[Marxism] Who "lost" the Bolivian recall referendum?

[Aaron Aarons]

I know this response is two weeks late, but here goes:

At 09:21 -0400 2008/09/19, Walter Lippmann wrote, in the thread, "Bolivia: Unity pact between COB and indigenous, peasant social movements":

<< Evo an MAS won the referendum. Your side lost, but you refuse to recognize and accept your defeat. But you lost and you and your perspectives were defeated in these skirmishes. >>

I presume this was addressed to S. Artesian, but it surely was addressed to someone who opposed Evo from the left. It is an extremely dishonest and reactionary argument on several counts:

1) A revolutionary perspective was not on the ballot, and therefore could not have lost!

2) Revolutionaries who are defeated in a "skirmish" recognize the defeat only to fight better in the future. They don't politically compromise with those who have, for the moment, defeated them.

3) The revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat and its allies doesn't come about through elections. In Russia, even after the seizure of power, the Constituent Assembly elections were won by the anti-revolutionary Right Social Revolutionaries, so the Bolsheviks and their allies quite properly dissolved the Constituent Assembly.

I keep on reading on this list how Evo got 67% of the vote in the recall. But that means, as far as I can tell, that 67% of those who voted either for or against Evo voted for him. That gives no information about how many people on the left abstained or didn't vote. I don't know what S. Artesian's position was, but I would argue that abstention (or a spoiled ballot) was correct, while voting for recall was wrong.

BTW, the workers and others who drove Goni from power in 2003 didn't do it by winning a vote. If there had been a vote, Goni might have won, since elections are a terrain that favors the ruling class.

 - Aaron