02.12.2004

Fight for SWP democracy

Dave Isaacson responds to a strange article on the Socialist Unity Network website in defence of the SWP by an ex-SWP member

Comrade Palmer is not the only reader of this paper to notice our “orientation towards the SWP”. Andy Newman, a regular contributor to the website of the Socialist Unity Network, has clearly spotted this trend and has penned a lengthy article entitled ‘In defence of the SWP’ (www.socialistunitynetwork.co.uk). Andy’s piece is an attempted refutation of arguments contained within “two major articles in the Weekly Worker, the paper of the ambitiously named CPGB, attacking the SWP.” He goes on to paint a less than accurate picture of the CPGB’s internal party life and concludes by comparing the SWP in a favourable light.

Andy, like myself, is a former SWP member. One might wonder why a comrade who has fairly recently felt the need to leave an organisation of which he had been a committed member would then go on to write a largely uncritical article in its defence. In actual fact it is a very common phenomenon. Almost every ex-SWP member I have known has been similarly defensive for some time after they have left (I include myself in this category). This tendency diminishes as time goes by and comrades are not usually so restrained when in the company of others who have experienced life in ‘the party’. It is of course easier to defend everything associated with one’s past rather than to critically analyse it. However, this will simply lead to repeated mistakes and nothing will be learnt. It must be said, though, that Andy is not entirely averse to criticising some aspects of the SWP’s current approach. From his attack on the CPGB coupled with his contention that “if anything, the SWP is ultra-left”, it appears to me that what Andy cannot tolerate is thorough-going criticism of the SWP from its left.

There is, I believe, much in the SWP to defend, but not in the way that Andy thinks. Most of all the SWP needs defending from its own rightward-moving leadership of John Rees, Lindsey German, Chris Bambery, Martin Smith and the rest of the committee. Those that need to be the core of this defence are the membership, and a good start could be made by supporting John Molyneux’s call for “a more democratic culture in the SWP” which features in the SWP’s Pre-conference Bulletin No2, 2004.

Specifically comrade Molyneux has stated: “Adoption of the following practices might help: (1) having contested CC elections; (2) restoring the practice of branch motions to conference; (3) granting, as custom and practice, the right of reply to comrades who raise significant disagreements at conference and other national meetings.”

Communists wholeheartedly support all of these elementary demands, but believe that our comrades in the SWP must go further if their organisation is to become an effective tool for revolution. They must demand full rights for permanent factions; a regular discussion bulletin; and the opening up of Socialist Worker to extensive and thorough-going debate. Beyond these democratic demands the issue of programme must be addressed, otherwise party democracy will have to be fought for again and again until some other vacillating leadership destroys it in order to hold onto power. “Without a programme and a democratic internal life, the rank and file cannot judge or control the leadership, nor can they hold it to account” (J Conrad Towards a Socialist Alliance party London 2001, p90).

So what specifically does our comrade, Andy Newman, want to defend the SWP from? He takes issue with a statement made in the article, ‘Left populism and its discontents’, which reads: “The SWP has retreated from taking a definite, principled stand on issues as diverse as a workers’ representative receiving a worker’s wage, opposition to all immigration controls, republicanism and supporting abortion rights” (Weekly Worker September 23).

“Is any of this true?” asks Andy, before going on to “look at each charge in turn”. This section of Andy’s article is rather weak, as he clutches at straws in an attempt to refute the allegations made against his erstwhile comrades. Andy claims that the SWP has “not retreated on the issue of a worker’s wage”: they simply have not made it “an issue at this stage in Respect”. Well, they certainly made an issue of opposing it at the Respect conference.

Andy also asserts that there has been no retreat over the question of immigration controls: “What they did was oppose building this into the founding declaration of Respect”, as though this is no retreat. Let us just remind ourselves of what the Socialist Alliance manifesto had to say on this issue: “Why should multinational corporations be free to move anywhere they like while human beings face discrimination and persecution if they try to do the same thing? The Socialist Alliance fights for freedom of movement, open borders and an end to immigration laws.” The SWP’s current position is a clear step backwards and to the right.

