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The Marxist Approach to the National Question: A Critique of Nimni's Interpretation Author(s): Enzo Traverso and Michael Lwy Reviewed work(s): Source: Science & Society, Vol. 54, No. 2 (Summer, 1990), pp. 132-146 Published by: Guilford Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40403065 . Accessed: 25/03/2012 19:07
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Science& Society, Vol. 54, No. 2, Summer 1990, 132-146

o
The MarxistApproachto the National Question: A Critique of Nimni's Interpretation
ENZO TRAVERSO and MICHAEL LWY

HISTORIANS (MARXIST OR NOT) emphasize theincompleteness limitations Marx'and Engels' of and writings thenational The critique Engels' of on question. - formulated the first of nations"without for theory history" time at the beginning this century Otto Bauer in his of by and developedin a more systematic rigorous and way by the Ukrainian after Second the Marxist historian RomanRosdolsky World War- hasbecametoday solidacquisition thecontemof a literature the nationalquestion.In general, on poraryMarxist Marxist as historians inclined consider national are to the problem one of themaingaps in thetheoretical of elaboration Marxand of Engels. In particular, theyhave analyzedthe category the conas "non-historical Vlker) basically peoples" (geschichtlosen to the premises Marxism. of tradictory in that view,thinks EphraimNimni,however, a dissenting "Marxand Engelshavea coherent viewof thenational question, evenifthere no single is that presents corpusofliterature directly theirtheories an explicit in way"(Nimni,1989). In his opinion, thecoherence thisconception based on threefundamental is of ofhistorical of i.e. materialism: a theory evolution, a) "paradigms" a visionof history a progressive seriesof changesthrough "as universal and hierarchically definedstages";b) a deterministic - through form "economic which of reductiona theory analyzes ism"- all socialchanges theautomatic of of as result thegrowth the forces production; at last,a "Eurocentric" worldview, of c) that of wouldrepresent necessary inevitable and the consequence 132
monumentalDie Nationalittenfrage die Sozialdemokratie und (1907)

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After premise, this "theoretical the thetwoprevious parameters." is as of that study conceived a critique well readermight think this one discovers that Marxismas a whole; at the end, however, himself be a Marxist appealsto to and considers Nimni Ephraim of the "misleading of materialism an historical heritage purged Nimni'sgood in(p. European Marxism" 34). We understand If is his but tentions, we think attitude quite contradictory. we is were convincedthat Marx's theory foundedon a formof determinism and evolutionism economic inevitably openingon a In be we Eurocentric worldview, shouldcertainly anti-Marxists. of the premiseof Nimni'sessayis a caricature Marx's reality, of as and thought wouldbe moreappropriate a characterization elaboratedby materialist the quite different Weltanschauungen of Some writings Marx and and Bukharin. Plekhanov Kautsky, of first all theCommunist undoubtedly Manifesto, present Engels, in or determinist tendency aspectsof an evolutionist economic itwouldbe totally ofhistory. their However, wrong interpretation and to to reducethewholeof Marx'sthought a viewof society of lawsofdevelopment productive of as theresult natural history to or forces, as a seriesof stages according theEuropeanmodel. are remarks indeed relevant forincritical Some of Nimni's Marx and Engels did not unstance,when he observesthat that movements were neither thosenationalist derstand willing But too often analysis his is state. a norable to establish national fromisolatedphrases;someunilateral, generalizing extremely little to resemblance times tendstobecomea caricature it bearing Marx'sideas. can 2. Some passagesof theCommunist Manifesto be read as a in the work capitalism destroying of of trueapology thehistorical Marx all feudalorderand, in general, archaicsocialformations. to character capitalism and Engels assigneda "revolutionary" within the of outsidethefrontiers Europe,in a periodin which, revothe considered conditions fora socialist continent, ripe they wouldhaveon one handdestroyed In lution. India,GreatBritain theancient hand,laiddownthefoundaand,on theother society the tionsformodernsocialdevelopment through industrializathe In tionof thecountry. 1853 Marxdefined England, leading of forceof thissocial change,as the "unconscious instrument (MEW, 1957, Bd. 9, 133). In the same vein, Engels History"

