THE ECONOMICS OF OUR TIMES

...The Idea of the Russian Revolution was not merely its ideal, but also—or primarily—its conception as an historical necessity...

...Sternberg believes he hss found the answer to this difficulty In his study of imperialism as a factor mitigating capitalist crisis...

...STERNBERG is aware that there are various kinds of state action whereby crisis situations can be met...

...Sternberg does not believe thst such bscklng can be obtained In the America of the period of "the coming crisis" lor a policy of outright nationalization of industry...

...4.00...

...and peculiar, also, because it has led, on the Left snd Right extremes, to deliberate operations, executed with grim enthusiasm, towsrds seizing the opportunity ot crisis...

...These necessitated apologies do not, of course, teach Fritz Sternberg, any more than other Marxists, to adopt a tone of caution snd humility...

...It is hard to understand quite what is intended by this insistence...

...If this precedent is what he had in mind, one wonders why (if not, perhaps, in order to preserve the thrilling tension of the Marxist genre of writing) Sternberg stresses so much the opposition of the- capitalists...

...Nome Hem...

...se.ds of the peculiar modern awareness of Nemesis: peculiar, because it thinks itself capable of predicting...

...The next crisis, he suggests, will be the crucial one: we no longc...

...If we are to take it.with complete seriousness, and agree with "the capitalists" in regarding the two as identical, it becomes impossible to understand Sternberg's assurance that overwhelming popular backing could be obtained for this program, but not for straight Socialism...

...Deep In the jungle and on far islands she and her charming companion were often in danger among actual headhunters...

...The time was full of philosophies of decline, the true reflection of a popular mood which since the First World War anticipated catastrophe...

...However, he insists that we must face the fact that a program of this sort, from the point of' view of the capitalists, amounts to the same thing as full Socialism...

...which, by the way, is categorically similar to (havjrig borrowed many ideas from) (jhe Nazi colonialism for European countries under the New Order, and to the model from which the Nazis themselves took mar.y hints — Japanese imperialism on the Asiatic mainland...

...Yet at a time when the intuition of approaching crisis is so general and taken-for-granted, a Marxist like Fritz Sternberg must devote a considerable part of his new book, The Cominu Crisis, to defensive arguments...

...kept while he wes Secretary or the Treasury, runs to *0O volumes...

...They were opposed, certainly, to the Labor Party victory...

...Thus, Marxism may claim to have planted the firs...

...Not only did they think they knew that "permanent crisis" was at hand, but Marxism forecast, slid Bolshevism blueprinted in detail, the Revolution by which the oncoming crisis was to be utilized to yield a millennial social order...

...MlSS MYTINGER and Msrgsret Warner, the constant companions in jungle journeys out of which came two books, are a pair of delectable and incalculable adventurers to follow...

...As Sternberg himself points out,"in the years 1917-1939, millions of people consciously feared (but could not prevent) the outbreak of the Second World War...

...He should be aware also that the British Labor Party has not yet departed from a policy of supporting right wing elements in certain European countries and "feudal" elements in colonial and semi-colonial countries...

...NlNE hundred volumes Is a lot...

...Indeed, extraordinary***, the fact it refers to may be, similar observations have been made so frequently d'irih...

...But now that the neglected factor has been found, there is again room for confident prediction of the moment of break-down...

...The height of unreality is hfs proposal that the United States abstain from preventing the formation of a progressive (Social Democratic) bloc of countries In Europe to balance the U.S.S.R...

...But they think nothing of It They record and discus items of costume, ritual and tribal organization - but constantly pretend modestly that thsy know nothing of anthropology...

...This second volume about practically impossible trials and triumphs in New Guinea is essentially a continuation of the earlier one about lively doings in the Solomons...

...It is time that Marxist books stopped looking to the bare bones of class struggfe analysis for a way out, and admit what effective Socialist tacticians have implicitly realized—at least, in crisis situations: that the "workers, clerical employees, farmers, middle classes and intelligentsia" are also human beinrs with values not strictly traceable in every case to their professional status...

