16.07.1998
A reply to comrade Abse
Toby Abse has felt the need to produce an article that is both polemical and open. Excellent news. Comrade Abse is not only a confirmed social democrat and a member of the Independent Labour Network; he is the chosen leader of the amalgamated bloc of the Socialist Party in England and Wales, Socialist Outlook and the Socialist Democracy Group that has malevolently formed itself in the London Socialist Alliance. So although “in the last analysis” he only speaks for himself, what the comrade has to say is a “reasonably accurate reflection of the thinking” of the amalgamated bloc.
Let me deal with comrade Abse’s article point by point. This will allow the correction of elementary mistakes and honest misunderstandings. It will also highlight the genuine areas of difference and show that despite them, with good will on both sides, principled unity is not only possible but desirable. Without its two wings, the left and the right, the LSA will never fly.
1. The CPGB is “seeking to build a democratic centralist Leninist revolutionary party which would have no room for left reformists and social democrats”. True. Comrade Abse is right. He is moreover spot on when he argues that the actual corporeal reality of the CPGB from 1920 to 1991 had only an equivocal relationship to that “model”. When it was formed - out of the fusion of various interdigitated but schismatic revolutionary groups - the CPGB was to all intents and purposes a left centrist party. Despite its impressive roots in the working class it possessed very shallow theoretical roots in Marxism. By the mid-1920s bureaucratic centralism replaced democratic centralism in practice. From 1935 onwards illusions were freely sown in ‘progressive’ imperialism and parliamentary democracy by the Harry Pollitt leadership. With the helping hand of Stalin in 1950 that bore poison fruit when the ‘official’ CPGB adopted a reformist programme (SPEW is committed to a similar British road to socialism). The liquidation of the Euro-wing in 1991 was thus a case of the dead burying the dead.
2. Our Leninist wing of the CPGB never fondly looked back over its shoulder to some golden age. Nor did we evolve from “classical Stalinism”. We certainly have nothing to do with “third period Stalinism”, as comrade Abse either mischievously or ignorantly alleges (our opposition to ‘national socialism’ is a critique of Stalin’s USSR and those who would repeat that sorry episode of history - the term and its critical meaning is, of course, taken directly from Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky, who employed the same or a similar oxymoron).
3. Reforging the CPGB is about what is necessary if the working class is to liberate itself and make itself the ruling class. Without a Communist Party the working class cannot really constitute itself as a class. Without a Communist Party the workers are incapable of decisive offensive action against capital and its state. Without a Communist Party the working class cannot hold state power. Can the same be said of comrade Abse’s Labour Party mark II?
4. The Communist Party is the highest, most conscious working class organisation. It combines the fullest democracy - enshrined in the right of minorities to form factions and openly debate in the Party press - with the most resolute unity in action (for the information of comrade Abse we apply those rules today). Factions not only have the right to their own autonomous publications but should be proportionately represented on leading committees. There is no exclusion of those who take part in agreed actions and who pay their membership dues. Nor should there be a requirement to toe the line of, or parrot, a particular thinker or doctrine. The Party cannot be reforged by turning away those who disagree with Leon Trotsky’s theory of “proletarian property forms” or Tony Cliff’s theory of “bureaucratic state capitalism”. To do so is merely to erect a narrow ideological sect. Unity in the Communist Party stems from the minimal requirement of accepting the revolutionary programme as the basis of common activity - no more and no less. Though by definition that counts out most left reformists it does not bar revolutionaries who have important differences on various, secondary, programmatic matters or principles (eg, the national question, parliamentary activity, Labour Party entryism). We have no interest in, or desire to create “a tiny ‘vanguard’ sect” or even a big vanguard sect. Our project is a class project. Comrade Abse should sum up the courage to admit it.
5. Reforging the CPGB is not the sole prerogative of any one group. All talents are needed. Every Marxist, every Leninist, every communist worth the name can and must be won to take up their responsibilities so they can play their full part in organising the advanced part of the working class into a mass revolutionary party. Such a Communist Party cannot become an actuality from the fusion of the existing groups. Nevertheless it is a task that can be greatly accelerated and qualitatively taken forward through the unity of existing groups (here we would include SPEW, the SWP, Alliance for Workers’ Liberty, etc, and not just comrade Abse’s “stranger” and “cult-like” grouplets). So our overriding perspective, to which we subordinate everything, is forging a working class weapon that can plan, make and defend the socialist revolution (which must have international scope and a simultaneous or synchronistic time frame, if it is not to fail - comrade Abse may scoff, but again we base ourselves firmly on and within Marxism).
