Rev organisation

Is there an alternative to the centralised party.

Although there may be homogenous revolutionary organisations like the ICT, is it possible that the revolutionary vanguard will remain divided and that unity will only be acheived by accepting a looser form than a centalised party?

An international organisation of revolutionaries with common aims but with sharp differences?

Forum: 

quote

A revolutionary organization that exists before the establishment of the power of workers councils will discover its own appropriate form through struggle; but all these historical experiences have already made it clear that it cannot claim to represent the working class. Its task, rather, is to embody a radical separation from the world of separation

Guy Debord Society of the Spectacle 119

I am not preaching the book, in fact I find it hard going, though I think I have a better grasp of it than when I first read it as an undergraduate.

When I saw the Roma video on this site, played out to the Sex Pistols "New York",this quote immediately came to mind;

_

The very style of dialectical theory is a scandal and abomination to the prevailing standards of language and to the sensibilities molded by those standards, because while it makes concrete use of existing concepts it simultaneously recognises their fluidity and their inevitable destruction._

Guy Debord Society of the Spectacle 205

I often think that an impediment to the spreading of Marxist ideas is the academic approach, the fact that many of the necessarily well read, educated Marxists are constrained by the university formalities that allowed them access to the Marxist theory. the habit of essay writing for good marks etc. Not that I have yet come to a conclusion on this matter, other than to think that a variety of communication formats are required, and that "taboo" subjects like drugs, sex , have to be explored.

I recall this from Marx;

In studying such transformations it is always necessary to distinguish between the material transformation of the economic conditions of production, which can be determined with the precision of natural science, and the legal, political, religious, artistic or philosophic – in short, ideological forms in which men become conscious of this conflict and fight it out. Just as one does not judge an individual by what he thinks about himself, so one cannot judge such a period of transformation by its consciousness, but, on the contrary, this consciousness must be explained from the contradictions of material life, from the conflict existing between the social forces of production and the relations of production. No social order is ever destroyed before all the productive forces for which it is sufficient have been developed, and new superior relations of production never replace older ones before the material conditions for their existence have matured within the framework of the old society.

_

Karl Marx 1859

A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy


the bold is mine.

What do you think?

In light of the country's political stalemate, a Belgian senator has proposed that women withhold sex until a government is formed. After almost eight months of frutiless negotiations and deadlock since elections took place, "the call is let's go for a sex strike until we have a government," said socialist senator Marleen Temmerman.

"It's not meant to be serious... It's a good joke," Temmerman said.

Temmerman took her inspiration from action in Kenya two years ago, where thousands of women vowed abstinence to protest against their country's bickering leadership failing to get a government off the ground.

A government was eventually formed but even Temmerman acknowledged that the impact of the strike was never scientifically proven.

For weeks now, Belgians have increasingly been searching for ways to goad the representatives of the six million Dutch-speaking Flemings and the 4.5 million Francophones into finally forming an administration.

Earlier this year tens of thousands of people took to the streets of Brussels in support of national unity and to demand that the rival political groupings finally agree on a government.

Public unease had been simmering for weeks, catching the imagination of Francophone actor Benoit Poelvoorde, who called on all Belgian men not to shave until the country created a new administration.

Belgium draws closer to the world record of 289 days without a government, set by Iraq in 2009. The low country currently stands at 242 days

Comrades

The conclusion is clear.

We must engage in as much sex as possible in order to prevent governments been formed.

Sex against capitalism.

The very style of dialectical theory is a scandal and abomination to the prevailing standards of language and to the sensibilities molded by those standards, because while it makes concrete use of existing concepts it simultaneously recognises their fluidity and their inevitable destruction

Stevein

I think you have raised an important issue (at least at the start of your post) when you ask about the nature and emergence of the future world proletarian party. Working class experience seems to teach us that the mass parties of the Social Democratic type are no use (they will make their peace with capitalisms) and the world proletarian party that will be created through the struggles against capitalism and debates on our own experiences will in all likelihood remain quite a small minority. This is why we understand that though this party can lead the fight to smash capitalism and its states it cannot be a government in waiting, the embryonic form of a new state. It can only act as a guide to the wider working class who alone can create socialism since it depends on the active (not passive) participation of the great mass of the world working class. The precise way in which the current minorities will get together is as yet unclear but we know that the current reason for their being so many minorities is because therre is as yet no conscious class movement on wide enough scale to compel revolutionaries to find ways of working together. This may be a situation which will not last much longer but the jury of history has yet to pronounce.

On the second part of your post I am not quite sure what you are trying to say. The quote from the intro to the Critique is just Marx stating the materialist method of analysis. He lists all the superstructural phenomenon which derive fromthe scientific hard core of the analysis of the mode of production (but he does not suggest that there is only one material explanation of these more subjective elements). This is what I have always understood to be the method of Marxism so I don't see why you have highlighted in bold the reference to the superstructural phenomenon.

Cleishbotham,

While I agree with your line of argument. I think you're over-stating it though.

