Communist Parties in Great Britain (1999)

May 13, 1999

Since the collapse of Communism in the Soviet Union and the Eastern block, communist Parties in Western Europe have faced an interesting challenge. How do they exist after the fall of official communism? This is a complex question. There are many different communist parties in Western Europe. I have chosen Great Britain as an example, and have randomly picked four different groups out of the kaleidoscope of Communist parties in Great Britain. Examining these four groups will hopefully serve as a microcosm to understanding what is left of the communist movement in Western Europe. In particular, examining their response to Kosovo is of interest. The four parties are the Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist), the Socialist Workers Party, and the Alliance for Workers Liberty, and The Communist Party of Great Britain.

"In some ways" writes David Lawday "the collapse of communism is even harder on the party faithful in the West than it is on their comrades in Eastern Europe" (Lawday 21). Those in the West were communist by choice, while many in the East were forced to be communists. The Western communists have had to re-orientate themselves to survive. They have been forced to look for other models of inspiration after the fall of the Soviet Union. It is worth noting that Communism in Western Europe was never the negligible force it has been in the United States. In fact, close to twenty million Western Europeans still vote Communist.

The first of these groups, the Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist) (RCPB(ML)) appears as a relic of the Cold War. It is firmly grounded in Marxist-Leninist philosophy, and shows very little willingness to adjust. The RCPB(ML) describes everything as "Imperialist". Cuba is defending itself against imperialist aggression. North Korea is defending itself against the imperialist South Korea, and the imperialist United States. Iraq is defending itself against actions of imperialism. The United States Missile Strike on Sudan and Afghanistan on August 20, 1998 was an imperialist act. The list goes on and on.

The RCPB(ML) at many instances shows what seems to be a break with reality. A good example of this is their attitude towards the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). Their history of the DPRK indicates more than a little bit of bias is put into their work.

The DPRK arouse out of the revolutionary traditions of the Korean
people’s armed struggle against the brutal Japanese colonial occupation and the
progressive social reforms carried out in the north of Korea in the period after
1945. However, just two years after its founding, the infant republic was
plunged into a cruel war provoked by the United States, which had occupied the
south of Korea and rigged up a puppet regime, mainly based on collaborators with
the Japanese. In the three years of war, the Korean people, assisted by the
Chinese People’s Volunteers, fought the aggressive forces of imperialism – which
included a substantial British contingent – to a standstill (Workers’ Weekly
V.28, No. 25).

The RCPB(ML) repeatedly praises the DPRK and Kim Il Sung in it’s publication Workers’ Weekly, ignoring the repressive elements of the DPRK. As the RCPB(ML) admits, DPRK is important to their ideology because it declared itself a stronghold of Socialism after the collapse of the Soviet Union and "acted as a rallying point for many communists and other progressive political parties in the midst of a confusing situation" (Workers’ Weekly V. 28, No. 25). The Workers’ Weekly also claims that the starvation in the DPRK has been largely exaggerated as a result of a South Korean smear campaign. Similarly, Cuba is often described in Workers’ Weekly as a place where everything is fine, never mind what the unreliable Western media is telling you.

Least one get too negative a view of the RCPB(ML), however, it should be noted that they are very concerned with the rights of the working class, with woman’s rights, and with combating racism.

In response to the crisis in Yugoslavia, the RCPB(ML) strongly condemns the air strikes.

The British government must be condemned for its subservience to US
imperialism, and for the leading role it is playing in NATO’s military
aggression, which is being carried out without any mandate and for which there
can be no justification. Britain must get out of NATO and NATO should be
dismantled. All Britain’s forces must be immediately withdrawn from the Balkans
(Workers’ Weekly V.29 No.9).

A second group, similar in ideology, is the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB). They too are firmly grounded in Marxism-Leninism, and like the RCPB(ML) appear quite dogmatic in their beliefs.

The Communist Party serves the interests of the working class. We
fight all forms of opportunism and revisionism in the workers’ movement because
they endanger those interests. We insist on open ideological struggle in order
to fight out the correct way forward for our class (CPGB homepage).

They hold to the Marxist doctrine of violent revolution. "Socialism can never come through parliament. … Socialism will only succeed through working class revolution and the replacement of the dictatorship of the capitalists with the dictatorship of the working class." The CPGB also declares that "War and peace, pollution and the environment are class questions", and asserts that "the liberation of women, the ending of racism, bigotry, and all other forms of chauvinism" will all be achieved by Marxism. "Oppression is a direct result of class society, and will only finally be eradicated by the ending of class society" (CPGB Homepage). In doing this, the CPGB shows how strictly they apply a Marxist interpretation to all of society’s problems. However, the CPGB does not praise Cuba and the DPRK like the RCPB(ML) does. Instead the CPGB calls both Castro and Kim Il Sung bureaucratic dictators.

In response to the situation in Yugoslavia, the CPGB supports the Kosavo Liberation Army (KLA), while remaining critical of NATO.

The cause of the Kosovars and the KLA is just. Communist – not only
in Britain, but crucially Serbia – should support the democratic content of
their program, while criticizing their petty bourgeois and nationalist
prejudices and shortcomings, not least the illusion that NATO is a trustworthy
ally (Weekly Worker 286).

This fits in line perfectly with their commitment to the right of nations to self-determination.

The CPGB frequently attacks the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) in its publication Weekly Worker. The CPGB accuses the SWP of splitting the London Socialist Alliance electoral block (which includes the CPGB, SWP, and the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty (AWL)). The CPGB also accuses the SWP of being controlled by demagogues, such as Arthur Scargill.

The SWP is another group that makes up Britain's Socialist Alliance. One should not be fooled by the name, the SWP is no less radical than its Communist counterparts. The SWP praises Cuba as a revolutionary model that all Socialists in bourgeois countries should aspire to. They do not support working with in, the system, but adhere to the Marxist doctrine of revolution.

The Socialist Workers Party believes that the power to win change
comes from below. The Labour party insists it comes through parliament. But
power does not lie with parliament – it remains with the unelected bosses,
bankers, police chiefs, judges and top civil servants. That is why we support
every struggle, every strike by working people, every campaign against racism
and injustice. We argue that you cannot reform this rotten system – it must be
overthrown (SWP homepage).

The SWP is very concerned with international causes, particularly the International Socialists of South Korea (ISSK), who have been harshly repressed by the South Korean government. The SWP has been raising money for the legal defense of the ISSK.

In Yugoslavia SWP calls for an end to the War. Its publication, Socialist Worker, chronicles regularly the devastation NATO’s bombings have caused. The Socialist Worker relates stories about how innocent people were killed or made homeless by NATO. The SWP also criticizes the British government for going to war to save the Kosovan Albanians, but then refusing to help the refugees. "The number of refugees Britain is grudgingly prepared to take is pathetic (Socialist Worker 1644)". The SWP also accuse the media of distorting the truth to support NATO. The SWP calls for an unconditional halt to the war and NATO aggression.

The SWP has also been very active in the ant-war movement. Although leaders of the SWP complain that the media has purposely refused coverage of the anti-war coalition, the SWP has organized marches, rallies, and a number of pamphlets all urging an immediate end to the war.
The SWP has been harshly criticized by both the CPGB and the AWL for its anti-war stance. The CPGB accuses the large number of pacifists with-in the SWP of being guilty of liberalism, since pacifism is a bourgeois ideology. However the attacks go deeper than this. The CPGB accuses the SWP of allying itself along Cold War lines.

"For the arch-proponents of ‘Yugoslav defencism’ … NATO's offensive
against Serbia seems to have induced an acute bout of Cold War nostalgia. It is
as if the collapse of the Soviet Union and with it the demise of ‘official
communism’ had never really happened. Unconditional defense of the USSR has been
replaced by unconditional defense of Yugoslavia" (Weekly Worker 286).

The CPGB also accuses the SWP of downplaying the atrocities of Miloslovic, while placing an undue amount of blame on the KLA for the war.

Also condemning the SWP is the AWL. The AWL is a Trotskyist group, and shows many signs of still being stuck in 1938. The AWL has two buzzwords it uses quite frequently: Imperialism, to describe anything they dislike on the right, and Stalinism, to describe anything they dislike on the left. Since the AWL never aligned itself with ‘official communism’, it was not left ideologically floundering after the cold war, as many other communist groups were. The AWL is not disheartened by the fall of communism, but optimistic. "In Russia, 1917, the workers took power, but were overwhelmed in the 1920s by a bureaucratic counter-revolution. Elsewhere the possibilities of working-class freedom were crushed. But those possibilities existed. And they will exist again!" (AWL hompage).

Like the other groups, the AWL is cynical about working through the system, and advocates a revolution from below. The AWL is committed to "a society reconstructed according to the working-class principle of solidarity".