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approved the annexation of Californiaby the United States because, accordingto his explanation,"the activeYankees would be better than the indolent Mexicans" in assuring the economic growthof the region (quoted in Davis, 1967, 62). In 1848 Engels even welcomed- as Nimni stresses the French conquest of (quoted Algeria as "a happy eventforthe progressof civilization" in Gallissot,1976, 25). Obviously,it is importantto criticizeand but condemn these statements, it would be wrongand schematic to see only these passages. In reality,Marx and Engels often denounced the mystification, deeply rooted in the Eurocentric culture of theirepoch and in imperialist ideology,that presents missions."They saw capitalismas colonial conquests as "civilizing that"turnseveryeconomic progressinto a social calama system by ity"(Marx, 1974, 457-458). They were fascinated the spread of on a world scale, but at the same timetheydenounced capitalism the barbaric and violent way in which this process was accomplished. In respect to the British colonization of India, Marx compared the "human progress" to an "horrible pagan idol, which did not wish to drink the nectar but in the skulls of the killed"(MEW, 1957, Bd. 9, 226). In 1857, in an articleon Algeria writtenfor the American Engels denounced "the Encyclopaedia, of horrorsand the brutality" the French "barbarouswar" against the "Arabian and Kabylian tribes,for which independence is a imperativeof precious weal and the hate of foreignrule the first theirlife" (quoted in Gallissot,1976, 99). In 1861, Marx defined the European expedition to Mexico as "one of the most monstrous enterprises in the annals of internationalhistory" and those in favorof (MEW, 1957, Bd. 15, 366). This statement, the Chinese in the "Opium Wars" with England, are not at all typicalof Eurocentrism. of the interpretation Marx cannot be Similarly, evolutionistic the and impoverishes complexity accepted,because it schematizes and the richnessof his thought.Nimni reduces it to a famous Marxpassage in Capitalthatbecame a dogma forthe positivistic ism of the Second International:"the countrythat is more deshows,to the less developed, the image of its veloped industrially own future" (Marx, 1974, 19). At the turn of the century,the intothe iron cage of closed Marx's theory Kautskyan"orthodoxy" The thoughtof Marx was so this evolutionistic interpretation. theories that the much identified with the social-Darwinistic

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welcomedthe Russianrevolution 1917 as a of youngGramsci "revolution againstCapitar (Gramsci,1967, 80-83). However, Marx'stheory its in thissinglepassagedoes notat all represent to all counHe neverclaimedto transpose mechanically totality. tries the development stages of WesternEurope- primitive on communism, feudalism, slavery, capitalism and hiswritings for societies hypotheses further are rather research, pre-capitalist With to in conclusions. thanunquestionable respect Russia, 1881the of transition from Marxconsidered possibility a direct 1882 to the obshchina Russianpeasantcommunity) communism, (the all the"terrible and downs" capitalof without ups goingthrough in with a ifa peasantrevolution Russiashouldfusetogether ism, in revolution Europe. In a lettersent in 1877 to the socialist Marx warned the readers Russian reviewOtchestvenie Zapiski, his of of thedangerof transforming "outline thegenesis against in WesternEurope" into a "historical-philosophical capitalism laid to all peoples,in any of theory the generalmarchfatally situation (MEW, 1957, Bd. 19, 111). In theyfindthemselves" in letter Vera to the 1881 he reaffirmed sameconcept a famous wherehe presented traditional the ruralcommunity as Zasulich, of forthesocialregeneration Russia"(MEW, the"starting point led Marxists, by 1957,Bd. 35, 167;cf.Shanin, 1984).The Russian the to Plekhanov, whom idea of"skipping" capitalism appearedas hid thisletter was foundand a populist (it heresy, scrupulously publishedby Riazanovin 1911). It is onlyan exampleof the in currents Marx'swritings. anti-evolutionist an morethanan accom3. Marxand Engelsformulated idea, a of the nationalquestion.This factrepresents plishedtheory, butat same timeprotheoretical limitation their of elaboration, and the tects definition, against dangerof a too-rigid normative like those proposed by Kautsky(the nationas an economicentity) linguistic-territorial or Stalin(thenationas an economic, culturaland psychological territorial, community) linguistical, n. 96; Traverso,1984, n. 1). Both German (see Lwy, 1976, lived marked theformation of revolutionaries in an epochstill by some nationalstatesin Europe (Germany, Poland, HunItaly, influenced theirview.We can gary),and thisfactnecessarily deduce from their a concept thenationas a historical of writings linkedto the riseof thecapitalist mode of production formation

