At 06:03 PM 1/25/98 -0500, you wrote:
>Adam,
>
>How would an "independent Cuban parliament" constitute popular
>participation in policy making? How is a parliament "independent"?
>Independent of what? Are you equating elections with democracy?
>
>I don't have much faith that you understand the structure of socialist
>governments in this century (or capitalist "democracies" for that
>matter). But socialist states have generally involved more worker and
>peasant participation than the polyarchic structures that exist in
>capitalist social formations.
>
>Andy
>
>
>Fine, so an independent parliament does not constitute popular
participation in polcy making. Then what does? I really would like to hear
some sort of description of the process of popular participation. Of course
I suspect that Austin simply means that in an "historically objective sense"
the "Vanguard Party" represents (no, constitutes) the proletariat and the
proletariat *is* the people so decisions by the party are ipso facto popular
decisions.
Its true though--I didn't know that there was a mystery about the "structure
of socialist governments in this century"--I thought there was simply a
corrupt nomenklatura at war with the people so they could hold on to their
privileges.