While it is basic Marxism (i.e. the dominant ideas will always be those of the....) that internationalist-communists, revoluntionary workers etc will also be a minority of the working class as a whole. But clearly there is a difference between a communist organisation and ultimately a revolutionary party that has a membership of 25,000 and one that has a membership of 20. While both represent a minscule minority of the working class, there clearly is a mass quality to the former and not the latter.

To offer my own thoughts of Stevein7's opening post. I don't see a centralised party being a problem for revolutionary unity (maybe I'm naive!) because I think democratic centralism (i.e. the most open and fullest discussion and debate, followed by unified action - is how I understnad it should function) provides the best framework for accomadating differences in an organisation.

As far as political homogenisation goes - if we undertand the communist programme as the necessary line of march working class struggles should take in order liberate humanity, therefore it should simply denote what separates communists from those who defend capitalism, nothing more, nothign less.

There is also then the consideration that in a period of class retreat, elements of a communist organisation/party will retreat from communist positions - how should we respond to this? I think we should seek clarity through discussion and debate, not through purges.

Just a few of my late night thoughts.

Ronan

I don't think I disagree with what you are saying but I perahps don't understand the issue!

Everything depends on working people breaking from the Labour Party and trade unions and building new democratic organisations of working class struggle

Quote from the Socialist Equality Party UK.

As far as I can see (and I asked over and over), the SEP has now moved much closer to us on this vital issue.

If anything(as far as I can see) they have a more negative view of the unions than us.

Despite their Trotskyist heritage, I wonder if this organisation could be suitable for study, contact etc as I think their trajectory is positive .

However, in the past I have contacted them via e mail without response.

The CWO says it will work with other genuinely working class organisations.

But what are the differences we can accept?

Very possibly the SEP could share

only two forms of organisation - Party and councils

socialism or barbarism, no third way

No war but class war (this I am unsure about, seems a weakness of Trotskyist outfits, support the lesser evil etc-maybe it would make a good starting point to any contact).

Soviet power not party dictatorship.

Vague at the moment., but something I hope to develop.

So, sent them a simple e mail

What is your opinion on the slogan

NO WAR BUT CLASS WAR

?

wsws.org

Is there an alternative to the centralised party. So asks Stevein7 above. The odd thing is that I am reading this just after reading another ICT hefty article called 'The new International will be The International Party of the Proletariat'. This latter aricle (if I understand it at all) thunders absolutely against any notion that the party would be anything but centralized and homogenous across international borders. Yet now I find Stevein7 seeming to call this in question. Is he perhaps being a devil's advocate? Is he trying to provoke?Or do I as reader tend to take what I read on proletarian web-sites too literally? I wish I knew the answer, because I'm beginning to get fed up, and am easily confused. The 'hefty' I refer to above also goes on about the ICC not being defenders of the proletarian revolution anymore. In fact this whole article appears to loathe and detest the ICC so much that I find myself shattered. The CWO has it seems hated the ICC since 1975.The hatred seemingly stems from the fact that theICC don't understand the correct reason behind capitalisms collapse. I don't know whether they understand or not. And perhaps I should care, but I don't! That capitalism is collapsing appears very obvious now and that all members of the proletariat won't be able to recite the exact economic reasons for the collapse is not going to matter is it? Not so long as we make the revolution anyway. Not so long as we establish our Dictatorship. And to go on mocking Rosa Luxembourg for trying to put Marx right and failing - according that is to theICT - just as a further justification for more ICC bashing, starts to make me wonder whether life after the revolution will be any more sensible than life as it is now under the crazed bourgeoisie. Surely no one questions Luxembourg's lifelong devotion to the proletariat and it's historical duty? That she got her economics wrong yet remained such a tireless revolutionary, must tend a bit to limit the necessity for a faultless economic analysis. Yes. No war but class war. An excellent slogan.

The question in my mind is the degree of difference which would make it possible or otherwise to work together and eventually constitute a Party.

For example if we have a very simple criteria such as No war but class war, no support for any bureaucratic form, no support for any faction of the bourgeoisie, then it would be possible to easily (?) gather various groups, but as criteria become more complex then it becomes more difficult.

My perspective is that a relatively small set of conditions could provide the basis for unity amongst a relatively high number of groups and from there democratic centralism would decide.

So differences would remain, and homogenity would have its limits.

I think that the ICC amongst many others should not be written off from this process, and that we will all change as the process develops and the issues of generalising essential positions emerge.

One thing for sure- expect the unexpected.

All development is a process of conflict, within the ICT, the ICC and any other group, the discussion on how to get beyond the current state of the fractured vanguard will produce a variety of responses.

There cannot be an absence of conflict, perfect agreement within an organisation, a Party, that strikes me as idealistic a negation of dialectical materialism.

