27.11.1997
Our slogans and reality
A reply to comrade Dave Craig
As demonstrated by his latest missive on the results of the boycott campaign and the slogan ‘parliament with full powers’, our comrade and friend Dave Craig is a stubborn fellow (Letters Weekly Worker November 20 1997). Having come to an idea or a conclusion, he sticks to it no matter what. In many respects that, of course, is an admirable and necessary quality for a revolutionary leader, whether it be in the field of science, art or politics. Prevailing opinion is very often mere aquiescence to an unacceptable situation or prejudice. So-called common sense is almost by definition superficial, conventional and blinkered.
Take the May 1 general election. The pro-Labour left insisted that there had to be a New Labour vote. That, these ‘sensible’ opportunists said, is what the mass of class conscious workers would be doing. The SWP, Morning Star, Workers Power, Workers Liberty, Socialist Outlook and other such publications and sects call this leadership. Rightly comrade Craig damned their miserable tailism. He sided with the CPGB, refused to bow before spontaneity and backed candidates standing as a left alternative to New Labour. The working class could do more than choose the butcher.
But comrade Craig’s stubbornness has a negative side. Defence of principle is a virtue. Refusing to take note of stated facts, actual practice and logic itself in the name of principle is blind dogmatism.
Take the September 11 referendum in Scotland. All the above named elements were going through their old routine of ‘leading’ the masses by following Labour. Almost as a reflex reaction they urged a ‘yes, yes’ vote. This time however the traditional pro-Labour left was augmented considerably. It was joined by a whole swathe of ‘anti’-Labour forces. From left nationalists to Scargill’s SLP, from Scottish Militant Labour to the Spartacist League, there was a united chorus ‘critically’ welcoming Blair’s monarchist parliament in Edinburgh.
Alone the CPGB and the Campaign for Genuine Self-Determination fought for an active boycott of Blair’s ‘rigged referendum’. Intransigently we stood by the Scottish Socialist Alliance’s founding principles of self-determination and a sovereign parliament with full - ie, constitutional - powers. Significantly unlike May 1, this time there was a wide and palpable gap between what masses of people aspired to and what Labour was proposing. If there was a potential crisis of expectations - of any sort - it existed in Scotland. Even amongst those who believed that there was no realistic option other than a ‘yes, yes’ vote there was a deep-felt disgust that Blair was offering nothing more than a sop (before the referendum 30% of the population in Scotland were reported as favouring outright independence). The CPGB and CGSD therefore objectively spoke on behalf of hundreds of thousands in Scotland at the very least. Given luck and single-minded commitment, we were well placed to ride spontaneity and imbue the masses with a conscious revolutionary perspective - ie, our programme.
Comrade Craig however only gave the most grudging endorsement, if that, to the boycott campaign. His was a ‘republican’ boycott. In other words the comrade wanted to stand against spontaneity. He failed to grasp the opportunities that had temporarily presented themselves. Communists could flow with and seek to articulate the democratic sentiments of those in Scotland who viewed Blair’s sop with contempt. The SNP, SML and the SSA majority had deserted or shelved the principled demand for self-determination in favour of Blair’s monarchist sop. Between May 1 and September 11 the field was clear for the CPGB and CGSD.
Showing a woeful, albeit uncharacteristic, lack of judgement, comrade Craig lambasted the ‘parliament with full powers’ slogan of the CGSD over a series of articles and letters in the Weekly Worker. Here for the benefit of the reader are a few choice samples.
On May 29 he describes the demand for a parliament with full powers, as “one of the most foul and rotten pieces of stinking reformism to issue from the lips of so-called Marxists in recent years”. On June 5 the parliament with full powers slogan was branded in equally harsh terms as serving “the interests of the constitutional monarchy”. “A parliament with full powers,” thundered comrade Craig, “is not a republican slogan.” The CPGB had, he said, a sub-minimum programme of reforming the monarchy. Foolishly, not to say dishonestly, he charged the CPGB with having adopted the politics of SML. On June 19 he was criticising himself not for being too “harsh” against the slogan, but for being “too soft”. On June 26 the comrade had nevertheless moderated somewhat his “harsh” assessment. Now the slogan was criticised in terms of being “ambiguous”; it “means different things to different people”. On July 24 the comrade was warning that the “revolutionary republican CPGB now has a scratch” - ie, support for the ‘parliament with full powers’ slogan - which, if not treated, can turn “gangrene”. Lastly on November 20 comrade Craig was worrying himself not about immanent and agonising death, but our appearing ridiculous to the left if we persisted claiming a mass impact for the CGSD. As to the “liquidator” ‘parliament with full powers’ slogan, it would have been acceptable tactically if it had “been possible to draw SML into an anti-Blair boycott united front.” From “stinking reformism” to “acceptable tactics” ... and all in five months.
Jack Conrad answered comrade Craig briefly in the Weekly Worker of July 10. Moreover we ‘starred’ in a two-way debate on the boycott campaign at the Communist University ’97. Frankly, rebutting comrade Craig’s charges is easy, but it does tax the patience - moreover, it should be pointed out that when it comes down to it, the politics of Conrad and Craig are programmatically extremely close. Hopefully therefore this will be the last time I will have to put the record straight on this particular issue (there are in my mind more fruitful areas to debate).
Let me answer comrade Craig point by point.
