Outlines of Some Cultural Aspects of U.S. Imperialism: The Struggle for Socialism

By Aldwyn Clarke

In Part I, this booklet traces the post-Independence struggles in the United States for the realization of the ideals of the early Enlightenment thinkers, with particular emphasis on the practical struggles of the working class. The mid nineteenth to the mid twentieth centuries origin and fates of the theories of Charles Darwin and Karl Marx in this country, are seen through the ideological lenses of the various classes, groups, and individual. We get glimpses of the pracgtical objectives of the culturally influential religious revivals, social Darwinist movement, and the current "dunbing down" of the US population - al of which had (and have ) the support and/or blessings of the corporate and political elite, down through the decades.
In Part II, the author presents a reappraisal, mainly by academic Marxists in the advanced capitalist ststes,of the demise of soviet socialism, and their alternatives for a non- market socialism with transparency - Democratic Participatory Socialism. It is the hope of this writer that the ideas within will seed more discussion on socialsit theory and practice.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jul 30, 2009
• ISBN: 9781465323958

Aldwyn Clarke

About the Author This writer belongs to that group of individuals who never managed to hold on to a lifelong profession, though trained as a nurse, as one or two varieties of social work, as semi skilled laborer, as low level sociologist (MA . Sociology, CUNY), and now as semi public school teacher. At this late point in life l have decided to air my views on some of the decisive social movements in which I participated, and in which I am still somewhat active, though to a very limited extent. The reader, therefore, will hopefully concentrate his/her attention on this first attempt to convey the idea that socialism is not an arbitrary invention of Karl Marx, Frederick Engels, nor V.I. Lenin. Neither is it a dead historical issue. I was born in, and spent the greater part of my life in Trinidad and Tobago, arriving in the USA over two decades ago, when my world outlook had been decidedly fixed by earlier training and experiences. I live in New York City where I’ve spent most of my time in the USA, and gained a more mature view of history.

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Copyright © 2009 by Aldwyn Clarke.

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Contents

Summary/Autobiographical Note

Introduction— The USA as the world’s sole super power

Ideological Beginnings of European capitalism and its American offshoot

The Struggle Of The Classes In The United States

Social Darwinism And Historical Materialism

Social Darwinism And American Capitalism

Introduction

The Demise Of Socialism And Theoretical Proposals For Its Renewal

Concluding Remarks

Bibliography

Summary/Autobiographical Note

The following accounts deal with a selection from some important ideological moments of US society over the life of the federal republic. A continuous struggle has been waged for the minds and support of the working classes that has been perceived by some observers as a battle between the forces of scientific rationalism and that of religious and secular irrational forms of behavior and thinking, under which latter category fundamentalist religious ideas has assumed the leading role. My stress has not been on the religious, or general secular irrationalism, but on the struggle for democracy and socialism, as it has been included as a pseudo science—one of the irrational movements that passed through American society. Also, I attempt to summarize, through the eyes of various Marxists, the attempts to break away from, and to build alternatives to capitalism in other parts of the world, to build socialism without the internal influence of the capitalist free market.

After the collapse of soviet type socialism, there was resurgence in the pronouncements of bourgeois spokespersons that with US and European capitalism, history had come to its end. Therefore, it was futile to struggle against the present social system. However, despite these conclusions of mainstream commentators, proven according to their standards of measurement, working class based movements revived their struggles to achieve forms of socialism, particularly in Latin America. Socialism remained a viable alternative to capitalism. And Marxism provided a scientific tool for the analysis of the social phenomena of bourgeois society and the guide for socialist theory. One consequence of the several critical analyses of the progress of soviet socialism over its seventy or so years of existence show that there was nothing inevitable about the collapse. It was the hope of the proponents of the non market socialist alternatives and that of this writer that the same mistakes are not repeated in the practice of regimes that are currently embarking on an anti capitalist path in the so called Third World.

