30.05.2001

Leaving behind the ghost of Cliff

Letter to IST

Dear comrades

1. Accompanying this document you will find some notes on international regroupment on the revolutionary left. These originated as a letter that I wrote in March to Daniel Bensa?d of the Ligue Communiste R?volutionnaire, and they helped to provide the basis of discussions that took place between members of the SWP central committee and the LCR political bureau on May 17. Also accompanying are the notes that formed the basis of Chris Harman?s presentation of the SWP?s position at this meeting.

2. This meeting took place at the initiative of the LCR. The discussions showed quite a high degree of agreement over the nature of the objective situation - there was, in particular, a shared appreciation of the significance of the movement against capitalist globalisation. A number of practical issues came up: it was agreed that the SWP and the LCR would try to organise a far left rally in Genoa; in addition to the presence of a number of LCR speakers at ?Marxism 2001?, we have been invited to attend the LCR conference in June, to participate in the Fourth International youth camp in Rome in late July, and to speak at the LCR summer camp at the end of August. The possibility of the SWP being invited to the next international executive committee of the FI was also mooted.

3. As my letter to Bensa?d makes clear, the starting point for any consideration of regroupment on the revolutionary left is the changed situation created by Seattle and the rise of the anti-capitalist movement.

More specifically: the key test of left currents today is how they relate to the anti-capitalist movement. As we know, the International Socialist Organization (US), despite its history and theory, failed this test, while currents much further away from our tradition - for example, elements from an orthodox Trotskyist background, and even the Democratic Socialist Party (DSP) in Australia - have not. It would therefore be sectarian to insist that we will only work in the same organisation with revolutionaries who also accept the theory of state capitalism (though the issue, of course, closely related to Cliff?s theory of substitutionism, is still very important).

Because of the prominence of international mobilisations and conferences in the anti-capitalist movement, the different international revolutionary tendencies are coming into contact with [each other] much more than in the past 20 years. In the 1980s and 1990s each tendency ploughed its own furrow: we are now entering a period more like the 1970s, when the different international currents interact much more, whether as allies or rivals (or both).

As in the 1970s, the British SWP - still much the largest group in the Tendency - may have to make its own initiatives towards other big far left organisations. The IS Tendency made a big impact on the European left thanks to its interventions at Prague and Nice. Because of this, and because of the British SWP?s electoral initiatives with the Socialist Alliance and the Scottish Socialist Party, we are being taken more seriously as an internationally current. We can?t any longer be dismissed as the SWP and its tributaries.

4. In Britain the united front approach that the SWP has been pursuing since the outbreak of the Balkan War two years [ago] has helped to produce a process of realignment on the left. To be precise, the Socialist Alliance in England and Wales has brought together the bulk of the far left in an electoral intervention that has begun to attract the support of significant elements from a Labourist background. Some elements would like it to become a new party. We disagree, for the reasons spelled out by Lindsey German in Socialist Worker (May 5 2001). But we do envisage the SA becoming an organisation that campaigns on a broad range of issues after the election.

We have worked very well with some elements in the SA, notably certain ex-Militant cadres and the International Socialist Group (British section of the FI). We see no principled reason why they shouldn?t be integrated into the SWP. The ISG have said they will propose that the SWP is invited to the next world congress of the Fourth International in 2002.

The Scottish Socialist Party is a peculiar formation: based on a relatively small group of ex-Militant activists whose politics remains at best centrist, it has a very significant working class periphery thanks in particular to Sheridan?s high profile in Scottish politics. Their prominence is in part a consequence of our past mistakes - in particular the opening we gave to Militant through our failure properly to intervene in the anti-poll tax movement in Scotland. But the balance of forces on the ground between our Scottish comrades and the ex-Militant cadres is much more even.

The SSP hard core is divided between sectarians who are irredeemably hostile to us, and key elements in the leadership (notably Sheridan and McCombes) who recognise the contribution we can make to build a much broader workers? party on the basis of disillusionment with New Labour. Joining the SSP involves an element of risk, but not to have done so would have thrown away an unprecedented opportunity to reshape the left in Scotland.

5. The objective situation is thus posing the question of regroupment, certainly in Britain and potentially internationally. It is important, however, to draw distinctions between the various formations with which we are coming into contact. For example, the SSP is a special case rather than a general model. It is very important to be clear about this, since what is happening in Scotland is being closely watched internationally. Centrist parties with a high public profile whose key leaders actually welcome revolutionaries joining them don?t grow on trees.

The LCR is another kettle of fish altogether. It is the USFI flagship in Europe, and did well in the recent municipal elections. It is a highly heterogeneous formation, with members ranging from left (and sometimes not so left) social democrats to genuine revolutionaries. A leading FI member described it to me as centrist.

It took an equivocal line on the Balkan War. LCR members have played an important role in the ATTAC leadership, but the organisation failed miserably to mobilise for Prague or (worse still) for Nice. Our comrades in Socialisme par en bas would be well advised to concentrate on building the broader movement through ATTAC and sharpening the small revolutionary axe within it rather than in getting involved in manoeuvres with the LCR. The same is likely often to be true of the FI groups elsewhere, which are often small and sectarian.

The DSP is involved with the International Socialist Organisation (Australia) in the Socialist Alliance, which is planning to stand candidates against Labor. It is also linked to the SSP. The DSP has plenty of money and is active internationally, notably in the Asia-Pacific region (eg, Indonesia, Pakistan, the Philippines). Its politics remains Stalinist - it has played a key role in encouraging the PRD in Indonesia to continue pursuing a stages strategy. It is therefore definitely a rival rather than a potential ally, but it is one that we must take seriously.

6. It?s quite unclear where the discussions with the LCR and possibly the FI itself will lead. But the idea might emerge of some larger international far left grouping embracing both the FI and the IST, and possibly other currents. At that stage, the Tendency (and it would, of course, have to be the Tendency that decided) would have to make a hard-headed assessment of the pros and cons of such a move.

7. What regroupment means in individual countries is likely to vary tremendously because of the state of the local left and the situation of our group there. It may mean nothing, either because our group is too small or because the line-up on the left is pretty rigid. The very deep crisis of British Labourism that Blair has accelerated won?t necessarily be replicated elsewhere. But the left internationally is in more flux than it has been for decades. Individual groups need to think creatively about how they can seize the opportunities that this situation may create for them.

Yours fraternally
Alex Callinicos
May 17 2001