Reflections on the character of the international context Comrade Solly Mapaila, SACP Second Deputy General Secretary The fundamental questions that we seek to resolve as a revolution are complex. In the face of this reality it does happen at times in political movements that instead of tackling such questions for what they are some would rather degenerate and adopt simplistic approaches. When this slides into narrow and factional grudges it becomes even more problematic that it could weaken unity and cohesion within a movement, and thus, wittingly or unwittingly, tilt the domestic balance of forces in favour of strategic opponents. This is the departure point to defeat in the international balance of forces which capacity to tilt is simultaneously curtailed. It is of no use to a revolutionary, i.e. if a person is indeed one, to seek a scapegoat within one’s own movement or Alliance and polarise it as a contribution to the answer to the complex questions that are under strategic consideration. Revolutionaries treat of complex questions for what they are, regardless of the degree of sophistication this may demand. Our intervention today focuses on the question of methodology to question of the character of the international context. The actual analysis and clarity of the tasks we are facing will follow in a series of instalments. But we lay the basis as we proceed methodologically. The analysis of the character of the international context is often reduced to events that are taking place in, or between, other countries. Consequently, the national sphere is not considered to be an international platform of action. Similarly, national processes and the forces that shape such processes in their international aspect are left out in this erroneous analysis as is the role that we – as one of the force at play too, both as a movement and country – can play in shaping the international context. This further excludes an examination of the relationship between the national and the international contexts and related balance of forces. Our intervention today looks at the question of the character of the international context methodologically. This we do by means of a review of the renowned communist scholar, Antonio Gramsci’s Selections from the Prison Notebooks. We focus particularly focus on his contribution, ‘Internationalism and National Policy’, because we believe it has useful elements that can help us move forward. Let us from the onset clarify the question of the relationship between the international and national balance of forces, i.e. whether the former conditions or influences the latter, or vice versa. The answer cannot be fixed for all the times; it must be as dynamic as the changes in material conditions; neither can it, therefore, be a straightjacketed one. The relationship between the two is a dialectical one. It is constructed in both ways, and is itself dependent on the balance of forces between the two, i.e. the national and international balance of forces! Our intervention must be understood in this context. Our selection of Gramsci’s classical contribution is also based on the fact that it not only moves from the standpoint of analytical methodology but the struggle for change and development. He best captures the problem being considered by posing the question: How, according to the philosophy of praxis as it manifests itself politically, whether formulated by Karl Marx – the founder of the philosophy, or particularly by Vladimir Lenin – its most recent great theoretician (i.e. at the time), the international situation should be considered in its national aspect? Gramsci argues that the national context of every country is the result of a combination of original and in a certain sense unique factors. These have to be understood both in their originality and uniqueness for an organisation to lead and direct them. Instead of being trapped in an abstract international sphere, Gramsci asserts that: “To be sure, the line of development is towards internationalism, but the point of departure is ‘national’ – and it is from this point of departure that one must begin. Yet the perspective is international and cannot be otherwise.” This is important for the progressive and revolutionary movement to take seriously. In other words, this movement, the majority of which is made up by the working class, must intensify the struggle for a complete revolution in every country, i.e. right in its home country. However, at times conditions could – as was the case in South Africa since 1950 starting with the banning of the Communist Party followed by that of the ANC in 1960 by the apartheid regime – force the movement to go underground and in exile. This did not mean that we abandoned action at the home front. On the contrary, underground work and work in exile including mass mobilisation and international mobilisation to isolate the apartheid regime were a direct continuation of work in its scientific definition to reinforce and intensify the struggle right at home. This is how all the pillars of our struggle, including the armed struggle we were compelled to adopt, were mutually reinforcing. The overthrow of colonialism and apartheid and the elimination of their underpinning social relations of production at home were, however, only a part of, and therefore did not alone constitute, the totality of our greater goal. Conversely, these were inextricably linked with the struggle for world peace to which our struggle had to contribute. This struggle was at the same time an international struggle: World peace was, and still is, impossible to attain for so long as there is a section of the people in any part of the world who are facing injustice from another, regardless of whether such is from within or outside national borders. The struggle for world peace continues! After all, the super-structural and structural systems of oppression and domination, such as colonialism, neo-colonialism, capitalism and its highest stage, imperialism, the latest form of which is neoliberalism, are world systems. In each country, the forces behind the world systems of oppression and domination manipulate and exploit the original and unique factors, including the specific weaknesses, of the national context that obtains, this as an entry point and in order to entrench. Gramsci asserts that it is necessary to study and accurately interpret the combination of national forces which the ‘international class’ has to lead and direct. By the ‘international class’ he refers to the class of wage labourers, i.e. the proletariat. This, of course, and at the same scale, is faced with its opponent, the class of the exploiters but who, while essentially the same in character do not necessarily share common national interests at every moment and therefore do develop divergent perspectives on associated questions of the day. Based on our theory of organisation and taking into consideration all the motive forces of our revolution, let us consider that the ‘international class’ in its broad definition refers to the working class, which, all our Alliance partners agree, is the main motive force of our revolution. Such a force, according to Gramsci, which is international in character has to ground itself nationally (i.e. to “nationalise” itself), inasmuch as it guides various social strata; some of these strata might as well be narrowly national in their outlook but nevertheless necessary to marshal in an internationalist direction. This sense, he contents, is not a very narrow one either, since before the conditions can be created for an economy that has a world plan, it is necessary to pass through multiple phases in which regional economic integration of groups of nations may assume various forms of organisation. In addition, this has to be understood in the context of the balance of forces nationally and internationally at different levels, i.e. regional, continental and world scales. Gramsci’s conclusion is even more important for us: “…it must never be forgotten that historical development follows the laws of necessity until the initiative has decisively passed over to those forces which tend towards construction in accordance with a plan of peaceful and solidary division of labour (by this he also discusses the socialist forces). As such: “That non-national concepts (i.e. ones that cannot be referred to each individual country) are erroneous can be seen ab absurdo: they have led to passivity and inertia in two quite distinct phases: 1. in the first phase, nobody believed that they ought to make a start – that is to say, they believed that by making a start they would find themselves isolated; they waited for everybody to move together, and nobody in the meantime moved or organised the movement; 2. the second phase is perhaps worse, because what is being awaited is an anachronistic and anti-natural form of “Napoleonism” (since not all historical phases repeat themselves in the same form). These two errors must be seen also as the direct results of an analysis that starts and ends with the international context that is seen narrowly as constituted by the “external world”. In addition, the same approach leaves out of sight the national sphere of action as part of the international terrain itself. It would be fatalistic and amount to the desertion of the revolution to be part of those who do not believe that they “ought to make a start” from which others must also take their cue. Most importantly, it is from the standpoint of ‘philosophical materialism’, based on a historical and dialectical perspective that we can best develop a scientific understanding of the international context (as it is with the national context). This methodological approach does not start and end with an analysis of events in their appearance only or in isolation from, but moves deeper into, their essential content, material basis and structural forces. In this way we will examine the most influential and ultimate decisive factor, the economy, appreciating that it is at the centre of those developments and the configuration of the forces behind them. It is from this very same point of view that the national content of international policy and the international content of national policy must be framed, articulated and elaborated. Second Deputy General Secretary, Comrade Solly Mapaila, Tshwane, 18 October 2014
Posted on: Thu, 23 Oct 2014 08:00:09 +0000
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