On the issue of republicanism Andy feels that it was a “mistake” for Respect not to adopt it as a policy, “but it is hardly the pressing issue of the moment”. He is, however, “confident that the next big royal event will see the usual scurrilous and amusing coverage in Socialist Worker”. Of course, the way in which we are ruled is always a “pressing issue” for socialists and unless the working class takes the question seriously it will never itself become the ruling class as a step to abolishing all classes and hence class rule.

Abortion is an issue over which the SWP leadership has clearly felt under pressure. The diplomatic silence which met George Galloway’s anti-abortion comments at the beginning of the year could not last for ever. The CPGB ensured that the abortion question had to be addressed at the Respect conference and the SWP had to take some kind of position on it. It obviously did not feel confident enough to simply vote down our motion calling for a woman’s right to choose and proposing a campaign to extend existing abortion rights to make this a reality. It did see to it that this motion was defeated, but could only get away with doing so by formulating its own motion on the issue - one which claimed to defend a woman’s right to choose, yet implied that this right already exists. An absolute fudge, which, just like the earlier diplomatic silence, cannot last.

The second Weekly Worker article over which Andy feels the need to defend the SWP was one written by myself, calling on SWP members to fight for greater internal democracy (‘Consider your tactics wisely, for yours is not an easy fight’, September 9). Andy claims that “the description he gives of life in the SWP is completely unrecognisable to anyone who has been in the organisation”. If, however, one takes the trouble to compare my description to that of John Molyneux, it is clear that there is a great deal of convergence. Indeed comrade Molyneux exposes a number of gruesome practices that I failed to mention.

Add to this the comments of James O’Nions, who was a contemporary of mine in the Socialist Worker Student Society: “The artificial unanimity of all party workers, national meetings as transition belts for the central committee’s latest enthusiasm, dissenters jumped upon by a series of speakers from the leadership, all making unnecessary personal attacks - these things are all too familiar” (Letters Weekly Worker November 25). It seems I am not the only person to have witnessed such practices; in fact mine is quite an uncontroversial description as far as they go.

At the core of Andy’s article there seems to be a misunderstanding of the nature of democratic centralism. It is also unclear as to whether he continues to give support to this method of organisation. Democratic centralism, the dialectical unity of democracy and centralism, is an organisational principle for communists. There must be freedom for the most wide-ranging and thorough debate and criticism possible within the revolutionary party. This debate must be conducted openly, in front of the working class.

Andy disagrees. He feels that “whether or not the debate is in front of the working class is a moot point, as most of the working class have better things to do than pay attention to what goes on in the SWP.” This misses the point entirely. To be successful a revolutionary party must be rooted in the working class and the most class-conscious workers must be able to engage with its debates, if it is to have any chance of winning the majority of that class to the ideas of socialist revolution. Just look at what happens when these debates are not openly reported: SWP members end up having to read the Weekly Worker just to find out what goes on within their own organisation. Of course the majority of workers are not interested at the moment in “what goes on in the SWP”, but thousands are, otherwise the Weekly Worker (not to mention the Socialist Unity Network website) would have a much lower readership.

Also central to democratic centralism is the concept of unity in action. Organisation is the surest weapon the working class has. If we are to smash the bourgeois state and create our own workers’ state, with the aim of producing a stateless, classless society of freely associated producers, then we need the highest form of organisation possible - a democratic centralist Communist Party. We do not demand freedom of discussion and criticism for their own sake: central to party democracy is the unity in action that must flow from those discussions. This does not mean, contrary to what the SWP’s constitution states, that debate and criticism stop once a vote is taken on a given issue - the positions of the revolutionary party must be constantly assessed and reassessed. It does mean, however, that all members of the revolutionary party accept its discipline and act as one in all party actions. This kind of centralism cannot exist effectively without the democracy that produces it.

Andy criticises the CPGB for expelling a member who “would not toe the party line and vote the right way at a meeting ... The SWP simply wouldn’t expel someone over that sort of issue.” The SWP leadership simply does not have the democratic legitimacy with which to exercise this kind of discipline - is a symptom of its bureaucratism, not its liberalistic leniency. In fact the leadership would love to be able to exert this kind of discipline over its members, but if it had simply expelled Andy and others for voting the wrong way on the Socialist Alliance executive, for example - that would have precipitated a huge crisis within the organisation, which would have necessarily raised questions about the leadership’s democratic legitimacy.

