Ideological Diversity

The last couple of postings have raised an important issue
which I think is relevant to the World Party discussion.  I
believe that it is crucial that any effort to link progressive
movements throughout the world have as one of its central
components a commitment to ideological diversity.

A key problem with the Shining Path (and certain
other revolutionary movements) has been its ideological
dogmatism. As Ed Weick noted, if a revolutionary party
comes to believe that it has the only 'correct' analysis --
there is the danger that it will begin attacking other leftist
groups that do not agree with its analysis.  This certainly
happened in the case of the Shining Path (see analyses
by Carlos Degregori, Gustavo Gorriti, or my own study
available at http://www.lclark.edu/~podobnik/shining.htm).

Rather than fetishizing some version of Marxism-Leninism-
Stalinism-Maoism-etc-etc, we should follow the examples
of Ghandi, Martin Luther King, and the Dalai Lama and
attempt to build an intellectually-diverse, non-sectarian world
movement.   I welcome comments.

Bruce Podobnik
podobnik@lclark.edu

PS: If anyone wants to discuss the Shining Path in more
depth, I recommend we do it via personal emails rather
than through WSN.