15.02.1996

World politicians

Marcus Larsen of Communist Party Advocates writes from Australia

I welcome the reply to our article by Mark Fischer (Weekly Worker 125). What is important about this debate is that we are approaching such questions as concrete internationalists. Questions such as where to organise - whether this entails a move from Kent or Belfast or Sydney to London (or the other way around) - are important. They are not abstract deviations from ‘real struggle’.

Contained in this discussion are issues of localism and the tension between top-down and bottom-up work. Also, there is the important issue of the flux, the development of the regroupment and reforging of the world communist movement as a real revolutionary force embedded in the working class.

I agree with much of comrade Fischer’s response. We are world politicians. “The struggle for revolution in a particular country is an organic and subordinate part of the fight for the world revolution,” as he correctly points out. His article then goes on to emphasise only one aspect of this dialectic: that we subordinate revolution in Britain or Australia to the tasks of the world revolution. What then do we mean by an organic part of the world revolution?

This aspect of our article was studiously ignored by comrade Fischer. One major aspect of our article identified a major problem with the world revolutionary wave of 1917-1923. At that time only one country had a party that was steeled in the long and arduous struggle of party building. Most of the other parties that became part of the Communist International were the result of amalgamations of left social democratic organisations and sects after 1917.

This is the history of the formation of both the CPGB and the CPA. It also contributed to the failure of the German revolution, the problems associated with the British general strike in 1926 and the crushing of the Chinese proletariat in 1927. The failure of communists to lead this revolutionary wave to victory in a number of advanced countries was part and parcel of the development of fascism and the corruption of our leaderships through placing defence of the Soviet Union above the tasks of the world revolution.

Of course, there were not only subjective factors at play here. I do not want to fall into the trap that some Trotskyists seem to do and say, ‘If it wasn’t for those dreadful Stalinists, we’d have won’. No, objective factors were at play too.

This is a crucial point at present. Where should we be working? We must fight to build revolutionary parties in every country in the world. Saying that it is just an “accident of geography” that we are working in Australia is a non sequitur. In one sense, it is an accident of geography and history. But these are the concrete conditions we have.

Our task as communists is to work with the concrete reality we have and change it. Not in a voluntarist fashion but in a collective, determined, scientific fashion. Can we leave the struggles in all countries to wait for the shining light of the reforged CPGB to bring on party formation around the world? We need an organic link between these factors.

 One, to build on the work of communist rapprochement begun in Britain and organically link this with reforging communist parties around the world. I think it is vital that when we are again in a position to lead a world revolutionary upsurge, we must have in place well developed communist parties, not just groups, around the world.

The comrades we work with in Australia are not empty containers. We all have organic links with various aspects of struggle of the class in this country. It is a given that for this point in time the level of the struggle is extremely primitive. If a small number of us leave for Britain, what message are we giving comrades here? That it is not worth struggling here at all? Pack it all in?

The reality is, not all of us could come to Britain, even if we thought it was the politically correct thing to do. Many people have organic links here, whether they be of a personal or political nature. After all, we are trying to build an all-rounded cadre, not Healyite automatons.

It is imperative that revolutionaries at all times, and especially in a period such as this, have deep wells of patience and tenacity. The call to drop everything and come to Britain smacks of impatience. If some of us come to Britain, it will be with the understanding that we will continue our ‘Australian work’ - both to broaden the understanding of comrades in Britain on issues they have little knowledge of (such as the indigenous struggle) and to develop ourselves as communists, so that we are better able to contribute to the world revolution and the reforging of the Communist Party of Australia as well as the CPGB. Not through any nationalist sentimentality, but because that is where we have real, concrete, organic experience of the class struggle, an understanding of the liquidation of the CPA and have developed a fledgling network of pro-party forces.

If some of us were to come to Britain, our immediate task in Australia would first be to lay the groundwork to ensure that the pro-party network we have begun to build does not collapse. It will be to link these small forces to a world struggle, to continue our work with them from Britain and, when the time is right, to rejoin them to build the Communist Party of Australia as part of a reforged Communist International.