In response to the situation in Yugoslavia, the AWL printed in their publication Workers’ Liberty a quote from Trotsky on the Balkan Atrocities in February, 1913.

An individual, a group, a party or a class that is capable of
‘objectively’ picking its nose while it watches men drunk with blood, and
incited from above, massacring defenseless people is condemned by history to rot
and become worm-eaten while it is still alive. On the other hand, a party or a
class that rises up against every abominable action wherever it has occurred, as
vigorously and unhesitatingly as a living organism reacts to protect its eyes
when they are threatened with external injury – such a party or class is sound
at heart (Trotsky in Worker’s Liberty 55).

The AWL condemns both the Stalinist left and the imperialist NATO in its stance on the Yugoslavian atrocities.

The West had no real objection to Milosevic’s repression of the
Kosovars – they simply objected to Milosevic acting in so brutal a way as to
provoke a conflict that drew in – ‘destabilized’ – Albania, Macedonia and other
neighboring states. They want stable rule in the area to facilitate capitalist
profit making. The West opposed an independent Kosova as they believed it would
be a source of instability and tension in the region. The West has been clumsy,
reckless and stupid. They may now have to put ground troops in Kosova. No
socialist or democrat should trust NATO or the West to adequately protect the
Kosovars (AWL homepage).

About the left, however, AWL claims:

The ‘left’ is a disgrace! Serbia is not an oppressed country
‘fighting imperialism’, as some on the left seem to believe. Far from it, it is
itself a minor, local imperialist power, of a primitive ethnic tribalist type.
The left should not have allowed itself to associate with Serb
nationalist-Stalinist campaigns which simply demand ‘Stop the bombings’ –
because the organizers are for Serbia, and against the Kosovars. The ‘left’ is
lining itself up with the racist Serb state whose demand is also, simply, ‘Stop
the bombings’ (AWL homepage).

Opposing both NATO and the anti-war movement, the solution of the AWL is to arm the Kosavars. However Workers’ Liberty also points out that although the AWL has good reason not to trust NATO, they should not call for an end to the bombing.

One did not have to positively support the North Vietnamese regime
to be pleased that in 1978 they invaded Cambodia and stamped out the murderous
Khmer Rouge regime. Or need to be a supporter of the Indira Ghandi’s regime in
India to be glad that India invaded the former East Pakistan in 1971 and put an
end to the genocidal drive of the West Pakistanis against the Begalis (Worker’s
Liberty 55).

Like the CPGB the AWL swipes at both the SWP and the RCPB(ML), both of whom it accuses of catering the anti-war movement to Serbian nationalists.

It cannot have escaped their [the SWP] attention that the anti-war
protests, such as they are, consist overwhelmingly of Serb chauvinists and old
Stalinists and fellow travellers who think the break-up of Yugoslavia is (a) a
terrible thing and (b) all the fault of Germany and western imperialism
(Worker’s liberty 55).

After contemplating the anti-war movement, one member of the AWL contemplates,

Is a left which sees this genocide and yet fails to place the
rights of the Kosovars at the center of their concerns a left worth having? … If
this was all there was on the left I would want no part of it. It is not only a
matter of the left we have, but of the left we can and will rebuild! (Worker’s
Liberty 55).

These groups are but a fragment of Britain’s Communist contingent. Absent from this discussion is the New Communist Party of Great Britain, the Communist Party of Britain, the Communist Alliance of Great Britain, and several others. However, these four groups can serve as an example to see how Communist groups have realigned themselves after the cold war, and how they are dealing with the crisis in Yugoslavia.

Bibliography
Alliance for Worker’s Liberty homepage. http://wwww.workersliberty.org/awl.html

Communist Party of Great Britain Homepage. http://www.duntone.demon.co.uk/CPGB/main.html

"A Just Cause." Weekly Worker 29 Apr. 1999: 1-4"Korea Friendship Bulletin Celebrates 50th Anniversary of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea." Worker’s Weekly 29 Aug. 1998: 21-22.

"Kosovo at NUT conference." Worker’s Liberty Apr. 1999: 5-8.

Lawday, David. "Better Green than Red?" Atlantic Monthly Aug. 1990: 21-26.

"No to NATO’s criminal Aggression!" Worker’s Weekly 1 May 1999: 21-22.

Socialist Workers Party Homepage. http://www.swp.org.uk/join/JOIN.HTM

"Welcome all the refugees." Socialist Worker 1 May 1999. 1.

"Who will save the Kosovars?" Workers’ Liberty Apr. 1999: 1-4.

Professor's Comments: An interesting topic and you have dug up some fascinating information. the essay needs a clearer and stronger thesis. What point are you trying to make about Western European Communism? Perhaps draw a stronger conclusions drawing a thread between the themes.
Grade: B+

Keep the Aspidistra Flying

Video Version HERE

December 3, 1999

“Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism,” (Orwell in Brander). Although Orwell is best known for his anti-Communist works such as “1984” or “Animal Farm”, it is important to remember that Orwell was a democratic socialist. Orwell, throughout his life, struggled with the question of socialism, and what it means to be a socialist. “Keep the Aspidistra Flying”, published in 1936, continues this struggle.

Orwell was born in 1903 in Motihari Bengal. In 1917, he was given a scholarship to Eton College, which he attended until 1921. Orwell was a poor boy in a setting where poverty was despised, and this helped to make him a youthful radical. He served in Burma with the Indian Imperial Police from 1922 to 1927, and came to detest his role as an agent of imperialism. He ended up identifying with the Burmese more and in 1927 he retired and decided to live among the least privileged members of society. These experiences provided much of the material for his early works, including “Keep the Apsidistra Flying”. In 1936, Orwell was sent by the Socialist Left Book Club to study the living conditions of the unemployed in England. Orwell angered his sponsors by writing “The Road to Wigan Pier” in which he criticized orthodox socialism.

Orwell went to Spain during the Spanish Civil War, and joined the militia unit of the Marxist Workers Party. Orwell was seriously injured in the war. He was also involved in the fighting between the communists and anarchists in Barcelona. The communist secret police sought out Orwell, and he fled from Spain.

One question that Orwell faces is: how does a socialist function in a capitalist society? This is taken in the person of Gordon Comstock. Gordon is not a socialist. However, Orwell uses Gordon to convey the message to socialists.

Gordon is a man who is disgusted by the capitalism he sees around him. As a student, Gordon writes an underground newspaper in which he advocates global socialism (although he will later in his life reject socialism) and the dismemberment of the British Empire. However, once Gordon graduates from school and enters the work force, the question of how he reacts to capitalism must become clearer.

Gordon works in an advertising company, where his literary talents are discovered and he is put in a very profitable position with a very optimistic future. However, Gordon can not escape the feeling that he has sold his soul to the money god. To the consternation of all his relatives, Gordon leaves the company.

Gordon at first has an overly romanticized view of poverty. Coming from a dreary middle class family, Gordon thinks poverty is where one feels one is alive; the excitement of living on the streets. Gordon finds out otherwise, that poverty is having to sneak away from the landlady, and always having a hungry feeling in one’s stomach. Gordon ends up taking a job in a second hand bookshop where he can barely make ends meet and where there is no chance of advancement.

Orwell presents some interesting paradoxes in “Keep the Aspidistra Flying”. Through Gordon’s eyes we are allowed to see the despicable character of capitalism. However, Gordon’s attempt to rebel against capitalism only brings misery to himself and to his girlfriend Rosemary. If Orwell approves neither of capitalism nor of Gordon’s rebellion against it, what is Orwell trying to say in this book?

Critics have differed in their interpretation. Some argue that Orwell agreed with Gordon’s moral conviction, but the purpose of the book was to show how deeply our society revolves around money, and it is impossible not to be obsessed with money in our society. In this light, the book becomes almost more of a critique of society than of Gordon. Gordon has noble ambitions, but he was defeated by an evil society (Guild in Oldsey and Browne 144). While there is some appeal to this point of view, I think it ignores the fact that much of Gordon’s misery is self-inflicted. Another variation on this is that it is foolish for Gordon to even try to rebel against capitalism in the first place, and his whole quest to escape the money god is foolish.

Let us assume for a moment that this is indeed what Orwell is trying to show. If this is the case, I believe Orwell has made a poor argument. Orwell could have designed a book about a man who recognized how hollow the value of wealth and possessions are, and decided to give everything he had away and live in poverty. This man would then come to take pride in his poverty. He would shun the traditions of the middle class. This is not, however, the situation that Orwell sets up.

The character of Gordon is obsessed with the social value of money throughout the whole book. In fact, Gordon does not even want other people to know he is living in poverty. He is forever concerned about whom he borrows money from, and how people treat him because of his poverty.

