Anti anti-communism is opposition toanti-communism as applied in theCold War. The term was first coined in 1984 byClifford Geertz and was meant to show that it was possible to criticize anti-communism, particularly its excesses likeMcCarthyism, without being acommunist. For example, there were bothliberal andconservative criticism of Cold War era anti-communism in countries like the United States.
In thepost-Cold War era, the term came to include the analysis of scholars and journalists who argue that anti-communist narratives had exaggerated the repression and crimes ofCommunist states, that thecriticism of Communist party rule should not be applied to communism as a whole or to otherleft-wing politics in order to discredit them and theircriticism of capitalism (particularlyneoliberal capitalism), and that thevictims of Communism narrative (thebody count of the deaths caused, directly or indirectly, by Communist governments) popularized byThe Black Book of Communism has adouble standard in that it could be equally applied tocapitalism or to other systems and ideologies to reach the same if not bigger number of victims, and that in general there is a double standard inmemory politics between the excesses of capitalism and those of Communist states.
Critics contend that anti anti-communism is an attempt to downplaySoviet espionage and the threat posed by communism, and that it is a form ofwhataboutism. Supporters respond that they are not downplaying the excesses and crimes of Communist states or rehabilitatingreal socialism but are trying to contextualize them within a comparative analysis of double standards.
Clifford Geertz, an Americananthropologist at theInstitute for Advanced Study, defined anti anti-communism as being applied in "the cold war days" by "those who ... regarded the [Red] Menace as the primary fact of contemporary political life" to "[t]hose of us who strenuously opposed [that] obsession, as we saw it ... with the insinuation – wildly incorrect in the vast majority of cases – that, by the law of the double negative, we had some secret affection for the Soviet Union."[1] Stated more simply byKristen Ghodsee andScott Sehon, "the anthropologist Clifford Geertz wrote that you could be 'anti anti-communism' without being in favour of communism."[2][3]
In 1964, socialist historianTheodore Draper used anti anti-communism to refer toFidel Castro and hisconsolidation of the Cuban Revolution, which preceded the Cuban–Soviet economic agreement of 1960.[4] In a critique ofStephen F. Cohen,Jonathan Chait used a fully hyphenated form of the term in 2014, calling Cohen "an old-school leftist who has carried on the mental habits of decades of anti-anti-communism seamlessly into a new career of anti-anti-Putinism", referring to the use of whataboutism or what Chait calls "defense-by-implication" as a rhetorical strategy byRT commentators.[5]
Several academics and journalists argue that anti-communist narratives have exaggerated the extent ofpolitical repression andcensorship in Communist states or have drawn comparisons with what they see as atrocities that were perpetrated bycapitalist states, particularly during the Cold War. Among them areMark Aarons,[6]Vincent Bevins,[7]Noam Chomsky,[8]Jodi Dean,[9] Kristen Ghodsee,[3]Jason Hickel,[10]Seumas Milne,[11] andMichael Parenti.[12] Albert Szymanski drew a comparison between the treatment ofSoviet dissidents afterJoseph Stalin's death and the treatment of dissidents in the United States during the period of McCarthyism, arguing that "on the whole, it appears that the level of repression in the Soviet Union in the 1955 to 1980 period was at approximately the same level as in the United States during the McCarthy years (1947–1956)."[13]John Lukacs was described as one of "anti-anticommunists among conservatives and their fellow travelers".[14]
John Earl Haynes, who studied theVenona decryptions extensively, argued thatJoseph McCarthy's attempts to "make anticommunism a partisan weapon" actually "threatened [the post-War] anti-Communist consensus", thereby ultimately harming anti-communist efforts more than helping them.[15]Harry S. Truman called McCarthy "the greatest asset theKremlin has".[16] Liberal anti-communists likeEdward Shils andDaniel Patrick Moynihan had a contempt for McCarthyism. Shils criticized an excessive policy of secrecy during the Cold War, leading to the misdirection of McCarthyism, which was addressed during theMoynihan Commission (1994–1997). As Moynihan put it, "the reaction against McCarthy took the form of a modish anti-anti-Communism that considered impolite any discussion of the very real threat Communism posed to Western values and security."[17] After revelations of Soviet spy networks from the declassified Venona project, Moynihan wondered: "Might less secrecy have prevented the liberal overreaction to McCarthyism as well as McCarthyism itself?"[17] In 1998,Geoffrey Wheatcroft criticized certain aspects of anti-anti-communism. He suggested that "one mark of the true anti-anti-communist is an evasive use of language", such as downplaying historical Soviet espionage.[16]
Chomsky observed double standards in his criticism ofThe Black Book of Communism. In outlining economistAmartya Sen's research on hunger that while India's democratic institutions prevented famines, its excess of mortality over Communist China, potentially attributable to the latter's more equal distribution of medical and other resources, was nonetheless close to four million per year for non-famine years.[8] Chomsky argued that if the same methodology ofThe Black Book of Communism was applied to India, then "thedemocratic capitalist 'experiment' has caused more deaths than in the entire history of ... Communism everywhere since 1917: over 100 million deaths by 1979, and tens of millions more since, in India alone."[18] At an April 2017 conference at theUniversity of Bern called "Anti-Communist persecutions in the 20th Century", American historianRonald Grigor Suny suggested that the panel write "The Black Book of Anti-Communism", referencing the controversialThe Black Book of Communism.[19]
