Rebuilding the left/
Marta Harnecker
- London: Zed Books, 2007.
- vii, 168 p.
Part I The Left and the New World 5 1 Profound Changes in the World 7 A unit in real time on a planetary scale 8 The internationalisation of the production process 8 The nature of the state changes but its role is not reduced 12 The communications revolution in the service of capital 19 Fragmenting strategy 22 The military danger 23 The phenomenon of imperialism has not disappeared, but has taken on new forms 25 2 Profound Discontent among Much of Humankind 27 Decline in the standard of living 28 The new international cycle 29 3 Towards the Creation of an Alternative Social Bloc 32 The need to rebuild the Left so that it can become the glue that sticks the social opposition together 32 Building a broad anti-neo-liberal social and political bloc 34 Capitalist sectors in direct contradiction to the transnationals 35 Part II The Crises of 'Party' and Why We Need a New Left Political Culture 37 4 Crisis of Theory 39 Threefold origin 39 A crisis of Marxism doesn't mean we have to deny Marx's contributions 41 5 Programmatic Crisis and the Crisis of Credibility 42 No plan for an alternative to capitalism 42 Crisis of the credibility of politics and politicians 43 6 The Organic Crisis 45 There is no political subject equal to the new challenges 45 How copying the Bolshevik model led to deviations 46 Other mistakes and deviations 50 7 The Theory Underlying This Concept of Party 56 Some explanation for these errors: Kautsky's thesis 56 How this is reflected in the conception of the revolutionary party 63 8 Politics as the Art of Making the Impossible Possible 66 Is it possible to come up with an alternative? 66 Politics cannot be defined as the art of the possible 67 Utopian goals: a source of inspiration 70 Changing the traditional vision of politics 70 Overcoming the narrow definition of power 71 Politics as the art of building a social force in opposition to the system 71 9 Why We Need a Political Organisation 73 The effects of the ruling ideology 74 Manufacturing consent 74 Direct knowledge and indirect knowledge 76 Drawing up a social project that is an alternative to capitalism 77 The need to give millions of people a single will 78 Part III The New Political Instrument 81 10 The Characteristics of the New Political Instrument 83 Understanding the importance of social practice for creating consciousness 83 An organisation immersed in society 84 Overcoming hegemonism 86 Creating a new relationship with the popular movement 87 No more workerism 90 A body to coordinate all the different emancipatory social practices 91 Democracy: the cause to champion 91 An organisation which is the harbinger of the new society 91 11 A New Paradigm for Internal Organisation 100 Unite your members around a community of values and a concrete programme 100 Contemplating different kinds of membership 101 Giving up authoritarian methods 104 There is no political effectiveness without unified leadership 105 A political organisation for those exploited and excluded by capitalism 112 A political organisation which is not naive but is preparing itself for any eventuality 112 New internationalist practice for the globalised world 114 Part IV From Reforms to Revolution: The Bolivarian Revolutionary Process 115 12 Local Governments: Signposts to an Alternative Path 117 The problem of knowing how to govern 119 The party's weakness vis-a-vis the government 120 The bureaucratic apparatus and how to contend with it 122 Popular participation in the government 125 The participatory budget: the key to participation and politicisation 126 13 The Left and Reform 130 Has the Left become reformist? 130 Varieties of reformism 132 Specific challenges in the election arena 136 A creative approach to the a-legal 138 14 The Bolivarian Revolution Is It a Revolution? 139 The state takes the initiative in changing the rules of the game and creating spaces for participation 139 Participation and human development in the Bolivarian Constitution 140 The communal councils: local spaces ideal for allowing everyone to participate 140 Encouraging worker participation 145 The state from a revolutionary perspective 149 On the political instrument that could move these ideas forward 149.
9781842772560
Socialism -- History -- 20th century. Socialism -- Latin America -- 20th century. POLITICAL SCIENCE -- Political Ideologies -- Communism & Socialism.