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in and crystallized a political superstructure: the national state (see Rodinson, 1968, 133; Haupt and Weill, 1974, n. 2), but this concept was never developed in a systematicway. This incompletenessin theiranalysisof the nationalquestionis probably linked to theirbelief that theylived in an epoch dominated by and by the advent,in the near future, bourgeoiscosmopolitanism In national conflicts. a work such as of a socialismtranscending and internationalism the Communist cosmopolitanism Manifesto, mode of tend to fuse.There, theinternationalization thecapitalist are market seen as a of of productionand the formation theworld the which"has made cosmopolitan[kosmopolitisch] producprocess tion and the consumption of all the countries,"establishinga "universal dependence of all nations upon one another" and of creatinga "world literature."In thisceaseless transformation social life, capitalismwould have subjected "the countryto the nations to the civilized town,the barbarous and semi-barbarous the peasant peoples to the bourgeois peoples, the Orient to ones, the Occident" (MEW, 1957, Bd. 4, 466). This admiringaccountof functionof the capitalistmode of production, the revolutionary viewed as an economic systemthat would everydaymore and and suppress and "spiritually" more unifythe world materially led the authors of the the basis for national conflicts, certainly to Manifesto neglectthe importanceof the nationalquestion. This whichdoubtlesscontainssome elementsof ecounderestimation, marked in particularthe and Eurocentrism, nomic reductionism of Marx and Engels of 1848-1849. writings containssome doubtful It is truethatthe Communist Manifesto it formulations; is, however,inaccurateto write,as Nimni does, that for Marx and Engels "the nation will be abolished by the What theywroteis thatthe supremacy advancingtide of history." of the proletariatwill cause the disappearance of "national deand limitations(Absonderungen) antagonismsbetween peoples." can be translatedas difference, delimitation, separaAbsonderung of tion or isolation.The mostlikelyinterpretation thisphrase is, in our opinion, the one presented by Roman Rosdolskyin an essay from 1965: when Marx and Engels hoped that in a comwill dismunist societynational antagonismsand delimitations not meant"certainly the 'abolition'of existingethnic appear, they communities and linguistic (whichwould have been absurd!) but of peoples. In a societyin which(in the the political delimitations

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" 'national states' (Rosdolsky, roomforseparate 1965,335; fora see Bloom, 1941, 26). "minimalist," different, interpretation, of This internationalist standpoint Marx and Engels was "unilinear Eurocentric" and basednoton someperverse ideology, a buton thehumanist thatin a socialist world, worldwithout hope will and conflicts disnot frontiers, only nationalantagonisms socialand political not butalso theeconomic, (but cultural) appear, nations between differences (See Lwy,1981a,n. 14). a theoretical The Irish example illuminates different apthatcan be foundin Marx to thenational phenomenon proach to Ireland that them recognize and Engels.The criterion brought but nationwas not economic, essentially as a historical political. of Their starting pointwas theunderstanding theIrishpeople's nation.In Ireland,nationalism wishto becomean independent to of in direct proportion theprocess denationalizagrewstronger This processdetermined out carried byBritish tion imperialism. of not onlythe economic spoliation the island,but even a true of assimilation the Irish,who abandoned the Gaelic linguistic "After most the Engelswrote: tonguein orderto speakEnglish. the at extermination, Irish after wildrepression, everyattempt tookbreathand raisedthemselves again,as if theydrew their in that the force from garrison wasimposed uponthem order just of to oppressthem" 1975,192). In thiscase,theconcept (Engels, to criteria nationwas not definedaccording objective (economy, was foundedon a subjective etc.), language,territory, but rather from British themselves the element: willof theIrishto liberate to in it rule.This conception, which is difficult findanysignsof of the instead "economic reductionism," emphasized importance In the and nationalidentity interiority. 1939 Trotsky adopted abouttheBlack with L. R.James C. in samemethod, a discussion an arguingthat"on thismatter abstract questionin America, the but is criterion notdecisive, thehistorical consciousness, feelof and theimpulses a groupare moreimportant" (Trotsky, ings of the 1978,28). In reality, twomainMarxist interpretations the - on one hand, the economicand denationalphenomenon of and Stalinand, on the other,the terministic theory Kautsky and of Bauer and Trotsky bothissue historical cultural theory fromthe classicalMarxist whoseincompleteness and approach,

