Trotsky and Black Nationalism

[Questionable]

Can someone explain Trotsky's stance on the concept put forward by Stalin and others that blacks in the South US should form their own nation?

I was reading some of his works on this and it appears that he had no problem with the idea as long as it was the majority of blacks themselves who wanted their own nation, but I've seen some Trotskyist sources mock Marxist-Leninists for saying blacks should split and form their own country.

[Let's Get Free]

I think Trotsky defended the ideas of Black nationalism, long before they were understood by American political activists. He emphasized that for good reason many Black workers saw white workers as part of the system of oppression. Communists-white and Black-must be in the front ranks of the fight for Black rights, up to and including support for a Black party that fights for an independent Black nation. He pointed out that an independent Black nation is not a threat to workers who are white-- it is a threat to the common enemy, imperialism. He said that no worker who fears the Black fight for self-determination can rightly call him or herself a communist. I think he met with the black Marxist CLR James to discuss this matter. In the late 1930s, he also predicted the vanguard role of Black workers and the emergence of leaders of the caliber of Malcolm X.


Blacks have not yet awakened, and they are not yet united with the white workers. Ninety-nine-point-nine percent of the American workers are chauvinists (racists): in relation to Blacks, they are hangmen as they are toward the Chinese, etc. It is necessary to make them understand that the American state is not their state. Those American workers who say, "Blacks should separate if they so desire and we will defend them against our American police"--those are the revolutionists. I have confidence in them. The argument that the slogan for self-determination leads away from the class point of view is an adaptation to the ideology of white workers.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Can someone explain Trotsky's stance on the concept put forward by Stalin and others that blacks in the South US should form their own nation?

I was reading some of his works on this and it appears that he had no problem with the idea as long as it was the majority of blacks themselves who wanted their own nation, but I've seen some Trotskyist sources mock Marxist-Leninists for saying blacks should split and form their own country.

He didn't know and thought it was a very important question. Here's a link to part of a discussion between Trotsky, James, and members of the US SWP:

http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/works/1940/negro1.htm

You can see through this discussion that he is trying to understand the place of blacks in the then modern system and try and draw analogies to the Russian experience.

Some of the discussion in quite nieve in post-black liberation struggles retrospect, but you can really see how they are trying to work this out and put the black struggle into the larger context.

The US CP adopted a focus on black struggles in part due to a top-down effort. In effect this wasn't all bad because they made a hard break from what was then called "chauvanism" and put a lot of emphasis on allowing their high-profile black members to take a lot of leadership over developing a CP practice in regards to anti-racist struggle. And initially this top-down effort was part a way to try and develop the class struggle. But the "Black-Belt Theory" was official adopted while in practice, they really didn't do much about it other than use it as a sort of propagandistic call.

What the black-belt theory missed, and why it was never a very sucessful call was that there was a huge migration of blacks to industrial areas at that time and that's where the CP was actually making inroads with black people. So in practice, I think the efforts to organize urban blacks, fighting against racism within the white population in the worker's movement is responcible for sucess in helping to fight racism.

The CPs other problems hindered this movement: sectarianism towards any black liberal organizations, and then switching over to total non-critical support of similar organizations due to the needs of USSR forign relations. Ultimately, too, the CP's orientation to the Democratic Party meant that it ened up betraying black workers in order to not rock the boat with the party of FDR (which was also, of course, the party of Jim-Crow).

[ind_com]

I think Trotsky defended the ideas of Black nationalism, long before they were understood by American political activists. He emphasized that for good reason many Black workers saw white workers as part of the system of oppression. Communists-white and Black-must be in the front ranks of the fight for Black rights, up to and including support for a Black party that fights for an independent Black nation. He pointed out that an independent Black nation is not a threat to workers who are white-- it is a threat to the common enemy, imperialism. He said that no worker who fears the Black fight for self-determination can rightly call him or herself a communist. I think he met with the black Marxist CLR James to discuss this matter. In the late 1930s, he also predicted the vanguard role of Black workers and the emergence of leaders of the caliber of Malcolm X.