If in fact the argument of Orwell’s book is that one can not escape the money god in a capitalistic society, then this would fit in with that argument. In trying to escape from money, Gordon ends up becoming obsessed with it. I would argue however that many individuals have successfully escaped the quest for accumulating wealth, and are able to simply not care about money.

There is much in the character of Gordon Comstock that is autobiographical to Orwell. Like Orwell, Gordon is a writer. Like Gordon, Orwell worked in a bookstore in London, and hated it. Orwell himself knows what it is like to be poor. In his travels in Paris, described in his book “Down and Out in Paris and London”, Orwell had to make ends meet on one Shilling a day (five times less than the fictional Gordon). Orwell actually describes many of the same feelings Gordon has. Orwell describes how women are repulsed by him because he has no money (Guild in Oldsey and Brown 147). Orwell also describes what a good feeling it can be to slide all the way into the very bottom of poverty because there is a relief that accompanies the realization that one is still surviving. Gordon also expresses a number of the same views that Orwell is expressing.

To Orwell, Gordon is not simply an abstract character he uses. Gordon is very much a reflection of Orwell. I believe that “Keep the Aspidistra Flying” is a difficult book to interpret because Orwell himself is ambivalent. He understands the problem all too well, but he is unsure of the solution. Orwell seeks to show through the character of Gordon his own experience in revolting against capitalism.

Of course, Gordon is not the only character Orwell sets up. Orwell realizes there is more than one way of rebelling against capitalism, and so he shows Phillip Ravelston as an alternative war.

Orwell sets up Ravelston as a foil for Gordon. Although both men are anti-capitalists, they take different approaches. Gordon lives in self-imposed poverty and is miserable because of it. Ravelston is a rich man, living in luxury, yet is a socialist. Ravelston’s optimism is a contrast to Gordon’s pessimism; however, the reader often gets the sense that Ravelston does not know what he is talking about. Orwell uses Ravelston to critique the “Cadillac Communist”.

At the beginning of chapter five, Orwell describes Ravelston. Ravelson lives in Regent Park which to him “was practically the same thing as living in the slums” (Orwell 80). “It was part of a life-long attempt to escape from his own class and become, as it were, an honorary member of the proletariat. Like all such attempts, it was foredoomed to failure” (Orwell 80). Orwell also states that Ravelston had the habit of dressing unconventionally. “He made a point of going everywhere, even to fashionable houses and expensive restaurants, in these clothes just to show his contempt for upper-class conventions; he did not fully realize that it is only the upper classes who can do these things” (Orwell 80-81). Orwell goes on to say about Ravelston: “in every moment of his life he was apologizing tacitly, for the largeness of his income. You could make him as uncomfortable by reminding him that he was rich as you could make Gordon by reminding him that he was poor” (Orwell 81). In these quotes, Orwell is able to describe Ravelston as somebody whose entire life is a contradiction. His attempts to make himself a socialist only make his wealth more glaring.

In chapter five, Gordon and Ravelston go to a pub and have some drinks and talk. Orwell attempts to show the folly of both Ravelston’s approach to capitalism and Gordon’s approach. Gordon’s approach, which is the subject of the rest of the book, is shown to be self-destructive, as it makes Gordon miserable and separates him from the one he loves. Ravelston’s approach is not shown in this way. He is always depicted as happy. His approach, as a young rich man playing socialist, is shown as harmless. However, Ravelston’s approach is hypocritical, where at least Gordon faces the reality of his decision to make war on money.

During the course of the conversation, Ravelston mentions several times that Gordon should read Marx, while Gordon indicates his distaste for Socialism. Orwell presents somewhat of an irony here in that the rich man should be defending Marx against a poor man. However, Orwell is also trying to make a point. Ravelston is incapable of understanding what he is talking about because he has never known what it is like to be poor. It is Orwell’s critique of the intellectual rather than the experimental socialist. At one point Gordon is talking about how miserable life in London is and how it is all a result of poverty. Ravelston responds with “Of course…After all, it’s only a reflection of what Marx said. Every ideology is a reflection of economic circumstances.” Gordon then answers, “Ah, but you only understand it out of Marx! You don’t know what it means to have to crawl along on two quid a week” (Orwell 90).

In the same chapter that Orwell contrasts Ravelston with Gordon, he also contrasts Ravelston with Hermione Slater. Hermoine is Ravelston’s lover, and he adores her. On one hand, the same Ravelston who looks hypocritical when contrasted with Gordon looks much better when contrasted with Hermione. Just as the reader is beginning to get disgusted with Ravelston, Orwell shows how so many rich people, like Hermione, do not even care about the poor at all. “Don’t talk to me about the lower classes” Hermione says to Ravelston. “I hate them. They smell” (Orwell 93).

At the same time, however, Orwell also raises the question of why Ravelston is so in love with Hermione if he takes his beliefs seriously. Ravelston adores her, and yet it does not seem to bother him that Hermione laughs at all his principles. “Why do you have to live in such a dreadful way? Pretending you’re poor when you’re not and living in that poky flat with no servants, and going about with all these beastly people” (Orwell 98). In this way, Orwell uses Hermione both to make Ravelston look more favorable and to further point out his hypocrisy.

Hermione, in one of her speeches, shows she does not understand what a Socialist really is. “Of course you’re a Socialist. So am I. I mean we’re all Socialist nowadays. But I don’t see why you have to give all your money away and make friends with the lower classes. You can be a Socialist and have a good time, that’s what I say” (Orwell 98). Orwell obviously intends to satirize this belief because, of course, giving your money away and making friends with the lower classes is what Socialism is all about. However, Orwell is making another point too. If Ravelston can call himself a Socialist, and still live in such luxury (compared to Gordon), then what is to stop Hermione from calling herself a Socialist.

Orwell shows how Ravelston, for all his good intentions, does not really sympathize with the poor. “In the taxi she lay against him, still half asleep, her head pillowed on his breast. He thought of the unemployed in Middlesbrough, seven in a room on twenty-five bob a week. But the girl’s body was heavy against him, and Middlesbrough was so far away” (Orwell 97). Ravelston is able to think of the poor only in the abstract sense, and so they do not seem real to him. He is able to dismiss them so easily in favor of his life of luxury, which is very real to him.

Orwell uses chapter five to set up Ravelston as an alternative way to make war on money, rather than the self-destructive way Gordon has chosen. However, Orwell also shows the meaningless in Ravelston’s war. For all the misery Gordon’s own war brings him, at least it is honest.

The book ends with Gordon getting his girlfriend Rosemary pregnant. Gordon gives up his war on money and becomes, in the words of one critic, a “disastrously defeated Rebel” (Richard Rees*1 in Oldsey and Browne). Many critics have criticized the ending. Again it brings up questions about what Orwell was trying to say. Does the failure of Gordon’s war means Orwell views a war against capitalism to be fatal? One must either delude one’s self as Ravelston does, or end in defeat as Gordon. Again, I believe the ending is supposed to be ambivalent. Orwell himself is still struggling with these questions, so rather than give the audience an answer, he just throws out the topic for them to think about.

Bibliography
Bander, Laurence. George Orwell. London: Longmans, Green and Co. 1956.

Calder, Jenni. Critical Essays in Modern Literature—Chronicles of Conscience: A Study of George Orwell and Arthur Koestler. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press. 1968.

Crick, Bernard. George Orwell: A Life. Boston: Little, Brown and Company. 1980.

Hammond, J.R. A George Orwell Companion: A Guide to the Novels, Documentaries and Essays. London: Macmillan Press. 1982.

Hollis, Christopher. A Study of George Orwell: The Man and his Works. London: Hollis and Carter. 1956,

Oldsey, Bernard, Joseph Browne. Critical Essays on George Orwell. Boston: G.K. Hall & Co. 1986.

Orwell, George. Keep the Aspidistra Flying. London: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. 1936.

Woodcock, George. The Crystal Spirit: A Study of George Orwell. Boston: Minerva Press. 1966.

Professor’s Comments: Joel, you have several good insights into Orwell’s book in this paper, but you needed to focus and organize these insights into a more compelling argument about the book. In particular, you needed to suggest the importance of his ambiguous response to capitalism. Why should we be concerned about working through this response? You also needed to use your paragraphs to give a better sense of the development of your argument.

Grade: B-

The Lasting Legacy of the French Revolution

March 20, 1998

“The eighteenth century [was], in spite of all the battles won over Frenchmen by Germans and Englishmen, a preeminently French century, even before that crowning French Revolution, the result of which we outsiders, in England as well as in Germany, are still trying to acclimatize” (Engels 12). Engels certainly recognized the impact of the French Revolution, and the fact that it still affected him even in 1892, over a century after the storming of the Bastille. The events of the French Revolution influenced all the major thinkers of the nineteenth century, who freely admitted to the effect it had on them. The last legacy of the French Revolution can be traced from Edmund Burke’s conservatism to socialism, both the utopian of Flora Tristan and the scientific of Frederick Engels.

