Proletarian Internationalism - Leftist Opposition To Proletarian Internationalism

Leftist Opposition To Proletarian Internationalism

In contrast, some socialists have pointed out that social realities such as local loyalties and cultural barriers militate against proletarian internationalism. For example, George Orwell believed that "in all countries the poor are more national than the rich." To this, Marxists might counter that while the rich may have historically had the awareness and education to recognize cross-national interest of class, the poor of those same nations likely have not had this advantage, making them more susceptible to what Marxists would describe as the false ideology of patriotism. Marxists assert that patriotism and nationalism serve precisely to obscure opposing class interests that would otherwise pose a threat to the ruling class order.

Marxists would also point out that in times of intense revolutionary struggle (the most evident being the revolutionary periods of 1848-9, 1917–1923 and 1968) internationalism within the proletariat can overtake petty nationalisms as intense class struggles break out in multiple nations at the same time and the workers of those nations discover that they have more in common with other workers than with their own bourgeoisie.

On the question of imperialism and national determination, proponents of third worldism argue that workers in "oppressor" nations (such as the USA or Israel) must first support national liberation movements in "oppressed" nations (such as Afghanistan or Palestine) before there can be any basis for proletarian internationalism. For example, Tony Cliff, a leading figure of the British Socialist Workers Party, denied the possibility of solidarity between Palestinians and Israelis in the current Middle East situation, writing "Israel is not a colony suppressed by imperialism, but a settler’s citadel, a launching pad of imperialism. It is a tragedy that some of the very people who had been persecuted and massacred in such bestial fashion should themselves be driven into a chauvinistic, militaristic fervour, and become the blind tool of imperialism in subjugating the Arab masses."

Trotskyists argue that there must be a permanent revolution in third world countries, in which a bourgeoisie revolution will inevitably lead to a worker's revolution with an international scope. We may see this in the Bolshevik Revolution before the movement was stopped by Stalin, a proponent of Socialism in One Country. Because of this threat, the bourgeoisie in third world countries will willingly subjugate themselves to national and capitalist interests in order to prevent a proletarian uprising.

Internationalists would respond that capitalism has proved itself incapable of resolving the competing claims of different nationalisms, and that the working class (of all countries) is oppressed by capitalism, not by other workers. Moreover, the global nature of capitalism and international finance make "national liberation" an impossibility. For internationalists, all national liberation movements, whatever their "progressive" gloss, are therefore obstacles to the communist goal of world revolution.