'the public power will lose its political words of the Manifesto) character' and thestateas such will wither away,there can be no

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can or fluidity be developed in eitheran evolutionistic a dialectical way. In his attempt prove thatMarx's viewsare not fragmentary to and incomplete, but a systematicand coherent "evolutionist" whole, Nimni argues thathis (and Engels') "fundamentaltheoretical assumption"was that "everynational state" is "indissolubly of linked withthe universalization the capitalistmode of productionand the hegemonyof thebourgeoisie."This explains,according to him, Marx's and Engels' "firmadvocacy of the rightof to self-determination the Irish and Poles," and at the same time the harsh treatmentof the "southern Slavs." Now, far from supportingIreland because of "bourgeoishegemony,"Marx was verypleased thatthe hegemonicforcesin the Irish national and agrarian struggle,the Fenians, were "characterizedby a socialist tendency(in a negativesense, directedagainstthe appropriation of the soil)" (Marx, n.d., 323). The reasons forsupporting Poland, were not economistic and not Serbian or Bohemian nationalism, of ("the universalization the capitalisteconomy") but exclusively while the tsarist, political:the Polish nationalmovementwas antiothers were considered by Marx as manipulated by Tsarism. In the case of the South Slavs,one can argue thathis politicalattitude was wrong; one cannot prove thatit was the logical outcome of a and "Eurocentric"view (by the way, why general "evolutionist" should Poland be more "European" than, say, Bohemia?), and of even less of the "classical epistemology Marxism." of 4. Withrespectto the theory "non-historical nations,"there is a basic contradictionin Nimni's argument: on one side, he writesthat this theoryis "a clear effect"of the "classical Marxist withits "universalprocesses of social transformaepistemology" tion" (308). But two pages later he observes that this Hegelian materialist is conceptualization "in directoppositionto a historical of history"! even considersit"strange"to findsuch He conception "idealist speculations"echoed "in the works of the founders of historical materialism"(310). We entirelyagree with this last thesis,but it is obviouslyincompatiblewiththe firstone. to The other problem is that Nimni insistson attributing Marx the same viewsas Engels about the "non-historical peoples," offeringvery littleevidence for this. Let us examine his argument:

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thatMarx and Engels "would disagree a) It is "unthinkable" over such a fundamentalissue." Well, this begs the question. There is nothingto show thatMarx eitheragreed or disagreed (or did not care to take a stand) withthistheory:the factit is thathe It to didnotuse itin hiswritings. is therefore arbitrary imputesuch views to him. Differencesbetween Marx and Engels have been observed by Marxist philosophers and scholars on several issues- withoutnecessarlyinvolvingany explicitdisagreement. in There is no reason whythisshould be "unthinkable" relationto the national question. denunciationof small b) "Marx also indulged in a derogatory and non-westernEuropean national communities." He used and intolerant withethnic "abusive language" and was "impatient minorities."As examples, Nimni quotes some remarks about Spaniards, Mexicans and Chinese. Now, none of those nationsis and none was considered as "non-historic" an "ethnicminority" either Marx or Engels (theyhad already a state). And Spanby or iards are not- either geographically historically a "small" Western"nation! or "nonout Moreover,the quotationabout China is takencompletely towardsChina, of contextby Nimni: farfrombeing "derogatory" this articleprojectsthat "the next uprisingof the people of Europe . . . maydepend more probablyon whatis now passingin the Celestial Empire - the veryopposite of Europe - than on any other politicalcause thatnow exists.. . . It maysafelybe augured that the Chinese revolutionwill throwthe spark into the overand cause the exploloaded mine of the presentindustrial system sion of the long prepared generalcrisis, which,spreadingabroad, in willbe closelyfollowedby politicalrevolutions the Continent" Far from being "Eurocentric,"this pre(Marx, 1969, 67, 73). diction- alas, enterelywrong, as were many other wildlyoptimistic predictionsof Marx and his followers is surprisingly of akin to the most extreme "third-worldism" the 1960s. Marx often refers to the Chinese nation as "semiTrue, barbarian"; but writingabout the Chinese war against English imperialismin 1858 he observes that this nation "stood on the and was "promptedbyethicalmotives"(the principleof morality" of refusalto accept opium trade),while "the representative overmodern societyfights the privilegeof buyingin the for whelming cheapest and sellingin the dearest market"(Marx, 1969, 343-4).

