Liam redux

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What kind of new organisation do we need?

This piece by Alan Thornett is a contribution to the discussion on organisation between former members of the SWP, Socialist Resistance and others who are involved in a process of regroupment. This is trundling on and is projected to be completed by late February.  The document is uncontroversial among those who have had a chance…

Liam
3–5 minutes

This piece by Alan Thornett is a contribution to the discussion on organisation between former members of the SWP, Socialist Resistance and others who are involved in a process of regroupment. This is trundling on and is projected to be completed by late February.  The document is uncontroversial among those who have had a chance to discuss it and goes some way to establishing a framework for a Marxist current to actively build a broader party while retaining an independent existence. It has some relevance to the the discussions currently happening at Socialist Unity.

We need to start to discuss what kind of new organisation we want to build if the regroupment process is successful, as appears to be the case. The following are some comments on the general principles involved in this rather than trying to propose a detailed constitution at this stage, though we will have to have a constitution before we can create a new organisation.

The new organisation should be strongly committed to building Respect as its central project. Or more precisely it should be strongly committed to building a broad party of the left to tackle the crisis of working class representation — at this stage this means building Respect, but it could mean at a latter stage arguing that Respect should became a part of something bigger and broader which could do the job more effectively.

We should strongly advocate building Respect as a multi-tendency party because it is by far the best way to build it as a democratic and pluralist organisation. Respect is in fact such an organisation already — although this has never been reflected adequately in its constitution.

The new organisation should therefore exist both as a component of Respect and as a public organisation. It should function as a platform inside Respect and conduct as much of its campaigning work as possible through it. At the same time it should have its own publications and public presence, including public meetings, in order to defend its own distinct politics and attract people to it as a current. It should seek to do this, however, firmly within the context of building Respect and in a way consistent with building it. At public events (demonstrations etc) it should give a high priority to the profile of Respect whilst maintaining a profile of its own where appropriate.

The new organisation should be committed to working in Respect in a constructive and non-sectarian way. In other words whilst it would remain an organised current it would not function as a permanent or homogeneous block-voting caucus in Respect. Other than on issues where class lines are crossed or the future of Respect jeopardised it would expect its members to function as part of the discussions in the organisation as a whole and vote as such.

The new organisation should be revolutionary socialist in character. In other words it should be committed to the overthrow of the capitalist system by the working class and the establishment of a socialist society by revolutionary means. It should therefore be committed to the construction of a future mass revolutionary organisation dedicated to this task.

Membership of the new organisation should be based on a commitment to its basic aims and programme and engagement in the political orientation and activities agreed thorough its decision making processes.

The new organisation should not be explicitly democratic centralist but should be based on the principles of maximum participation in the decision-making processes and maximum unity in action. Members will therefore normally be expected to uphold and support the policy decisions of the organisation, promote the publications of the organisation, be a member of a trade union where possible and pay regular dues to the organisation.

The new organisation should have a fairly ‘traditional’ structure. The sovereign body should be a conference, held at least every two years. This should elect a National Committee (NC). The NC should elect an executive committee from its number to oversee the implementation of its decisions and react to event between meetings. The basic unit of the organisation should be the branch.

Members of the new organisation should have the right to constitute themselves in organised tendencies and factions on the basis of a clear political platform available to all members of the organisation. The rights of such minorities should include the right to meet and organise around their views and adequate opportunity at conference to explain and develop their views.

The new organisation should recognise that various forms of oppressive social relationships are present in capitalist society and that they act as a block to the unity of the working class in its struggle for socialism. It therefore views all oppressive behaviour such as of racism, sexism, homophobia, or violence as against the interest of the working class. Any oppressed group has the right to caucus if they feel the necessity.

22 responses to “What kind of new organisation do we need?”

  1. jim jay Avatar
    jim jay

    I was struck by this “The sovereign body should be a conference, held at least every two years.”

    I suspect a new organisation would be quite fluid in its first few years as it finds its feet – so every two years to re-elect the NC seems a little long I’d have thought.

