And Bellamy would say: “We can’t possibly go back to the lifeways of 1491.”

And I’d say: “If This All (our modern industrial Leviathan) is unsustainable, which it is, then we’ll be forced back to lifeways that are socially and ecologically sane: simpler, more local, lower tech, lower population (after enduring a Long Emergency of degrowth and devolution). Capitalism is untenable, but we won’t be ‘ascending’ to some ‘higher stage.’ We’ll be reacting to an inevitable crisis. We’ve gone way beyond overshoot by now. We’re heading back to 1491, either by design or by disaster. If we get there we’ll be no less happy. Native Americans enjoyed fully rich and satisfying enculturation. Living at a saner scale, they often were able to practice a more participatory form of democracy than we do. Meanwhile, their lifeways didn’t hyper-stress people and the planet, as ours do so pathetically (and have since the wrong turn toward statism, empire, technological development, and totalitarian agriculture).

“John, just look under your feet … at the land and the lifeways of 2022 vs. those of 1491 (just six long lifetimes ago). As representatives and executors of the death culture called Western Civilization we’ve lost more than we’ve gained here in ‘America’ since 1491.”

And Bellamy would say: “absurd” and reply with Big Concepts: “historical materialism dialectical naturalism labor liberation metabolic rift.”

And I’d decline to address all that mumbo-jumbo and just say: “If we’re no happier now and we’ve destroyed the place and we’ve ‘progressed’ to the precipice of collapse … we might want to consider going in a rather different direction. Eco-socialists should call it: The greening of society.”