20.06.2007

How to build Marxist unity

CPGB makes no concrete suggestions for actually building a Marxist party, argues Phil Sharpe of the Democratic Socialist Alliance

The recent Weekly Worker articles by Mike Macnair ('End bureaucratic centralism', June 7) and Peter Manson ('Campaigning with Marxist teeth', June 14) raise serious points that deserve an answer. Both articles are united in opposing what they consider to be the undue influence of myself in the Campaign for a Marxist Party. However, what is primarily apparent is a different conception of how to build the CMP.

Mike's critique of my standpoint is connected to the view that I do not have a valid understanding of what constitutes party-building. Mike's approach, and presumably that of the CPGB, is that the left should break from the process of building their own sects, and instead unite around a Marxist programme in a common organisation. This united party of the left will apparently quickly attain a membership of 20,000, and have a potential electoral base of between 5% and10% of the popular vote. In other words, Mike is proposing a magic formula by which the presently small-sized CMP could rapidly grow, and become the nucleus of a mass Marxist party. Mike's perspective raises more questions than answers.

Firstly, what Mike does not ask is what is the incentive for the present groups on the left to unite around a programme of democracy and internationalism? Mike knows that the dominant parts of the left - the Socialist Workers Party and Socialist Party - are promoting their own projects (either Respect or the Campaign for a New Workers' Party) and there is no indication that this situation will change in the future. Consequently, Mike does not outline a perspective of how we get from A to B. Instead he advocates an idealist approach that argues because something should happen, this means it will happen.

What he suggests is superficially attractive: it would be a progressive move for the left to unite into one party, but without any concrete understanding of how we can arrive at such a possibility this perspective is merely a moral call for unity that lacks any political substance or coherence. Specifically, how would the SWP and SP benefit from a process of unity? We already know the history of the Socialist Alliance: the SP left when its proposals were being defeated by the SWP-led majority, and the SWP wrecked the alliance when it no longer seemed to be their obedient creature.

Hence, how can the future be any different? How do we bring about a different balance of forces that would make a united party attractive to the SWP and SP? Mike does not answer this question because his approach is based on wish-fulfilment, and the connected rejection of an elaboration of a concrete strategy of how to get from A to B (the only practical answer is conciliation - more of this later on).

This point is emphasised in relation to Mike's criticisms of my conception of the lack of a relation between party and class. Mike argues that there is no party of Marxism in existence, and yet somehow by miraculous organisational moves we can arrive at this Marxist party of the class. Thus what Mike glosses over is the very importance of the fragmentation of the left, which is an expression of a division into dominant Menshevik parties (the SP and SWP), and a chaotic collection of potential Bolshevik organisations. This is what I meant by the isolation of party from the class, not that there is an actual and viable party that has somehow become divided from the class.

Hence the present question is, how do we develop a dynamic by which the potential Bolshevik organisations can start to be united? To answer this question we have to ask the basic question: which organisations are most compatible with the principles and aims of the CMP? If the principles of the CMP are not to be merely platonic, or a form of differentiation from other groups, we have to establish what it is about these principles that creates an affinity with others. Our principles will mean that we will be developing a conception at the level of theory and practice that indicates which other groups are moving closest to us, and which are moving away from us.

For example, the present political practice of the SWP seems to be a denial of the principle of the self-emancipation of the working class, and even defends a stagist conception of revolution - first a reformist stage of change, and social revolution is relegated into the future. They also seem to have an opportunist conception of alliances that glosses over the primacy of labour as an agency of revolutionary change. Hence, the SWP would seem to be moving away from the CMP. The question of unity with them would seem to be precluded.

This issue is not decided by the stance of the SWP on any particular theory of the former Soviet Union, or even their rejection of the importance of globalisation, but rather the crucial question is, what does their practice mean in relation to our principles? Does the practice of the SWP enrich or undermine the commitment that the CMP has made to its principles and aims? If the answer is in the negative, then the question of any fusion with the SWP would seem to be unprincipled and the only result would be a dilution of our principles. The same issue would arise in relation to any prospect of the SP joining the CMP. (However, this issue does not apply to the CMP joining the CNWP, which instead is a forum to propagate our principles, and to seek to win this campaign to them.)

Rapprochement

In contrast, it is possible to argue that other particular groups are closer to the CMP, and therefore negotiations with them for the purpose of joining the CMP is principled. This is because the aims of these groups are compatible with those of the CMP. In this context, the Permanent Revolution group is committed to theoretical development in order to facilitate the class struggle in principled terms. For example, their study of globalisation and the working class tries to establish the historical facts in order to comprehend the objective balance of class forces, and on this basis develop a strategy of revolution that is not based upon illusions and a false perspective. This standpoint would seem to be compatible with the CMP's commitment to theoretical analysis in order to sustain and enrich our aims.

It is precisely because we do not defend our aims as a dogma that we recognise that theoretical elaboration of what they represent is necessary. However, such similarities with Permanent Revolution does not mean that negotiations with them about joining the CMP can be a guaranteed success, or even that they will take place. For historical reasons, Permanent Revolution may even reject any prospect of joining the CMP. But if we do not try and take this opportunity, we never will know what could have been.