...We .twentieth century that the remark has almost the ring of a commonplace...

...tt ¦ ^s»R the first time in history, millions of people consciously fear the approach ri of a 'gsttt* economic crisis Ifvng liefore its arrival" There is no gainsaying this extntojrTJtijfciity statement, with which Fritz Sternberg begins his book...

...and second, that it never could be enough, so long as the New Dealers accepted the implicit: premise that they must not go so far in government intervention ss to threaten the dominance of private control in our economy...

...Richer el Armour...

...He does believe, apparently, tuat such backing can be marshalled, in ths face of a erlsis, for a program based on a governmental guarantee of full employment, without such implicit limitations as hog-tied the New Deal...

...It Is all adventure, ludicrous mishap, happy or half-hysterical laughter, inevitable but surprising happy endings...

...have the outlets of imperialistic development and expansion to help us emerge from the depression peacefully...

...Marxists of Sternberg's type ought by now' to_ be mature enough to soflcede that In politics a global dirk sion strictly according to "class ''i*L terest" may not always be realised...

...Yet they came in ways so different from ths forecast, and led to results so contrary to anticipation, that any Marxist book, intended for the general reader, must now spend much effort in apologetics...

...Eugen Rosenstock has pointed out that the Russian Revolution was the first to be looked forward to by its ideologists...

...The material supporting this view is, within the limitations of a popularization like his book, convincingly marshalled...

...One~mjgft.tr justly call ours the Age of Doom Foreseen...

...March 1. GOLDEN TREAURY The diary of Heavy Morgenthaa Jr...

...In consequence of the misplaced stress on the factor of right wing opposition, Sternberg does not reckon with the possibility that there will be another period of unstable, middle-of-the-road palliatives in domestic policy...

...StII.I., in spite of the sturdy dogmatism of Marxists, time and haul experience have taught the theorists how to descend to reality from the highly abstract and 'ragmentary "rules" out of which Marx deduced the sharpening of Internal capitalist conflicts toward a final crisis...

...But perhaps we should not take it too seriously...

...From Editor A ff'Uisher...

...These two books of tight-pscked chapters contain every sort of thing which you .expect and which you don't expect.' Miss Mytinger innocently pretends to be nothing more than ah itinerant artist...

...rjust what did Henry Do, but jot...

...By Caroline Mytinger...

...ANTHROPOLOGY WITHOUT PAIN NEW GUINEA HEADH11NTERS...

...Hence, he concludes that any program of state action to overcome and prevent crisis must be prepared to cope with the opposition of the capitalists...

...Never wa,s travel in far places more rewarding or the tale of it more evenly fraught with pleasure and profit...

...Instead, each one, convinced that he has finally grasped the neglected factor which invalidated previous Marxist analyses, assumes the mantle of prophecy and with assurance foretells how actually the anticipated breakdown will now proceed to eventuate...

...Sternberg's addition to this doctrine is to recognize a simple fact, quite evident irj, all the statistics but very difficult to stomach for writers impressed by the mood of Marx's writings—the mood of imminent expectancy of crisis: for the latter half of the nineteenth century, in the advanced industrial countries, real wapes rose steadily, unemployment was at a low level, class antagonism was moderated, and the troughs of crisis were shallow snd brief...

...Thus, Sternberg has to make the regular declaration that special circumstances explain why the Revolution in Russia did not pan out as predicted: in a backward country the difficulties of selfdefense against a hostile world inevitably paralyzed the "withering away" of the state, etc., etc...

...441 pages...

...It is 'certainly rather childish to claim that'if the United States does not stand rh the way, Social Democracy will sweep Western Europe...

...They drew nesrer to the concrete phenomena, admitting In some rases facts unpalatable to the pure theory...

...ThIS is the most realistic part of the book...

...He criticizes their actual practices, however, on two related grounds: first, thst the smount of income "reflation" put into effect by the New Deal was never enough to give us full employment...

...In ti 'ate nineteenth and early twentieth century, to conform with the Marxist piognosls of deepening crisis and sharpening class antagonism In the advanced Industrial gountrlM...