I don't think I disagree with what you are saying but maybe I don't understand the issue. If the ICC no longer defend the proletarian revolution (which is what you say in your article) then why do you say they shouldn't be written off? If a small set of conditions is required for acceptance into the revolutionary milieu, won't a willingness to actually want to defend the revolution be one of them? I don't want to negate dialectical materialism (I only want to negate the negation, as Marx put it) but you'd have to be pretty idealistic to reconcile (a) a lack of belief in revolutionary politics with (b) acceptance into some group engaged in developing a revolutionary party! So, while I'm all for conflict, and am longing for the unexpected, and am surprised to hear that the SEP is now a group you might work with - that's unexpected - this is yet another response to the current state of the fractured vanguard. But this is all gobbledegook isn't it? How do I know whether I agree with you or not, if I don't understand the issue? And are things really as bad as they sound?

I am considering that under the weight of events, there will be elements from many groupings who can come together despite differences.

Splits will occur.

The eventual outcome could be a relatively narrow set of conditions for adherence to the "Future International" or otherwise.

None of this is guaranteed.

As for the SEP, as they are I do not think they would want to engage in dialogue, but they represent a possible arena to raise issues. The fact that they have changed on various positions leads me to think that they have a membership which would be interested in the "Communist left". Much depends on how these groups develop in the future. All of reality is a process and they will develop, as will we.

Note I am not speaking for the ICT, policy is not simply the thought of one person.

If the majority believe certain organisations are a lost cause, so be it, I tend to think that it is better to maintain dialogue with all who are willing.

Kinglear, you do seem to be confused on this one. The article you refer to is a discussion document written by the PCInt in 2001. It partially replies to an attack on the IBRP (as we were then) by the ICC. It is intended to state our conception of the party and contrasts it with the other two wings of the Communist Left (the ICC and the Bordigists). It actually refers to the times when the ICC and CWO have cooperated in the past. It also underlines that we (CWO and ICT) have a different project and different perspectives to the ICC (this rather than any discussion about economic theory or Rosa Luxemburg) is the basis of our different paths. We do not "hate" the ICC as you put it repeatedly but we do think they are wrong.We do not even discuss the ICC in our normal work (there is too much else to do). The ICC on the other hand (because of their perspectives) are in a bigger hurry and they not only write long articles about us (someone once calculated they write about 25 polemics against us to every one we write back) but also pass resolutions calling for their members to do everything they can to discredit us in the hope we will disappear. On the issue of the future World Party of the Proletariat it will be homogenous and centralised programmatically and also in action but parties by their very nature cannot be monolithic (we think the ICC's attempt to do so has led to some of their splits). As to having basic points for agreement the 7 points that emerged from the International Conferences are still our basis for such cooperation. Some ICC people say they now agree with them but the organisation will not because the resolution that produced them was designed to exclude the ICC from the conferences. In fact the ICC could not agree in 1980 becaue it still had lots of councilist in its ranks.After the External Fraction split (now the councilist group Internationalist Perspectives) in the mid 1980s I have been expecting them to say we can now agree on them. Instead the ICC has now condemned the entire communist left as parasiticv or worse and it now actively cosying up to anarchists.

Steve, the SEP may have taken on our view of the unions (Trotskyism has amyriad of groups who appear good on one issue) but as you yourself suggest the SEP would have nothing to do with any left communist group because we are opposed to them in our whole attitude to current bourgeois society, particularly parliamentarism (they changed their name to SEP from International Communist Party to sound less intimidating to voters).

Although I doubt that there will be an oportunity to get a communist into parliament anywhere, I would not set the parliamentary issue as a definitive obstacle.

The issue is not the SEP and all its positions, it is the definition of what constitutes positions which prevent the proletariat coming to power.

Regarding Trotskyism in general, as long as the solution remains independent proletarian activity and no support for any regime, questions on whether the Stalinists constituted a ruling class, or a bureaucracy but not a class, might not be an insurmountable barrier between us, but as soon as they take sides with what we would call a state capitalist regime in the name of defence of nationalised property or a deformed workers state or some such like pretext, we would not be able to work together.

For example "Support Libya against the Imperialist West" I would say would be insurmountable, a definite call for support of a bourgeose faction. However, I think the SEP does not say this. they support independent working class activity only, but I need to look into this more.

Of the 7 points mentioned by Cleishbotham, I would say that there is room for debate on the point

Acceptance of the October Revolution as proletarian.

There is a valid point that the Bolsheviks violated soviet principles with the establishment of sovnarkom.

Hence for those who would absolutely insist that "proletarian" could only mean soviet power, there is a valid foundation for criticising the 1917 experience.

Below is a piece from Mattick who I consider goes well beyond a measured critique of 1917, but may interest someone.

I am not absolutely sure about

  • "An orientation towards the organisation of revolutionaries recognising Marxist doctrine and methodology as proletarian science."

Is there such a thing as proletarian science?

Paul Mattick 1938

Was the Bolshevik Revolution a Failure?

A Symposium

Source: The Modern Quarterly, Fall 1938, pp. 16-20.