Blacks have not yet awakened, and they are not yet united with the white workers. Ninety-nine-point-nine percent of the American workers are chauvinists (racists): in relation to Blacks, they are hangmen as they are toward the Chinese, etc. It is necessary to make them understand that the American state is not their state. Those American workers who say, "Blacks should separate if they so desire and we will defend them against our American police"--those are the revolutionists. I have confidence in them. The argument that the slogan for self-determination leads away from the class point of view is an adaptation to the ideology of white workers.



Thanks. That quote will be useful against certain Trots.

[GoddessCleoLover]

Trotsky seems to have had a poor understanding of American politics and society.

[Yet_Another_Boring_Marxist]

Thanks. That quote will be useful against certain Trots.

Yea, I always respected Trosky as a theorist, but it doesn't seem that many Trotskites understand what he actually wrote

[GoddessCleoLover]

Trotsky was MTW before MTW was cool.:rolleyes: Seriously, Trotsky's level of analysis in that quote is about at the level of that dude from Maoist Rebel News.

[Grenzer]

It was Trotsky's line that blacks should form their own nation, but it's something that is rejected by many Trotskyists on the grounds that Trotsky never really had a thorough understanding of the conditions in the United States, as demonstrated by an infamous preface to one of his speeches: "Workers and peasants of the Bronx!".

[GoddessCleoLover]

Workers and peasant of the Bronx! Priceless.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Yea, I always respected Trosky as a theorist, but it doesn't seem that many Trotskites understand what he actually wrote

The thing that people here seem to be missing in their reading of that quote (and if you read the whole thing I linked, you get a better sense of the context in which he said this) is the part in bold here: "Those American workers who say, "Blacks should separate if they so desire and we will defend them against our American police"--those are the revolutionists."

But as the CP's Black Belt calls demonstrated, blacks had little desire for this as the 20th century progressed. The CP didn't get any traction on this line other than for its sentiment and rehtoric, Garvey had support for his "back to Africa" scheme, but it too was more propaganda than anything else and when his financial organization blew up, no one really tried to re-create this on the same level.

Blacks in the South were largely seperate and black elites sought favor from white patrons so there was little interest from the rural poor or the black elite in the South. In the north, people liked the idea, but were pretty fully prolitarian and so any sentiment towards nationalization was actually more focused around the black middle class (such as the Garvey movement) while having a broader appeal from black workers who wanted white cops and landlords and racist unions off their backs. But there was no real "nationalism" in the sense of a desire for an autonomous "black belt".

Having said that, where US trotskyism has followed the general outline of debates such as the one I linked to was in terms of political nationalism: the US SWP worked with Malcolm X and supported the BPP and the Auto-industry revolutionary Black unions. The reasoning is the same, it would be chauvanistic to demand that black radicals and militants just trust non-black workers in the US, solidarity has to be built organically and sometimes this means arguing for a unified class movement but not setting that as a condition of being in coalition movements.


So far as I am informed, it seems to me that the CP’s attitude of making an imperative slogan of it [Black Belt] was false. It was a case of the whites saying to the Negroes, ‘You must create a ghetto for yourselves’. It is tactless and false and can only serve to repulse the Negroes. Their only interpretation can be that the whites want to be separated from them. Our Negro comrades of course have the right to participate more intimately in such developments. Our Negro comrades can say, ‘The Fourth International says that if it is our wish to be independent, it will help us in every way possible, but that the choice is ours. However, I, as a Negro member of the Fourth, hold a view that we must remain in the same state as the whites,’ and so on. He can participate in the formation of the political and racial ideology of the Negroes.

[Questionable]

Trotsky seems to have had a poor understanding of American politics and society.

Could you share your viewpoint on the issue?

[GoddessCleoLover]

Could you share your viewpoint on the issue?

Trotsky seemed to be ill-informed to say the least. I have read an interview where Trotsky referred to the "Negro language" and opined that African-Americans only spoke English because they were afraid of being lynched if caught speaking the "Negro language".

What strikes me the most is how close Trotsky comes to falling into Maoist Third Worldist ideology in referring to white workers as the "hangmen" of African-American workers. The American economic system is and was when Trotsky made this statement based upon capitalism. Not to deny a certain amount of white worker privilege vis a vis African-American workers, but Trotsky's use of the term "hangman" is hyperbolic and hysterical.