“Reflections on the French Revolution” by Edmund Burke is interesting because he wrote it in 1790, three years before the start of the Terror. Burke was less than pleased by what he saw in France, and his writing brings this out in full force. A major counter-revolutionary document, Burke’s “Reflection on the French Revolution” was very influential in Europe (Burke Introduction).

Burke was a conservative; he loved tradition. The French Revolution, which sought to completely break from the past, was repulsive to Burke. Burke’s idea of freedom differed from the revolutionaries in that he defined freedom only in order, in which the rights of the individual are subject to the state. Burke also romanticized the role of the aristocracy, and saw it as essential to the state.

Burke’s idea of community has similarities to socialism, which would later appear as a result of the French Revolution. Burke was no Karl Marx, but he did see the responsibility of the rich to care for the poor. Burke was also a strong believer in corporatism.

Despite Burke’s protest however, the revolution in France continued, and the impact it had on the coming generations was noticeable. Socialism, though its goals were in many ways different from that of the revolution, is a product of the French Revolution. It took the principle of equality, which was one of the major emphases of the French Revolution, and expanded it to refer to more than just equality under the law but economic equality as well.

Flora Tristan is an example of a utopian socialist. She wrote about forty years after the French Revolution but she obviously did not consider it an event in the distant past. Flora Tristan was both a citizen of France and a product of the French Revolution. Her mother had been a refugee from the Revolution who could not return to France until 1802 (Beik X). Tristan was proud of the French Revolution, but considered it unfinished. She wished not only to revive the democratic principles that had existed during the revolution, but also to make them international (Beik XX).

Tristan recognized that class struggle had not gone away with the overthrow of the aristocracy but rather had intensified. However, she did not preach violent revolution, as did the revolutionaries before her and Engels after her. Instead, Tristan wished to build on the achievements of the French Revolution. She encouraged the workers to claim their rights which the document, “Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen” established in 1791 (Tristan 108).

In “Worker’s Union”, Tristan saw the bourgeois class as having used the proletariat during the Revolution. She described the bourgeoisie as the head of the Revolution, the proletariat as its arms. Although the proletariat contributed the muscle, the bourgeoisie grabbed all the rights for themselves. In this way, the granting of rights to the proletariat through utopian socialism would be the continuation of what the French Revolution never finished. Tristan further emphasized the incompleteness of the French Revolution when at the end of “Worker’s Union” she made a plea for the equality and unity of all humanity. She ended by saying, “Sons of ’89, that is the work that your fathers have bequeathed to you!” (Tristan 122).

“The Tour of France” repeated many of the same themes. Tristan took the three themes of the Revolution of 1789, and corresponded each to a social concern in 1844: “(1)-Equality-the first right, to work, (2)-liberty-second right, to bread, (3)-fraternity-third right, to education” (Tristan 169).

Utopian socialists of the early nineteenth century gave way to scientific socialists, such as Engels and Marx. In contrast to the romanticism of utopian socialism, scientific socialists were materialists at heart. They rejected religion. Marx went as far as to call religion the opiate of the masses. This was in contrast to the radical religious ideals of the utopian socialists.

The belief of scientific socialists, that the only way to improve conditions for the proletariat would be a violent revolution, reflected the spirit of the radical stage of the French Revolution. The scientific socialists believed that history was progressive. Thus the French Revolution, in which the bourgeois class overthrew the aristocracy, was a necessary stepping stone to the eventual triumph of the proletariat.

Frederick Engels in his book “Socialism: Utopian and Scientific” took a unique view on the French Revolution. He traced the beginnings of the bourgeoisie take over to the Reformation. According to Engels, the development of the bourgeoisie was incompatible with feudalism. Unfortunately, the center of feudalism was the Roman Catholic Church. Therefore, all of the bourgeois struggles against feudalism prior to the French Revolution had to take on a religious disguise. However, it was science that Engels credits as starting the revolution. Since the bourgeoisie needed science for industrial production, they had no choice but to join in its rebellion again the church. Engels shared the view of Tristan, that the peasants helped the revolution but received nothing in return from the victorious bourgeois. Engels also declared that the Revolution was inevitable in order for the bourgeois to claim the fruits that were ripe for picking (Engels 18).

Engels saw the French Revolution as throwing off the religious cloak that had dominated the struggle until then. The bourgeoisie destroyed their opponents this time. The bourgeoisie took the opportunity to break from the past, including religion. Engels pointed out however that they have not been able to remain in control long, the monarch shortly afterwards returning to France. Engels claimed that America is the only nation where the bourgeoisie have been able to stay in control but only because it had no memory of feudalism to return to. The proletariat was ready to take over in both America and the continent (Engels 24-25). Only too late did the bourgeoisie realize the importance of religion. According to Engels, the bourgeoisie use religion to keep the proletariat in check. When the bourgeois rejected religion, they did not realize the ill they were doing to themselves, paving the way for the eventual proletariat revolution (Engels 28).

The ideals of the French Revolution also influenced Engels. The principles of equality, as well as his skepticism of religion, both have precedent in the revolution. Like Tristan, Engels also attributed materialism as a factor in the French Revolution, and was a materialist by his own admission. However, unlike Tristan, Engels regarded the French Revolution with scorn. While Tristan tended to think of the French Revolution as a good idea that did not go far enough, Engels saw it as a set back in the living conditions of the proletariat. “The society based upon reason had faired no better. The antagonism between rich and poor, instead of dissolving into general prosperity, had become intensified by the removal of the charitable institutions of the church” (Engels 34). In this respect, Engels can be seen as similar to Burke, who also maintained that conditions in France were worse as a result of the Revolution.

Instead of seeing the proletarian dominance as a completion of the Revolution, as Tristan did, Engels saw it as the solution of it. The proletarian revolution is a “solution of the contradictions” brought on by the French Revolution (Engels 74).

Although all three of these writers differed from the goals of the French Revolution, and from each other, it nevertheless had an impact on them. The French Republic might not have outlasted Napoleon, but the ideals produced by the Revolution had a tremendous affect on the intellectuals of the nineteenth century. These same ideas produced three very different responses, and yet all three can be traced back to the same event despite their differences with each other. The French Revolution had an impact that outlasted its immediate results.

Grade: A-/ B+

Professor’s Comments: Joel, this is a very fine paper. It is clear, well-organized, and you chose wonderful quotations to illustrate your point. You also integrate lecture material well. You not only suggest connections, you demonstrate them.
My biggest criticism is about language. You write well, but you can write even better. Some of you constructions are too wordy, or better put, not as direct as they could be. What you should do is to begin to edit out those phrases. I made a number of stylistic suggestions, just to give you an idea of what I mean. My purpose is not to be needlessly picky, but to encourage you to think about ways to improve your writing, because you have the ability to become an excellent writer.
Also, in the second half of the course, please contribute more to class discussions. You have good ideas; share them with the rest of us!
Good work.

Anti-Semitism in the New Testament

January 15, 1999

The history of Christian treatment of Jews has hardly been laudable, and Christians are repeatedly embarrassed by it. While there are several causes for this treatment, much of Christian Anti-Judaism is a result of scripture that appears to condone it. Is the New Testament itself anti-Semitic, or is this merely a result of faulty interpretation?

The accusation of anti-Semitism in the New Testament at first seems absurd. Of the twenty-seven books of the New Testament, only two are written by a Gentile writer, according to Church tradition (Luke and Acts are attributed to Luke, a Gentile companion of Paul). This means that all the other books are written by Jews, including the Letters of Paul and the Gospel of John. Both of these works have been particularly attacked for anti-Semitism, but unless Paul and John both had an abnormal case of self-hatred, a Jewish anti-Semite is probably as rare as a Calvin student who cheers for Hope’s basketball team.

However, if we grant that many of the books of the Bible were not written by their traditional authors, but rather later ascribed to these authors in order to give the books more authority (and there is good evidence for this), then things become a lot more interesting. We may consider, as many scholars do, that 2 Thessalonians, Ephesians, and 1 and 2 Timothy were not written by Paul, but by followers in his name (Rousmaniere 12). Similarly, the Gospel of John was not written by the Jewish apostle, but by later Christians as if John had written it. If we consider this possibility, the charges of anti-Semitism have more validity. As Michael Cook argues, “The further we recede into earliest Christianity-approaching the time frame of the historical Jesus-the more evident it becomes that intense expressions of anti-Judaism in the gospels are a function, not of Jesus’ ministry, but rather of the later church” (Cook 37).