    Having national get togethers can seem like unnecessary work sometimes but if you don’t have them you’re more likely to reduce the amount of activity and the connection members have with the organisition – leaving aside any ability of members to hold that NC to account.

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  2. thedigger Avatar
    thedigger

    Liam, I take it the existing ISG would desolve into this new organisation.

    I ask because in the run up to the split in Respect an ISG member in converation with me said that no matter what reservation he had about George and Salma’s political practice he would be backing them as the ISG had already made a decision and as a democratic centralist organisation he was bound it.

    Or is it the case the ISG would continue to exist as a democratic centralist organisation in both this new organisation and Respect. If on the contrary the ISG are abandoning any form of democratic centralism ths is a major change in their political philosphy.

    Also having a platform with its own public presence, publications and public meetings is not the model adopted by the SSP and touted by certain FI supporters as the best model of a broad left type party.

    I think you are not a member of the ISG but given your support for open debate in revolutionary organisations you might point me in the direction of where they have publically debated this in the ISG.

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  3. Andy Newman Avatar
    Andy Newman

    I suppose everyone needs a hobby, but how such a historical reeneactment society has any relevence to mass working class politcs, or the aim of acheiving a future socialist society in British conditions in the twenty first century remains opaque to me.

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  4. Piers Avatar
    Piers

    Andy Newman ” … remains opaque to me”

    Can we deduce from this that you have a great interest in all things opaque, given the massive slabs of text posted by you recently and in the past year, on your own site, on the same issue.

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  5. Liam Avatar
    Liam

    Thedigger – I’ll leave it for an ISG member to steer you to the documents but as for democratic centralism the practice of the British far left has been a Stalinist influenced caricature. My most recent experience of it was watching a group of pretty intelligent people always voting the same way on trivial third order tactical questions. As the document suggests it should be a rare necessity to enforce that sort of discipline.

    Andy – let’s take climate change as an example of the need for revolutionary politics. The rich and the powerful will find a solution to it but it won’t be a pleasant one for most of the world’s population. We would argue that a transferral of power to the working class and poor is still a necessity if everyone on the planet is to be fed, educated, kept healthy and lead a fulfiling life. At the moment in Britain the priority is to build a class struggle party to Labour’s left and there is no contradiction between these two things.

    Jim – I agree on the two years thing. It is a discussion paper only at the moment and is sure to be amended.

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  6. Andy newman Avatar
    Andy newman

    Piers

    I am not sure that an article has ever appeared on SU blog, cerainly not penned by me, advocating the type of “revolutionary” group that you are proposing.

    Liam – the need for a thorough and irreversible removal of power and infleunce from ccapitalism to socialism is not dispuated by me – what is in dispiute is whether the sort of ortanosation that you are proposing, a format that has demonstrable failed in the past, has much positive contribution towards that happening.

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  7. Joseph Kisolo Avatar
    Joseph Kisolo

    I was at the recent Manchester meeting discussing this regroupment and for me the key point is that revolutionaries can’t have our cake and eat it.

    By organising as a part of a broad class struggle party we do loose something – we loose our ability to primarily put out propaganda and agitate around the maximally radical demands.

    If we are to be part of the broad party we must primarily relate to the class through it, through its publications and through the radical (though not always as maximal as we might like) demands that it makes.

    (In fact in many cases the difference may be smaller then people would think. Take for example the SWP petition over nationalising woolworths and the practically identical one being pushed by Respect).

    On the other hand what we gain is far bigger. The potential ability to relate to and organise with a much larger and wider section of the working class.

    So while I agree with the document above I would put the emphasis slightly harder on the primacy of the broad party. As someone, I forget who, put it on another blog: One of the main problems with the SWP in Respect was not that they were a party within a party but that they were and party outside the party. That is because they refused to give up their right to go “straight to the class” their party and Respect operated in fact almost as rival organisations.

