ALB
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Our review of one of his books here:http://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Istvan%20MeszarosI think he was better known for his book on Marx's Theory of Alienation.
This pamphlet "Socialism As a Practical Alternative" provides a description of how the prtoduction and distribution of wealth could be organised without money especially chapters 4 and 5:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/pamphlets/socialism-practical-alternative
There are two separate issues (1) whether or Catalonia should break away from Spain and become a separate, capitalist state, and (2) whether there should be a referendum on the question. The reaction of the Spanish government has shifted the debate from (1) to (2), which has enabled the Catalan regional government to win sympathy and support on that basis rather than for the less popular breakaway from Spain.While Socialists have no sympathy or support whatsoever for setting up yet another capitalist State and are implacably opposed to Catalan as to all other nationalisms, our position on the referendum can be, as Vin points out, more nuanced — even if the question on the ballot paper was irrelevant the vote should not have been prevented. I imagine that if there was a socialist party in Spain it would have taken the same attitude as we took to the Euroreferendum here — that it was an irrelevant side-show and that those who wanted socialism should write "socialismo mundial" across their ballot papers. Abstention would have been another option, but generally we favour taking part in elections where they are called, even if only to cast a write-in vote, just to show we regard them as a potential weapon a socialist working class can use to win political control and end capitalism.Actually, although it is being denounced for brutality, it was not in a position to employ its full (paper) power. The New York Times reported the Spanish Minister of Justice as saying:
Quote:Most polling stations stayed open on Sunday, he said, “because the security forces decided that it wasn’t worth using force because of the consequences that it could have.”On the other hand, it will have had some support in other parts of Spain from Spanish nationalists.
I see the Trots are already on the independantist bandwagon:https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/europe/catalonian-referendum-was-popular-uprising/http://groupemarxiste.info/?p=3945And the Catalan government doesn't even pretend to have any leftist or radical project, just to have an independent Catalan state so the capitalist class will be able to pay less in taxation !
BBC wrote:Catalan officials later said 90% of those who voted backed independence in Sunday's vote. The turnout was 42.3%.That's only 38% of the electorate. The Spanish state hasn't sent "rottweillers" only a few yapping dogs, i.e., their response hasn't been that repressive, certainly not as repressive as a state can be. But why not? Because even if only 38% of the population is against them they dare not. Think how much they would have think again if over 50% were against them and, again, if those 50+% were determined Socialists (not wishy-washy independanists).
Mike Foster wrote:What is new here is the personality cult he has attracted, typified by the 'Oh Jeremy Corbyn' chant (to the tune of a White Stripes song, is it?).Our branch worked out in the pub after one of our meetings that "Ohh Soch-al-ist Party" can be sung to the same tune if anyone wants to prepare a chorus for our coming delegate meeting.
Vin wrote:Legislate to ensure that any employer wishing to recruit labour from abroad does not undercut workers at home – because it causes divisions when one workforce is used against anotherThis one sounds a big dodgy.
Vin wrote:Should socialists support the Labour Party's proposed reforms on "Rights at Work" proposed in it's 2017 manifesto?Depends on what you mean by "support". Certainly the Party can't support them in the sense of advocating them. Maybe a minority of Socialist MPs could be instructed to vote for them. A socialist in a trade union could well support them through their trade union and as a trade unionist. What they couldn't do is to vote Labour or tell others to vote Labour to try to get them.The situation here reminds me of that in France in 1980 in the run-up to François Mitterand's election as President in 1981. The Labour Party is making the same sort of promises about changing the way capitalism works as his party made during that period. When he was elected there was dancing in the streets. But things soon turned sour. For those who can read French what's happened is documented here:https://www.worldsocialism.org/canada/frechec.htmBasically, when the "Socialist" Party/"Communist" Party government came to power in June 1981 they increased benefits, nationalised the banks, etc but within a few months were forced to backtrack and ended up imposing austerity and devaluing the franc three times. A bit like the Wilson 1964-70 Labour government in Britain.We know that this is what would happen to a Corbyn Labour government, so there's no point in encouraging illusions about what reforms it might be able to deliver.
I wonder whether Kliman was not referring to this passage in the famous last-but-one chapter of Volume I of Capital about the "expropriation of the expropriators":
Quote:The capitalist mode of appropriation, the result of the capitalist mode of production, produces capitalist private property. This is the first negation of individual private property, as founded on the labour of the proprietor. But capitalist production begets, with the inexorability of a law of Nature, its own negation. It is the negation of negation. This does not re-establish private property for the producer, but gives him individual property based on the acquisition of the capitalist era: i.e., on cooperation and the possession in common of the land and of the means of production.Which seems to mean that, on the basis of common ownership, individuals will have a right to a share of the collectively-produced product to satisfy their individual needs. What else could it mean?
Dave B wrote:I didn’t think Josephus mentioned the Nasoreans or Nazzoreans.No, but he does mention the "Nazarites". Just checked, as taking time off from selling Socialist Standards and pamphlets at the West London Peace Fair yesterday I bought a copy of The Works of Josephus, a 19th century reprint (1875) of William Whiston's classic 1737 translation in a local bookshop for only £9. So, I'm equipped to re-enter the fray.Here's the notorious passage (from Antiquities, Book XVIII, chapter 3) where some pious fraudster has made Josephus write:
Quote:Now, there was about this time, Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man, for he was a doer of wonderful works, — a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews, and many of the Gentiles. He was [the] Christ; and when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him, for he appeared to them alive again the third day, as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him ; and the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day.Josephus was writing around 93/94 AD (as the christians put it). The tampering with what Josephus might originally written (some reference to the christians and their beliefs perhaps) is blatant. A religious Jew such as Josephus would never have called Jesus "the Christ" (the Greek for Messiah) nor doubted that he would have been a man.Only a christian would have, so giving away that one of them had tampered with the text. Whiston himself, in an appendix entitled "The Testimonies of Josephus concerning Jesus Christ, John the Baptist, and James the Just vindicated", concedes the point that it could only have been written by a christian, and uses this as evidence that Josephus himself must have secretly been "a Nazarene or Ebionite Jewish Christian". I don't think Roman's "modern scholars" set much credence to this theory (do they?)
In the news this week:http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4911972/Bible-passage-banning-women-speaking-added-later.htmlPious fraudsters at work again?
Can't the price in the basket be increased to £3.50. We have just received an order for Europe from someone who has paid £2. But, as the pamphlet weighs 200gm, this means that we won't even recover the cost of postage which, for this weight to overseas, is around £3.80 and this doesn't take into account the cost of the jiffy in which it will be packaged.£2 is even cheaper than our ordinary, shorter pamphlet and this is more a book. Incidentally, talking about books I see that neither Strange Meeting (Socialism and World War One) nor A Socialist Life (by Heather Ball) can be ordered through our website. Both of these have less pages than the Martov pamphlet and sell for more.In short, the Martov pamphlet seems to be ridiculously underpriced