So what does the modern Christian do with passages like John 8:44? “You [the Jews] are of you father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning.” Or Thessalonians 2:14-16? “You suffered from your own countrymen the same things those churches suffered from the Jews, who killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and also drove us out. They displease God and are hostile to all men in their efforts to keep us from speaking to the Gentiles so that they may be saved. In this way they always heap on their sins to the limit. The wrath of God has come upon them at last.”

John Rousmaniere describes the dilemma eloquently. “If Christians today accept its [scripture’s] apparent reasoning, they, like many before them…can only conclude that Jews are enemies. But if they reject it out of hand, they may be compromising our scriptural heritage” (Rousmaniere 5). Perhaps another solution would be to examine the apparent anti-Semitic Biblical passages and decide if they are genuinely anti-Semitic, or simply just taken out of context. This can be done by looking at the Gospel of John, the death of Jesus, the attacks made on the Pharisses, and the reaffirmation of Jews contained in the New Testament.

More than any other Gospel, John is accused of being anti-Semitic. “The main source of the idea that the Jews killed Jesus is John’s gospel, which is also the most influential passion account. It is the one usually read and sung on Good Friday, the day when Christians are most sensitive to the narrative” (Rousmaniere 21). Whereas the other gospels distinguish between which groups sought the death of Jesus (the Pharisees, the Sanhedrin, et cetera), John makes no distinction, referring to Jesus’ enemies as simply “The Jews”. John’s wording is unfortunate; however a Christian should read John in light of the other Gospels. Doing so, a careful reader will notice that John is not offering a blanket condemnation of all Jews, but rather particular groups, which are mentioned by name in the other Gospels.

Secondly, much of what is found in John (and for that matter the Pauline Epistles) that appears to attack Jews are not directed against the Jews as a people, but rather against unbelievers. The Jews are the example at hand, but the anger of Jesus is not against them because they are Jews, but because of the stubbornness exhibited against him.

The Jews are also blamed for the death of Jesus. In all four Gospel accounts, the Roman governor Pilate is seen as someone who wants to help Jesus, and the Jews as pushing for his death. In Mark, the encounter between Jesus and Pilate is very brief, while in John, Pilate argues against the crowd for Jesus’ life, and engages in philosophical conversations with Jesus: “‘Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.’ ‘What is truth?’ Pilate asked” (Jn 18: 37-38). In Matthew, the famous blood curse is found. “He [Pilate] took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd. ‘I am innocent of this man’s blood’ he said. “It is your responsibility!’ All the people answered, ‘Let his blood be on us and on our children!’” (Mt 27: 24-25).

Much of the perceptions of anti-Semitism hinge on the accuracy of this account. If the Gospel writer’s were actively changing the truth to give the Jews a more sinister appearance, then this would be anti-Semitism. However if they were merely faithfully recording events as they actually happened (as Christians believe) then it is more difficult to make the accusation.

It is, however, the responsibility of the reader to realize that in either case the Gospels are only talking about a select group of Jews, not all Jews. As Rousmaniere puts it, “while a few Jews had some responsibility for the death of Jesus, not all Jews had all responsibility. To hold all Jews-then and since-responsible would be the equivalent of holding all men named Peter responsible for the apostle’s denial of Jesus in the courtyard” (Rousmaniere 22). Furthermore, the Gospels also record many Jews sympathetic to Jesus. His disciples are one example, and Luke presents a Pharisee who tries to warn Jesus about the plot against his life.

Pharisees are continually presented as opponents of Jesus throughout the Bible. “The scriptures often portray the Pharisees and scribes as foils for Jesus’ teaching” (Rousmaniere 10). Some of Jesus’ harshest denunciations are directed against the Pharisees. “Woe to you teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to Hell?” (Mt 23:29, 33). This has later been interpreted by many Christians as a condemnation of Judaism, but Jesus himself identified the closest with the Pharisees out of all the other sects of Judiasm at the time. Therefore, what was in reality a family argument has been misinterpreted by later Christians.

Finally, there are many statements in the New Testament which affirm the Jews and the Law of Moses. “At no point in the Church, not even in Paul who coined the phrase, ‘Christ is the end of the Law’, is there a radical rejection of the traditional law of Judaism but rather the recognition of its fulfillment in the ‘law of love’ and in the words of Jesus” (Davies as quoted by Rousmaniere 14). Jesus and Paul both stressed that the Law of Moses was not dead but completed.

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have come to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven” (Mt 5: 17-19).

Paul writes that “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). This is far from an invitation to anti-Semitism, but imploring Christians to treat Jews as equals.

Although the New Testament may at first appear to be anti-Semitic, it does not need to be interpreted this way. It is tragic that Christians in the past have used scripture as a justification for hatred rather than “love thy neighbor”, however this does not mean that scripture itself is at fault. The New Testament is far from an example of anti-Semitism.

Bibliography
In-Class Discussion

Religion 103

Bible

Rousmaniere, John. A Bridge to Dialogue. Paulist Press. New York. 1971.

Fisher, Eugene. Interwoven Destinies. Paulist Press. New York. 1993.

Grade: A-

Professor’s Comments: Very good paper with a clear and convincing argument.
Your first paragraph still sounds a bit “wooden”, and not as fluent as the rest. Probably, because of the many prepositional phrases used here. Otherwise, style is fluent and eloquent.
You could also have pointed out that for Paul “Jew” and “Gentile” often means “Judeo-Christian” and “Christian from gentile background”, thus leaving Judaism almost entirely out of the picture…
Very good paper.

A Panther is a Black Cat by Reginald Major: Book Review

Video Version: Video 1, Video 2

History 360 (African-American History)
November 24, 1998

A Panther is a Black Cat by Reginald Major is a thoughtful look at the Black Panther Party, written when the party was still alive. Major describes the book himself as "A study in depth of the Black Panther Party--its origins, its goals, its struggle for survival" (tittle page). Major provides interesting insight, and a unique perspective in the Black Panther Party.

The Booklist describes Major's book as "definitely pro-panther" and I agree. After having read several books that are decidedly anti-Panther, Major's outlook is a refreshing one. Although Major does have some organizational issues (his train of thought can be hard to follow), I enjoyed his book overall. There are three aspects of Major's book that I would like to examine: the issue of the Black Panthers and Communism, Black Panthers and their white allies, and Black Panthers and their conflicts with police.

One topic that Major handles poorly is the issue of the Black Panthers and communism. Major leaves the reader confused as to whether the Black Panthers are pro-communist or anti-communist. Giving contradictory quotes in his book, Major does not adequately reconcile them.

The first encounter the reader has with communism appears on pages 89-92, in which Major cites a speech made by Eldridge Cleaver in which he attacked white radicals and communists in particular. Cleaver "pointed out that the Communist Party supports Russia against the People's Republic of China, and was, therefore, a traitor to the best interests of non-white peoples throughout the world" (90). Cleaver is quoted as saying.

"From now on the Socialists Workers Party and the Communist Party should not be allowed to function in the black community at all....The Literature on Malcolm X which the bloodsucking Socialist Workers Party has grown fat on should not be allowed in the black community. Their newspapers and so forth should be banned from black communities. The black funkies who are members of these groups should also be barred from the back community" (90).

Later on Major quotes the Black Panthers as saying:

"Those black revolutionaries who understand the value of a coalition between white radicals and black radicals have had the ground cut out from under their feet by the nefarious activities of these white radicals.... They are nothing but hitch-hikers on the black revolution....The Socialist Workers Party went so far as to kill off the Black Panther Newspaper by refusing to allow the paper to be sent out of its various branches around the country. The Communist Party is nothing but a white NAACP" (92).

With such quotes, Major shows the apparent disdain the Panthers hold for Communism, however the next time the philosophy is mentioned, it is in regard to Stokely Carmichael's break with the Panthers in 1969, which he does by attacking Marxist-Leninism.

"I believe that people who talk about 'Marxist-Leninism' so hard, in such a hard line, are the people who are groping for an answer. They seize on 'Marxist-Leninism" as if it were some sort of a religion. Marx becomes in essence, Jesus Christ. Now anything you cannot answer you take over and bow to Marx. That, in my view, is absolutely absurd" (102).

Carmichael is portrayed as leaving the Panthers because he does not agree with Marxist-Leninism, which of course implies that the Panthers are Marxist-Leninists.

Major also quotes Huey Newton as saying:

"In the spirit of solidarity with the people of the world and the Third World or the developing world in particular, the Black Panther Party would like to extend the friendship and spirit of revolutionary solidarity. We will give a declaration to the Paris peace talks where we will commit an undisclosed number of troops to the National Liberation Front in order to show solidarity--in order to help the Vietnamese people fight the cowardly American aggressors" (103)."