[Yuppie Grinder]

It was Trotsky's line that blacks should form their own nation, but it's something that is rejected by many Trotskyists on the grounds that Trotsky never really had a thorough understanding of the conditions in the United States, as demonstrated by an infamous preface to one of his speeches: "Workers and peasants of the Bronx!".

lol that's hilarious
What's the speech called? I wouldn't mind a look at it.

[GoddessCleoLover]

It may be apocryphal. My internet search didn't come up with anything reliable. Perhaps my search was insufficient. Like GourmetPez I would love to know more.

[Geiseric]

Can someone explain Trotsky's stance on the concept put forward by Stalin and others that blacks in the South US should form their own nation?

I was reading some of his works on this and it appears that he had no problem with the idea as long as it was the majority of blacks themselves who wanted their own nation, but I've seen some Trotskyist sources mock Marxist-Leninists for saying blacks should split and form their own country.

A lot of trotskyists are closet ethnocentrics, lately I've seen a bunch of groups trying to overcompensate for that lately. Trotsky supported self determination for oppressed nationlities, meaning he would of supported say the black panthers and late malcolm x. James p. Cannon and other people from the swp were actually in contact with Malcolm in his latest days, after malcolms trip to mecca.

[Geiseric]

It was Trotsky's line that blacks should form their own nation, but it's something that is rejected by many Trotskyists on the grounds that Trotsky never really had a thorough understanding of the conditions in the United States, as demonstrated by an infamous preface to one of his speeches: "Workers and peasants of the Bronx!".

Trotsky lived in the US for many years, and that attitude reeks of nativism. I know what it sounds like, being around irish americans teaches you that being born here doesn't mean you understand conditions any better than an objective foreign observer.

[Grenzer]

lol that's hilarious
What's the speech called? I wouldn't mind a look at it.

I don't think it was ever recorded. He made it while staying in New York just before the Revolution, but a few people who heard it have written about it. I forget which of the books I read about that in, but it's pretty well documented.

Trotsky was also infamous for being a miserly patron. While he was in New York, he would read the paper at a cafe daily and refuse to give tips to the servers. It was his opinion that they weren't paid enough because of capitalism, and that it wasn't his responsibility to give them a tip. It didn't make him any friends, and people were to recall that years later.

[GoddessCleoLover]

Please correct me if I am wrong, but my understanding is that Trotsky's residence in the USA was of a relatively short duration.

[Vanguard1917]

Trotsky was also infamous for being a miserly patron. While he was in New York, he would read the paper at a cafe daily and refuse to give tips to the servers. It was his opinion that they weren't paid enough because of capitalism, and that it wasn't his responsibility to give them a tip. It didn't make him any friends, and people were to recall that years later.

In his classic account of the Russian revolution, John Reed reported that Russian waiters and other service workers saw tipping as an insult:

'The waiters and hotel servants were organised, and refused tips. On the walls of restaurants they put up signs which read, “No tips taken here–” or, “Just because a man has to make his living waiting on table is no reason to insult him by offering him a tip!”'

http://marxists.org/archive/reed/1919/10days/10days/ch1.htm

I probably don't have the balls to try the same thing at my local curry house, but i think Trotsky, and the Russian waiters, were probably right to be critical of an activity which, when you really think about it, is quite patronising.

But yes, Trotsky's views on black nationalism...

[Yet_Another_Boring_Marxist]

A lot of trotskyists are closet ethnocentrics, lately I've seen a bunch of groups trying to overcompensate for that lately. Trotsky supported self determination for oppressed nationlities, meaning he would of supported say the black panthers and late malcolm x. James p. Cannon and other people from the swp were actually in contact with Malcolm in his latest days, after malcolms trip to mecca.

Not all trotsyite though, some have pretty good lines on race (I can't think of any names right now, but I think Broody probably could because he's a trotskyite. I know the SEP party's line is pretty god awful and is basically a party of white middle class "closet ethnocentrists" that Broody speaks of.

