Two hundred Pharaohs, five billion slaves is a 52 page (A4) tract I bought about 10 (12?) years ago and never – until now – tried to read.
Very tl:dr, so I skimmed. Mostly it slags off everyone. Well, I am normally up for that, but this just did go on, and is it just me, or is a manifesto supposed to suggest a course of action? Asides mildly entertaining sledging of academics and post-modernism on page 48
This bitter act of betrayal by a supposedly revolutionary government whose slogan was after all “all power to the workers councils” is frequently used to shame modern Trotskyist managers. But of course, as “good managers” all Trotskyists are proud of Kronstadt. For them it is the Station of the Cross in terms of learning to be a radical manager…. Kronstadt is the ideal for which all New Left managers strive as well, they seek, as a rite of passage into mature managerialism, the exquisite pleasure of carrying out an act of cruelty as “regrettable” and “difficult” as Kronstadt supposedly was for Trotsky. Every day they take pleasure in ordering up their very own micro-Kronstadts (be they evictions, social security terminations, sackings or the removal of children) to be used against members of the working class under their jurisdiction, this is, after all the revolutionary dedication to “good management” which capitalism demands.
Page 42