1. Comrade Craig says he was concerned to be on the “right side of the class divide” on September 11. He sought to identify with “those who went ‘on strike’ against Blair’s referendum, and against the bourgeois plan for a reformed monarchy” (Weekly Worker November 20 1997). A worthy aim. But it is also a passive method. We often find ourselves reduced to a similar, literary, form of struggle too. A good example is the collapse of the USSR. We commented on things, but could not change them - our Leninist forces in Britain being small, our Leninist forces in Moscow non-existent. Nevertheless in August 1991 the Provisional Central Committee recognised the crucial importance of issuing a statement ... to history. Our concern was to show, or place ourselves, on the “right side of the class divide” against both Gorbachev’s “quick” restoration of capitalism and the State Emergency Committee’s “controlled” restoration of capitalism. The PCC reiterated our advocacy of, and support for, a “political revolution”, and a “return to the world revolutionary line of Lenin, Sverdlov and Dzerzhinsky” (J Conrad From October to August London 1992, p252). In Scotland however, as explained above, the CPGB did have a possibility of mass action (no matter how remote). Our slogans and tactics were designed to put us into contact with, and in the leadership of, those who wanted more than what Blair had on offer.
2. That explains why comrade Craig simply highlights the absolute numbers of abstentions: ie, 49% in Glasgow and 1.5 million across the whole of Scotland. He seeks to identify with this bloc. On the other hand, the fact that we were determined to actually change things explains why the CPGB is concerned to underline and characterise our mass impact. Though needing qualification in that it was marginal, our impact was real. Offices were opened in Glasgow. Mass meetings were addressed. Our message forced its way into the mass media, radio, TV, press, etc. Letters, articles, interviews, debates. Tens of thousands of leaflets were distributed.
3. Our main slogan from May 1 to September 11 was self-determination. For the CPGB, and comrade Craig, a minimum demand. Till shelved, also the slogan of the SSA and SML. If the SSA majority and SML betray self-determination for a Blair sop parliament, there is no need for us to drop our own slogan, as comrade Craig seems to suggest. On the contrary our responsibilities and possibilities dramatically increase. We correctly linked the overwhelming desire of the Scottish people for self-determination with the means previously advocated by the SSA and SML through which it could be exercised: that is, a parliament with full powers.
4. Is the call for a parliament with full powers in Scotland incorrect? It would certainly be wrong to place such a demand on the UK state in the midst of an unfolding revolutionary situation. Then we communists would almost certainly stress the role of working class organs like the councils of action produced by the upsurges in 1920 and 1926. In order to convene a Scottish constituent assembly, they, the workers organised in their soviets across the whole of Britain, should take power. Then on the ruins of the old state the Scottish people can freely and democratically decide their own future up to and including independence. The CPGB would, of course, fight for the unity of the peoples of England, Scotland and Wales, international revolution and working class power in a commune-like semi-state.
5. What do we mean by ‘full powers’? As explained in Jack Conrad’s widely read pamphlet Blair’s rigged referendum and Scotland’s right to self-determination the CPGB is for a sovereign parliament that can exercise self-determination.In my words, a “republican parliament” or a “constituent assembly”.
6. These formulations were explicitly echoed in the propaganda of the CGSD. The CGSD made clear in black and white its commitment to a “republic” in its main propaganda folder. Comrade Craig’s charge that we had gone over to a programme of “reforming the monarchy” is therefore completely unfounded and rather ludicrous. It is a falsehood, a calumny.
7. Did the pro-Labour left and the left nationalists stand for a ‘parliament with full powers’ between May 1 and September 11, as comrade Craig contends? No, they did not. Instead they supported Blair’s parliament and a ‘yes, yes’ vote. Hence the SWP, SML and the SSA majority shunned the principle of self-determination for the sake of a monarchist sop. Comrade Craig quotes our Trotskyite friend, John Stone, at one of our recent London seminars. He claims the comrade opposed a federal republic in the name of a parliament with full powers. Yet that is not how I remember things. Comrade Stone in fact strongly criticised the CPGB for not voting ‘yes, yes’ on September 11 - in the name of being with the masses. Against our common demand for a federal republic he counterposed Blair’s parliament on the one side and on the other an abstract socialism.
8. Comrade Craig is a member of the Revolutionary Democratic Group. Therefore we can presume he accepts its draft programme, the ‘Revolutionary democratic road to socialism’. Besides calling for a federal republic of England, Scotland and Wales it says Scotland and Wales should have self-determination. That, says the draft programme, should be both exercised under and against the existing state through a “referendum” and presumably some form of elected body (Weekly Worker July 11 1996). Ironically it appears that the CPGB has in practice fought for comrade Craig’s minimum programme against the opposition of comrade Craig.
9. Is the slogan a ‘parliament with full powers’ ambiguous? We must answer in the affirmative. The same goes for self-determination and a republic. All such slogans are by their very nature subject to many different interpretations and possible outcomes. Self-determination unites all manner of different forces. Nationalists would certainly exercise it for an independent Scotland. Comrade Craig called for a republican boycott - note, despite all his strictures, not a federal republican boycott. We too called for a ‘republic’ via the CGSD because we sought to reach out to left nationalists - ie, those who want a Scottish socialism or a Scottish republic. Naturally in CPGB propaganda we maintained our distinct position for a federal republic. The CPGB wished to keep in view its continued loyalty to the principle of working class unity and the necessity of overthrowing, not breaking up, the existing state. If comrade Craig would do away with all ambiguity he ought to, in the name of consistency, abandon the demand for self-determination. Being a democratic, comrade Craig will, I am sure, do no such thing.
10. Comrade Craig asks if the demand for a parliament with full powers - and presumably its concomitant, Scottish self-determination - is inferior or superior to the demand for a federal republic. It is a wrong question, comrade Craig. Slogans depend on concrete circumstances. Between May 1 and September 11 it was correct to place greater emphasis on self-determination than the demand for a federal republic. After September 11 it is the other way round. Now we must bring to the fore working class unity and firmly stand against spontaneity.
Jack Conrad