Now, knowing all this, what is the possibility/plausibility/coolness level of a *Communist revolution occurring in the CSA?
I'm not a total expert on the Confederate States, but I do know quite a lot about the Russian Revolution(s) and Communism.
Firstly, Marx believed and wrote that a communist revolution would be brought forth by the urban proletariat, and not the peasantry.
The peasantry were considered to be too conservative and even reactionary by some. in fact, it wasn't until the Chinese Revolution that communists seriously considered the prospect of a peasant-based revolution.
The south was predominately rural, with a large slave population. What little heavy industry(factories) went on would most likely be run entirely on slave labor following a Confederate victory in the Civil War.
This leaves us with a rather small southern urban proletariat that would be based in very few factories
until the end of Confederate slavery(if it ever ends); even then, owing to there being less major industrial centers in the south then in the north, there would still be very few "classical proletarians."
Here, we basically have a Russia-meets-the Confederacy scenario. A large rural population in conjunction with a small(er) urban population.
However, assuming racial prejudice clouds southern Marxists judgements, then I don't think that domestic, southern Marxists would focus on the exploited slave population as much, instead they would try to build up their following amongst however many exploited white proletarians there were in the south.
Northern Marxists would most likely be the main advocates of slave-based communist revolution, as we saw in
How Few Remain.
Secondly, I don't believe that a southern revolution would be based around Syndicalism.
Following Lenin's publication of
What Is To Be Done in 1901, the issue of higher, more centralized organizational forms became more widespread, especially in Russia.
Lenin arguably is to be considered the founding father of authoritarian-communism. Yet, at the time he was advocating what would go down in history as "Marxism-Leninism," Russia was more or less a police state, and always had been one too.
He sought to fight fire with fire. To fight the centralized state with a centralized party. It made since for
Russian conditions.
Rosa Luxemburg would heavily criticize Lenin's methods of organization in Germany. She argued that "Leninism" was a strictly-Russian affair, and not akin to say, Germany, which had a more open, although still authoritarian government in charge.
It wasn't really until the Russian October Revolution of 1917(which was actually a well-timed insurrection led by hardcore Bolsheviks) that Lenin would insist that all other Marxist parties copy the "success" of Bolshevism.
Assuming that the Confederacy stays democratic, we wouldn't really see Leninism kick off in a major fashion until the Russian October Revolution happened(it easily couldn't have occurred. All it took was Lenin being left stranded, in exile in Europe during WWI).
Although Syndicalism would no doubt play a large part in southern revolutionary politics, I still believe that somewhere down the line Anarchism would play a major part too, even more so.
Anarchism, at least amongst Blacks, oppressed under the jackboot of plantation-based, and/or factory-based capitalism, would no doubt prosper amongst southern Blacks, be they free or in chains.
Anarchist ideology, when combined with slave revolts in general, would create a powerful revolutionary situation in the south, and would no doubt raise class consciousness amongst rural and urban black proletarians.
Thus, I don't believe that a communist party would bring about a successful communist revolution in the south, at least with in the time frame I am referring too(early 1900's).
It would take a southern defeat in WWI or a similar war to bring down southern capitalism. White and blacks would have to reject it in union with each other, as I don't believe that blacks could succeed in overthrowing Confederate capitalism alone, and so too could white workers not bring it down either alone as well. It would be a single united, multiracial effort.
This long post alone could easily be turned into a counter-factual essay. But I shall leave that for the future...
