Letters

Pandering

Regarding my distinction between the "rational kernel" and the "pseudo-religious" elements of Marxism, Joseph Roth argues that "rationalism is not always enough", since sacrificing oneself for the cause can only be justified in pseudo-religious rather than rational terms (Weekly Worker September 14).

In so arguing, Joseph is guilty of pandering to the pious myth that self-sacrifice, altruism and morality are impossible without some sort of religious faith. And he also gives credence to the reactionary myth that people who want to bring about fundamental change in society must be unthinking, irrational fanatics.

The pseudo-religious elements of Marxism which I was suggesting need to be ditched are (inter alia): the assumption that true believers possess ready-made, absolutely complete and correct answers to all possible questions concerning history, philosophy, natural science, life, the universe and everything; the elevation of certain writings into unquestionable holy scriptures; the acceptance of arguments from authority; the elevation of the leaders of parties and factions to the status of infallible 'popes'; and the use of 'dialectical' mumbo-jumbo to justify clinging dogmatically to theories, perspectives and forms of organisation which have palpably been discredited.

Pandering

Cultism again

Dave Turner's response to my letter on cultism is interesting (Weekly Worker September 7). I will set aside his references to my personal past and present, and that of Tim Wohlforth: what matters is the argument. The issue is whether much of the everyday practice found on the far left is inherently cultic (whatever that may mean), whether such an analysis sheds some light on the major problems which have beset the left over many decades, and what should be done about it.

To summarise, I view cults as organisations run by a charismatic leader/guru deeply convinced of their personal indispensability for the group's project, and who encourages an attitude of reverence and debilitating dependence on the part of the membership. Gerry Healy, Tony Cliff, Peter Taaffe et al spring to mind. Such leaders discourage independent and critical thinking. All worthwhile insights are deemed to have originated with the leader, who has mastered the sacred texts from which the group's semi-divine insight is said to spring.

For example, in his later years, Gerry Healy became obsessed by the category of 'semblance' in dialectics, and insisted that an understanding of the topic was an essential precondition for rational thought. Naturally, doubts arise. However, members are kept too busy to think (collecting money, selling papers, 'building the party'). When I joined Militant in 1974 the main line of the leadership was that there would be either socialism or catastrophe within 10 to 15 years.

Typically, cult leaders strive to project an image of monolithic unity. Hence, they fear genuine debate. Of course, they make persistent assurances about democracy, and just as routinely violate them. Still sound familiar? Sometimes they face the tantalising prospect of influence in the real world, as did Militant in the 1980s. However, this suggests alliances with others, and involves relinquishing the notion that they possess a monopoly of wisdom. Hence they prefer to reassert control over the frantic activities of their dwindling and increasingly desperate membership.

Such an approach further repels those genuinely interested in change and ensures that the group, despite occasional surges in membership, remains small. Each such group is implacably convinced that it alone holds the key to world salvation in its hands. Competitors are dangerous, and are disparaged at internal gatherings. Ironically, the closer others are to the cult's own ideological lineage, the more they are ridiculed.

I also argue that cults routinely manipulate the membership and therefore in a real sense con people into joining. For example, in my former incarnation (highlighted by Dave) as a Militant leader in Northern Ireland, the organisation's main guru there, Peter Hadden, argued with me that leaders of the organisation should go out of their way to appear even more certain of their views in public than they were. This is manipulative nonsense, designed to project an impression of infallible gurudom rather than engage the critical faculties of members. In this conception, the role of members is to applaud the efforts of the leadership, however dismal their performance.

Ultimately, it is what organisations do rather than what they believe that qualifies them to be cults. I have never argued that all Marxists or Marxist organisations are cultic. However, if it quacks like a duck and waddles like a duck, it is a duck. Wherein, precisely, does the internal practice of the CWI, SWP, etc differ from that of the Moonies? There are some differences (to my knowledge, no one has alleged that Tony Cliff derived personal profit from his organisation), but in terms of how the membership are driven, motivated and manipulated the similarities are more striking than the differences.

Dave argues that it is patronising to suggest that people can be manipulated into adopting courses of action against their real best interests - one of the things cults do well. Is it? Insurance salesmen made a killing in the 1980s, flogging products that were useless and which people did not want. It does not mean that their hapless customers were cretins. It does mean that we all have points of vulnerability, which others cynically use for their own ends. Dave stresses that many activists sincerely hold their beliefs. Sincerity is admirable, but does not equal proof that a belief is correct, and still less that there is no manipulation behind the process whereby the belief is adopted.