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There is no doubt thatone can findin both Marx and Engels all kindsof "derogatory in to remarks" references severalnations; it is also true that their private correspondence contains some horribleexpressions,like the infamous"Jewishnigger" formula for Lassalle. But we do not believe thatone can make a "theory" if out of all this,particularly one considersthatthe great "historical nations" (France, Germany,England) also receive theirshare of "derogatoryremarks." of It is also true thatthere is in some of Marx's writings the assessmentof the South-Slav na1840s and 50s a verynegative tions,but this was not organicallylinked to any general "evolutionist,economicistand Eurocentric"philosophy. It was rather the ad hocproduct of his obsessivefear of Tsarist counterrevolution, and of Panslavism as a tool of the Tsar. As soon as the prospects of revolution in Russia began to materialize (after fromhis writ1870), this negativeassessmentdisapears entirely ings. 5. Engels' approach to the so-called "non-historical peoples" was very different.In his vocabularythis term designated the nations lacking the "historical,geographical, political and industrial premises of independence and vitality." Engels wrote: who neverhad theirown history, "Nations(Vlker), who, fromthe are raw stage of civilization, momentwhen theyarriveat the first already under foreigndomination,or whichwere compelled by a have no vitality stageof civilization, foreignyoke to enterthe first and will never achieve any form of independ(Lebensfhigkeit) to ence" (MEW, 1957, Bd. 6, 275). Engels was referring those in the nationsthatknewpermanently theirhistory politicalrule of a foreign state and that, in his opinion, were doomed to be assimilatedby the sociallyand economicallymore advanced nations. Engels continued:
or one in doesnothavein somecorner other Thereis no country Europewhich of of peoples(Vlkerruinen),remnant a former the or several populafragments became and which later tionthat suppressed heldin bondage thenation was by Entwickder for themainvehicle historical development (Trgerin geschichtlichen of underthecourse history, of These relics a nation, mercilessly trampled lung). of peoples(Vlkerabfalle) become as Hegel saystheseresidual always fragments their comof and so fanatical standard-bearerscounter-revolution remain until

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or character oder (gnzlichen Vertilgung pleteextirpation loss of theirnational in as theirwholeexistence generalis itself protest a just Entnationalisierung), revolution. a (MEW, 1957,Bd. 6, 172.) against greathistorical