...The real question is whether enough popular support can be marshalled for this program, as in England, to override right wing opposition at the polfa...

...N. Y. TIMES LENDS PAPER TO DAILY WORKER Answering a call for help to the New York City Publishers Association for newsprint, the Ne* York Times has loaned IS tons to the F A l> Printing * Co., which publishes the Communist Daily Worker and the Freiheit, Jewish language paper...

...With crayon and paper and paint she seek;, among the Melanesians types to perpetuate in portraits...

...We may get Wehrwirtschaft—but it Is very doubtful if we will have to wait until the right wing thinks of it as an expedient for pulling us out of a permanent crisis...

...We note that Sternberg refers approvingly to the program of the British Labor Party, holding it up virtually as a model of what might do for America...

...Afti all, Fritz Sternberg is aware of the .(«velopment, in Europe as well as Asia, of a Soviet colonialism...

...Before 1914, at a time when there was no general prevision of calamity, they alone foresaw breakdown...

...Sternberg argues, with considerable cogency, that the major capitalist country, the United States, never really emerged from thi crisis of 1929, except by the artificial resuscitation of war economy...

...He accepts the theory of some of our pump-primers, who believe that capitalist crisis is basically a matter of deficient purchasing power, and can be remedied by governmental monetary and investment 1 licy tending to expand national income...

...Thsy meet governors and discuss colonial policy—but It is all carried on in a carefree way as if thsy had never studied history or political theory...

...Crises and revolutions have come, to be sure, and nearly everyone anticipates new ones...

...He, proposes, therefore, that progressives fight for a policy of preparedness short of Wehrwirtschaft, and for a foreign policy of support to progressive elements in Europe (Social Democrats) snd in colonial and semi-colonial countries (it is not clear just whom he has in mind here...

...In the light of these comments, trie Sternberg analysis of th>e dangers of a total war economy appear unrealistic...

...We are all concerned with the problem of avoiding these evils: the currently dwindling chances for an adequate full employment program, the erosion of democratic Socialism in Europe by the wind of Communism and the rain of clericalism, and the spectre of an atotnjearmament-and war-economy rare...

...Sternberg attributes these consequences to imperialist expansion...

...MacMillan...

...If Sternberg want* to help our brother parties in Europe, l#t him rather suggest a program wheivhy they can prevent the flow of their members into the Communist fold and st trie same time free such Socialist sentiment as exists in parties like the MRP...

...William E. Bohn...

...In sn atmosphere as propitious for Cassandras as the present, the Mux st theorists of cspitalist crisis nevertheless And themselves in a paradoxical position...

...But inside of it there is a solid core of appreciation and understanding...

...He foresees, also, a right wing attempt to restore full employment by resorting to a total war economy...

...the very lineaments of awful Fate...

...Frits Sternberg's claim ti s p'nci among the builders of M-nnsi theory lies in his contribution to this pi orris « '•'he point of departure for his *ck Is the failure of history...

...This is a problem not very adequately faced by Steinberg's analysis...

...The background of his work lies in Rosa Luxemburg's doctrine that imperialist exploitation is the method whereby capitalists unload the surplus production which they cannot sell in the domestic market because they keep wage income at so low a level...

...on the one side and the United States on the other...

...By now, every simple newspaper reader knows that not only are Communists steadily gaining at the expense of Social Democrats in trios11 Western European countries, but' tfie total left-wing vote, is becoming mofe and more plainly a minority...

...but now, after the fact, they do not seem to mind So badly being ransomed out of a number of uneconomic industries by nationalization, vvfth compensation at such a rste as to ensure them secure enjoyment of an income equal to their former profits...

...In connection therewith, he predicts an American foreign policy of support for right wing elements in Europe and "feudal" elements in colonial and semi-colonial countries...

...and it must, accordingly, have behind it an overwhelming popular backing of "workers, clerical employees, farmers, middle classes and intelligentsia," who are psychologically prepared to see the end of the predominantly private control of our economy...