In light of the discussion we had during our advisee meeting on Friday about being strategic in our means as critical scholars I was struck by the words of Lenin who emphasizes the role of the intellectual. He says, "The history of all countries shows that the working class, exclusively by its own effort, is able to develop only trade-union consciousness, i.e., it may itself realize the necessity for combining in unions, for fighting against the employers and for striving to compel the government to pass necessary labor legislation, etc. The theory of socialism, however, grew out of the philosophic, historical representatives of the propertied classes, the intellectuals." (pg. 74)
This idea of the bourgeois socialist intelligentsia as an instrument of raising consciousness and fomenting dissent is an ideal one I am sure but in contemporary times we, the academics, forming a substantial part of the "intellectual elite", occupy a unique position which forces us into "strategic" straitjackets. This is not to say that any kind of strategic maneuver is to be discounted as Bernsteinism, but it raises issues of how to reconcile this position as the academic/intellectual with Lenin's proposal of a "professional revolutionary". How then do we create a hybrid of the academic, intellectual, professional revolutionary?
Further, it is ironic that Lenin's summation of the misleading of the "workers who were carried away by the arguments that a kopek added to a ruble was worth more than socialism and politics, and that they must "fight, knowing that they are fighting not for some future generation, but for themselves and their children", seems to apply today to the position we are in today as academic workers ourselves. How many Rabocheye Dyelo's are we guilty of contributing and pandering to?
This idea of the bourgeois socialist intelligentsia as an instrument of raising consciousness and fomenting dissent is an ideal one I am sure but in contemporary times we, the academics, forming a substantial part of the "intellectual elite", occupy a unique position which forces us into "strategic" straitjackets. This is not to say that any kind of strategic maneuver is to be discounted as Bernsteinism, but it raises issues of how to reconcile this position as the academic/intellectual with Lenin's proposal of a "professional revolutionary". How then do we create a hybrid of the academic, intellectual, professional revolutionary?
Further, it is ironic that Lenin's summation of the misleading of the "workers who were carried away by the arguments that a kopek added to a ruble was worth more than socialism and politics, and that they must "fight, knowing that they are fighting not for some future generation, but for themselves and their children", seems to apply today to the position we are in today as academic workers ourselves. How many Rabocheye Dyelo's are we guilty of contributing and pandering to?
Comments
Having said that at the same time, how do we access the powerful discursive spaces if we do not participate in the same? If participation leads to co-optation across time, how do we negotiate that...I think all these do have a answer but again it depends on your personal commitments, your o, e and a and your limiting horizons. For ex., I get extremely uncomfortable when people say that buying certain kind of books somehow reinforces their critical commitments....
Anyway, enough rambling..loved your post!!
-First, you need the guts to actually speak in public and take the consequences. This means taking unpopular stances and being vocal about it. Mainstream in academia or media doesn't necessarily reflect the mainstream of the common person.
-Speaking of which, it would help that intellectuals break down the communication and other barriers that stop them from engaging the common person. We remain hardliners on our theories but let's be honest, most of the Proletariat doesn't give a fig about them. The very term 'Proletriat' is somewhat demeaning if you think about it. There seems to be a tinge of patronization of the oh-so-poor masses in much of our discussions in class. And we lack the ability to speak in a down-to-earth style that non-academic can relate to. Our discussions sometimes strike me as mere intellectual exercises rather than passionate discourses on how to help people. Until we cure ourselves of this ivory-tower pseudo-intellectualism we remain dilettantes to the process of social transformation. My two cents.
This is an example of what I just talked about. You took a relatively anodyne phrase of "helping people" which I used in a structural context and framed it as some sort of neoliberal jingo. Communicating from that sort of theoretical box means one has effectively lost touch with the majority of masses one wishes to energize to revolution.
I agree that ultimately changing the system can benefit many more, but helping people on a smaller, day-to-day level is important too. Both of these are "helping people," just on different levels. They are not mutually exclusive either. I would actually say that people who start assisting victims of a system on a smaller level can better diagnose and target the system-level problems. Otherwise, you operate from an ivory-tower with a mere academic, prosaic view of the system divorced from things on the ground.
For the record, "helping people" is not patronizing if you see it as personal responsibility rather than a token gesture of sympathy. It is more supremacist in reality if one thinks they are so unworthy of assisting others that they should just remain on the sidelines.
I would like to add my bit to the excellent thoughts presented above. When we conceptualize "helping" others it does seem to make a fair bit of sense to think of helping on a micro level as well as contending for structural changes. However, this seems to background an important part of one's status as an "intellectual" and that is, taking into full consideration our privileges. Since we have a privileged position in the structure of the society let us try and use this privilege toward identifying what we can do best. When one talks about helping people at a micro level he ignores the state where an intellectual is equipped with thoughts and insights that can (a) expose the unjust exploitation in the society and (b) can propose structural changes that help people "en mass" ..... An intellectual by virtue of his privilege is capable of articulating and propagating plans of structural change that can have impacts greater than helping people on a one-to-one basis. Owing to his privilege, thus, an intellectual can cause a bigger ripple if and when he thinks of structural changes.