[Sperm-Doll Setsuna]

In his classic account of the Russian revolution, John Reed reported that Russian waiters and other service workers saw tipping as an insult:

'The waiters and hotel servants were organised, and refused tips. On the walls of restaurants they put up signs which read, “No tips taken here–” or, “Just because a man has to make his living waiting on table is no reason to insult him by offering him a tip!”'

http://marxists.org/archive/reed/1919/10days/10days/ch1.htm

I probably don't have the balls to try the same thing at my local curry house, but i think Trotsky, and the Russian waiters, were probably right to be critical of an activity which, when you really think about it, is quite patronising.


This Anglo-American culture of tipping (going so far as to giving service establishment workers lower wages to be made up for with tips) is quite puzzling and tipping never seemed to be a common thing to do here, unless it is a truly fancy restaurant that the rich pricks frequent; who wish to feel better about themselves by giving the waiters a few scraps.

[Questionable]

Trotsky seemed to be ill-informed to say the least. I have read an interview where Trotsky referred to the "Negro language" and opined that African-Americans only spoke English because they were afraid of being lynched if caught speaking the "Negro language".

What strikes me the most is how close Trotsky comes to falling into Maoist Third Worldist ideology in referring to white workers as the "hangmen" of African-American workers. The American economic system is and was when Trotsky made this statement based upon capitalism. Not to deny a certain amount of white worker privilege vis a vis African-American workers, but Trotsky's use of the term "hangman" is hyperbolic and hysterical.

But was it not true? White workers were in fact hanging black workers at the time.

I don't think that's third-worldism. Third-worldism generally argues that white workers have been risen to the same economic level of the bourgeois, making them non-proletarians. To them it's not just false consciousness, it's that white workers are literally not workers anymore.

Trotsky clearly isn't saying that white people aren't workers. I think he would agree that they were imbued with the false consciousness of bourgeois racism, but that their productive role was the same as blacks.

[GoddessCleoLover]

I doubt that white workers were the ones hanging African-Americans. Lynchings occurred in non-industrial areas and local KKK groups were filled with bourgeois townfolk and members of the rural petit-bourgeoisie, not workers. I would agree that Trotsky's theory was based upon false consciousness, but IMO a badly distorted analysis based on his relative unfamiliarity with the USA.

[blake 3:17]

Trotsky lived in the US for many years, and that attitude reeks of nativism. I know what it sounds like, being around irish americans teaches you that being born here doesn't mean you understand conditions any better than an objective foreign observer.


When and where did Trotsky live in the US?

[blake 3:17]

Trotsky was also infamous for being a miserly patron. While he was in New York, he would read the paper at a cafe daily and refuse to give tips to the servers. It was his opinion that they weren't paid enough because of capitalism, and that it wasn't his responsibility to give them a tip. It didn't make him any friends, and people were to recall that years later.

Many radical European workers in the 30s would refuse any kind of tip -- best known example being Spanish barbers as described by Orwell.

I'd see it as a small mistake exacerbated by the position of being in exile. Sins of omission are quite different than sins of commission.

[GoddessCleoLover]

I am certain that Trotsky lived in New York city at the time of Russia's February revolution. My understanding is that he lived there for less than a year.

[Grenzer]

Well I never made a personal judgement on the matter of tipping; that's just how the employees of the cafe saw it. I would actually tend to agree that the idea of tipping is a bad thing since it's essentially used by the bosses to justify lower wages.

To Gramsci Guy, I think he was only in the United States for a few weeks to a few months.. it wasn't long.

[GoddessCleoLover]

I tip because servers are underpaid and tips are essential for their livelihood. I wish servers were not so grossly underpaid, but the fact is they rely upon tips to make a living. I don't mean to offend anybody but the discussion of tips on this thread reminds of the opening scene in Reservoir Dogs.;)

[Vanguard1917]

I tip because servers are underpaid and tips are essential for their livelihood. I wish servers were not so grossly underpaid, but the fact is they rely upon tips to make a living. I don't mean to offend anybody but the discussion of tips on this thread reminds of the opening scene in Reservoir Dogs.;)

Great scene. Though Buscemi's school of thought (tips should match performance) was distinctly lumpen petit-bourgeois in class content, much unlike Trotsky's proletarian-bolshevik angle.

[Rugged Collectivist]

I think you should tip. The bosses have to make up the difference if servers don't get enough in tips to make minimum wage, but minimum wage is still shit so you should tip generously if you can.

