FW: a violent revolution?

A World Party should absolutely not have "violent revolution" or "violence"
as one of its guiding principles.  Beyond that, we are fantasizing about
practical praxis.

Let me explain.  People talk of "revolution," but what do they mean?
Hitherto it has meant seizure of the reigns of power of a state or a bloc of
states.  Assuming this is not what people have in mind when they speak of
"revolution," it is quite unclear just what they do have in mind.  Seizure
of the UN?  Please!

Further, I don't think there is much convincing evidence that would lead one
to such iron clad conclusions (and questionable logic) that "Unless we truly
have entered a New Age, there will be violent revolution."   The possibility
that future wars will simply be bipolar conflicts between conservatives and
truly progressive groups is unlikely.  Given the existing and possible
divisions by race, ethnicity, nationality, region, core-periphery, etc., one
would not expect that the developing systemic contradictions will result in
a bipolar-polar opposition between progressives and conservatives.
Certainly the cold-war was not of such character, nor were many (not all) of
the leftist guerilla movements in the periphery.

To be sure, there is much likely hood that wars will erupt.  Rosenthall, for
example, makes an interesting and compelling comparison between post-war
Germany and post cold-war Russia.  The possibility of civil wars within
Russia, with a pro-West faction supported by the US, Europe, and Japan
against a reactionary-fascist faction, and BOTH sides suppressing leftist
movements, seems more like what we can expect -- just as occurred in the
Iranian Revolution and the Gulf War.  More discussion on the trajectories of
systemic collapse along these lines would be useful.

If we cannot expect bipolar struggles, but rather multi-polar conflicts
among the powers that be, then it seems more likely that the left has to
create a family of oppositions spanning the divisions fighting against the
conservatives of each side.  Is this not what a WP could become?  Can this
family of struggles ever seize power?  The power of what?  And would it
really want to?  Or would it prefer to simply create enough social pressure
for the creation of the kind of lasting changes at the systemic level that
would realize a far more equitable world?

All this makes the issue of violence a moot one.  If, hypothetically, a
difficult situation arose, such as a war(s) among certain semi-peripheral
cum core areas, then members of the WP and other progressive groups
presumably would collectively decide a course of action over whether to
react with violence to violence.  This is the practical issue regarding the
use of violence -- as opposed to the issue of a founding principle.  It's
purely hypothetical whereas founding principles should not be.