Secondly, in contrast to this attempt to develop a concrete strategy of how to get from A to B, Peter Manson rejects any prospect of talking with groups like Permanent Revolution and the Workers International League, and instead also defends the platonic notion of what a mass Marxist party could be like. The ideal form - the mass party - is contrasted favourably with the apparently faulty limitations of both Permanent Revolution and the WIL in the present. In other words, because such groups do not measure up to what the hypothetical mass party could be like, we should absolutely reject any prospect of them joining the CMP.

This means that the CPGB lacks any tactics for how the CMP should advance in the present. Instead, what is on offer is business as usual, and means accepting the proposals of the CPGB. In these vague terms the ultimate goal of the mass Marxist party is somehow advanced.

But instead of concrete suggestions of how to actually build the Marxist party we are presented with negative propaganda about the problems of so-called halfway house parties. That is to say, because of the uncertain distance between the present and the realisation of the mass Marxist party, the vacuum is being filled with criticism of what should not be. The CMP should not be this, and not become that. Hence we are told, the CMP should not listen to Phil Sharpe, and should not contemplate any unity with groups like Permanent Revolution.

But what should we be doing? On this issue there is a profound silence - all that we are constructively offered is the goal of a distant future, the mass Marxist party. However, in practice, the CPGB reject any concrete suggestions that may contribute to the formation of a mass Marxist party, such as fusion with other groups. Instead the ideal form is contrasted with the flawed empirical limitations of organisations in the present.

Thirdly, how does the question of possible talks with other groups, such as Permanent Revolution, compromise the principles of democracy and internationalism, which the CPGB contend should be the basis for the formation of mass Marxist party? Peter Manson does not provide any answers to this question - his unwillingness shows this underlying reluctance of the CPGB to actually test their theories in practice. Instead of the actual concrete process of trying to develop a mass Marxist party in negotiation with others, which should by no means be exclusively reduced to one or two Trotskyists groups, what the CPGB are actually doing is differentiating between theory and practice.

CPGB conciliation

In this context, the practice of trying to establish unity and consensus is rejected, and instead the theory of the mass Marxist party is held up to be the only worthy goal. Indeed, practice can never match up to the theory, because what is held to be the only worthwhile basis of a Marxist party is unobtainable, which is the proposed principled unity of all of the left. Indeed, such a unity would not be principled, because it would actually be based upon the domination of opportunist ideas over revolutionary ones. For the proposed unity would be based on the sway of the SWP and the SP within the new mass organisation. In other words, what would be proposed would be a unification of Mensheviks and Bolsheviks.

The historical analogy of this approach was the attempt of Trotsky to unify the Mensheviks and Bolsheviks between 1912 and 1914. Such an attempt was not unprincipled because of the potential for unity in and of itself. Instead what was crucial was the basis of this unity, which meant the accommodation by the Bolsheviks with the rightwing legal Marxists, or liquidators - the revisionists of Russia. Instead what was really called for was the unity of the Bogdanov and Lenin factions of the Bolsheviks, and this would in turn had become the basis to call for the differentiation of Trotsky and Martov from legal Marxism. In other words, a process of negotiation, compromise and upholding principles could have brought about a mass Marxist party in Russia. Instead 1914 made these issues a formality.

What the CPGB proposes in the present is similar to Trotsky's attempt to unify Marxism on the basis of what favours opportunism over revolutionary Marxism. In this context, the aims of the CPGB - democracy and internationalism - could be formally agreed with, but the balance of forces would still favour those of opportunism. For the CPGB is not arguing for a revolutionary party organised around a revolutionary programme: rather unity around minimal principles that would not upset the present domination of opportunism.

The CPGB does not ask the crucial question: how can what we propose to be the aims of a Marxist party change the present balance of forces that express the ascendancy of the two factions of British Menshevism? Furthermore, what is the process of ideological and political struggle that would bring about this change in the balance of forces that could generate the formation of a principled revolutionary party? The CPGB approach lacks any strategic guidance in this regard. Instead it is assumed that some type of miracle will change the views of the SWP and SP, and realise the platonic ideal of the revolutionary party.

In contrast, I am trying to suggest something both concrete and which will represent the necessary ideological and political struggle to realise the formation of a revolutionary party. Namely, the aim of the unification of Bolshevism. This is not a dogmatic aim, which merely amounts to a aggregate collection of groups within one organisation. Instead it is about theoretical and political clarification. To what extent do the aims of different organisations coincide? This does not call for theoretical homogeneity, but rather for a process of comparison between strategic objectives. In these terms we can define what amounts to a principled and yet flexible process of discussion and fusion in the formation of a Bolshevik organisation to challenge the domination of British Menshevism.

But, in direct opposition to this process, the CPGB's main aim seems to be the conciliation of British Menshevism in the name of a platonic ideal - the unconditional unification of all groups in one organisation. This would not be a mass Marxist party, and neither would it be a genuine workers' party. Instead we would have the recipe for another Respect, but without the populism. Such an organisation would be a true halfway house that lacked revolutionary aims and principles. Reformism in the name of Marxism.