If you are looking for a good leftist take on Stalin that includes a whole chapter criticizing the USSR (but not from a U.S. propaganda angle), might I recommend Blackshirts and Reds by Michael Parenti? Tons of free PDFs if you google it. Very readable, pretty short, and you can get a lot of the material from his lectures on YouTube if you’re pressed for time.
Btw, the Drug of part of my nick is the Yugoslavian version of comrade. Drug/Drugarica means male/female friend.
And to return a book recommendation, “counterrevolution and revolt” has some great points against using Marx and Soviet literature to educate new revolutionaries.
I think on the other hand you really have to consider the fact that if there was no soviet union then the capitalist powers would have torn Yugoslavia apart. It took a major world power being communist to occupy all the west’s attention
Parenti’s analysis of Stalin in Blackshirts and Reds is the weakest part of an otherwise excellent book. I can’t really fault him as at the time of writing, the Soviet archives had not yet been analyzed in their entirety. For a better analysis that focuses specifically on Stalin, read Domenico Losurdo’s Stalin: The History and Critique of a Black Legend.
Glad to have you :rat-salute-2:
If you are looking for a good leftist take on Stalin that includes a whole chapter criticizing the USSR (but not from a U.S. propaganda angle), might I recommend Blackshirts and Reds by Michael Parenti?
Tons of free PDFs if you google it. Very readable, pretty short, and you can get a lot of the material from his lectures on YouTube if you’re pressed for time.
Thanks, and thanks for the recommendation, I’ll check it out.
My main issue with him is due to the Tito-Stalin split. Non-aligned > USSR
Mmm I can see it. Yeah, that’s the type of criticism from the left stuff that makes sense.
Btw, the Drug of part of my nick is the Yugoslavian version of comrade. Drug/Drugarica means male/female friend.
And to return a book recommendation, “counterrevolution and revolt” has some great points against using Marx and Soviet literature to educate new revolutionaries.
Oooh who’s the author?
Herbert Marcuse, here’s the wiki link
I think on the other hand you really have to consider the fact that if there was no soviet union then the capitalist powers would have torn Yugoslavia apart. It took a major world power being communist to occupy all the west’s attention
Parenti’s analysis of Stalin in Blackshirts and Reds is the weakest part of an otherwise excellent book. I can’t really fault him as at the time of writing, the Soviet archives had not yet been analyzed in their entirety. For a better analysis that focuses specifically on Stalin, read Domenico Losurdo’s Stalin: The History and Critique of a Black Legend.
I’ve heard that mentioned a few times – definitely on the list.
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