It's disgusting that the bosses are allowed to shift the responsibility of paying their workers onto the customer. I mean really disgusting.

[GoddessCleoLover]

If I can't afford a tip, then I eat at a place where one walks up and orders from the cashier. I don't see non-tipping as a "revolutionary" act. If Trotsky did, that was just another of his peculiarities like his belief that African-Americans spoke "Negro" rather than English.:rolleyes:

[Geiseric]

Again I'm not sure if these rediculous claims, which conflict with eachother since he's both mtw in one quote and an anti black racist in the other, are actually real or hearsay. Trotsky lived in new york for at least half a year, in the bronx, writing for a russian revolutionary labor emigre newspaper. So I'm sure he has at least some research done in U.S. racial culture.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I doubt that white workers were the ones hanging African-Americans. Lynchings occurred in non-industrial areas and local KKK groups were filled with bourgeois townfolk and members of the rural petit-bourgeoisie, not workers.

In the right-wing shift around the time of the WWI-era red-scares there were some examples of pogrom-type riots of white workers attacking blacks due to economic competition and as a reaction against black migration.

Not to mention that unions and parts of the left before the early 20th century often fully endorsed white supremacist ideas.

In the 1960s too, it was people in working class white neighborhoods (no doubt petty-bourgeois "tea-party" types too) that were attacking attempts at building a northern wing of the civil rights movement. White gangs of working class kids enforced the informal color lines (led by bank red-lining policies that created geographical divisions) in California.

So in the south it was most likely the actual rural big-wigs that wanted and defended jim-crow and did so largely themselves and with civic organizations like the "white citizen councils" and the KKK if they really needed to. But in the north, it was the landloards and banks and industries which maintained a 2nd class ghetto life for most blacks, and so bankers and landloards just used the police and courts to enforce their interests. Vigilante-type conflict in the north tended to be either fascists (who may or may not be workers) or working class people who adopted the racist arguments and because of economic competition resented blacks (or chineese or immigrants or whatnot).

Today I think the economic logic that maintains systemic racism has found a social base among the sort of petty-bourgoise layer around the "new right" project of "tough on crime" and eliminating "benifits". They have their own social organizations like the White Citizens Councils; they have landloard and business groups pushing gentrification and crime policies. they have "homeowners associations" pushing for limiting property taxes and therby starving urban social programs; etc.

There are definately still a lot of racist white workers out there, but compared to the post-war period, I think the US working class is much more organically diverse (though geographic segregation has retuned with force) and less suceptable to racist arguments. The forces really supporting the forms of structural racism in the US today are much more suburban professional types.

[Le Socialiste]

Not all trotsyite though, some have pretty good lines on race (I can't think of any names right now, but I think Broody probably could because he's a trotskyite. I know the SEP party's line is pretty god awful and is basically a party of white middle class "closet ethnocentrists" that Broody speaks of.

The SEP is notorious, I think, for their line on race. Their articles regularly dismiss movements or fight backs against racism or police brutality as "single issue movements" and "identity politics," going so far as to attack those who engage in these struggles for "attempting to divorce class from race" (which has never been the case I think). It's a dangerous line to take, but it can't be too surprising given the SEP's hyper-sectarianism.

[Lucretia]

I don't think it was ever recorded. He made it while staying in New York just before the Revolution, but a few people who heard it have written about it. I forget which of the books I read about that in, but it's pretty well documented.

Yeah, sure, it's "well documented," but oddly nobody can locate a source for it. In other words, it's just mindless gossip and rumor-mongering. And there's literally no proof that he ever said any such thing. What a great contribution to the discussion.

[Lucretia]

Today I think the economic logic that maintains systemic racism has found a social base among the sort of petty-bourgoise layer around the "new right" project of "tough on crime" and eliminating "benifits". They have their own social organizations like the White Citizens Councils; they have landloard and business groups pushing gentrification and crime policies. they have "homeowners associations" pushing for limiting property taxes and therby starving urban social programs; etc.

White citizens' councils? If you want to see those, you need to step into a time machine and travel back about forty years.

[Sea]

How about we only tip if the waiter or waitress is active in black nationalism?