This is hardly an anticommunist quote. Later on Cleaver is quoted on page 145 at a conference in North Korea. After scolding the Soviet Union for not doing enough to help Korea and Vietnam, Cleaver justified his right to speak "as a member of the world Communist movement which has made many sacrifices for the Soviet Union" (compare with his speech above). Later on Major mentions the Panther's adoption of Marxist-Leninist program, and the use of the Little Red Books, but only in passing (127). The Little Red Books also appear scattered in other parts of the book, as both Huey Newton and Eldridge Cleaver carry them around with them often, and will consult them at times to prove their opinion. Major however never explains the significance of the Little Red Book, or tells his reader if the Panthers were dependent on Mao's doctrine, or if it was just something they threw into an already established worldview.

Major also mentions Cleaver's insistence on having a portrait of Stalin in his apartment, despite criticism from other blacks. "Who the hell is that whitey on the wall?" (259). When his wife, Kathleen Cleaver, asks why Stalin's picture is in the room and not Mao's, Eldridge replies, "I just keep it there to remind you, Baby, that Mao is a Stalinist" (256). This is not consistent with the man who is earlier quoted as saying that the communist party betrayed black people by supporting the Soviet Union over China. (One could, I suppose, reconcile these two positions by recalling that China's feud with the Soviet Union did not begin until after Kruschev denounced Stalin, but Major never brings this point up in his book. Perhaps at the time he was writing (1971) it was obvious to his contemporaries. However, even if this was the case, the other discrepancies are still unaccounted for.)

In the end, Major does not explain the contradiction between the denunciation of communism by the Panthers and their embrace of it. Much of this may be because Major himself is definitely pro Black Panther, but appears to be against Communism. Much of this can be inferred by the type of quotes Major includes in his book. The anti-Communist quotes above are examples (Cleaver's and Carmichael's) as well as other quotes. Major includes a quote by Carleton Goodlett, one of the Panther's critics, which probably summarizes his views as well.

"Two hundred and fifty years of slavery and one hundred and seven years of crypto-freedom, out of the black experience, contain enough suffering, pathos, agony and sacrifice for liberty to have developed a rhetoric which would have communicated with and united black America, rather than by its very nature as a Marxist ideology separated us....Three and a half years of going it alone, setting yourself apart from ninety-nine plus percent of American blacks, has led to your present precarious position. No revolution can succeed without the indivisible support of a total people" (159).

Major's own quotes though are probably more of an insight into his mindset.

"The adoption of Marxist-Leninist political cant, along with the taking over of the Red Book, and their unspecific call for socialism, requires more development before it is actually applicable to the everyday black political situation. The Marxist approach to social stratification and class must be modified locally before it can be applied with any validity to black people. Recognizing that black people are in danger of genocide and that blacks are politically and economically powerless, the concept of class struggle--particularly that portion that condemns the bourgeoisie--needs drastic modification in order to satisfactorily describe the social class within the black community" (155-156).

Major goes on, describing how the Panthers condemning of the black middle class ended up dividing the black people when the Panthers should have been intent on uniting them. Major chides the Panthers for failing to make a distinction between the black middle class and white middle class. In particular, much of the blame is placed on Cleaver who Major says, "showed up on the scene fresh from prison, made a few connections, and then proceeded to judge the revolutionary aptness of the approaches of people who had been around the area for some time" (156). Major cannot resist taking one more poke at the Panther's ideology, which he does on page 164, saying "in the last analysis, [the Panthers] must return to the ghetto only to have shoved down their ideological throats the fact that Marx and Lenin where white."

I believe that because Major was pro-Panther, but disagreed with their Marxist ideologies, he allowed that to creep into his writing. He is eager to include anti-communist quotes from Eldridge Cleaver and the Black Panther Party because they match his ideology, but fails to reconcile these to the rest of the book, leaving his reader confused about what the actual position of the Panthers was.

Another area where Major confuses the reader is on the issue of the Panther's relationships with whites. Here once again he includes various quotes in his book at various places that end up contradicting each other when they are compared.

Major mentions that early on the Panthers were hassled by white radicals, discovering that "the most vocal anticapitalist tended to believe that giving or raising money placed him in a policy-making position" (93). The Panthers decided in all their coalitions with whites to follow the rules of Stokely Carmichael:

"First, that the coalition be for a limited and clearly defined purpose; second, that the coalition last only so long as it is mutually beneficial; and third, that it be a union of equals, thus guaranteeing that one member of the coalition does not dominate the other" (93).

Major talks about the Black Panther's coalition with the Peace and Freedom Party, an organization that he describes as a "loose coalition of white radicals representing every spectrum of leftist thought" (92). However, despite the coalition, the Black Panther Party did not look favorably on blacks in the Peace and Freedom Party. Eldridge Cleaver is quoted as saying:

"The Black Panther Party looks upon the black members of the Peace and Freedom party as misguided political freaks who are trying to maintain their dual status in an incorrect manner; they have one foot in the mother country, and the other foot in the colony, and their political manhood gets strangled on the borders separating the two nations" (94).

Despite this strict view of the coalition, and Cleaver's disapproving view of blacks who worked too closely with white radicals, Major claims this treaty still frightened a number of blacks away from the Panthers, who saw this as a sign that the party was really run by whites. Particularly interesting is the quote from Sultan Nassar Ahmad Shabazz, head of the Black Guards, a Muslim group.

"Eldridge Cleaver did a good job of selling the Black Panther Party to the Communists and Socialists....The Black Panthers are becoming more red each day....When the Black Panthers say 'power to the people' they also mean power to the whites" (110).

Despite attacks from other black revolutionaries, the Panthers continued to work with white radicals. However, Major paints the Chicago eight trail as a disaster, and places the blame for it on the white radicals. "When Bobby Seale was indicted behind Yippie activity in Chicago there were a lot of black mouths sounding I-told-you-so's" (111).

Tom Hayden receives much of the blame for this, as Major seems rather to admire the childish antics of Jerry Rubin and Abbie Hoffman.

“Judge Julius Hoffman is a Jew, a fact he was constantly reminded of by at least two of the defendants in the conspiracy trial in which Bobby Seale was one of the original eight defendants….Abbie Hoffman…and Jerry Rubin, two of the defendants, must have shook the judge right down to the roots of his juridical-christian (sic) ethic. They threw gibes at him in English, German, and Yiddish. Hoffman’s a ‘shonder for the goy’ they intoned, an expression which was decorously translated as a “front man for white supremacists”….Hoffman and Rubin could not help but get to the judge as they tore into him from the vantage point of 5000 years of Jewish history and culture” (245-246).

With these words and others Major attaches praise to the tactics of Hoffman and Rubin. Major rises elsewhere to the defense of Jerry Rubin.

"Eldridge Cleaver was chided by officials of the California Peace and Freedom party when he chose Jerry Rubin as his Vice-Presidential (sic) running mate, rather than one of the more doctrinaire leftists available to him. He was patronizingly described as ignorant of the significant trends in white radical politics. As it developed two years later, Rubin and his political orientation were closer to the center of white radical activity than any of the gaggle of respectable leftists made available to Cleaver” (163).

Hayden does not come out so well.

“Reportedly, Hayden’s ideas influenced the conduct of the Chicago trial. He had rejected the Rubin-Hoffman approach that would have turned the trial into a total display of guerrilla theater. Hayden had hope that the court would deal favorably with their case, a fantasy not shared by other defendants” (113).

As much as I admire both Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin, I doubt the Panthers would have been more pleased had their approach won out over Hayden’s. The Panthers, with the seriousness in which they took their cause, would probably have been much more frustrated with the anything goes, “Revolution for the Hell of it”, tactics of Rubin and Hoffman.

Major describes a cocktail party as an example of how relationships between white radicals and Panthers deteriorated. Black Panther David Hillard was there, who had already “pointedly questioned [Stew] Albert’s and Hayden’s understanding of Marxist-Leninist principles” (112), and, Major implies, found them to be lacking. When Hayden was asked to speak, Hillard jumped up and asked: “Yeah, goddamnit, get up and explain why you’re out on the streets and Bobby is in jail” (114). Hayden sidestepped the question by attacking the racist nature of America’s courts. Major condemns him.

“The question actually was why Hayden was not in jail. Bobby had been indicted, tried, placed in chains, and was subsequently sentenced to four years in jail for contempt of court as the result of a casual speechmaking excursion into the scene of hippie-involved political mayhem. Hillard’s words implied that if Hayden and his fellow defendants were really the revolutionaries they claimed to be, they would have closed ranks and stood on their conspiratorial constitutional rights when Bobby Seale was denied the right to represent himself, and if necessary to force the court to chain them all. It didn’t happen” (114).

Hillard was unimpressed by Hayden’s answer, and began to question him angrily. Stew Albert, a revolutionary writer who Major also dislikes, tried to smooth things over, but Hillard answered, “Fuck you, Albert, you jive-ass revolutionary. We can do without you and your shitty writing” (115). The conference finally ended with Hillard and the rest of the Panthers storming out.