Transcribed: by Thomas Schmidt

Proofed: by Jonas Holmgren

The Questions

  • Did the Bolshevik Revolution achieve its proletarian objectives?
  • Is the dictatorship of the proletariat consonant with Party Dictatorship?
  • Can a proletarian State arise on the basis of the wage system, managed by a Party-State? What constitutes the abolition of capitalism?
  • Does Lenin’s thesis that in the imperialist epoch the proletariat alone can lead a revolution to complete the “Bourgeois task” claim validity in view of the course pursued by Cardenas in Mexico, Kemal Pacha in Turkey, etc.?
  • Viewed in retrospect, did the seizure of power by the Bolsheviks retard the World Proletarian Revolution?

I.

I deny the assumption of the first question that the Bolshevik Revolution had proletarian aims. The proletarian character of the Russian Revolution is only apparent. It is true that the revolutionary workers were striving for a vaguely conceived sort of socialism, but in every bourgeois revolution in which workers participated, proletarian objectives were evident.

The ideas and slogans connected with proletarian objectives, and even actual struggles and forms of organization peculiar to the independent proletarian class movement, are not enough to give the Russian Revolution a proletarian character. Certainly many workers believed that the Bolshevik Revolution would end in socialism, however, the illusions of the workers cannot replace the necessary action to attain proletarian objectives. Socialism as a slogan, as an ideal, still fits perfectly in an otherwise bourgeois revolution and society. Proletarian objectives, first of all, must incorporate the abolition of the proletarian class through the abolition of all class relations.

The Bolshevik Revolution, however, aspired to the development of modern industry and of a modern proletariat, a fact which comes clearly to light in the bolshevistic concept of “socialism,” which still contains wage labor and capital production, and secures those relations through the division of society into rulers and ruled. That the Russian Revolution first of all was a peasant revolution cannot be denied; that these peasants, striving for land and property, had no proletarian objectives is obvious. In so far as the Bolshevik Revolution found support by the peasants and in turn supported them, no proletarian objectives were involved. For this reason the Bolsheviks regarded their early peasant policy as an unavoidable concession to the backwardness of Russian conditions. The later collectivization drive in agriculture illustrates how earnestly the Bolsheviks agreed with Western Socialism that the distribution of land to the peasants is no socialistic goal. However, the collectivization of agriculture, and the transformation of independent peasants into wage workers, is still no proletarian objective, but a bourgeois desire of long standing and has little chance of being realized without radical and risky changes in the socio-economic set up.

So far the making of wage workers was always considered the task of capitalism; by making this task their own, the Bolsheviks fulfilled capitalistic objectives. It is true that within the whole revolutionary situation in Russia there were also forces which fought for outspoken proletarian objectives. They were achieved, here and there, through the expropriation of factories and other forms of property by the Soviets. They were lost again as soon as the Bolshevik State arose which supplanted the power of the Soviets with that of the Bolshevik Party.

It is often asked how it is possible that power won by the workers by way of revolution may be lost again without a counter-revolution. The latter here is conceived as a return of the old authorities, but counter-revolutionary actions are not confined to old authorities; new officials can engage in them just as well, or even better. The counter-revolution against the state-capitalistic intent of the Russian Revolution was defeated by the Russian masses following the directives of the Bolsheviks. The counter-revolution against the proletarian objectives expressed within this revolution was triumphant with the success of Bolshevism, which transformed private property into state property, and continued the exploitation of the workers on state-capitalistic terms.

Not without opposition and struggle were the Soviets reduced to a mere instrument of the Bolsheviks’ rule over the whole of society. Groups of workers in Western Europe as well as in Russia recognized quite early the real character of the Bolshevik Revolution. Others, arising in opposition to the Stalin machines believe even today that the latter is a perversion of Bolshevism, and that the original Leninism intended something else than what exists in Russia. This, however, is not true. The Russia of today represents the essential aspirations of the early Bolsheviks before and after the October Revolution. That the Bolsheviks carried through a bourgeois revolution of which the bourgeoisie was no longer capable, was stated many times by Lenin himself. The fact that this revolution, essentially bourgeois in its tasks, made use of a Marxian terminology, gave rise to the illusion that its socialistic trends were strong enough to alter fundamentally its original character. However, all that happened was that the Bolsheviks were not only forced or willing to fulfill the functions of the bourgeoisie, but by this process they became the new ruling and exploiting class.

II.

The dictatorship of the party cannot be consonant with the dictatorship of the proletariat. Either the proletariat rules or is ruled. The party is only a small group in society; it is not the entire proletariat; it rules as a minority and is an expression of the conditions of exploitation. By the very conditions that make it necessary, it is impelled to rule in its own interests—that is, reproduce continually the conditions of the dictatorship over the proletariat—until the proletariat finally ends the rule of all minorities by destroying the bases of exploitation, which are wage labor and the state.

III.

The state always and invariably represents domination over the proletariat. It is the unmistakable badge of the exploiting society. A “socialism” that is realized by the state always includes the continuation of class relations, inequalities of income, money and market laws, and other forms of modern exploitation. Like any other contradiction in terms, a “proletarian state” is quite inconceivable. It is possible to conceive, however, the temporary and direct execution of state functions by the armed proletariat—the actual revolution to the end of securing the development of socialism, or the association of free and equal producers and consumers.