My attraction to Marxism began by way of Black Nationalism, anti colonialism, and the anti imperialist ideas of radical West Indian authors like Franz Fanon, Walter Rodney, and our country’s Prime Minister Eric Williams. When the Black Power movement took to the streets of Port-of-Spain, Trinidad & Tobago, in the late 1960’s, and merged with the island wide trade union demonstrations, I became a Black Power militant for a few months. I joined the demonstrations, helping to organize grassroots activities in support of the NJAC (the National Joint Action Committee). The defeat of the Trinidad and Tobago soldiers’ revolt in 1970, also coincided with a short lived ‘armed struggle’ of some young people, NUFF, (National United Freedom Fighters) who had hoped to build up a guerilla movement from their forest hideouts in the northern range of mountains. Then, as elsewhere, the Black Power movement fizzled out, and ushered in the era of consumerism that held sway from the mid 1970’s to the present day. From this period until about the mid 1980’s, I was actively involved in the trade union and political life of the country, which taught me how important the working class was to the continued smooth functioning of the bourgeois economy, the reproduction of its wealth and power, and to its real ability to become the head of the movement for socialism.

When I immigrated to the USA and gradually got inkling about the history of the struggles of the classes since the early days of the republic, it dawned on me how little I knew about this country. Coming from a small island state, I found the US federation very complicated, the physical terrain huge and differentiated; the ruling class hidden behind a multitude of economic and cultural mirrors; the working classes burdened by traditional conventions and beliefs, the middle classes by illusions and false hopes; the progressive intelligentsia continually attacked and marginalized. There were so many distracting influences and media, that I thought it a wonder that intellectuals sympathetic to the working class even survived in this environment. Fortunately for the future prospects of the people, the US Constitution is grounded in the Enlightenment ideas of the then progressive section of the US bourgeoisie, supported by like minded working class, small farmers, and middle class professionals. The original articles which gave protection to the citizens (excepting non propertied males, women, children, slaves, and Native Americans) have been the focus of civil battles over the centuries, and the inspiration for much discussion. I realized that without the knowledge and Marxist understanding of the history of the USA, from abroad it was easy to assume that in the most advanced country—the wealthiest in the world—there would be a corresponding powerful working class movement that acted as a counter to the rule of the US bourgeoisie. The traditional outlook of the organized working class has been one of cooperation and acceptance of the alleged identity of interests between itself and the bourgeoisie. This has been the dominant philosophy since the founding of the American Federation of Labor led by Samuel Gompers, in the late nineteenth century. While this identity of interests may be true for the top leaders of the various AFL-CIO trade union divisions, who are bourgeois in their lifestyles, this is not true of the broad membership of the working class who are not even represented by any kind of trade union organization and are not strong enough to stave off the arbitrary lay-offs, withdrawal of benefits won during the earlier decades of militant struggles, much more to live the life of a bourgeois, except in imagination.

Some years ago, with the above latter thoughts in mind, I had begun this writing with the purpose of presenting the underlying cultural biases of the US working class, including those prejudices carried over from its European heritage, which acted as blocks to their reception of new, revolutionary ideas and activities. I had made use of D. Levitas’ book. The Terrorist Next Door to this end. At the same time I had been trying to get a sense of what had caused the collapse of the Soviet Union, but could get no satisfactory analyses from the bourgeois press, nor from the publications of revolutionary Marxist organizations. Later, when I began to get analyses from the Marxist publication Science & Society, I decided that I would try to summarize these views for my own clarification, but ended up incorporating these analyses of the demise of soviet socialism, and alternative proposals for a non market socialism as the second half of this interpretation of contemporary social events.