Major asserts that:

“Hillard--in fact the Panthers generally—were very unhappy about this indictment, as it was a direct result of the Panthers association with white radicals. The indictment was a confirmation for a number of black people of their belief that a black-white radical alliance could only bring trouble to the Panthers” (109).

Major describes the whole affair as the Panthers being deserted by their white allies, and he implies that they learned their lesson and would never trust whites again. However, later in the book, Major writes about the Panther’s preferences for white lawyers. He gives a quote from Bobby Seale about John George, a black lawyer who had represented Seale, Newton, and others.

“I, Bobby Seale, know for a fact, when without my knowledge, John D. George, who was handling three misdemeanor cases for me, sold me out by waiving a jury trail for me where I would possibly be railroaded off into jail…. He has been one of the advocates and foolish black racists running around talking about we (sic) should have a black lawyer. HUEY P. NEWTON’S (sic) life is in danger and these ignorant, stupid, life sucking, petty minded fools, who call themselves black lawyers, have done nothing but harm the black community” (213).

Kathleen Cleaver also defends white lawyers.

“Black power would never be attained if the burden of achieving it were in the hands of black lawyers….During the non-violent stage of the resistance movement, black lawyers did not rush to defend the jailed students and freedom fighters….Thousands of people were jailed and beaten and denied their rights, but the bulk of the legal work was done by white lawyers, regardless of whether or not they could be paid….The vast bulk of legal service given to the struggle has come from white lawyers dedicated to the establishment of social justice, and the vast bulk of that legal service has gone unpaid….James Forman, Stokely Carmichael and Rap Brown of SNCC have all been indebted to the services of white lawyers—without too much complaint from the black lawyers or the black community....However, all of a sudden…an outcry has been raised about the fact that Minister of Defense Huey P. Newton has a white lawyer” (213-214).

Major goes on to lavish praise on the Panther’s own white lawyer, Charles Garry. Although not totally irreconcilable, the high praise given by Kathleen Cleaver, Bobby Seale, and Major himself to whites working for the white cause seems contradictory to the earlier assertion. Cleaver and Seale were not quoted by Major regarding the success of the Panther-white radical alliance in the Chicago eight trial, although Major gives the impression that all the Panthers were fed up with the unreliability of whites. Major himself is the most amazing reversal of opinions, going from condemning white radical-black alliances in the Chicago eight trail, to praising them later here. As a result, the reader is not left with a clear impression of where either Major stands or more importantly where the Black Panther Party stands. (Perhaps the Black Panther Party was itself unsure of what to do with this issue, as can be imagined by looking at these different quotes. However, even if this were the case, it still does not get Major off the hook for his own ambivalence.)

A third point of interest is Major’s consistent bias towards the Panthers whenever a Panther-police conflict is reported. After spending the first chapter describing the poor conditions that the blacks in the ghettos live in, the entire second chapter is spent giving example after example of police brutality against black people. In every example, the guilty policeman always ends up being found innocent by his colleagues, or by the courts. Even though I knew Major was writing about conditions almost thirty years ago, I was still left with a hatred of the police by the time I finished his second chapter.

It is well known that the Black Panthers and the police came into conflict more than once. Major consistently lays the blame at the feet of the police. Much of this is very well done, and he uses common sense to destroy the alibis of the police. When the Panther’s entire Illinois office was destroyed by the police, who claimed the Panthers were sniping at them from their offices, Major replies, “Imagine a group with enough sophistication and political know-how to build a nationwide organization in the period of a couple years could not develop a sense of tactic sufficiently refined to avoid shooting at policemen from their own headquarters” (179).

By showing holes in the testimony of police, Major eloquently shows how ridiculous it is to believe the charges that Huey Newton killed a policeman in cold blood, and how much more likely it is that Newton killed the officer in self-defense. Major also writes about the murder of Bobby Hutton and Fred Hampton, again showing how the story of the police did not match the evidence.

However, as I continued reading through the book, I began to doubt some of Major’s bias. Was every policeman the Panthers encountered racist, violent and dishonest? Could the police be at fault in every shoot out with the Panthers? What caused me to think particularly were the cases in which former Black Panthers testified against their comrades. One example is George Sams, Jr., a former Panther who claimed he was ordered to kill Alex Rackley (a member of the Harlem chapter of the Black Panthers) by Bobby Seale. Although Major points out holes in Sams’ testimony (he later changed his story to say he took orders from Stokely Carmichael), one wonders what would possess Sams to bring this testimony before his former comrades if it were not true. (Although Major scornfully rejects Sams’ testimony, he never answers this question.)

However, in light of what we now know about the FBI’s systematic attempts to destroy the Panthers, perhaps Major’s claims do not seem all that unlikely. Since we also know that the FBI infiltrated the Panthers with undercover agents, it is quite possible that these renegade Panthers were more than what they seem. Major goes to great lengths to explain in the second chapter of his book both the racist nature of the police force, and the solidarity which police show each other, to the point of protecting a comrade they know is in the wrong. In this respect, perhaps his consistent bias for the Panthers is not all that unbelievable. So, after being at first skeptical, following some consideration I am siding with Major on this one. The Panthers were probably more consistently the victims of police aggression, instead of the originators of the violence.

I wish to emphasize again that despite the critical nature of this review, I found Major’s book enjoyable and his perspectives refreshing, except where noted above. Major treats the Panthers with an open mind, and I find this admirable.

Bibliography

Reginald Major. A Panther is a Black Cat. William Morrow & Company, Inc. New York. 1971

Booklist. Volume 68. September 15, 1971. Page 74.

Professor’s Comments: Was this a history of the Panthers? Did you only find one review?

After re-reading this a couple of times, this is a decent paper. I wished you would have distanced yourself a little more.

Grade: A-

Video Versions

Teacher-Pupil Conflict in Secondary Schools: An Educational Approach by K. A. Cronk: Book Report

Video Version HERE

            Originally submitted for Education 307, March 8, 1999

            In her book, Teacher-Pupil Conflict in Secondary Schools: An Educational Approach, K.A. Cronk explores why students conflict with teachers.  Cronk uses interviews with the students as a research technique, as well as time spent in the classroom.  Cronk’s conclusion is that most conflict occurred because the students failed to see the teacher as human.

            Cronk outlines chronologically the way her research took place.  She begins by outlining her theories on morality.  This part of the book was the hardest to get through.  It is both hard to understand and boring to read.  However, once I got past the first sixty pages, the book became quite enjoyable.  Cronk outlines the discussions she had with the students, followed by the experiment in which Cronk taught the class for two periods every Wednesday.  Finally, Cronk gives some of her conclusions.  Because of this format, the book reads almost more like a story than a piece of academic research.  The different children are portrayed vividly and realistically.  Much of the conversation that took place is reproduced verbatim and the idioms used are interesting.  (Although the author never says so, it is apparent that the book takes place in Britain.)

            The first chapter is the introduction.  In it Cronk lays the framework for the rest of the book.  She mentions Rogers’ belief that most conflict arises from teachers being too authoritative, and conflict would be reduced if the teachers let the students see them as human.  Cronk states that, “Like Rogers, I believed this, because I believed in the intrinsic morality and trustworthiness of pupil-persons” (4).  Cronk goes on to qualify this belief, including “it is important to understand that the suggested approach to pupil-teacher conflict does not contain a naïve hope that if persons are ‘nice to each other’ all their problems will disappear.…Morality is not conceived here as a body of ‘right’ answers, but a constant search for the ‘best’ answers in a continuously changing present” (5).

            The second chapter, Theoretical Considerations, Cronk describes the concept of intrinsic morality (the subject must be capable of choosing his or her own behavior, and then must act altruistically).  She outlines seven points which follow from that, and describes each in more detail (exempli gratia If persons are moral, they must be free).

            Cronk then goes onto talk about the support in academic literature for her concepts of morality.  Cronk writes about the problem of determinism, and declares that none of the philosophical solutions to this are satisfactory, and the only recourse left is to declare that humans are organisms, “and to explore the physical sciences for evidence which would allow them to be regarded as intelligent, creative, and moral organisms too” (40).  Cronk writes about this for a while, and then applies what she wrote about to teacher-pupil conflict.  By using Bohm’s analogy of humans as miniature force fields, she concludes, “it is possible to maintain that persons, as wholly physical systems, are ‘free’ in the full sense which is required by the concept of intrinsic morality.”

            In the third chapter, 3Y and their teachers: a case study of classroom conflict, Cronk gives background on 3Y, a class of twelve boys and six girls between thirteen and fourteen, who come from impoverished homes and many of them have police records.  Cronk records briefly the teachers’ view of the students and then interviews the students in the groups that they come in with.  She asks them for their complaints concerning the teachers, and then compares the teachers’ views that the students’ views, and concluded that one of the main problems was that the students were misinterpreting the teacher’s motives.