IV.

The Bolshevik Revolution was not led by the proletariat but by the middle class. The bourgeoisie of that country was extremely weak, and the intelligentsia and all the “progressive” forces struggling against reaction could obtain support neither from them nor from the already reactionary bourgeoisie of western Europe. Only in the workers’ movement could it find a usable revolutionary ideology, and only with the workers’ help, together with the agricultural revolutionary necessities, could the intelligentsia hope to change Russia into a modern state.

In Turkey and Mexico, as well, it is not the proletariat who leads, but the middle-class, who make use of the proletariat for their own ends. Important layers of the middle class, no longer able to secure or elevate their economic positions within the old-style capitalism, try to secure their further existence as non-workers by political means, by elevating themselves into ruling positions, to continue to participate in the exploitation of labor—naturally in the “interest of labor.”

The state has always played an important part in the development of capitalism. Its role increased in importance with the relative stagnation in capital expansion. A whole revolution was necessary for Russia to secure by political means what it could reach no longer by economic warfare: the complete centralization of all possible power in the hands of the dictatorial state, as the necessary prerequisite for a swift development of modern industry in Russia, to save the country from becoming a colony of one or more of the imperialistic nations, and to end the misery resulting from the backwardness of the country. The Bolshevist policy, aspiring to a state capitalist system, was best suited to save Russia from semi-colonial conditions, and to elevate it as a power among the other world powers. Imperialism as a hindrance to the development of the backward countries brought forth the modern nationalistic movements to end imperialistic oppression.

To build today successfully a modern state capable of maintaining its independence, the slow process in which private property expands is useless; instead, the highest concentration of all capital resources is needed which necessitates a radical onslaught on those interests defending the backward state of affairs. In order to bring results, the struggle for national liberation had to take on revolutionary forms. This necessity determines the developmental trends in other countries like Turkey and Mexico, also in countries trying a come-back as an imperialistic force, like Germany.

Other countries did not go as far as Russia in this concentration process with political means, for reasons of different internal and external conditions. It was, for instance, relatively easier for Russia, to challenge the imperialistic nations than it is for Turkey or Mexico. However, state capitalism expresses an economic weakness within the countries employing it, as well as an existing weakness of world capitalism, which loses control over the backward countries, as this control can no longer be secured economically. Economic warfare no longer suffices; political warfare, the open brutal slaughter, becomes the only possibility for coping with the economic stagnation which strangles the capitalistic world. Under such conditions the power of the state increases continuously. The real rulers of society are no longer recognizable by their private money bags, but by their position within the state apparatus.

Russian state capitalism has become the example for other nations as indicated in the rise of fascism and the growth of governmental control in all countries. However, this trend is no sign of “progress,” as many people believe. It does not correspond to a “higher stage” of capitalism, but indicates the decline of world capitalism. The trend toward bolshevization and fascization is only the political expression of the stagnation and decline of the capitalist system; it is barbarism.

V.

The world-revolutionary propaganda of the Bolsheviks in the first year of the revolution is often taken as an assurance of the proletarian character of Bolshevism. However, this “internationalism” at no time aspired to more than to secure the Bolshevik Revolution, to help the Bolshevik Party to remain in power.

As soon as the Bolsheviks recognized that the proletariat was too weak to establish state capitalistic systems favorable to Russia in other countries, and also that the bourgeoisie was no longer willing to risk anything in a struggle against state capitalist Russia, that is, about 1920, the Bolsheviks ceased to support revolutionary movements in other countries and instead prepared for a peaceful side by side existence with the other capitalistic systems. No more than Stalin today, were Lenin and Trotsky interested in helping the world revolution to reach proletarian objectives. The decline of the revolutionary movement in the world, and the consolidation of the power of capital now also served the needs of Bolshevik Russia.

Still, it cannot be said that the Bolshevik Revolution retarded the world revolution. If attempts toward the latter failed, this failure was quite independent of the Bolshevik policies, or the policies of any other minority group for that matter, and was due only to the still enormous power and vitality of world capitalism. The Bolsheviks can be blamed only, if at all, for hindering the proletariat from drawing the necessary lessons on its first great defeat after the last war, and for destroying the first attempts to create a real revolutionary labor movement in conformity with the necessities of today.

Steve A hasty remark. I do not think the proletarian nature of the October Revolution is up for question. We have pointed out many times that the establishment of Sovnarkom was an error (I thought we were the first to focus on this but I read Voline the anarchist recently and he also mentioned it). However it was an error we can see via hindsight. There was no violation of soviet principles mainly because these were still being established. In fact yoiu could argue the Bolsheviks were carrying on the principles established by the SR and Mensheviks from Februrary 1917. The fact is though that we judge the events afterwards by their consequences and this was one way in which the party state began to develop. Even if the Bolsheviks had been more aware of this problem it is unlikely that it would have prevented the counter-revolution (but it might have taken a form which would have left us a more shining legacy). The weakness of your argument here is ahistoricism (the same disease which infects all the Mattick opinions in the article you paste). The principles we now stand on were developed by the Left (including the Russian Communist Left) in response to the growing counter-revolution.