    To take some practice points, in my view:
    1) The Marxist current can recruit people who are not yet in the broad party but joining the broad party should be part of joining the current. I.E. The current should have no membership outside the broad party.
    2) The current should primary agitate using the publicity of the broad party. It should not (except perhaps on very rare occasions) use its own separate petitions or produce its own separate placards etc.
    3) Whilst the current will need some independent funds, its members should pay more subs to the broad party then to it.
    4) The current should be less organised then the broad group. It should hold far less meetings and its members should spend far more time directly on broad party initiatives.

    To invert and old Cliff saying SWP members are found of. It is better to be party of a bigger heavier but blunter axe then a sharper but much smaller and lighter one.

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  8. Joseph Kisolo Avatar
    Joseph Kisolo

    It is better to be part of a bigger heavier but blunter axe then part of a sharper but much smaller and lighter one.

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  9. Mark P Avatar
    Mark P

    Liam ‘ let’s take climate change as an example of the need for revolutionary politics. ‘

    Well if thats the case then gawd help the penguins. A little bout of modesty wouldn’t go amiss. The spruced up SWP grouplet, ie minus the nastier excesses, being advocated will remain precisely that, a tiny grouplet of entirelynegligible influence apart rom through organisations it has achieved through fair means or foul disproportionate influence.

    There really is no future in such dead-end politics. And the longer people maintain this futile myth the further they move away from any prospect of an outside left party, something which the left in every single other European country has achieved. If more time was spent considering the size and nature of tis failure of the English left rather than bothering ourselves with the antics ‘revolutionary regroupment’ of a few dozen diehards, or those enlightened souls in the SWP for whom the case for inner-party democracy has finally dawned then posters to this blog and the like might have at least the semblance of living in the real world.

    Mark P

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  10. RobM Avatar
    RobM

    Joe K, I very much agree with many of your points above and was going to post something (here or on the regroupment list) about the issues in your points 3 and 4.
    The problem, in some ways, is having a layer of members of the broad party who are really into this politics stuff in a big way. they have energies which they need to harness and they do this by discussing politics, writing for and then selling papers, attending meetings, organising events etc.
    All very good, laudable and worthy but things that, perhaps, your average memeber of the Broad Party will only do occasionally or at election times or when they are rrrreally fired up about an issue.
    So, revolutionaries, however loosely organised, will tend to dominate or have disproportionate influence no matter what they do unless there is some way of imposing a self-denying ordinance such as limiting the number of people we are allowed to sell the paper to (thats the Broad Party’s paper), the number of meetings per month we attend or even the time we allow ourselves to read party publications (email lists etc) and respond and discuss.
    The issue of subs is related and it is also a much more complex issue than it seems at first.
    Respect’s current £5 a year is pitiful- I was paying an order of magnitude greater than that as an SWP student in 1988!!
    I can also afford more than my small additional monthly standing order to Respect- but should I pay more? (I currently square the circle by putting a bit of money into the local campaign I am involved with- work that takes place outside the framework of Respect or any other organisation).
    If a revoultionary current did decide to pour the bulk of its members (former) subs money into the broader formation (a good thing to do if we want a regular press, a functioning office) there still must be a tendency to want something for the money in the longer term- if not direct influence in terms of executive members, perhaps, a feeling that we have a ‘right’ to have our stuff published in the paper which we largely finance.
    And the broader layers might also have concerns that the revolutionary minority unwittingly holds a financial knife at the throat of the party because they could take away their gold plated football at a later date.
    So, the issue is almost, pay a normal amount to the broad party- in line with other non-group comrades- pay an even smaller contribution to the revo current and spend the remainder on ice cream.
    The really ironic thing is that small groups tend to spend a lot of time on cunning plans to increase their influence inside organisations or campaigns whereas we are discussing how to curtail our own influence!

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  11. skidmarx Avatar
    skidmarx

    “(In fact in many cases the difference may be smaller then people would think. Take for example the SWP petition over nationalising woolworths and the practically identical one being pushed by Respect).”

