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PARTISAN REVIEW.
road pos1t1on, like that represented by Kerensky, Lenin devised the
stratagem of the "united front," which was simply an alliance made
by communists with other working-class groups to defend their im–
mediate interests against a common enemy and to "expose" the
limited aims of these other groups. In this way, Lenin and his fol–
lowers hoped to keep intact the unity and striking power of the
proletariat. Now, obviously, these conditions no longer exist in west- .
em Europe. And Stalinism cannot be said to keep its hold on the
masses simply because of a moderate left policy. On the contrary,
its influence is due to its seeming monopoly on the memories of the
Russian revolution and, at the same time, its ability to attract other
sections of the population on a non-revolutionary basis. Or, to put it
in another way, the degeneration of the Russian regime has paralyzed
the
will
to socialism outside of Russia.
Yet nowhere has Macdonald tried seriously to grapple with the
problem of detaching the peoples of Europe from the Stalinist myth–
ology-especially in those countries now occupied by Russia. In his
report on Greece (see
Politics)
and in other writings he has casually
suggested some sort of "united front" with Stalinism. But who is to
make this united front?-a few isolated individuals and small groups
scattered throughout the world? Perhaps Macdonald, in New York,
with the Greek Communists?-or with the
Red
Army? Even
if
all
this made any practical sense, still it would become theoretically
meaningless, according to Macdonald's conception of bureaucratic
collectivism in Russia, for socialists to effect a united front with a new
class building a new order, not socialist.
Lest I be misunderstood, I should like to emphasize that I am
not trying to counterpose an attitude of pessimism to Macdonald's
optimism. All I am saying is that no one seems to know the answers
to these questions posed by new and unforeseen political develop–
ments; and I cannot see how the cause of socialism is helped the least
bit by Macdonald's fostering the illusion that he possesses most of
the answers. Or by his optimism, the only real content of which is
an evasion of the problems raised
by
the present predicament of the
left. The primary task of socialists is to find the causes of this predica–
ment, to rethink their position in terms of the present political situa–
tion, instead of indulging in the psychological game of measuring
each other's optimism or pessimism. Only in
this
way can we salvage
from the overwhelming realities of history the positive ethos of so–
cialism as a morality as well as an economy.