How does the United Front from below differ from the TROTSKY version?

Again Iam looking for possible insurmountable differences.

... according to the classical theory of the united front, the purpose of the front must not be propaganda, electoral campaigning or even peaceful demonstrations.  Rather, the united front must be organised in order to deliver the united actionof the workers.  Actionmeans strikes and physical, potentially violent, perhaps armed, mobilisations.  Actiondoes not mean conferences, and implies no organisational form except those necessary to directly organise physical class struggle action at a grassroots level.[19] Since this will be a surprise to most SWP members let us prove that these were the conditions under which Trotsky advocated the united front.In 1922, Trotsky saw the point of the united front as “the struggle of the proletariat for its daily bread”, and emphasises the importance of winning economic demands through union action.[20] A decade later, with the threat of fascism rising in Germany, the proposals he makes are no less immediate, no less physical:“it is precisely in the sphere of propaganda that a bloc is out of the question. . . . no common publications, banners, placards! March separately, but strike together!Agree only how to strike, whom to strike, and when to strike!  . . . The program of action must be strictly practical, strictly objective, to the point . . .

As set out above, it sounds acceptable, even if subsequent practice of the united front has gone beyond this framework.

Steve. One insurmountable difference is that between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie. So that to join in some united front that includes even the 'red' bourgeoisie (like the Trots) would be a disaster for the workers who job it is to overthrow the capitalist regime and establish it's own. The left wing of capitalism doesn't want that, does it? So what do we have in common to unite over? I suppose we might struggle together as individual starving workers (rather like what's happening now in large sections of the Arab world) for our daily bread, as you mention, but we are probably not going to get very far - maybe a few scattered crusts on a temporary basis: depending how generous, or threatened, the ruling class feel - not that is until we start to understand that it is the whole, total system that we need to get rid of. Some of us struggled for a better existence in North Africa, and all we got so far is smatterings of bourgeois democracy. A change of ruler here, the threat of sone silly election process there. There are things that we, the working class, understand better now than we did in the 1920's, when we had just suffered a mighty defeat: which defeat, please note, was not all the fault of Lenin and the Bolsheviks. And I think a major thing we've gained from the defeat is a clarification of what furthers the proletarian struggle and what doesn't. These are theoretical gains to begin with, and without which all the violent physical action you refer to above, will remain mere sound and fury signifying nothing. Getting nowhere: like smashing up the shops in Oxford Street. So, in the end, what you lay out above isn't acceptable to me.

Absolutely agree with Kinglear here. The quote (if it is a quote) from Trotsky taken in isolation is not his full position and very soon afterwards he was not only advocating a united front with Social Democracy but a return to it in the form of entryism (with the unbelieivable idea that a force which had murdered communist workers was somehow something to do with the working class rather than a force for counter-revolution). The Trotskyists (and the SEP are the best at it) are trying to sanitise their own past in order to make themselves appear more revolutionary. Some have projects like the Commune (which blends anarchism and Trotskyism) , others like the SEP edit the past. This is not archaeology but an attempt to avoid the conclusions drawn by the communist left from its inception and wipe out some of the more shameful aspects of their Trotskyist past.

Instead the ICC has now condemned the entire communist left as parasiticv or worse, is what comrade Cleishbothom says above. Oh! come on comrade, sometimes you say such daft things you make me laff. The ICC is a part of the communist left isn't it, so would it condemn itself? But wait. Since you think they no longer defend the proletarian revolution anymore, maybe you don't see them as part of the communist left anymore! Oh! Lord have mercy on us. The communist left has just been reduced to a mere handful of comrades, who'll probably never be able to achieve anything let alone scrape together a party. All we'll be able to do is carry out ACTIONS, as advocated by Steve - with no conferences, no organizational form, and, presumably no theory to underpin what we're up to. And now this starts to sound like anarchism. But this is only logical, because the ICC is cosying up with them anyway - so the editor says - so now I understand. It's the end of everything. Help. Help!

AFAIK the ICT does not rule out the united front.

I was looking for a clarification of "the united front from below'' and how it differed from the Trotsky version sketched above.

As for pointless violence, the fascist threat is very real, and no doubt we would be amongst their targets. The united front is a way for workers to defend themselves.

J- the Trot quote came from the Commune.

Perhaps the hope with the Trot groups and others is that our intervention will provoke splits, influence individuals.

Years ago when the SEP was rhe ICP I went to a well attended meeting and asked why they advocated a Labour vote.

That was shortly before I started to read ICC materials and through the ICC I found out about CWO.

Stuck with the CWO since, despite all my best efforts I cannot fault them!

However the vexed question remains of how to deal with the zillion little groups who share some of our posititions and a class that by and large does not want to know, and I wonder if that is worse in the UK and why.

