How does PSL view Trotskyism and Maoism?

  1. heiss93
    heiss93
    I have heard PSL described as both Maoist and Trotskyist. I know Sam Marcy, who PSL lists as a major influence, developed a unique brand of Trotskyist analysis of deformed worker's states that downplayed attacks on "stalinism" and supported leftist anti-revisionism. Marcy called himself a Marxist-Leninist. My main objection to Trotsktism is the neocon third campist variant that supports attacks on socialist "totalitarian" regimes objectively siding with imperialism, which neither the PSL or WWP engages in.
  2. KurtFF8
    KurtFF8
    Well, firstly, I don't know the answer to your question.

    But Trotskyism as "anti-totalitarian" or opposed to "Stalinism" is a uniquely Western thing. Trotsky defended the gains of the USSR and saw it as a socialist state. His main disagreements were about Socialism in One Country and things of that sort.
  3. Kassad
    Kassad
    You're exactly right, heiss93. The Party for Socialism and Liberation traces its roots to the Socialist Workers Party (USA), but those who left to form Workers World Party rejected the rabid anti-Stalinism of the Socialist Workers Party. We are not a Trotskyist party, but our party and its main influences, such as Sam Marcy, are influenced by our roots. The PSL rejects the often-times elitist nature of Trotskyist parties, while still acknowledging Trotsky's theoretical contributions.

    On Maoism, we are definitely not a Maoist party, but we uphold the gains of the Chinese Revolution and a lot of militant Maoist movements worldwide, such as the struggle for socialism in Nepal.

    If you have any questions, let me know.
  4. The Hong Se Sun
    The Hong Se Sun
    I have been talking to the PSL for a while now and never got the hint they hated Trotsky or considered themselves to be Maoist.
  5. The Hong Se Sun
    The Hong Se Sun
    To go even further I told the people who where recruiting me that I hated Stalin and that I thought he kinda of ruined socialism's reputation for the world. I was still allowed to join so I'd say that the PSL is not a Stalinist group. If they were I'd quit.
  6. Honggweilo
    Honggweilo
    while still acknowledging Trotsky's theoretical contributions
    Allthough i never heard any PSL'er, even CC members, going into what "his theoretical contributions" are. At the International Communist Seminar the PSL "saw it as a necessity to fight petit-bourgeois ideologies like anarchism and trotskyism". I have read some pieces by Sam Marcy (the one about the portuguese carnation revolution, which is thought to be a bit harsh), but all his rethoric is plain maoist. Can anyone elaborate on that?
  7. Kassad
    Kassad
    Allthough i never heard any PSL'er, even CC members, going into what "his theoretical contributions" are. At the International Communist Seminar the PSL "saw it as a necessity to fight petit-bourgeois ideologies like anarchism and trotskyism". I have read some pieces by Sam Marcy (the one about the portuguese carnation revolution, which is thought to be a bit harsh), but all his rethoric is plain maoist. Can anyone elaborate on that?
    We are definitely not a Trotskyist party. You won't find his name mentioned much in our writings. However, we believe that Trotsky's theory of permanent revolution, the belief that authentic socialism and eventually, communism, cannot be attained while capitalist states, especially ones with large influence and power, exist. Revolution is needed in the belly of the imperialist beasts to spread world revolution. Marcy made legitimate criticisms of Stalin, while still realizing that he was constructing socialism in the face of nearly impossible odds and he turned the Soviet Union from a backwards state to an industrialized superpower. Does that answer your question?
  8. Honggweilo
    Honggweilo
    We are definitely not a Trotskyist party. You won't find his name mentioned much in our writings. However, we believe that Trotsky's theory of permanent revolution, the belief that authentic socialism and eventually, communism, cannot be attained while capitalist states, especially ones with large influence and power, exist. Revolution is needed in the belly of the imperialist beasts to spread world revolution. Marcy made legitimate criticisms of Stalin, while still realizing that he was constructing socialism in the face of nearly impossible odds and he turned the Soviet Union from a backwards state to an industrialized superpower. Does that answer your question?
    Almost, although i dont really see how genuine marxist-leninists ever disapproved of international socialism and permantent internal revolutions against the restoration of capitalism, its not like those things are inherently trotskyist. What were the actual criticism of Marcy on Stalin?
  9. Kassad
    Kassad


    During the period of the Stalin regime, precisely because of the annulment of the rights of the workers and peasants, and the repressive form of the new state as against the socialist democratic state that had existed under Lenin, the question of whether a counterrevolution had taken place was debated in many socialist and communist organizations and among workers and progressives.

