The Left is the only hope for the country: Ashok Mitra in conversation with Prasenjit Bose
Ashok Mitra and Prasenjit Bose represent two generations of the Indian Left. Mitra, 84, is a well-known economist. He was finance minister in West Bengal between 1977 and 1987 and chief economic adviser to Indira Gandhi's government. Prasenjit Bose, 38, is a former convener of the CPI(M)'s research unit. He criticised the party for backing Pranab Mukherjee's candidature as President and was removed from the party. Mitra and Bose have had their grouses with the party. Here they discuss what's left of the Left..
Prasenjit Bose (PB):We have been witnessing a global economic crisis for the past four years. This whole triumphalism which we saw in the immediate aftermath of the fall of the Soviet Union; Francis Fukuyama saying that it's the end of history. How would you look at such a prognosis today, in the light of the global crisis?
Ashok Mitra (AM):I would say that Marx's ideas about the final stage of capitalism are about to be vindicated by the latest series of developments in the United States, as well as in Europe. The falling rate of profit we have been reading in textbooks, we have been discussing galore; now suddenly we find that what Marx had predicted has come true. The United States is trying hard. The Europeans are trying to pick lessons from what their American gurus are suggesting but to no avail. Employment is falling, the rate of growth stagnates and suddenly we find, despite what lyricists on behalf of capitalism might chant, the world is really taking a shape which was foretold by Marx hundred and fifty years ago.
PB:I think that therefore there is definitely a return to the interests of Marxism, to the interests of not only the intellectual components of Marxism but also in a way we see popular movements which are coming up in Europe today, in countries like Spain and Greece; there have been huge protests by the trade unions, by the workers and it is leading to political changes as well. One doesn't know what exactly would be the outcome in the American elections but the Occupy Wall Street movement also caught the imagination of people across the world. But do you think that whereas Marx's analysis of capitalism as a crisis-ridden system, as a system ridden by exploitation; while that is getting definitely vindicated but are we today seeing, in the political domain, a return of the kind of revolutionary politics that we saw hundred years back or are there new trends that one has to look into?
AM:I do admit that there is a certain qualitative difference between what had taken place throughout the major part of the 20th century and what is happening now. Certainly as a major consequence of so-called economic liberalization which others call globalization but I wouldn't call it globalization because the original concept of globalization is very much a Marxist concept. It was Marx who talked about globalization of the working class... Read more:
http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/ashok-mitra-in-conversation-with-prasenjit-bose/1/237608.html
Also see:
End of the Left in India?
The Other Side of Maoism:
Prasenjit Bose (PB):We have been witnessing a global economic crisis for the past four years. This whole triumphalism which we saw in the immediate aftermath of the fall of the Soviet Union; Francis Fukuyama saying that it's the end of history. How would you look at such a prognosis today, in the light of the global crisis?
Ashok Mitra (AM):I would say that Marx's ideas about the final stage of capitalism are about to be vindicated by the latest series of developments in the United States, as well as in Europe. The falling rate of profit we have been reading in textbooks, we have been discussing galore; now suddenly we find that what Marx had predicted has come true. The United States is trying hard. The Europeans are trying to pick lessons from what their American gurus are suggesting but to no avail. Employment is falling, the rate of growth stagnates and suddenly we find, despite what lyricists on behalf of capitalism might chant, the world is really taking a shape which was foretold by Marx hundred and fifty years ago.
PB:I think that therefore there is definitely a return to the interests of Marxism, to the interests of not only the intellectual components of Marxism but also in a way we see popular movements which are coming up in Europe today, in countries like Spain and Greece; there have been huge protests by the trade unions, by the workers and it is leading to political changes as well. One doesn't know what exactly would be the outcome in the American elections but the Occupy Wall Street movement also caught the imagination of people across the world. But do you think that whereas Marx's analysis of capitalism as a crisis-ridden system, as a system ridden by exploitation; while that is getting definitely vindicated but are we today seeing, in the political domain, a return of the kind of revolutionary politics that we saw hundred years back or are there new trends that one has to look into?
AM:I do admit that there is a certain qualitative difference between what had taken place throughout the major part of the 20th century and what is happening now. Certainly as a major consequence of so-called economic liberalization which others call globalization but I wouldn't call it globalization because the original concept of globalization is very much a Marxist concept. It was Marx who talked about globalization of the working class... Read more:
http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/ashok-mitra-in-conversation-with-prasenjit-bose/1/237608.html
End of the Left in India?
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Maoism and the Philosophy of Insurrection (2010, Seminar # 607)
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