to This category included, according Engels,the Gaels of Scotthe Bretons,the Basques, the Yiddish-speaking land, Jewsof the Slavs. EasternEurope and, in particular, Southern to According Engels,in 1848 the greatEuropean nations while Slavs(with exception the the wereon thesideofrevolution, of the Poles) were allied withTsarismon the side of reaction. to role Engelsdid nottry graspthesocialcausesofthe"vendean" in 1848,butsimply movements deduced playedbythesenational nature.The failit fromtheirsupposed"counterrevolutionary" had ure of the 1848 revolutions precisecauses,whichwerenot Slavs. Rather, this at all the "vendean"natureof the Southern context: epoch in whichthe an linkedto a historical defeatwas its had potential Europeanbourgeoisie exhausted revolutionary on unable to solve the main problems the agenda: the (being and was and agrarian national questions), theproletariat notyet itwastoolatefora bourgeois In totakepower. other words, ready revolution and too soon for a socialist revolution (see Lwy, 1981b,27). was of history" brilliantly Engels' theory peoples "without who provedits basic inconsiscriticized Roman Rosdolsky, by role He tency. explainsthe reactionary playedby the Slavonic of of movements national duringtheuprisings 1848 in thelight in of contradictions therevolution EasternEurope: theintrinsic for ownliberation, Polandand like whofought their somenations in and other nationalities ethnical minorities oppressed Hungary, theirown bosom.The leadingsocial forcesof the Polishand and were movements thebourgeoisie thegentry, opposed Magyar The Ruthenians of to the other"peasantnations." (Ukrainians) for example,did not supportthe demand for Polish Galicia, of because theyalreadydefendedthe embryos independence, whicheven exa theirown nationalidentity, nationalidentity with landowners. Croaclass their Serbs, conflict thePolish pressed Slovaksand all the other"peasantnations" tians,Romanians, of Southeastern Europe took the same attitudetowardsthe In Germansand the Magyars. reality, theseso-called"non-hisin toricalpeoples" would have participated the revolution if

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they had obtained a land reformfromthe bourgeoisie and the gentry,but the chauvinistand conservativeleadership of the German, Polish and Magyar national movementswould not accept this and pushed the peasant masses into the arms of the Instead of grasping- witha Marxist Tsarist counterrevolution. - the social roots of the Pan-Slavistmovement,Engels method drew a map of Europe based on two categories: "revolutionary viewed as historthe nations"and "peoples withouthistory," first of the second regarded as dead fragments the past. icallyviable, of the whichdenies a priori possibility a next awakThis position, ening of the "peoples without history,"is completely antidialectical. Rosdolsky proves, with a large list of citations,that even after 1848 Engels retained his view of the revolutionin East-CentralEurope as a basicallyGermanrevolution,with the same allies (in the firstplace the Polish) and the same enemies (tsarist Russia and the Pan-Slavist movement) (see Rosdolsky, 1979, 125). facingthe birthof the Alreadyat the end of the 19thcentury, Socialistmovementin the Balkan countries,Kautskydenounced Engels' mistake(See Haupt, 1980, 185). In 1907, in his greatwork on the national question, Otto Bauer criticizedEngels, recognizSlavonic ing the social and culturaldevelopmentof the different to modernlife)(Bauer, 1975, 1, nationalities (i.e., theiradaptation ch. 3). In his critique, Rosdolskyintroducesanotherargument:he that during Cromwell's revolution the Irish- whose explains national rights were justly supported by Marx and Engels role than the AustrianSlavs in 1848. played a not less reactionary movement Nevertheless, theylaterbuilta nationalanti-imperialist (Rosdolsky,1979, 116). Through a critiqueof the Neue Reinische Marxistanalysis attitude, Rosdolskyelaboratesa brilliant Zeitung's of the national question in the 1848 revolution.Far fromfalling again, as Nimni thinks,into Engels' "paradigmatictrap" of the "historicaland non-historical nations,"he comes to a veryclear Vlker nothingbut "a is of conclusion: the theory thegeschichtlosen residue of the idealistic conception of historyand thereforea foreignbody in the theoreticalsystemof Marxism" (Ibid., 121). thatthe attitudeof Engels We can agree withNimni's statement towards the South Slavonic nations reveals some elements of evolutionism,economic determinismand Eurocenpositivistic trism. Marx's friend doubtless internalizedthe cultural preju-