Then, a few months ago, I came upon Susan Jacoby’s book, The Age Of American Unreason, whose treatment of the cultural movements, deviations, and prejudices, concentrated on their adverse effects upon the early American Enlightenment ideals; their irrational and the unscientific bases. These ‘anti-Enlightenment’ tendencies have blossomed into a general mistrust of science, intellectuals, education, etc., by a significant proportion of the American population. The two accounts by Levitas and Jacoby seemed to me to treat of the same phenomena with different emphases, but gave a glimpse into class dynamics at different periods. As the working class tends to be that part of the population most deeply influenced by the ideology of the bourgeoisie, these accounts give us an insight into changing belief systems of the working class. I should not have been surprised to find that Marxism was included in the ranks of the humbug irrational movements by Jacoby. Levitas’ work was concerned to trace the roots of American prejudice and national terrorism as originating in European state and church structures of feudalism and early capitalism. In The Terrorist Next Door, Levitas showed how over the centuries the prejudicial ideas changed their forms, but were directed at the same estranged groups—Jews, non whites, progressive Enlightenment thinkers (sections of the Illuminati*), the Jacobins, blacks, and later the communists/Bolsheviks. Jacoby’s book targeted all the major purveyors of prejudice, irrational knowledge, and mass ignorance in US society. It’s author saw that the spreading of this present day video/internet evolved form of irrationalism—the ‘dumbing down’ of the young population through perpetual entertainment, lowering of educational standards, etc—is materially profitable to the media conglomerates owned by less than a handful of multinational corporations. The why of it all is left unanswered. Jacoby’s book detailed the supportive contributions made to the irrational and anti intellectual movement, down the decades, by leading bourgeois politicians, business people, church leaders and their organizations, academics at prestigious universities, the mass media, and the fundamentalist religious right. The book concludes in a hopeful mood that the author’s intellectual contribution may effect a positive tilt against irrationalism.

At this point, I want to return my starting point—to Trinidad and Tobago. It would be an unforgivable error if I neglected to mention that this brief review of some aspects of US culture, and of the status of socialism—could not have existed without my fortunate encounter with the late John Poon, whom people used to jokingly call the last communist, and who served as guide and organizer that kept alive the communist tradition into the 1980’s. I am also indebted to his wife Amy and to the militant trade unionists and left wing politicians in the country all of whom helped me to understand the practical sides of revolutionary politics.

Introduction— The USA as the world’s sole super power

In the midst of the campaigns by the two major bourgeois parties leading to the 2004 US national presidential elections, loud debates took place, focused on a major change in the politics of the incumbent Republican administration—the urgent need for the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Though a few Democratic and Republican representatives in both Houses of Congress opposed the timing, manner, and relative importance of invading Iraq, which they saw as of secondary importance to that of concentrating this country’s military and political resources upon Afghanistan, where the terrorist enemies were located, not a single representative of the United States Congress raised a finger against the imperialist policy of invasions and wars against sovereign states as such. The strongest opponents of the Bush administration’s military invasions viewed these events as matters that were taken for granted. The United States of America had the imperial right to invade, occupy, wipe out, or do whatever it thought fit in another nominally sovereign country to secure its ‘national interests’. As we come to the end of the first decade of the twenty first century, with a nominally ‘new’ administration adorned with all the rhetorical trappings of change, the deepening crisis of imperialism, now undeniably of world spanning significance, shows that the new Obama administration is even more embedded in the webs of the banks, and in Wall St and the biggest financial institutions. Although the militaristic rhetoric has now been honey coated, US imperial policy is still headed by war hawks like Hillary Clinton, urging war against Iran, as did the militarists in the former Republican leadership. Instead of the withdrawal of troops from the Middle Eastern states, there has been a revamping of the USA and its NATO allies’ efforts to pacify the inhabitants of opposing Middle Eastern states. In its US homeland—the anti imperialist voices of the American public remain muted in the Congressional halls of power.

That this country has invaded and overcome other relatively weak Third World states, Iraq and Afghanistan, threatens with nuclear annihilation Iran, and bombs its ally Pakistan, all with the ostensible aims of securing its national interests, taking revenge for the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, ridding the world of the scourge of terrorism, and ensuring the victory of democracy—is not surprising. What is surprising and new was that unlike its past ‘regime changes’,—the CIA organized subversions and military occupations in countries like Guatemala,