THE COLD WAR AND THE WEST
75
and had workers pouring out to tell their comrades in other countries
what a glorious life they are building through their ownership and
control of the means of production." "Very funny," growls Echo
from behind the Curtain. "And a tough time you'd be having
in
Latin America or Africa if your enthusiasm for individual liberty
caused you to use that tremendous power and productive capacity
of yours to free people from poverty and from oppression by the
Trujillos, the Francos and the French
colons."
Yet the hostile propaganda of each side against the other is not
altogether true either. It is too simple to say that the West cherishes
capitalism not freedom and that the Soviets cynically mask their
totalitarianism in Socialist phrases. The ideals of a society, which
reflect the revolution that originally brought it into being, are serious
factors in the formation of events. The West wants freedom to the
extent that freedom is compatible with private ownership and with
profits; the Soviets want socialism to the extent that socialism is
compatible with the dictatorship of the Communist bureaucracy.
In both instances, the "issues" for which they fight mean something,
but what they mean is modified by the presence of a concrete self–
interest.
Is the modified issue a valid issue? Is the preservation of the
capitalist self-interest as greatly in the interest of everyone as the
preservation of freedom? That the matter is arguable is indicated
by PR's question 4. Nobody knows to what degree the freedom we
value is tied to the capitalist mode of freedom. It
is
a subject for
debate and experiment.
Assuming that we are, above all, devoted to freedom we might
re-phrase the problem. What is the extent to which the expansion
of freedom is consistent with profits (and the realization of socialism
with the rule of the Communist Party)?
If
these questions could be
answered it might be possible to develop an effective reformist politics
in both the USA and the USSR. A U.S. party, whether in power
or in loyal opposition, could say: We advocate going thus far with
freedom, then it must be slowed to a halt in order to protect capitalist
interests. The same with a Soviet party, just so far with socialism
then stopped to protect the interests of the C.P. leadership. Such a
politics of pursuing stated values while maintaining the status quo
could be genuinely conservative
and peaceful.
