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lieve ideological conflicts linked to foreign policy, and Harrington
will undoubtedly find that many of his former comrades in the Social
Democrats have more in common with him than with truly right–
wing Republicans.
There is but one exception . "Central American policy," Lipset
writes , "may remain as a major point of divisiveness."
It
is in this
regard that we must turn to Harrington's views of Nicaragua and
United States policy, which is symptomatic of the major weakness in
his position. He talks proudly of participation in the spring 1987
march on Washington against intervention in Central America, but
ignores the participation of black and left extremists like Stokely
Carmichael, and the scores of banners proclaiming the illegitimacy
of the State of Israel. Harrington , who once asked "Does the Peace
movement need the Communists?" and strongly answered no, now
seems to think , although he avoids addressing the issue directly, that
such participation with extremists is permissable - since they too see
the United States as the main enemy.
Harrington , convinced that we live in the post-cold war era,
seeks a "break-out of the Cold War definitions of socialism" prevail–
ing in the fifties . He proposes this be done by seeking an opening to
the third world, by endorsing the economic and social policies of
Socialist International leaders Willy Brandt, the late OlofPalme and
Michael Manley, who proposed a massive economic aid program for
the third world funded by the richer countries of the industrial West.
Their plan certainly merits serious consideration. However, the new
policy also seems to include the decision to denigrate all meaningful
criticism of third-world Leninism. In practical political terms , it
means allowing the Sandinistas to receive observer status within the
Socialist International , extending a fraternal hand to the Salvadoran
guerillas' civilian representatives, and giving membership in the
Socialist International to Maurice Bishop's New Jewel Movement in
Grenada. (Harrington explains that in supporting membership for a
black power group, he was "willing to vote for anything approved by
LionelJospin, the French Socialist Party's First Secretary," as if that
is an explanation . Would Harrington vote to endorse the French
Socialist Party's hard-line nuclear policy? The answer is self-evident.)
Harrington himself became, at Nicaraguan Foreign Minister
Miguel D'Escoto's suggestion, the American member of the Socialist
International's Committee to Defend the Nicaraguan Revolution .
As a member of that group, he traveled to Nicaragua in 1981 . Har-