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

Trotsky seemed to be ill-informed to say the least. I have read an interview where Trotsky referred to the "Negro language" and opined that African-Americans only spoke English because they were afraid of being lynched if caught speaking the "Negro language".

I think you should read that discussion again (http://marxists.org/archive/trotsky/works/1940/negro1.htm). Trotsky referred to the "Negro language" in the sense that he did not know if it actually existed:

I am not sure if the Negroes do not also in the Southern states speak their own Negro language. Now that they are being lynched just because of being Negroes they naturally fear to speak their Negro language; but when they are set free their Negro language will again become alive. I will advise the American comrades to study this question very seriously, including the language in the Southern states.
In my opinion he was speculating, then passing the buck by "advising" the American comrades to "study this question very seriously", because he acknowledged his ignorance on the matter. Almost immediately after a comrade clarifies this:

Swabeck: I admit that you have advanced powerful arguments but I am not yet entirely convinced. The existence of a special Negro language in the Southern states is possible; but in general all American Negroes speak English. They are fully assimilated. Their religion is the American Baptist and the language in their churches is likewise English.

[Zulu]

Marxist-Leninists for saying blacks should split and form their own country.

Some Marxist-Leninists tend take everything Stalin said as (1) universal truth and (2) out of contest (just like Trotskyists do with Trotsky, btw).

Stalin could not advocate such a thing for any reason other that it would create turmoil and undermine somewhat the power of the US imperialists at the time of the global standoff between the imperialist and socialist camps. But blacks having a nation of their own ran counter Stalin's idea of a nation, because the blacks neither had their own language, nor economic life. Stalin didn't even consider the Jews a nation.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

Please just buy it and read it. (http://www.kersplebedeb.com/settlers.html)

[Os Cangaceiros]

If I can't afford a tip, then I eat at a place where one walks up and orders from the cashier. I don't see non-tipping as a "revolutionary" act. If Trotsky did, that was just another of his peculiarities like his belief that African-Americans spoke "Negro" rather than English.:rolleyes:

I always feel like a dick if I don't tip. I usually tip pretty generously if the service is passable.

[Geiseric]

Some Marxist-Leninists tend take everything Stalin said as (1) universal truth and (2) out of contest (just like Trotskyists do with Trotsky, btw).

Stalin could not advocate such a thing for any reason other that it would create turmoil and undermine somewhat the power of the US imperialists at the time of the global standoff between the imperialist and socialist camps. But blacks having a nation of their own ran counter Stalin's idea of a nation, because the blacks neither had their own language, nor economic life. Stalin didn't even consider the Jews a nation.

Language doesn't constitute a nation though, latinos all speak spanish and aren't their own nation. I don't even know what "economic life," means, seeing as most poor people regardless of their race work for whites, if you want to look at it that way, pretty much everywhere around the world. Nation means that people are bound togather by a common history, family lineage, and culture. Stalin used his "definition of a nation," to completely oppress the nationalities that he didn't consider nations, such as Georgians, Ukrainians, Chechnyans, Estonians, etc.

[Zulu]

Stalin used his "definition of a nation," to completely oppress ... Georgians

yeah, Stalin oppressed himself, that makes a lot of sense.

[Ostrinski]

Wouldn't it rather be more accurate to say that a nationality is merely a matter of cultural identity that includes identification as a nation? I mean there is so much grey area, so much area for subjectivity that it is a cultural phenomenon that is almost impossible to attribute a concrete definition to.

I mean, what if any given group of people share a common history, family lineage, and culture but don't identify nationally? Are they still a nationality? Say, the Basque people have all their cultural characteristics but didn't identify as a nation. Would they still be a nation?

I would conclude that is merely a matter of self-identification, because since nationality is something that has no material basis it can only exist through the cultural consciousness of individuals and groups of individuals.

[Ostrinski]

yeah, Stalin oppressed himself, that makes a lot of sense.It is no secret that Stalin became a Russian nationalist and during his rule promoted Russian nationalism.

[Zulu]

It is no secret that Stalin became a Russian nationalist and during his rule promoted Russian nationalism.

Sure, that's why he canceled out his abolition of capital punishment in the USSR to have a bunch of fellow Russian nationalists shot after the "Leningrad affair". And that's also why there was civil disturbance in Georgia, when the word about Khrushchev's "secret speech" reached there.



nationality is something that has no material basis
Oh, look, we have an idealist here...