    Though of course in the case of the SWP it may be mostly a scam to get names on a contact list, while for “Respect” it’s their entire agreed domestic strategy.

    Is “Respect” the broad class struggle party you speak of ? I see Thornett only goes so far as to call it a broad party of the Left. I must have a look at a dictionary to check whether black now means white, up down, etc. Apparently the editors of the current OED online forgot to include the word “gullible”.

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  12. thedigger Avatar
    thedigger

    Obviously no one from the ISG wants to come on and explain their current thinking and the public debate they have held to arrive at it.

    On the revolutionary regroupment site there is only two pieces posted in a 6 month period. Is this a secret discussion?

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  13. Ger Francis Avatar
    Ger Francis

    ‘revolutionaries, however loosely organised, will tend to dominate or have disproportionate influence no matter…’

    Not in any organisation which represents real social forces. In these bodies political leadership is more genuinely contested, more reflective of differing levels of class consciousness and therefore in general more conservative, less prone to abstract propaganda, and certainly less likely to have leadership bodies disproportionately stacked with ‘revolutionaries’ who in the real world represent nothing of social weight.

    In this country any broad left type formation dominated by the far left either reflects that organisations lack of roots in broader society and/or its political immaturity, for the simple reason that the real influence of the Trotskyite left does not reach beyond the farest fringes of society.

    Most Marxists with a half grip on reality and a touch of humility understand this and when operating in broad formations do impose a ‘self denying ordinance’. Those that don’t will find themselves prone to delusion and sooner or later confronting some very hard facts of life. The sorry tale of John Rees should illustrate this if nothing else. And in fairness to Rees and the SWP, whatever their limitations, they had a much more legitimate claim to at least represent something, however small, than any of their competitors on Trotskyite left.

    Initially the SWP leadership did operate in a very positive way in RESPECT. The problems arose when the lost their ‘self denying ordinance’ and started looking for short cuts. When confronted with real problems associated with pressures of electoral politics in South Asian communities they tried to find a solution by substituting their disproportionate influence in the structures due to RESPECT’s political immaturity for their lack of real social base. The consequence was a political abuse, a breakdown of trust inside RESPECT and more generally the destruction of much of the political capital the SWP had accrued in the anti-war movement.

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  14. The Digger Avatar
    The Digger

    (‘revolutionaries, however loosely organised, will tend to dominate or have disproportionate influence no matter…’
    Not in any organisation which represents real social forces. In these bodies political leadership is more genuinely contested, more reflective of differing levels of class consciousness and therefore in general more conservative, less prone to abstract propaganda, and certainly less likely to have leadership bodies disproportionately stacked with ‘revolutionaries’ who in the real world represent nothing of social weight.)

    Tut tut Ger don’t be so ahistorical. I am sure the Bolsheviks represented real social forces and they were crammed full of revolutionaries. And though I don’t share your new found fondness for the Cuban Government they claim to be made up solely of revolutionaries.

    While I don’t share your analysis of Respect I think this side of a socialist revolution (and even in a revolution itself), revolutionaries get their influence from their activity and political clarity. This can be disproportionate to their actual size. Now with influence comes responsibility, and that includes an awareness of how to build coalitions around areas of agreement. There are quite a few examples of revolutionaries doing this in practice, Stop the War, Defend Council Housing, Unite Against Fascism. In all these revolutionaries work with broader and larger forces. However there will be disagreements both tactical and political and therefore retaining separate organisation is important.

    Probably the only revolutionaries who don’ agree with this are those that have ceased to be revolutionaries.

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  15. Ger Francis Avatar
    Ger Francis

    I was being very historically specific, Digger. I am talking about the UK, at this moment in time. I agree with you that ‘with influence comes responsibility, and that includes an awareness of how to build coalitions around areas of agreement.’ .And critically, an awareness of who you are and what you actually represent. It is this issue of political responsibility that I am specifically referencing, and not just in relation to the SWP.

