30.06.2004

Debating the issues

Last weekend saw the second annual Communist University Wales. Held in Cardiff, it offered an opportunity for left activists to discuss issues affecting both the Welsh and international left. Ben Lewis reports

It was refreshing to see comrades from the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty, along with some of the Plaid Cymru left and a few independent socialists, at the CU Wales. Nevertheless the absence of what is still quite a numerous, although extremely fragmented, left in Wales says a lot about the situation we find ourselves in.

Comrade Houzan Mahmood of the Worker-communist Party of Iraq opened the first session by giving a unique analysis of the situation in Iraq, the forces operating within it, and the ongoing struggle of the Iraqi people. Branding this week’s so-called ‘handover of power’ as nothing but a sham, she said that her party’s declaration was something communists should support because it opposed the puppet regime and also distanced itself from political islam, which denied the workers’ movement even the “tiniest of freedoms”.

From this, the debate naturally led on to the relationship between genuinely progressive and secular forces and those forces who, comrade Mahmood argued, are exploiting the occupation of Iraq for their own interests. Cameron Richards of the CPGB argued that this relationship was something not only relevant to the situation in Iraq. It is relevant to Respect and electoral alliances with forces such as the Muslim Association of Britain - which is quite open about its links to the Muslim Brotherhood. Comrades Richards and Mahmood both agreed that the left should learn the lessons of Iran.
CPGB national organiser Mark Fischer said that in certain cases it is tactically beneficial to unite with such forces around certain issues - the occupation of one’s country being a rather significant example. Many comrades agreed that there is a so-called ‘third camp’ - neither backing the imperialist occupation nor blindly supporting the resistance, irrespective of the nature of the forces leading it. Comrade Mahmood pointed out that the western left has a rather frustrating tendency to do just this. In response to comrade Fischer’s argument that the AWL supports the first camp, seeing the occupation as the lesser evil, comrade Rob of the AWL replied that to call for a withdrawal of the troops is “unrealistic” - it would hand over power to political islam, which would crush the workers’ movement just as it did in Iran in 1979.

Mike Macnair, however, argued that this missed the point. He said that a feature of imperialism since World War II had been to destroy the infrastructure of countries where it intervened, leaving in its wake warlordism - Afghanistan and Iraq being the most recent examples. Now, the US administration is looking for an exit strategy, which involves political wheeling and dealing with forces like shia leaders and so forth, effectively meaning that they would hand over power to the islamists anyway. This follows on from British imperialism’s strategy of divide and rule and creates rival communalist movements which are far from progressive.

The afternoon session saw Mark Fischer and Cameron Richards, a supporter of the CPGB’s Red Platform, debate ‘After Respect: what are the lessons?’ Comrade Fischer argued there was no need to dress up the SWP’s shift to the right - it was a sect that has been inspired by the two million people marching in London against the war on February 15 2003; but frustrated that it had failed to get the slightest boost in numbers to show for it. The response from the SWP was to ditch the Socialist Alliance and veer off sharply to the right. Nevertheless, while this was far from welcome, the fact of the matter is that Respect has been created and has gathered together slightly bigger forces - and as a site for struggle that at least was positive. Our Red Platform was certainly sectarian and misguided in its approach, said comrade Fischer. The conditions it chose to place on Respect candidates were artificial, in that they did not apply to other left candidates, and reflected both political immaturity and impatience with the SWP’s shift to the right.

Comrade Richards insisted that his stance is not determined by George Galloway, but rather the way in which the SWP, with the CPGB following them, had given up on the third campism of the International Socialist/Cliffite tradition which once held to the slogan, ‘Neither Moscow nor Washington, but international socialism’.

The Red Platform’s identification of MAB Respect candidates as unsupportable under any conditions was not - as some in the SWP, and even in the CPGB, have suggested - due to islamophobia. Rather it is based on the same reasoning that last year led Jack Conrad to ague that political principles should not be abrogated in working with such forces as the MAB. Furthermore, comrade Richards argued, the programme of engaging with the so-called muslim community was not only demeaning. It further alienated the white working class, who are increasingly drawn to voting for the BNP already. Rather we should seek to unite all of the working class along socialist lines.
This was arguably the most controversial debate of the weekend, with disagreements over the political nature of the MAB, the way in which communists should overcome religious ideas and prejudices, and also what the relationship between the workers’ movement and the church/mosque should be.

The evening session on Saturday was given over to the European Social Forum. The CPGB’s Tina Becker was of the opinion that, although the ESF was an excellent initiative in terms of bringing together the left across Europe, as presently organised it offered no real solutions. The danger was that it could simply become an annual jamboree for charity-mongering NGOs, left-posing careerists and the various sects. In Britain building local social forums had been practically ignored simply due to the fact that the SWP, the main left force, was not interested. Instead it has promoted its now almost defunct front, Globalise Resistance. Yet, where the left was pursuing a non-sectarian agenda, the social forum movement tends to be strong. This has created a wide political space within which the left can operate and find a degree of real social purchase - such as in Italy with Rifondazione Comunista.

The final day was dedicated to politics within Wales, covering the language and culture of the Welsh people. There was also debate around whether or not Welsh independence would bring forward socialist change in Britain. In these discussion the presence of Plaid Cymru left thinkers Alun Cox and Leanne Wood was very much welcome, of course.

Comrade Cox outlined the decline in the Welsh language since the rise of the industrial revolution. He argued that as socialists it was our duty to defend the Welsh language, just like all minority languages. We should uphold the rights of all to be educated in one’s own mother tongue and the right to receive state material, etc, in that language.

Comrade Bob Davies agreed that it is not possible to be a communist without defending the right of Welsh-speaking people to use and fully develop their language. He also highlighted how back in the days of primitive capitalist accumulation the best jobs went to English speakers. Hence the relative decline of Welsh to this very day. Nevertheless, the recent renaissance in the Welsh language is indicative that defending it has proved successful.

Mark Fischer argued against narrow nationalism. It was good to create the conditions where the Welsh language could flourish, but what was key was creating the political conditions where people voluntarily merged on the basis of the highest possible culture. Although the world was moving towards one culture under the impulse of capitalism and its fake icons celebrities, he nevertheless thought that it was positive that some kind of common culture was emerging. Communism would surely be build on this objective reality: it would see the light of day only when the whole of humanity has voluntarily merged to such an extent that it speaks one language.

The final debate of the weekend was devoted to the rise of socialist nationalism within the United Kingdom left. Leanne Woods put forward the argument that it was more likely that Welsh workers would achieve socialism through independence, since Wales, she said, has a much more leftwing tradition than Britain as a whole. Far from the stifling atmosphere of London, the democratic aspirations of the population could be met far more quickly. 

Bob Davies argued that it was unnecessary to call for independence. It was also unviable. Put into practice, a three-million-strong Welsh socialist state would either be a social democratic version of Ireland or a horrendous rerun of Enver Hoxha’s Albania. Socialism is international or it is anti-socialism.

Leanne Woods argued that it was necessary to split Wales from the British state. Time and time again all attempts to unite the UK left have failed. Comrade Woods’s observation, is of course, not without foundation. But like the struggle for socialism we should expect failure after failure … that is, until we succeed.