    Some thought that a full-scale counterrevolution had taken place. They made no differentiation between a political counterrevolution and a social one. Indeed, the repression seemed so overwhelming at the time that many considered it must reflect a change in more than the mere form of state. But in reality the Stalin regime ushered in a new form of state, anti-democratic and repressive, while retaining the basic class structures. Collectivization, with all its harshness and drawbacks, strengthened the class alliance between the workers and the peasants.

    Whatever one may say about the character of the Stalin regime, the changes it ushered in were mostly in the superstructure--although it did at the same time foster social inequality. No social counterrevolution took place. Perhaps the greatest challenge to this view came during the 1960s when none other than the Chinese leadership under Mao Zedong abandoned their conception of the USSR as a workers' and socialist state, and introduced the concept that the Khrushchev leadership (which followed on the heels of the Stalin regime) constituted a full-scale social counterrevolution. Capitalism had been fully restored, according to them. This view was abandoned by the subsequent Chinese leadership, and has not been revived to this day.
    Source: http://www.workers.org/marcy/cd/sam9...ml/s900726.htm
  10. Honggweilo
    Honggweilo
    good article, except that he was soooo wrong on the "inabillity of full capitalist resoration in the USSR" in 1990 , he underestimated the internal and external forces of counter-revolution. Also i dont agree with him that reactionary reforms are that hard to put through, especially when he uses Salazar's portugal as an example (it did restore alot of feudalism, and anglo/american transnational capital has been exploiting portugal even during feudalism). Political transformation and social transformation are not things that have little relationship to each other and they effect each other much more rapidly in some cases then Marcy describes in this article. There will always be remnants of progression after a counter-revolution, but counter-revolution can destroy almost all progress when the conditions are right.. What is left of the class composition in the former USSR and Russia today?

    anyway. his characterization of the stalin era as "anti-democratic and repressive" is a bit vague, does he elaborate on it in any other works?
  11. Kassad
    Kassad
    Here's a list of Sam Marcy's works by topic and year. There's a lot of stuff on Stalin, the Soviet Union and capitalist restoration there before Marcy's death: http://www.workers.org/marcy/cd/index1.htm

    It should answer your questions pretty well. I don't exactly know a specific article where he elaborates immensely on the question of Stalin, but there's a good place to start.
  12. Rusty Shackleford
    Rusty Shackleford
    I actually know a PSLer who acknowledges trotsky's theories but is not a trot. he actually gave me Culture and Socialism by Trotsky to read, which personally i found to be a good read. the book was from the PSL's library in San Francisco. after i had read that he compared it to mao's take on culture. he preferred trotsky's but is not a trotskyist.

    i find it great that a party like the PSL can recognize the contributions of both Stalin and Trotsky at the same time. from my experience, the PSL is at its core Marxist-Leninist with no real major deviation towards "Stalinism" "Trotskyism" or "Maoism."
  13. Chimurenga.
    i find it great that a party like the PSL can recognize the contributions of both Stalin and Trotsky at the same time. from my experience, the PSL is at its core Marxist-Leninist with no real major deviation towards "Stalinism" "Trotskyism" or "Maoism."
    Exactly and that's one reason why I chose the PSL.
  14. Kassad
    Kassad
    I actually know a PSLer who acknowledges trotsky's theories but is not a trot. he actually gave me Culture and Socialism by Trotsky to read, which personally i found to be a good read. the book was from the PSL's library in San Francisco. after i had read that he compared it to mao's take on culture. he preferred trotsky's but is not a trotskyist.

    i find it great that a party like the PSL can recognize the contributions of both Stalin and Trotsky at the same time. from my experience, the PSL is at its core Marxist-Leninist with no real major deviation towards "Stalinism" "Trotskyism" or "Maoism."
    I mean, that's basically how most members of our party are. We uphold Trotsky's analysis of the Soviet Union and while recognizing the degeneration of the state and the rise of bureaucracy, we still considered it socialist in character. One of the biggest influences on me is Mao's definitive stance on self-criticism and the PSL upholds that -- taking from the past, learning, criticizing and taking the best from all lines of theory.
  15. Obrero Rebelde
    Obrero Rebelde
    " . . .taking from the past, learning, criticizing and taking the best from all lines of theory."

