Chomsky on Anarchism.pdf - Zine Library

OBJECTIVITY AND LIBERAL SCHOLARSHIP
82
45 Of what importance, then, is the fact that the overwhelming majority of
Okinawans, including 80 percent of (hose whose business would be impaired or
destroyed by this move, want the island returned to Japan, according to the Asahi
polls (sec japan Quarterly, Vo l. 15 [January-March 1968], pp. 42-52)? As [Q (he
"strategic trust territories," Adam says, we must also not become overly sentimental:
"A strategic trust is based on the assumption of [he overriding importance of national
defense and the preservation of world order as against the cultural and political
freedom of the indigenous inhabitants."
46 H.S. Malaviya, quoted in Clairmome (op. cit. , p. 114), who cites subsranrial evidence
in support of the following evaluation of the consequences of Western dominance:
"The systematic destruction of Indian manufacturers; the creation of lite
Zemindari [landed aristocracy] and its parasitical outgrowths; the changes in agrarian
structure; the financial losses incurred by tribute; the sharp transition ftom a premonetised
economy to one governed by the international price mechanism-these
were some of the social and institutional forces that were to bting the apocalypse of
death and famine to millions-with few or no compensatory benefits to the ryot
[peasant]" (p. 107). See also note 37.
47 Cited in Paul Avrich, The Russimt Anarchists (Princeton, N.J., Princeton University
Press, 1967), pp. 93-94. A recent reformulation of this view is given by Anton
Pannekoek, the Dutch scientist and spokesman fo r libertarian communism, in his
Workers Counc;!s (Melbourne, 1950), pp. 36-37:
It is nOL for the first lime lhal ruling class lries lO explain, and. so La
perpetuate, its rule as the consequences of an inborn difference
between two kinds of people, one destined by nature to ride, the
other to be ridden. The landowning aristocracy of former centuries
defended their privileged position by boasting their extraction from
a nobler race of conquerors that had subdued the lower race of common
people. Big capitalists explain their dominating place by the
assertion that they have brains and other people have none. In the
same way now especially the iIHellectuals, considered themselves rhe
rightful rulers of to-morrow, claim their spiritual superiority. They
form the rapidly increasing class of university-trained officials and
free professions, specialized in mental work, in study of books and
of science, and they consider themselves as the people mOst gifted
with intellect. Hence they are destined to be leaders of the production,
whereas the ungifted mass shall execute the manual work, for
which no brains are needed. They are no defenders of capitalism;
not capital, but intellect should direct labor. The more so, since
now society is such a complicated structure, based on abstract and
difficult science, that only the highest intellectual acumen is capable
of embracing, grasping and handling it. Should the working
masses, from lack of insight, fail to acknowledge this need of supe-