Dave writes that I try to equate the CWI's internal regime with the thought reform programmes found in such countries as China, and that this is grotesque and preposterous nonsense. Well, it would be - if I had said any such thing. There are clearly fundamental differences between the two - Peter Taaffe may be bonkers, but he does not shoot opponents in cellars. However - and dare I suggest that this is a dialectical point? - there are also similarities between thought reform programmes in Stalinist states and the internal regimes often found on the far left. It is worthwhile studying the similarities as well as the differences, in order to learn lessons from the mistakes of the past.

The left has failed in Britain and internationally for many years. There are a multitude of reasons for this. All I am modestly suggesting is that at least some of the blame lies in the left's internal organisational practice. In approaching this problem we will not find ready-made answers in the works of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky. But we might find worthwhile insights from studies in psychology, communication theory and other disciplines.

By no means am I suggesting that the particular approach adopted by Tim and myself in our book (On the edge: political cults right and left) exhausts the question. I acknowledge there are many political issues that must also be addressed. But perhaps our analysis might be part of the answer, however small.

Cultism again

LSA slogans

When Mark Fisher writes that the Red Action call for 'a review' of London Socialist Alliance strategies and tactics in regard to the refugee issue was "overwhelmingly defeated" at the steering committee meeting on September 5, he is of course correct, but it is not the entire story. Indeed the issue is far from being either clear cut or resolved (Weekly Worker September 7)

While acknowledging that the CPGB has some "sympathy", with the resolution, but abstained, he omits to mention in his report that others were similarly ambivalent. Joining the CPGB in refusing to vote against the resolution were, along with the Revolutionary Democratic Group delegate, two 'independents' elected from the conference floor in June. With the addition of the Red Action delegate, this took the dissident vote to six - about 20% of those present.

In addition to these six, a delegate for the Socialist Party had also argued strongly that the resolution should not be dismissed out of hand. After the meeting, a delegate for yet another organisation, while having voted against the resolution, admitted she had felt 'uncomfortable' with the way the debate had been conducted. Mainly because, as she explained, while those opposing the resolution argued that the 'Refugees welcome here' slogan had proved a 'vote winner' in Haringey, when she went to canvass she was instructed not to 'bring race into it, unless they do'.

Similarly, in marathon discussions around the same subject on the UK Left discussion page, Alliance for Workers' Liberty member and LSA candidate Janine Booth was prepared to acknowledge that, at least in relation to the specific criticisms around the slogan 'Refugees welcome here', "Red Action were right".

Now we have Mike Marqusee, who argued vociferously against the need for any 'review' on September 5, more or less calling for precisely that in the letters pages of this paper little more than a week later (Weekly Worker September 14).

Marqusee now argues that the real importance of any slogan is "what particular resonance it has in the minds of the people to whom it is addressed". He then adds that, "It is idle to expect any single slogan ... to strike the same chord among the many different sections of a fragmented class." The limitations of a slogan like 'Asylum-seekers welcome here', he admits, "is that it doesn't make anyone do anything, it makes no demands on anyone but ourselves".

And particularly in light of "Labour's proposals to recruit selected skilled immigrants", a way must be found, he concludes, "to express the underlying class content of the issue".

It may startle some of your readers to discover that these are points Red Action wholeheartedly endorse. In point of fact, it was precisely these arguments in support of the need for an 'urgent review' within the LSA which were heavily flagged on September 5. If everyone had been entirely candid, then the LSA steering committee vote may well have been "overwhelming", but with the opposite result. As has previously been pointed out, a certain prejudice against Red Action also extends, as is evident from the content of the letters pages here, to that half of the class not visibly represented within the LSA. If that is to change, then it is the LSA rather than the section of the class to whom the slogans are addressed, which will have to change - first. As we cautioned at the outset of the debate, this it is not really a matter of changing slogans, but mind sets.

Though the era of the sect is over, facilitating such a transformation, as this example shows, will not be easy - but it can be done. Indeed, as is also increasingly evident, the credibility, and indeed very survival, of the LSA depends precisely on such a reorientation. For, as recent events demonstrate, neither momentum nor time is on our side.

LSA slogans
LSA slogans

Fight immigration

I must say that I am disappointed. I was expecting denunciation, but hoping for intelligent denunciation. Comrade Tom Delargy speculates that I might be embarrassed. Well, I feel like a bull who has just charged into a china shop and has upset some very well-to-do customers.