Kinglear

Have you read the ICC Theses on Parasitism? Obviously when they condemn the rest of the "proletarian political milieu" as a waste of time (or worse) they do not include themselves. In fact they now see themselves as all that is left of the communist left. You should also read their apologies for criticising anarchism in the past and their own excusing of the CNT in the Spanish Civil War. We have not polemicised against this but it is sign of increasing opportunism on their part (and if you want concrete examples of how they have refused to cooperate with us but preferred instead to work with anarcho syndicalists we can give them).

I don't know where you live but in Europe the communist left (and this includes the ICT and ICC) is expanding and has been expanding (albeit with periods of stagnation) for most of my adult life. There are debates influenced by it going on all over the place and the latest collapse of the financial bubble has meant that more people are prepared to think in revolutionary terms. Obviously in terms of the scale of the challnege we are still nothing but that is also a function of the fact that the working class as a whole has yet to act in a more decisive manner. Revolutionary organisations do not exist independently of the class struggle.

The fact that there are different communist left organisations is a weakness but it is bsed (as I said earlier in this thread) on genuine differences over perspectives and tasks. We don't indulge in idle polemics against anyone but get on with trying ot orgnaise our work deeper inside the class

I fully subscribe Cleishbotham's post about our status, our perspectives, our duties. It's much more important to create roots in the working class, from which a genuine class vanguard can get strenght, than thousand sterile polemics.

This doesn't exclude, in my opinion, the possibility to work together with good comrades external to ICT, also rank & files of other organizations, about particular questions. In my experience, it's normal practice when dealing with concrete struggles.

About the "united front from below", there are lots of text... but mainly in Italian. For example:

The second link did not work, it took me to links about nuclear powerr....

Given that here in the UK we have a little fascist/antifascist activity, I'll translate the first link , maybe into English and Spanish just be sure to increase my parrty pension...

I thought the United Front from Below was used as a way to defend workers from fascist attack but it seems it was also seen as a much higher aim.

bibliotecamarxista.org

scroll down to

Appello del Partito Comunista Internazionalista per la creazione del Fronte Unico Proletario contro la guerra.

  • Thanks Mic for posting those two links, unfortunately since I can't read Italian I'm going to use Google Translate to try and read them. I am glad Steve has raised this question; it is an interesting and important discussion to have. It is something I have investigated over the recent past as well; as Cleishbotham knows from discussions we have had previously. In order to try and go some way to answering Steve question 'how does the united front from below differ from the Trotsky version?’. It is necessary to look at the context in which it originated. It was a strategy/tactic (depending on who you talk to) borne out of desperation of Russia's isolation after the failure of world revolution in Western Europe. It was devised by the Comintern to try to break this isolation by creating mass parties in Western Europe via opportunism - i.e. absorption of layers from social democracy who weren’t won to the communist programme. It is also worth remembering that it was part of a series of opportunist inventions such as the ‘Entryist’ strategy-tactic and the ‘Workers Government’ formulation, which amounts to the installation of a bourgeois government. Which in subsequent theorisation are almost invariably glossed over and divorced from the historical experience of their application. Which is why contemporary advocates of it reference Trotsky’s writings on the rise of fascism in Germany, which is meant to be a powerful example of where it could have been applied. But this in my view anyway, just demonstrates their idealism that fascism could have been stopped if socialist and communist workers had united. Leaving aside the bloodshed that occurred only a decade previously, unity with the organisation of social democracy necessarily means limiting us to a struggle within the confines of capitalism. So all the talk of freedom to criticise and agitate is meaningless. What would the common goal to unite around be? There isn’t one, if you think that there can’t be a separation between our immediate struggles and the struggle for communism. To echo what others were saying, the necessary separation between communists and bourgeois left/left-wing of capital emerges. The left takes its starting point as the ‘raising of consciousness’ with its package of tricks devised for this purpose. Whereas we start from the real movement of the working class against the conditions of our exploitation, requiring us to organise independently of the bourgeoisie in order to assert our needs against those of capital. Therefore the ‘consciousness tricks’ that the left specialises in have the effect of sacrificing working class independence, whereby a necessary result is that they reinforce the rule of capital. As far as the ‘united front from below’ formulation goes – in substance I agree with it but I have been confronted before with people equating it to Stalin’s Third Period ‘red united front from below’. The important point for us is to move beyond mere propaganda groups and establish and deepen working class political organisation(s) that are a real factor in working class life. Obviously there is a pressing need for working class unity and solidarity in the face of all the attacks - the bosses’ austerity programmes and the attacks on marginalised sectors of the working class by the capitalist state mostly and to a more limited extent by reactionaries. But this must be done on a class basis and with the clear perspective that it is the system itself that is the root cause. Not saying any of the contributions have suggested anything otherwise.

Single issues like an anti war movement could be an organisational form which would bring the party into contact with a wider layer of workers.

Perhaps unemployment could give rise to something similar.

