Debate On Revolutionary Theory: Marxist versus Egalitarian
How to get from here to there? What way forward?
Green Liberty Caucus will host a debate between Chuck Fall, chief proponent for Green Liberty, John Spritzler, egalitarian revolutionist, and Thomas , Marxist / Trotskyist ‘socialist revolutionary,’ at our national monthly meet up, on first Monday, December 2; 4pm pacific time/ 7pm Eastern.
The debate is about how to get from here, where we are today, to there, into a revolutionary future that liberates us from plutocracy and orients society toward regeneration of natural eco-systems and builds out an egalitarian society.
We all agree that we are egalitarian, that we want a fair society based on mutual aid and solidarity, and accept the principle that all people work based on abilities and receive according to needs. I think we all agree on this, but where we disagree is on the matter of whether “the revolution” will be framed explicitly as egalitarian or an explicitly Marxist / Socialist / Communist. This assertion can be qualified by speakers as needed.
This debate will be about ideas for structure, the language we use, and what practically speaking can work to advance the revolutionary project in our modern era.
Can revolutionary free cities provide the fulcrum point for a mass of workers and all other people in the cities, to lever change? Or, is it absolutely necessary that a central revolutionary committee command and direct the “socialist workers” revolution?
Where / what is the locus of the revolution? The hearts and minds of the people? The streets? Or, in the city as the ‘commune of commune’, the place where real democracy can be engaged and mutual aid practiced?
Thomas, a professor and avowed Marxist, expert on Marxist / Leninist revolutionary history, will argue for an explicit Marxist socialist workers’ revolution that builds out a central organizing authority, and functions as a vanguard for the revolution. Highlighting the central role for the workers in the revolution is key, and being explicitly socialist / communist is important. Thomas will defend Marx as the best light bearer for revolutionary possibility and he will refute claims that Marxism is authoritarian and anti-democratic. Read Thomas’s clarification of the debate here.
John Spritzler is an anti-Marxist Egalitarian who has written extensively on the topic of an Egalitarian Revolution. He will argue for a direct revolutionary message to remove the rich from power and that an egalitarian society replace it. His arguments for egalitarian revolution evoke and invoke the anarchist / libertarian socialist struggle in Spain from 1936 to 1939 that fought to create a society free from the ruling class. Read recent post from John on nature of popular consciousness.
Chuck Fall, as chief proponent for Green Liberty, supports efforts to advance a liberation coalition against plutocracy, and is in solidarity with the ideas of John Spritzler and his call for an Egalitarian Revolution. Green Liberty represents that society needs to liberate from the ecologically destructive practices of capitalist economics, and liberate from the plutocracy that has exploited labor and nature for profit, and conducted state crimes against democracy through assassinations and counter-revolutionary actions.
Green Liberty recognizes the work of Murray Bookchin, born in 1921 in NY City and now deceased. He was raised in a socialist revolutionary family, a Marxist / Trotskyist soap box preacher in his teens during the depression era; evolving from his roots, Bookchin has advanced the most cogent revolutionary theory that stands any possibility for actually accomplishing a revolution. He draws on history to show that the city (in coordination with other cities and towns and regions) is the natural context for democracy and thus the locus for revolution.
I will argue for an egalitarian revolution that advances libertarian municipalism as the revolutionary model that creates a confederation of free cities. A confederal agency would logically function as a central authority, its power delegated to it by the cities, and it would face off with the existing state (s), but the cities, and the revolutionary people would lever the change we seek.
Ultimately for a revolution to succeed there will need to be a sea change of consciousness among the American people. There will be transitional projects that build the movement and seek immediate objectives.
Advancing a revolution against the plutocracy will require a message that appeals broadly, is fair and rational. Reclaiming the commons, creating new commons, and putting the city at the center of these projects, are appeals that can win people to our side.
To the question, what will get us from here to there:
John Spritzler argues the vast majority of American people already want to remove the rich from power, but people think they are alone in this view point so don’t act on it, nor even talk about their desire to remove the rich from power. They just need to hear from others that they are not alone and then they would be motivated to advance revolution. The people don’t need to be told why we should remove the rich from power, (they will have their own reason) only that there is a revolutionary project to do so…and that will suffice. John can elaborate on this point.
Classical Marxists might argue that the workers need to be educated in the revolutionary possibility so they can actualize the revolution, and that the reason for a revolution is to overthrow the ruling class to create a communist society run by the workers who control the means of production. Thomas can elaborate on this.
I accept that to create a mass revolutionary movement we will need to educate about what an egalitarian revolution would look like, what it would accomplish, and I think we need to say why it is necessary.
Every individual is free to say why we should remove the rich from power, but the more unified we can be in our message, the more likely we can advance a united front, in my opinion.
I will argue a revolution is necessary for multiple reasons, but aside from the fact that the rich treat workers and ordinary people like dirt, and commit ecocide without remorse, and are militaristic, and get us into war, if we don’t revolt, then human kind may be lost to technocracy.
To counter technocracy and the emerging techno-totalitarianism, our revolution needs to advance a social ecology that restores things natural, and makes human society work in harmony with natural systems, not as a dominating force and singularly extractive, by in stewardship for biological diversity, however that may be accomplished.
Another deeply moral reason, and chief reason to remove the rich the rich from power is that they have secretly, and continue to secretly, conduct war against the American and global populations through unaccounted for state crimes, within the USA and outside the USA. See the work of David Hughes for details around the Covid event and history of NAZI association.
Meanwhile, we were warned by Eisenhower about the military, bio-pharmacological, medical industrial complex, and John Kennedy heeded the warning, but the 1960’s assassinations followed; the Iran Contra gun-trafficking-financed-by-drugs produced the crack cocaine epidemic; then we got 9/11; and now the Covid debacle with Ukraine and Gaza; all these events amount to multi-generations of state crimes, and crimes against humanity, which reveal the evil and impunity of the power elite. The failure to prosecute these crimes, and heed Eisenhower’s warning, has brought us to where we are today, on the brink of a globalist techno-totalitarianism and ecological ruin.
We should feel indignant that historic possibilities were stolen from us when the assassinations robbed society of talented leaders who would have directed history in the arc of justice Martin Luther King imagined. We are due reparations for failure to regulate markets and toxins, and the stolen possibilities.
It is morally incumbent on us, those in the political truth, and revolutionary movement, those willing to acknowledge the evil of the plutocracy and the deep state it commands, to demand the power elite stand down, or be taken down, since they have ruined the planet and killed many people in the interest of holding and expanding power.
So, which way, and how, forward? Each presenter will take 8 – 10 minutes to make their case for getting from here to there. What is the goal and objective? How to do it? What language do we use to build a mass movement under a united front?
After opening presentations, debaters will each get two – three minute rounds to refute remarks from others, ask questions. Then we will open discussion up to others in the audience.
This protocol is subject to amendment on day of debate.
