📓 the-question-of-national-liberation.md by @ryan

the question of national liberation

[[Israel]]/[[Palestine]] has been in the news recently, and it has brought up questions about the [[nation state]] and [[national liberation]]. When it comes to the question of [[colonialism]], there seem to be two options put forward:

Waiting for communism

[[Anarchists]] and the like tend to put forward this option. The argument goes something like: “there can be no international communism in a single state, and there can be no freedom in a single state, therefore every state must go at once.”

While this may have some truth to it, it comes across as tasteless at best.

Fighting for a nation state

As an end

There is a certain current of [[Marxist-Leninist]] thought that postulates that the goal of [[decolonization]] is to simply build nation states, and that this is the goal in itself.

This should be criticized, in my opinion, because as communists I don’t think we should be fighting to put the bourgeoisie in power per se. That said, especially in the case of Israel/Palestine, putting the Palestinian bourgeoisie in power would at least stop the apartheid.

As a means to an end

This to me is the correct solution.

The construction of a nation state is merely a stopping point on the road to communism. As mentioned above, it would at least do away with the colonial oppression of the Palestinians.

To me, this is most analogous to what the [[1905 Russian Revolution]] is to the [[1917 October Revolution]].