6. Comrade Abse tacitly implies that SPEW, Socialist Outlook and the SDG are united in the struggle for a reformist party. He singles out the CPGB because that is not our objective. One must assume that comrade Abse knows his bloc partners and is privy to what they think. Needless to say, the CPGB is confident that the revolutionary minorities in these organisations will rebel against crypto-social democratisation. Either way, fighting to reforge the CPGB and working for the Socialist Alliances to become a mass force in British politics are not, as comrade Abse insists, mutually exclusive. His logic is woefully flawed. They are in fact complementary: ie, a unity. Reforging the CPGB as a Leninist vanguard in no way means that we seek to exclude social democrats or left reformists from the Socialist Alliances. Quite the opposite in fact. We are for the practical unity of the revolutionary left wing of the Socialist Alliances and the reformist right wing of the Socialist Alliances. Under present circumstances that means opposing Blair and his whole economic, social and constitutional programme. We have no problem therefore in taking sides, as comrade Abse boldly suggests, against Blair’s attack on the welfare state, and in defence of London Underground workers and the poor and oppressed in general. It should also be noted that, following the initiative of the CPGB, an overwhelming majority in LSA voted for a boycott of Blair’s referendum on his London mayor and assembly.
7. Unity is precisely what the CPGB’s motion at the July 5 LSA general meeting was designed to confirm, order and develop. Comrade Abse is correct to argue that at the end of the day we have in the Socialist Alliances “divergent political projects” (the same applies to communists and social democrats within the trade unions). But whether they are “totally divergent political projects” - ie, requiring, as comrade Abse infers, an immediate split - is another matter entirely. The CPGB is unequivocally for an inclusive LSA. There should be room in the Socialist Alliances for all shades of working class and socialist opinion. We strive for and would wholeheartedly welcome an influx of social democratic refugees from Labourism. The same applies to green socialists and militant trade unionists. The CPGB has no wish to mould the LSA into a conglomeration of sects, as suggested by comrade Abse’s good-for-nothing caricature. Because they can unite the advanced sections of the working class - a layer organised at present mainly in small groups - with those wider forces who have a middling or left reformist level of class consciousness, the Socialist Alliances can help to challenge and break Blairism, and thus open up a new era of working class politics. That is why the CPGB is determined to defend and institutionalise the right of every shade to have its legitimate place.
8. Our motion to the July 5 general meeting stood squarely for the continuation of the LSA’s inclusive democracy. The aim was to formalise the structures of LSA in the manner of the flexible, combative and inclusive democracy practised by the soviets - or workers’ councils - during and immediately after the Russian Revolution of 1917. John Reed, the celebrated US communist, rightly described the soviets as “the most perfect organs of working class representation” (What Next? No8, 1998). There is no revolutionary situation in Britain. In our view the world is in the midst of a period of reaction. Not surprisingly then, we are not sleeping with our boots on, expecting the “imminent arrival of soviets in Brent and Hackney” as comrade Abse groundlessly, factiously and only half-jokingly claims. Nevertheless the CPGB is convinced that the system of elected delegates and recallability can serve the Socialist Alliances admirably - because it is an alliance of federated organisations.
9. Comrade Abse slyly conflates our present situation with an abstract future. Instead of dealing concretely with the actual organisational needs of the moment and our immediate goals, methods and likely prospects, he conjures into being an entirely imaginary new party of recomposition which he knows for certain will contain a huge social democratic majority (and perhaps have 50 MPs). Like a typical utopian he then dictatorially lays down the law about what will and what will not be deemed allowable in his phantom party. Different papers and pamphlets are to be permitted. Parliamentary and council candidates standing on “the pure revolutionary programme” are ruled out of order. He thereby indulges not only in a flight of fancy, but excuses himself from the onerous but vital task of building unity in the here and now. In place of practical structures he substitutes easy platitudes and truisms. Whether or not the Socialist Alliances transform themselves into a party and what sort of party then develops can safely be left to posterity. Nothing with social weight is tabling ‘party’ at this juncture. What matters today is cultivating the political trust and building the organisational forms whereby the left can practically unite in an alliance. That is the burning issue that confronts the LSA (as it does Greater Manchester SA and the National Network).
10. As we have explained on numerous occasions, every affiliated organisation should have the right to send one instantly recallable delegate to LSA - that would include borough alliances, political organisations, trade unions and progressive campaigns (by that we do not mean every CPGB, SPEW or SWP branch, but their central or London committee). This arrangement is applicable to our movement - from the borough all the way to the National Network. It has the great virtue of recognising that at present we are an alliance or a federation and not a centralised party. Comrade Abse mocks our plan. “Nobody should expect tokenist reserved seats on any party executive,” he commands. Apart from the simple and undeniable fact that there is no party, we presume that comrade Abse and the amalgamated bloc envisage an alliance whose leading committees are entirely subject to the whim of this or that majority (either constituted by one faction or via backroom deals). This is no way to build the sort of unity or the trust needed. It certainly runs counter to the detail of Dave Church’s plan being presented on behalf of the National Network Liaison Group to the Rugby meeting on September 5 - it gives automatic representation to affiliated organisations with over 500 members (at the moment that would unfortunately exclude everyone apart from the ILN - a crisis-riven SPEW no longer clears that hurdle). Comrade Abse might also like to bring his much trumpeted academic skills “as an historian” to bear and consider the Labour Party. Constitutionally it remains a federated party. The trade unions, societies and CLPs have their automatic representation - however hollow. Equally to the point, prior to its crystallisation as a bourgeois workers’ party, it was agreed that the socialist groups, including the Marxists in the shape of the Social Democratic Federation, would have an automatic five seats on its 12-strong executive. The 54-14 vote by the SDF’s August 1901 annual conference to withdraw from the Labour Representation Committee was surely, as Martin Crick says, “a fundamental error” (M Crick The history of the Social-Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p97). And not one the CPGB is tempted to make in the Socialist Alliances.