            Cronk than observes the classroom.  I thought it interesting that the one teacher that the students unanimously approved of, Cronk was not allowed to observe because she was a young probationary teacher.  She describes the way 3Y was hard for the teachers to control, and the various techniques teachers would use to attempt to control the class (exempli gratia teacher circling, in which the teacher circled around the classroom so that his or her back was never to any of the students for very long).

            In the fourth chapter, Experimental Design, Cronk outlines the experiment, including the layout of the classroom, and the rules that she proposed for both teachers and students based on the interviews with the students.

            In chapter five, Lesson One to Four, Cronk describes the beginning of the experiment.  In this experiment she taught the class for two periods every Wednesday, and she envisioned that the class and her would continually dialogue until they reached a set of rules and activities suitable for each.  She describes this part of the experiment as a disaster, in which she was continually losing control of the class and beginning to believe in the students as the monsters they had been made out to appear like by the other teachers.  She has difficulty getting the class to listen to her, to do any work, and the class is obsessed with sex.

            Chapter six is entitled: The Effect of Teacher-Pupil Discussion on General Classroom Behaviour.  In this she brings three of the boys in to talk about how to manage the class.  One of the boys said the only way to solve anything was by strict punishment, which she was theoretically opposed to.  The other advocated a compromise by which they would work for half of the class, and be allowed to play cards for the second half.  Despite reservations, Cronk decided to implement this.  She describes the results (some improvement on their work), as well as the effect this had on the rest of the class.  Cronk embarks on a quest to wean them away from their card playing by making the curriculum more interesting.

            In chapter seven, The Relationship between Classroom Behaviour and the Curriculum, Cronk describes the remainder of the lessons, and her attempt to engage the card players.  She has frustrations with one of them, whom she goes to significant effort to get started on a project he will enjoy, only to have him abandon it without telling her.  She says her primary frustration with this student was that he did not treat her like she was human.  Cronk also describes the conversations with the students at the end of the semester, and the conclusions she drew.  She claims that although there were difficulties, she made much progress by the end of the semester, and many of the students were doing more work than they previously had.

            Cronk’s unique experiment with this class was interesting.  What I was most surprised by was the inability of most of the students to articulate what they found so distasteful about school.  Similarly, they had little helpful suggestions to Cronk about how to improve it.  Almost all of them advocated strict punishment as the way to control the class, yet reacted negatively when this was employed. 

            I find little objectionable in Cronk’s thesis, but believe that perhaps she was a bit too trusting in the goodness of human nature when she did her experiment, and this accounts for much of the frustration she encountered.

            Professor’s Comments: One of the most important points she makes is that teachers and students hide within their roles.  It is the teacher’s task to work through this situation.

            This is a nice summary but missing some of the crucial points.

            Grade: B+

The Imperative of American Leadership by Joshua Muravchik: Book Report

Video Version HERE

             Originally submitted to Political Science 308, April 19, 2000

            In his book, The Imperative of American Leadership, Joshua Muravchik discusses the phenomenon of Neo-Isolationism.  Muravchik argues against what he identifies as the tendency of the United States to shy away from taking a strong leadership role.  Muravchik cites the example in Yugoslavia as a case study of how neither Europe nor the United States was able to exert strong leadership in a time of crisis.  His conclusion is a unilateral leadership role that the United States should assume.

            I found reading Joshua Muravchik to be an interesting experience.  One thought that frequently reoccurred to me as I was reading his book was: “how could a man who knows so much be so stupid?”  Muravchik continually amazed me with his logical gaps and his outrageous statements.  My personal favorite was: “We entered World War II late and won it.  We entered the cold war late and won it” (208).  This not only ignores the fact that the Soviet Union was largely responsible for turning Germany back, but also leaves any intelligent reader wonder how the cold war could exist before the United States entered it.

            In order to refute all of Muravchik’s logical shortcomings would require almost a page by page analysis.  I have decided instead to focus on three general assumptions he bases his book on.  These are what I primarily objected to.

            To begin with, I consider myself a Christian pacifist.  I do not believe that military intervention is an acceptable Christian alternative in any situation.  I realize that this is not mainstream political thought, and I do not expect Muravchik to agree with me.  What I resent is the way he ignored the distinction between pacifism and isolationism.  Muravchik was all too eager to lump pacifists in the same category as Pat Buchanan.

            Like Muravchik, I believe America has a responsibility to help the rest of the world.  Like Muravchik, I believe that all life is sacred, not just that of American citizens.  However, I do not believe that dropping bombs and sending troops will solve anything.  It is unfair of Muravchik to then assume I am an isolationist and care nothing about the rest of the world.  Muravchik does not even address the pacifist alternative.

            There is a second problem I have with Muravchik.  At one point in the book, he uses an analogy of global politics as the hawks preying on the weaker birds. Muravchik asserts that the American leadership is needed to stop the hawks.  This is his assumption throughout the book, but Muravchik gives no thought to the idea that the United States might well be the hawk.

            Muravchik cites the example in Iraq as an example of positive United States foreign policy.  Not mentioned is the devastation that the Gulf War and the following economic sanctions have caused the Iraqi people.  Muravchik does not even consider this.  (Although perhaps the fact that this book was written four years ago does excuse Muravchik somewhat.  The debate on the Iraqi sanctions has increased in recent years.)

            Worse, Muravchik cites Reagan’s policy in Nicaragua as another positive example.  Personally I believe what Reagan did to Nicaragua was unforgivable.  Again, I realize this is still a matter of debate, and I do not expect Muravchik to agree with me.  However, Muravchik treats Nicaragua as if there were no debate. In doing this, Muravchik loses much of his credibility and shows what a narrow perspective he has on world events.  (I can not resist mentioning here that last semester I read another Muravchik book: Media Coverage of the Sandinista Revolution.  I found this book narrow-minded as well).

            More telling is the examples Muravchik does not bring up.  Perhaps if Muravchik wanted to see a good example of American foreign policy, he should look at Guatemala in the 1950s, or Argentina in the early 1970s.  He should take a closer look at El Salvador during the 1980s, as well as current United States funding to Colombian military.  Of course, Muravchik should not forget the School of the Americas.  Finally Muravchik should consider the current exploitation of third world countries by American corporations.  Then perhaps Muravchik would agree with me that America is not the white knight protecting the world from hawks, but the hawk from whom the rest of the world needs protection.  The United States has proven repeatedly that it is not the kind of leader the world wants.

            And then there is Muravchik’s discussion on world trade.  As with the Iraq example, Muravchik should be given some slack for having written the book in 1996, before the debates about the World Trade Organization were forced into the public eye.  However, Muravchik again bases his argument off of assumptions that are not universally shared.

            At a recent IMF protest I saw a sign that said, “Hey Bankers, your profits are being made with the bodies of third world women.”  Although this sign is an obvious oversimplification of the problems surrounding globalization, it brings up a point completely absent from Muravchik’s discussion.  Muravchik says that “The less-developed countries do not want to slow their ascent from poverty for the sake of the environment.  Who are we to stand in their way?” (203).  Not only does this quote ignore the fact that the welfare of third world people is frequently closely connected to their environment, it makes the assumption that the wealth of the third world elites will benefit the mass of the third world.  In fact one could make the argument (as thousands of Americans did in Seattle) that the policies of the World Trade Organization is harmful to the great majority of third world workers.  Perhaps America should use its influence to secure the rights of the third world people instead of just focusing on opening up their markets.

            Although Muravchik has plenty of data at his disposal in the writing of this book, it is obvious he is looking only at a narrow set of data and examples.  Muravchik sees the world through patriotic lenses, but he does not realize the world neither wants nor needs American leadership.  Hopefully others will find his ideas as ridiculous as I do.

Professor’s comments:

On Outsourcing Jobs:  This is a mixed bag—outsourcing has given millions of jobs to people in the 3rd world…Poor ones by our standards, but good by theirs.  Of course improvements can and should be made…I think the WTO can be a plus in this regard.

On the world desiring American leadership: The world is a complex place—some parts want and have benefited from American involvement…including Bosnian Muslims and others throughout Eastern Europe.  So your statement needs qualification.

On the WTO: Complicated Issue—but I tend to disagree from what I know.  The WTO hasn’t been around long enough to make any conclusive judgements.

Final Comments:  I think we are a leader in some ways whether we like it or not.  WE are too big not to have a big impact on other states in the world.  I think the world does need the right kind of U.S. leadership—The UN and other multilateral approaches requires active positive U.S. involvement (leadership) if they are to be effective.

The question is what kind of leadership we will give.  On this question you rightly make some telling comments.

A well argued and written paper (critique).  Some points could use qualification.

Grade: A/A-