    I don’t agree with your view that it is tactics that determine whether you are a ‘revolutionary’ or not but that is another story and one I am not all that interested in engaging with at this moment. I don’t know all that much about UAF but from my experience I do generally agree with your assessment of the SWP’s role in DCH and STW. Wish I could have added RESPECT to the list.

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  16. Joseph Kisolo Avatar
    Joseph Kisolo

    Skidmarx – For the most part I am unsure what point you are trying to make in your post so unsure who to respond. I’m going to take what you right in good faith, though you don’t seem to be willing to do that for Thornlett.

    You ask if “Is “Respect” the broad class struggle party you speak of ?”. Hmm … Respect is a work in progress, just as it was a work in progress before the split.

    I aspire that it will become a broad class struggle party. I guess Thornlet would to. I think Galloway, Salma and Ger Francis and others would aspire to this too. Though we would probably all disagree about
    1) the best way to get there
    2) about which struggles we can most effectively get involved in at this point especially considering our small size and
    3) about what struggles are most important

    As to Thornlett using the term “broad party” rather then “broad class struggle party”. The terminology to disgribe the kind of broad party is all over the place at the moment as no one as really theoretically pinned down exactly what it is we need. I would suggest that this is an issue for everyone on the left.

    How would you characterise the type of party we need to build? Since you right off Respect and Left Alternative has been mothballed, how do you think we can get to this party? Or do you think ‘objective’ circumstances make it impossible at the current time and that we should just go back to building limited revolutionary groupings? I hope not the latter as though that might seem like the easiest path right down that road does not lead out of the wilderness.

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  17. Joseph Kisolo Avatar
    Joseph Kisolo

    Mark P – I think the point you are making is about the assumption made by “revolutionaries” that their political outlook gives the sharpest answers to all questions and its fallacy.

    If so, then to a large extent I agree with you. The Marxist tradition isn’t some kind of magical answer book, it should not be thought that adherence to it results in automatically more correct answers.

    You rightly mock the idea that Marxism provided a better grasp of climate change. Indeed the activists that first started campaigning about climate change mainly held a loose mix of anarchist and autonomist political view points. I do believe that the Marxist tradition can add something important to the discussion around climate change campaigning but only through dialogue not through assuming it has all the answers.

    I would add that on every day questions such as; should we leaflet this estate or that, should we put out 100 leaflets or a thousand, how do we get people to join us in this leafleting, what exactly should the leaflet say – and such like – the idea that Marxist will find it easier to get the correct answer is laughable to the extreme. All such issues should be decided within framework of broad party.

    You may think any grouping of Marxists is thus problematic. I however disagree because I think that there is still much positive to be taken forward by that tradition and that for it to remain alive people who accept it should organise around it. Of course if this is seen as a replacement for (or more important than) organising through the broad party then it will fuck things up.

    As I hope is clear from Thornlett’s article and what others are saying no one intends to build a group or grouplett that will act separately from Respect.

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  18. Joseph Kisolo Avatar
    Joseph Kisolo

    Ger – On your “self-denying ordinance” point. I’m not sure if I fully agree with this.

    True for Marxist to try to impose there world vision on a fledgling party would be daft. Also true is that if the party were to grow into a real broad party the weight of the Revo’ Marxists would come to be more in scale with their real (currently very unfortunately small) real social weight.

    I don’t agree that the abandonment of such an “ordinance” by the SWP was what caused Respect to spilt. It may suit SWP leaders to claim today that the split was over them trying to pull Respect to the Left, but in truth its post-hoc justification. The split was over the external pressure for a better operating party verses the SWP’s need to keep Respect loose so it did not rival their separate party. Or at least that’s how I see it. Would you disagree with this? Perhaps I’ve misunderstood your point.

    I see your not at all interested in discussing your view that it isn’t tactics that determine whether you are a ‘revolutionary’. A pity because on this I think I would probably be closer to you then to digger. As I said in my reply to Mark P, the marxist tradition/being a ‘revolutionary’ doesn’t provide set answers to tactical (in one sense not to any) questions.