In her 2012 bookThe Communist Horizon, Dean argued that there is a double standard among all sides of the political spectrum, includingconservatives,liberals, andsocial democrats, in how communism and capitalism are perceived nearly two decades after thedissolution of the Soviet Union. Dean stated that the worst excesses of capitalism are often minimized, while communism is often equated only with the Soviet Union, and experiments in Eastern Europe, Latin America, Africa, and Asia are often ignored, with an emphasis placed on theStalin era and its violent excesses includinggulags,purges,droughts and famines, and almost no consideration for theindustrialization andmodernization of theSoviet economy, the successes ofSoviet science (such as theSoviet space program), or the rise in thestandard of living for the once predominantlyagrarian society. The dissolution of the Soviet Union is therefore seen as the proof that communism cannot work, allowing for all left-wing criticism of the excesses of neoliberal capitalism to be silenced, for the alternatives would supposedly inevitably result in economic inefficiency and violent authoritarianism.[2][9][20]
Other academics and journalists, such as Ghodsee and Milne, asserted that in the post-Cold War era any narratives including Communist states' achievements are often ignored, while those that focus exclusively on the crimes of Stalin and otherCommunist party leaders are amplified. Both allege this is done in part to silence any criticism ofglobal capitalism.[3][11][21] InBlackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism, Parenti holds that Communist regimes, as flawed as they were, nevertheless played a crucial role in "tempering the worst impulses of Western capitalism and imperialism", and criticizedleft-wing anti-communists in particular for failing to understand that in the post-Cold War era Western business interests are "no longer restrained by a competing system" and are now "rolling back the many gains that working people in the West have won over the years". Parenti adds that "some of them still don't get it."[12] In their anti anti-communism article forAeon, Ghodsee and Sehon conclude: "Responsible and rational citizens need to be critical of simplistic historical narratives that rely on the pitchfork effect to demonise anyone on the Left. We should all embrace Geertz's idea of an anti-anti-communism in hopes that critical engagement with the lessons of the 20th century might help us to find a new path that navigates between, or rises above, the many crimes of both communism and capitalism."[3] InThe Jakarta Method: Washington's Anticommunist Crusade and the Mass Murder Program that Shaped Our World, Bevins argues thatanti-communist mass killings backed by the United States during the Cold War have been far more impactful on shaping the contemporary world thanCommunist mass killings have.[22]
The specific kind of anti-communism that took shape in these years was partly based on value judgements: the widespread belief in the United States that communism was simply a bad system, or morally repugnant even when effective. But it was also based on a number of assertions about the nature of Soviet-led international communism. There was a widespread belief that Stalin wanted to invade Western Europe. It became accepted as fact that the Soviets were pushing for revolution worldwide, and that whenever communists were present, even in small numbers, they probably had secret plans to overthrow the government. And it was considered gospel that anywhere communists were acting, they were doing so on the orders of the Soviet Union, part of a monolithic global conspiracy to destroy the West. Most of this was simply untrue. Much of the rest was greatly exaggerated.
While the precise number of deaths is sensitive to the assumptions we make about baseline mortality, it is clear that somewhere in the vicinity of 100 million people died prematurely at the height of British colonialism. This is among the largest policy-induced mortality crises in human history. It is larger than the combined number of deaths that occurred during all famines in the Soviet Union, Maoist China, North Korea, Pol Pot's Cambodia, and Mengistu's Ethiopia.
The full answer to that question is complex. It is true, as has been often stated, that from 1945 to 1991 conservatism, as a political movement, was held together primarily by the glue of anticommunism. But then there are also were [sic] many staunch liberal anticommunists (e.g., Lionel Trilling) and even some staunch radical anticommunists (e.g., George Orwell). Furthermore, there were even anti-anticommunists among conservatives and their fellow travelers (e.g., John Lukacs).
... we do not live in a world directly constructed by Stalin's purges or mass starvation under Pol Pot. Those states are gone. Even Mao's Great Leap Forward was quickly abandoned and rejected by the Chinese Communist Party, though the party is still very much around. We do, however, live in a world built partly by US-backed Cold War violence ... Washington's anticommunist crusade, with Indonesia as the apex of its murderous violence against civilians, deeply shaped the world we live in now ... .