I stand accused of being a "fellow traveller" of the BNP by comrades Ian Donovan and Tom Delargy. This is a very serious accusation. It has, however, illustrated quite clearly the thinking of these comrades.

Ian Donovan is an ex-member of the Spartacus League. This is a tendency which believes that Marxist theory is complete and all there is to do is to argue from shibboleths. This means that actually understanding your opponent's thinking is unnecessary because if they disagree with you then they are wrong. Arguments, for the Sparts, serve the purpose of arriving at the pre set conclusions. It strikes me that Ian has broken organisationally and politically, but not methodologically with the Sparts. Incidentally, open borders is not one of the Spart shibboleths - it is not part of Marxist orthodoxy at all.

Similarly Tom is an ex-member of the SWP, who have a similar tendency to invert reality to fit their theories. For both Tom and Ian immigration is not a class phenomenon, but a law of nature. Open borders becomes a categorical imperative. Tom, Ian and many, many other middle class leftists have it hard-wired into the their heads that the attitude to immigration in general is the same as the attitude to immigrants in particular.

Anyway, back to the BNP. What exactly is the BNP? What does it aim to do? These are very important and very difficult questions. It is an organisation which is transforming from overt Nazism to trendy new European right ideologies. This does not answer the questions though, and I admit that I do not have the answers. Fascism is by its very nature subjective and voluntaristic. It does not necessarily see itself as it really is. I would speculate that fascism can change radically, depending on the historical conditions without even being conscious of those changes. We can, however, say a lot about its ideological underpinnings just by a glance at its propaganda.

The first thing to understand about fascist ideology is that it does not rest on thin air. It always, but always exploits real issues and real concerns. That is, real material conditions. It is not simply reactionary ideas which are created by reactionary ideas and propagate more reactionary ideas.

The second thing to understand is that the issues are approached with an ultra- rigid adherence to a perceived status quo. However, capitalism is contradictory. Social and economic processes have different phases and at different points can be opposites. For this reason fascist attempts to make capitalism consistent are reactionary. Their efforts turn into its opposite. For the fascist this does not matter: they are 'doing the right thing'.

Then and only then does fascism arrive at reactionary dogma, be it racist, be it homophobic, be it misogynist, be it whatever.

For the fascist and his mirror image - the liberal anti-fascist - this process is in reverse. The fascist cynically exploits legitimate concerns of ordinary people for the propagation of his ideology. The liberal anti-fascist cynically exploits popular disgust at reactionary ideology so as to propagate his own fake 'progressive' ideology.

Now there are two phases with modern mass immigration. The first is the crises, wars and national inequalities caused by globalisation. It should also be added that our rulers actively conspire (although it is no official secret) to bring in cheap labour so as to undermine wages. The second phase is that immigrants are pitted against 'natives' and indeed other immigrants. This is where the imperialist, anti-communist ideology of multiculturalism comes in. Open borders socialists see only the second phase just as the far right only sees the first phase. The open borders socialists rightly believe that immigrants should be integrated: they rightly challenge the racism and the state harassment that immigrants face. They do not see the fact that immigration is used to undermine living standards. It is ironic that both 'right' and 'left' end up greasing the wheels of Blairism.

It has been said that Red Action capitulate to fascism when they say that the left should learn from the right. On the contrary it makes them closer to genuine Marxism than any other tendency in Britain.

I maintain that it is our task to fight anti-immigrant attitudes and measures, but also to fight immigration and multiculturalism. Down with the new world order and its apologists on the 'right' and the 'left'!

Fight immigration
Fight immigration

Just say 'socialism'

I realise that Leninists are opportunists who believe in trying to get on any bandwagon that's started rolling, but I must say that I was surprised to read in Jack Conrad's article on the petrol protest that you are in favour of "a set of immediate programmatic demands, including the abolition of VAT, the cancellation of small business debts and mortgages, cheap credit, and generous subsidies" (Weekly Worker September 14).

Quite apart from the fact that this is not a credible programme in terms of those you hope to convince (ie, people who still have illusions that capitalism can deliver reforms that will help them) - the question of 'where's the money to come from?' will inevitably arise in their minds, and they might not like your answer of 'tax the rich' - if implemented it would make the situation of small road hauliers even worse, since it would make entry into this already overcrowded line of business easier, so adding to the overcrowding and number of bankruptcies.