Consider this statement from a prominent member of the SWP’s central committee: “The centralism is the logical outcome of genuinely democratic discussion. Issues are debated, argued about and sometimes fought over. Once they are settled, everyone - regardless of their position in the course of the debate - has to abide by the decision and act upon it. The mass reformist parties may have discussion and debate - but there is little to bind individual members to particular decisions. So discussion has no link with activity, and those with different positions go their own way. This lack of accountability - for example, among Labour MPs who ignore conference decisions with impunity - is in fact highly undemocratic” (L German, ‘The role of the revolutionary party’ What do we mean by revolution? London 1996, p27). So what’s changed, Lindsey? Why should Respect MPs be able to ignore conference decisions by claiming that abortion is a matter of personal conscience?

Another example of the SWP’s inability to give effective centralised leadership to its own membership is contained in the description Andy gives of debate within the SWP. For me this was the most interesting part of his article and he raised issues that I simply did not have the space to go into in my previous piece.

He writes: “Debate certainly does take place in the SWP, but it takes place outside and alongside the official structures. One of the interesting aspects of the SWP is how experienced and leading comrades pretty much work on their own initiative, and these comrades network with each other, based on years of experience, trust and respect gained working alongside one another in the workers’ movement (often with very real achievement). Amongst this layer there is constant informal debate. Now I would not idealise this arrangement, and the drawbacks are recognised, and I assume the new party structures are partly designed to address this ... One of the characteristics of the SWP is the way comrades only apply those parts of the perspective they want to.”

This is certainly not the case across the board. There are some areas where the leadership is more influential than others - usually where there are larger concentrations of members in one city, where a district organiser can be far more effective. There are, however, huge areas, such as East Anglia, where I was active, and presumably the south west, where Andy lives, where the leadership finds it particularly difficult to exert its influence. This is mainly down to the geography of these areas - lots of small to medium-sized towns spread out across a large area, often with very poor transport linking them. In these circumstances the work of a district organiser is hellishly difficult (in fact in East Anglia it is years since anyone attempted this job). Under these circumstances individual branches are able to “work on their own initiative” to a large extent.

Andy is right, then, not to “idealise this arrangement”. In an organisation where democracy and debate are a rarity this may seem refreshing and liberating, but organisationally it creates massive weaknesses. A ‘do what you like’ culture leads to anarchistic ineffectiveness.

If Andy thinks that the “new party structures” can “address” these problems, then he is way wide of the mark. Effective centralism and leadership cannot be brought about by tinkering: they need the introduction of a vibrant democratic culture which connects each and every isolated branch and member through, amongst other things, an open, democratic newspaper. It is just as true now that “a newspaper is not only a collective propagandist and a collective agitator: it is also a collective organiser. In this last respect it may be likened to the scaffolding round a building under construction, which marks the contours of the structure and facilitates communication between the builders, enabling them to distribute the work and to view the common results achieved by their organised labour. With the aid of the newspaper, and through it, a permanent organisation will naturally take shape that will engage, not only in local activities, but in regular, general work, and will train its members to follow political events carefully, appraise their significance and their effect on the various strata of the population, and develop effective means for the revolutionary party to influence those events” (VI Lenin ,‘Where to begin?’ CW Vol 5, Moscow 1977, p22).

Andy claims that my “biggest mistake” was the conclusion I wrote. He questions whether I was “genuinely addressing” myself “to what SWP members should do”. Throughout the article my honesty is questioned and Andy wonders whether I am “mischievously seeking to sow discord and attract a few of the SWP’s more ultra-left members towards the CPGB?”

No, this is not my aim. I thought I made this clear in my article when I stated: “I regret leaving the SWP the way I did. It did nothing to change that organisation, which plays such a prominent role in left politics in Britain. It did not improve the position of the many sincere revolutionaries within the SWP. It would have been far better to remain a member for as long as possible, to have sought to link up with others” (‘Consider your tactics wisely, for yours is not an easy fight’ Weekly Worker September 9).

It is not the aim of the CPGB to pick off a few members here and there from amongst our rivals. That is the mentality of a sect. Our ambitions are far greater than that. We want to reforge the Communist Party of Great Britain. If that is going to be achieved, then the SWP will have to be involved one way or another. I do not want SWP members to walk away from their party. I want them to fight for the organisational principles that a Communist Party must be based upon: democratic centralism and a revolutionary programme.