    Is this why someone somewhere in these threads described the PSL as "pan socialist"?
  16. Rusty Shackleford
    Rusty Shackleford
    I mean, that's basically how most members of our party are. We uphold Trotsky's analysis of the Soviet Union and while recognizing the degeneration of the state and the rise of bureaucracy, we still considered it socialist in character. One of the biggest influences on me is Mao's definitive stance on self-criticism and the PSL upholds that -- taking from the past, learning, criticizing and taking the best from all lines of theory.
    would the stance on criticism be explained in "Criticism and Self-Criticism" in the little red book? if so i should bring that up at the next study group im at with them.
  17. RedScare
    RedScare
    How does the PSL view Bukharin in relation to him being an alternative to Stalin?
  18. Kassad
    Kassad
    How does the PSL view Bukharin in relation to him being an alternative to Stalin?
    I think it's pretty easy to maintain a relative unity in a revolutionary organization when struggling for a common purpose. That's why anarchists in Russia during the time leading up to the revolution struggled alongside the Bolsheviks. However, once the ruling class in Russia was overthrown, followed by Lenin's death, there was definitely a crossroads in which the revolution could have gone in many directions. This is when very distinct "left" and "right" wings of the party come to be.

    Bukharin represented a very obvious movement to the right, seeking to continue and further the New Economic Policy. Though right wing elements in a communist party are not necessarily going to destroy it, they can be quite dangerous. Just look at the Chinese Revolution and what happened once Mao died. Mao took direct action in purging capitalists and bourgeois elements from the Chinese Communist Party, but Stalin's general paranoia led to killing off elected party leadership that he thought opposed him. There's a very distinct difference there.

    Though Bukharin's political positions were very wrong and frankly, would have meant a much earlier death for the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, he should have been criticized and driven from the party if he became a threat to the revolution, not murdered. Does that answer your question? It's a really difficult question to grapple with because there will always be bourgeois elements in a communist party that takes power. What is necessary is to properly continue the revolution and to protect it from right-wing elements.
  19. The Hong Se Sun
    The Hong Se Sun
    To go even further I told the people who where recruiting me that I hated Stalin and that I thought he kinda of ruined socialism's reputation for the world. I was still allowed to join so I'd say that the PSL is not a Stalinist group. If they were I'd quit.

    * just wanted to say that I do not hate Stalin anymore and have been called a Stalinist a million times now and it doesn't bother me.

    I think the PSL is something beautiful because Ive met people who like trotsky, people who like Stalin and Ive met Maoist so we are kind of the united socialist party here in the US
  20. Queercommie Girl
    Queercommie Girl
    I wouldn't call the PSL "pan-socialist", that term is certainly too wide.

    The PSL is more like "pan-Marxist-Leninist", a mixture of the three major continuations of Marxism-Leninism: Trotskyism, Stalinism and Maoism.
  21. Queercommie Girl
    Queercommie Girl
    Well, firstly, I don't know the answer to your question.

    But Trotskyism as "anti-totalitarian" or opposed to "Stalinism" is a uniquely Western thing. Trotsky defended the gains of the USSR and saw it as a socialist state. His main disagreements were about Socialism in One Country and things of that sort.
    Not really. Democracy, with a proletarian economical basis, is absolutely crucial in any kind of real socialism. It is a fundamental mistake to label "democracy" as something that is intrinsically bourgeois.

    Democracy has a class basis: bourgeois democracy vs. proletarian democracy. But this doesn't mean proletarian democracy is not democratic, indeed, if anything, it is even more democratic than bourgeois democracy.

    And Trotsky was not the only Leninist who emphasised worker's democracy. Mao Zedong did as well, he introduced elements of worker's democracy during the Cultural Revolution. The contemporary revolutionary Maoist party in mainland China, the MCPC (Maoist Communist Party of China), explicitly calls for worker's supervisory councils to take political power in the country.

    Of course, Maoist and Trotskyist democracy aren't exactly the same. Contemporary Maoists support democracy within the Communist Party, and democratic supervision by the working class, but they don't support multi-party democracy or direct democracy of the "one person, one vote" type, which the Trots do support. But generally speaking, there cannot exist a genuine socialism without proletarian democracy, and one does not need to be a Trotskyist to believe this important political principle.