All of this assumes we have the numbers to get the ball rolling or we get involved in a movement that arises independently of ourselves.

Could such a network eventually transform into the territorial soviets we advocate?

J wrote

I do not think the proletarian nature of the October Revolution is up for question.

I am willing to accept both a considerable part of the Russian working class and the Bolsheviks had the intention to carry out a proletarian revolution by the establishment of a revolutionary proletarian dictatorship.

However the fact remains, and it seems to be a major one, that he direction pursued was flawed.

I think this goes beyond word play to the heart of the issue of proletarian self liberation.

If Irecall correctly, the cwo at the internatinal conferences of left communist groups clearly told the ICC that the task of the revolutionary party was to weild state power, however please correct me if I am wrong, nor am I saying this is a current position, I am simply pointing out the longevity of the concept of a special ruling body as opposed to the council authority. A concept which I consider carries a lot of weight to this day.

This is why I consider it valid to question the proletarian nature of 1917,

As Marx said

Just as one does not judge an individual by what he thinks about himself, so one cannot judge such a period of transformation by its consciousness, but, on the contrary, this consciousness must be explained from the contradictions of material life, from the conflict existing between the social forces of production and the relations of production.

There is no contradiction between saying that the October Revolution was proletarian and it was flawed. We learn from those flaws and incorporate them into our current thinking. The positions you attribute to the CWO in the International Conferences are not those I defended.

Having said all that, I do not think there is a better explanation than the one set out in the ICT pamphlet "Class consciousness and Revolutionary Organisation".

what I could possibly comment on is the fact (and I am recalling from memory of reading Lenin some years ago) that even before 1917 Lenin and the Bolsheviks were thinking in terms of the Bolsheviks assuming State power. I do not think that this occured after 1917 as in the quote

When Lenin first defended the

idea of the “dictatorship of the party" in

1919 he also said that the party’s ideas

can only be carried out in reality by the

new body, the soviets but by December

1920 (the very month in which the

civil war against the Whites and Allied

imperialism was won) he was stating,

...the dictatorship of the proletariat

cannot be exercised through an

organisation embracing the whole of that

class, because in all capitalist countries

(and not only over here, in one of the

most backward) the proletariat is still so

divided, so degraded and so corrupted

… that an organisation taking in the

whole of the proletariat cannot directly

exercise proletarian dictatorship. It can

be exercised only by a vanguard that

has absorbed the revolutionary energy

of the class.15

This is mysticism not materialism. It

has more in common with the fascist

myth that the Fuehrer/Duce is the real

expression of the will of the nation than

with the Marxist materialist Lenin of

l9l7 18.

Eg Can the Bolsheviks retain State Power?

"On what are all trends agreed, from Rech to Novaya Zhizn inclusively, from the Kornilovite Cadets to the semi-Bolsheviks, all, except the Bolsheviks?

They all agree that the Bolsheviks will either never dare take over full state power alone, or, if they do dare, and do take power, they will not be able to retain it even for the shortest while.

If anybody asserts that the question of the Bolsheviks alone taking over full state power is a totally unfeasible political question, that only a swelled-headed "fanatic" of the worst kind can regard it as feasible, we refute this assertion by quoting the exact statements of the most responsible and most influential political parties and trends of various "hues".

But let me begin with a word or two about the first of the questions mentioned—will the Bolsheviks dare take over full state power alone? I have already had occasion, at the All-Russia Congress of Soviets, to answer this question in the affirmative in no uncertain manner by a remark that I shouted from my seat during one of Tsereteli's [2] ministerial speeches. And I have not met in the press, or heard, any statements by Bolsheviks to the effect that we ought not to take power alone. I still maintain that a political party—and the party of the advanced class in particular—would have no right to exist, would be unworthy of the name of party, would be a nonentity in any sense, if it refused to take power when opportunity offers."

Perhaps it is the wording, a fusion of the concepts of Party and class somewhat akin to bordigas formulation that there is no class without the party, but I do not see a clear indication that the concept of party dictatorship occured after 1917/18.

Is Marxism a science? Is 'proletarian science' any different from 'science'?

Obviously some disagree- '' I will step out on a limb with one final comment. It is my opinion that the most damaging conception of Marxism is that it is a science, as the word is commonly understood. Marxism is neither a science nor does it reveal a preexisting truth. It is a highly imaginative “ideology/tool” describing experience in a way that links material potential to collective desire to will to action, and seeks to realize its truth materially in class struggle, revolution and collective human liberation; nothing more and nothing less.''

I tend to think that Marxism (even the vocabulary is difficult, for we are not simply looking at the product of a single man's brain) is more than a science, it contains elements which correspond to science, but it is not disinterested social research, it is intended to produce an effect and therefore is necessarily biased to that end.

The issue of class consciousness cannot be settled simply by scientific explanation, it requires propaganda, art, literature aimed at broad masses who are deprived of the higher intellectual training of the scientist.

And would such disagreement regarding the status of Marxism (as science or otherwise) really constitute a definite barrier to participation in a future international?