    Take having a discussion over whether to call a strike or not. This is the kind of question that many ‘revolutionaries’ believe that they automatically can better answer because of their tradition. But reading Lenin won’t tell you how motivated the workers on the ground are. It won’t tell you what length of strike is needed to make the bosses give in. On such questions, a rooted trade union activist, whether her politics be anarchist, ‘reformist’, labourist or whatever, is likely to have a far better grasp of the opportunities for struggle.

    This is what make the idea of “revolutionaries” caucusing before broad party meetings, making decisions over say what candidate to stand, before they have all had a chance to jointedly discus the different perspectives within the whole room, so very ridicules.

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  19. Joseph Kisolo Avatar
    Joseph Kisolo

    I support the regroupment, however insignificant and small it may be, because I think that if we are ever going to change the world we will need to do more then struggle – we will need to have an over arching view of the sort of different society we want – we need grand narratives. This may be an unfashionable view in these supposedly post-modern times but I think it is true.

    I would welcome the setting up of different tenancies within Respect that try to develop different grand narratives. A group that develops automomist views about how we work around the state prehaps, a group that pushes forward ideas about the importance of focusing on small scale community work, a statist big government/old labour type group maybe. I wouldn’t generally support any of these world views but I would welcome them collectively developing ideas to through into the pot

    The answer I sure some will give is that such multi-tendency loverlyness is all very well in principle but in practice – i.e. within Respect as it is now – it is a diversion because:
    1) Respect is too small to correctly reflect the different tendencies of thought in the real world.
    2) The balance of tendencies within Respect would squee power towards those how now have the most apparent weight but wouldn’t have actual weight in a real mass party (i.e. the revolutionaries).
    3) all this is a diversion away from getting on with building Respect.

    (1) is correct however setting up such groups now even if they don’t do much at present, is the best way to insure they flourish in the future.

    (2) Can be overcome by such groups not seeking to push their world view on the broad party but participating in debate as outlined above.

    (3) It need not be. Indeed for those of us who do see ourselves as standing in particular traditions it may be a way to best sustain and increase out involvement in the broad party.

    Sorry for hogging the discussion board and for these 4 rambling posts. I hope people find stuff they can agree and disagree with in them.

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  20. skidmarx Avatar
    skidmarx

    Joseph Kisolo – I try to look with good faith on the writing of Thornett and the Thornlettes, but I think to believe that anyone outside the ISG really sees “Respect” as being oriented on class struggle when the calculation to ditch the SWP and the prespectives based on it all seem to centre around the elctoral base it claims to have, and to believe that it will evolve is a fantasy. It’s certainly not a broad party in terms of numbers, even if the hope of electoral success is all that binds those left within it together.

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  21. Chris Brooks Avatar
    Chris Brooks

    Just a quick, personal, reaction to thedigger´s comments on the ISG and democratic centralism. I share Liam´s view that what the British left calls democratic centralism is a distorted Stalinised, top-town hierarchy. It would be quite unrecognisable to the Russian socialists who coined the term. In the sense understood by the bulk of the British left, the ISG is not a democratic centralist group. Neither, I think, will the new organisation which we hope will replace the ISG. But the new organisation will be democratic and, as in any organisation, we hope that we will have the maximum unity in action behind collectively-made descisions.

    I was interested by the comment that “revolutionaries get their influence from their activity and political clarity.”. We should not forget that, on the British left, we have also had the experience of the leaderships of far left groups substituting for the broad vanguard and, to a certain degree, excluding the rank and file from participation. That, for example, is the experience of the SWP, whose bureaucracy is reflected in both the party and the broader movement. It has primarily gathered control, rather than grown its influence, and we should not mistake the two.

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  22. Irish Left Review · ULA! “No one would have believed….”

    […] posting: 18th December 2008; Alan Thornet, ‘What Kind of New Organisation Do We Need?’ A Contribution to the discussion on organisation between former members of the SWP, […]

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