[Jimmie Higgins]

So in the south it was most likely the actual rural big-wigs that wanted and defended jim-crow and did so largely themselves and with civic organizations like the "white citizen councils" and the KKK if they really needed to. But in the north, it was the landloards and banks and industries which maintained a 2nd class ghetto life for most blacks, and so bankers and landloards just used the police and courts to enforce their interests. ...


Today I think the economic logic that maintains systemic racism has found a social base among the sort of petty-bourgoise layer around the "new right" project of "tough on crime" and eliminating "benifits". They have their own social organizations like the White Citizens Councils; they have landloard and business groups pushing gentrification and crime policies. they have "homeowners associations" pushing for limiting property taxes and therby starving urban social programs; etc.



White citizens' councils? If you want to see those, you need to step into a time machine and travel back about forty years.

Sorry if this was unclear - in the 2nd paragraph "Like" was meant as in: they function "similar to". Real estate associations, for example, that are gentrifying cities are pushing hard to control black and brown and homeless urban populations, repress them legally, and push them out ultimately. In Oakland these are the organization which both control city hall and are constantly asking for more police with more leeway, backing curfews, gang injunctions, etc.


Trotsky seemed to be ill-informed to say the least. I have read an interview where Trotsky referred to the "Negro language" and opined that African-Americans only spoke English because they were afraid of being lynched if caught speaking the "Negro language".

What strikes me the most is how close Trotsky comes to falling into Maoist Third Worldist ideology in referring to white workers as the "hangmen" of African-American workers. The American economic system is and was when Trotsky made this statement based upon capitalism. Not to deny a certain amount of white worker privilege vis a vis African-American workers, but Trotsky's use of the term "hangman" is hyperbolic and hysterical.

I'd say that some of this is most definately "ill-informed" - but only at worst. As the guy himself said when discussing "the negro problem":


I have never studied this question and in my remarks I proceed from the general considerations

So I believe the full version of the discussion I linked to in my first post has the line about language, and if I remember correctly, Trotsky asks this question and the SWP representative in the discussion says he doesn't know and thinks it may be possible. I think this question can easily be understood as a Russian trying to understand nationalities in other regions - in much of Europe, language would have been a marker of a specific nationality. So definately ignorance, but I think with the whole discussion - even the sections transcribed in my link - you get an understanding that they are sincerely trying to figure this out, and at a time when they have no black SWP members.

Most directly it is their attempt to understand the CP's position and how they relate to it. The SWP says it's opportunism and linking with the black bourgeois desires and call for a "liberal" short-term demand for equality. Trotsky's responce is in trying to figure out the relationship of blacks to capital, the (mostly white) worker's movement, and the wider class struggle.

In the discussion Trotsky sides with the view that it's a case of racial, not national oppression, but because of the racism of white workers against black workers, the question of if blacks will seek liberation through a national struggle or through working class struggle will depend on the consiousness of blacks themselves. But either case the struggle will be a benifit to the class struggle ultimately and so revolutionaries should argue that if black movements fought for a "black belt" that revolutionaries should argue for support amongst the white worker movement. He later said that it was problematic to insist on the slogan of "black belt" if there was no desire for it, but that overall self-determination was part of the struggle for liberation; the problem of the "negro question" is not in black desire for liberation through class or national struggle, but that some white workers accept "chauvanism".

So while I think by WWII this specific question of rural national liberation was already antiquated, the larger discussion and Trotskys other work with CLR James is very interesting and useful in understanding the relationship of racism to the class struggle.

There's nothing wrong with not understanding something and trying to figure it out - the US CP was doing the same thing and made mistakes as well as great steps forward. Some sections of CP groups were outright hostile towards organizing blacks, not necissarily for overt racist reasons, and the CP leadership took a really strong stand on it and made a principle of anti-racism. But IMO this is also what was ultimately problematic with their approach - they were often pretty good in their anti-racist work, but the top-down nature of the CP and Comintern also meant that like enforcing a no-strike pledge after a decade of leading big strikes, shutting up about racism when they got friendly with the Democrats flushed all that down the tubes.