Albert Szymanski

Albert Szymanski was an Statesian sociologist and Professor of Sociology at the University of Oregon. He was a notable figure in academic Marxism during the 1970s and 1980s and was known for upholding Marxism–Leninism through empirical sociology.

Albert Szymanski
Born	1941 Rhode Island
Died	March, 1985

Albert Szymanski was born in Rhode Island in 1941. He was the son of a Polish-American fisherman and a devout Italian mother. His mother pushed him to pursue education as early as six years old by getting him a library card. He initially majored in physics at the University of Rhode Island but switched to sociology after reading Karl Marx. He then went on to earn a PhD at Columbia University, producing a two-volume dissertation on Chile.

He was a member of the Sociology Liberation Movement and brought their newspaper to the University of Oregon, contributing to its transformation into The Insurgent Sociologist (now Critical Sociology). He often personally sold copies at sociology conferences.

However, this activism attracted the attention of the FBI, and he had an FBI file in which he was suspected of being affiliated with Youth Against War and Fascism, the Workers World Party, the Weathermen, the Worker–Student Alliance, the Progressive Labor Party, the Revolutionary Youth Movement, the People’s Coalition for Peace and Justice, the Venceremos Brigade, and the Revolutionary Union. The file also referenced his arrest at a voter registration protest in South Carolina and his participation in a demonstration at Columbia University.

He was known by his colleagues as a large man who preferred to dress in faded jeans and work shirts rather than the formal attire typical of sociology conferences. He was described as a compulsive worker and was charismatic, maintaining close relationships with those he disagreed with politically. He typically expressed the philosophy that students who ignored him would eventually, years later, when they faced such conditions, come to realize the truth of his message.

Szymanski committed suicide in March 1985 at the age of 43. He had been suffering from depression and was convinced he had liver cancer, though in reality he had treatable gallstones. He avoided medical attention, and in his final moments he left a note asking for his retirement money to be divided between his dogs and his journals.

Works

Szymanski’s most famous work is Is the Red Flag Flying? The Political Economy of the Soviet Union, where he debunked the myths of Trotskyists and Maoists that state capitalism had been restored in the USSR, through extensive economic data he argued that the USSR remained socialist.

Human Rights in the Soviet Union - Written in 1984, it is about how the human rights in the USSR improved whereas the human rights in the U.S worsens, while documenting the evolution of human rights in both.

The Logic of Imperialism - It interprets relations between the imperial core and the periphery, colonialism and neocolonialism. It explores the theories and historical development of imperialism, including its economic, political, and ideological dimensions.

Class Struggle in Socialist Poland - It provides an alternate understanding of the ‘’Polish Crisis’’, it argues that it happened due to long term tensions within the socialist movement.

Class Structure: A Critical Perspective - It discusses the origin of class inequality, surplus value in society, serfdom and enslavement and the reproduction of class relations.

The Capitalist State and the Politics of Class - It discusses the relationship between social class and political power.

Sociology: Class, Consciousness and Contradictions - It consists of analysis into economic inequality within the United States, the impact of class and economic relations upon work, politics, race, family and education. Alongside an overview of theoretical arguments about social order and change.