Also, of course, your other immediate demand to raise the minimum wage won't appeal to them either. But why should socialists make proposals to help small businesses survive under capitalism? Why, in fact, should socialists make any proposals to patch up capitalism? Let's just propose socialism without any minimum programme of reforms.

Just say 'socialism'

Progressive taxation

A week is a long time in politics, and there are going to be a hell of a lot of them before the general election. That is why I have nothing but contempt for bourgeois political commentators. Almost without exception, these oh so clever people, from across the mainstream political spectrum, have been arguing that New Labour is a shoe-in at the general election. Incapable of dialectical thinking, they are oblivious to all but slow, evolutionary changes. All previous revolutionary leaps fade, almost instantaneously, from memory.

Jack Conrad, on the other hand, has the firmest grasp of Marxist dialectics. So what is his excuse for writing the following in the middle of last week's oil blockade: "The Tory Party is a rump and deeply divided over the euro. More than that, it is still nowhere in the opinion polls. Hague's prospects for the forthcoming general election look decidedly dim" (Weekly Worker September 14)?

It was none too clever to have made such a statement before the blockade, but to have done so during it beggars belief. Jack thus demonstrates a false assessment of both the opportunities and threats facing the revolutionary left in Britain today. In my opinion, the CPGB PCC has never properly understood Blair's popularity. You do not have to believe that Britain is teetering on the verge of revolutionary struggles in order to recognise that support for New Labour was a mile wide but never more than an inch deep. It was never going to take very much for it to collapse. With the Tories the natural alternative government under the first-past-the-post system (in England, that is), inevitably they would be the initial beneficiaries from any loss of confidence in Blair.

Three opinion polls over the last three days show the Tories ahead for the first time in eight years. Jack should not be surprised at this. But this fact poses far more serious questions for the conservative wing of the socialist alliances than it does for Jack. They have been determined to get next week's Coventry conference to decide to limit our general election intervention to standing only in safe Labour seats. They need to think very carefully about what has happened in the last week.

Thanks to New Labour's commitment to regressive indirect taxation, thanks also to their defiance of 90% support for the fuel tax protests, hundreds of "safe Labour seats" vanished in a puff of smoke last week. This incompetent, corrupt, hypocritical, anti-democratic government is perfectly capable of so pissing off Labour's traditional supporters - the working class and its potential allies (the middle classes) - that there could be no safe Labour seats within months. Are we really going to allow the incompetence of Blair to determine where we can and cannot stand?

We need to be clear that our standing against the Blairites does not make us allies of the Tories. We neither look forward to a Tory government, nor are we indifferent about the prospect. Blair is forcing us to fight them at the ballot box simply because he is singularly incapable of doing so effectively.

We alone have it in our power to stop reactionaries benefiting from the fuel tax fiasco. The greens cannot do so: they support this anti-Robin Hood tax! Workers (and all progressive sections of the middle classes) can protest against this tax without abstaining or voting Tory. But only if we present them with our socialist alternative. The socialist alliances should announce that we oppose all regressive indirect taxes, VAT included. The Tories can only promises to fiddle with these taxes. And they can only balance the books by slashing essential (and popular) public spending - health, education, pensions etc.

We, on the other hand, can call for substantial increases in such spending. And we can do so even while calling for raising the threshold for paying income tax! We can do all this by resorting to exponential increases in income tax on high earners, by introducing crippling corporation tax, and abolishing the right of inheritance on capital. We can also balance the books by slashing spending on things like defence. We can even steal the support of progressive sections of the green movement by calling for cheap, safe, regular public transport right across the country.

There is absolutely no prospect of the socialist alliance forming the next government, even if we contested every seat. However, by standing at least 100 candidates, presenting a genuinely socialist alternative to New Labour, the Tories, the greens, the nationalists and the fascists, we can make an historic breakthrough.

Alas, such a breakthrough is unlikely to take the form of our winning a single seat, nor coming close to doing so. But we can save a large number of deposits, especially by emphasising our policy of a workers' MP on a workers' wage. In the process, we will drag the political debate substantially to the left, thereby paving the way for an even greater breakthrough in the future - under PR elections, parliamentary by-elections and council elections.

It is in fact the only way to stop politics drifting ever further rightwards: to take fright, choosing to stand in only a handful of "safe" Labour seats, will simply allow the Tories, the nationalists and the fascists to exploit the palpable and entirely justified discontent with Blair and his wretched government. And we will make any future breakthrough that much more difficult

Progressive taxation
Progressive taxation