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to dicesof 19th-century Europe,butitwouldbe wrong generalize the of thisattitude: concept "peoplewithout history" represents of an aspect Engels'approachto the national question. only From the end of the 19thcentury Marxist ideas onwards, the ethnic extra-territorial minorities and among spreadwidely of "non-historical nations" East-Central theso-called Europe.The and ofthese nations movement theSocialist workers' intelligentsia thebestintellectual instrument explain to in found Marxist theory of to their processof formation oppression, graspthehistorical a of their cultural and, at last,to elaborate project both identity The conceptof cultural-national social and nationalliberation. first all bytheMarxist of currents such of was autonomy created as of nationalities the Slavs (the SlavonicFederation oppressed the Austrian Social-Democracy), Jews(theBund) and theArmeThe Socialists Ukraina(Rosdolsky), of nians (the "Specifists"). Bohemia (Smeral),Bulgaria(Blagoev),Romania(Dobrogeanuas Gherea), Georgia (Jordania), well as the Austrian-Slavonic and the Russian-Jewish Socialists, (Medem,Borokhov) (Kristan) national realities esp. their different to used Marxism analyze (see of Weill,1987).The theory peoples"without history" appearedto but wasnota good reason and useless, this as them totally wrong of the for rejecting Marxist theory the nationalquestionas a the the between world whole.In theyears wars, SpanishMarxists in the instrumentaldeveloping theoretical whoweremost analysis of the nationalquestionwere AndreuNin, a Catalan,and the two Arenilla brothers, Basques (See Nin, 1977,esp. 70-72; Aredebateon thenational was nillas,1978). If the Marxist question of after carried death,aboveall bythesocialists forward, Engels' this and minorities theoppressed theethnic nations, meansthat on had Marxist theclassical writings thismatter somelimitations muchis obvious), also but the and did notresolve problem (that in nationwas Marxist that theory indispensable ordertoconfront al issues. of if elaborated Marx 6. In conclusion: theconcept nation by of if and Engels is vague and incomplete, Engels' theory the "non-historical" metaphysics totally peoplesis a pseudo-historicist what remainsof theirreflections the on to Marxism, foreign We now national the problem? shallattempt tosynthesize classical Marxist approach.

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In 1867, when theyreturnedto the Irish question,Marx and dominanti Engels acquired a basic theoreticalpoint: thedichotomy saw in the colonial dominationof Ireland nations. They oppressed not only the source of the Irish people's oppression,but also the of key for explainingthe impotence the Englishworkingclass, the most numerous and organized proletariatof the world in the The chauvinismand feelingsof second half of the 19thcentury. towardsthe Irishwere of nationalsuperiority the Englishworkers nourished by the Britishbourgeoisie, which exploited this antagonismin order to maintainits rule in Ireland and to oppress the English proletariat.Marx wrote in 1870:
a in center Englandnow possesses working and Everyindustrial commercial Irishproletarians. and into classdivided twohostile proletarians English camps, who as worker a competitor lowers hates Irish the worker The ordinary English of a himself member worker feels he to hisstandard life.In relation theIrish of and intoa toolofthearistocrats capitalists himself and nation so turns theruling .. over their thusstrengthening domination himself. . This anIreland, against
class, despite its of tagonism is the secretof the impotence theEnglish working

And its class the It by organization. isthesecret which capitalist maintains power. awareof it. (Marx-Engels, thatclassis fully 1965,236-7.)

the wouldbecome basis which two Marxthusformulated concepts that self-determination: nation of ofLenin'stheory national a) the it anothercannotbe free(Engelsconsidered a "misoppresses of fortune" a people to ruleoveranother); theliberation for b) in revolution the for nation a premise thesocialist is theoppressed dominant nationitself. and retains importance validity, its Today,thisapproachstill forthedevelopment an and remains absolutely necessary premise This methodological enrichment Marxism. of and thetheoretical but nor is neither economicdeterminisi Eurocentric, approach for an compass thosewhobelieve represents irreplaceable simply if ourselves Marxists we in internationalism. cannotconsider We ofNewCaledonia's of do notsupport right self-determination the in and Kanaks in France,of Palestinians Israel,of Armenians in in Albaneses Yugoslavia, Balticnationalities USSR,of Kosovo's if but and Turkey; of Kurdsin Iran,Iraq,Syria last, notleast, we in theAmerican States do notstruggle theUnited military against in If Nimni and intervention Nicaragua Salvador. Ephraim agrees he withus - as we hope he does- on thisconclusion, must

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recognize that it is possible to criticize Marx's and Engels' approach to the national question withoutrejectingMarxism.
ENZO TRAVERSO MICHAEL LWY

Paris, France

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