11. Our plan allows for the speedy and full reflection above of growth, new priorities and changed political complexion below. As such it facilitates trust and unity. Organisations, not ‘star’ individuals, ought to be central to the Socialist Alliances. Representation should not be in the pocket of a majority bloc. It should come with affiliation. There would be no fixed terms. Hence a new affiliate would walk straight in as an equal partner and not have to wait cap in hand at the door (cooption is not something we favour, but should be avoided at all cost, because as a system for the Socialist Alliances it is prone to terrible abuse by a determined clique - a majority of one can be built into something totally unassailable using such a device).
12. The CPGB plan applies the same flexible practice to officers. Treasurers, editors, chairs, coordinators, trade union organisers, etc should be elected when and where needed, not according to some snapshot popularity poll by an atomised membership. The mayoral or presidential system has no legitimate place in our tradition. It breeds arrogance. Another labour dictator like Arthur Scargill would help no one apart from our enemies. Officers should be strictly accountable to their peers. They should be elected and replaceable by those whom they work alongside. If a comrade drops out because of illness, disillusionment or family pressures, another can easily be elected. By the same measure those officers who fail or who become isolated from an emerging political majority can be replaced without trial, humiliation and death at a full blown general meeting.
13. Our plan roots the LSA in the actual politics of its base. What happens below is almost instantly reproduced at the top. If we and comrade Abse are successful and there is a mass influx of social democrats into the Socialist Alliances then this will be fully and speedily reflected above. By the same measure if those social democrats move to the left under the dual impact of events and the CPGB then the political coloration and affiliations of those holding leading positions would likewise change from pink to red. So the CPGB’s plan is not organisationally inimical to the social democratic politics of comrade Abse and his amalgamated bloc. We merely stand for the right of the majority to take leading positions and the right of the minority to become a majority ... through political struggle, not exclusion.
14. Comrade Abse maintains that his amalgamated bloc “believe that there is a place for revolutionary currents” within their “new workers’ party and would be totally opposed to bans and proscriptions”. It is good to know that in the realms of abstraction comrade Abse and his friends are not anti-communist witch hunters. His “new workers’ party” will tolerate revolutionaries (presumably as long as they are happy to be a “small minority” and do the donkey work for the social democratic majority). But what about in the real world? Are comrade Abse and his bloc prepared to tolerate the CPGB?
15. On July 5 Nick Long of Lewisham SA and the SDG spoke for the amalgamated bloc. He claimed that it had no hidden agenda. Articles in the Weekly Worker to the effect that the amalgamated bloc wants to drive out the CPGB from the Alliance, as happened in Manchester, were the result of “paranoia”. His hypocrisy was easily exposed. Not only was comrade Long an anti-communist witch hunter during his brief stint in Scargill’s Socialist Labour Party. He remains one. During the July 5 meeting our comrades circulated an internal SDG document authored by a certain Duncan Chapple (a close ally of the SDG). Amazingly, in the name of “trust and mutual respect” and creating a “pluralistic” and “matrix-type organisation”, the SDG majority have been busily plotting to purge the CPGB.
16. The reasons put forward in secret by comrade Chapple are remarkably similar to those in comrade Abse’s open article. It is not that the CPGB has attempted to dominate, disrupted campaigning work or shirked its responsibilities (in London we have supplied the coordinator, kept the project afloat financially and during the May 7 local elections the biggest slate of SA candidates were fielded by the CPGB). No, what is so objectionable about the CPGB is that it apparently considers itself “the embryo of the future movement”. This “absolutist” notion, which certainly could be applied to Peter Taaffe’s ‘small mass party’, is for comrade Chapple “destructive” and for comrade Abse “total divergent”. Comrade Chapple delphically favours creating “the position” whereby the CPGB finds itself outside the “atmosphere of trust and transparency” the SDG piously preaches. Comrade Abse is more blunt. He advises us and our supporters in the revolutionary wing of the LSA to “reflect upon the merits of a principled split” along the lines the CPGB calls for in the proposed Scottish Socialist Party. Whatever the nuances, however, they both wish to see the back of the CPGB.
17. That comrade Abse and his amalgamated bloc partners raise no protest whatsoever against the documented anti-communism of the SDG majority speaks volumes about the worth of their democratic protestations. The silence on the Manchester events is also eloquent testimony.
18. Finally it ought to be explained to comrade Abse that there is a huge difference between the CPGB being a partner in a united front such as the Socialist Alliances (in London or Scotland), where we maintain an independent organisation and can openly - ie, publicly, including during elections - fight for our political programme, and being in a centralised ‘party’ committed as a founding objective to the nationalist break-up of the United Kingdom and a reformist road to national socialism (ie, non- or anti-socialism). The first is principled. The second is unprincipled.
John Bridge
CPGB representative on London SA ad-hoc committee