CWI Sweden splits

[lipmeister]

The entire Umeå branch of RS (Swedish CWI section) has left the party.
It's one of the biggest branches, with two of the party's eight local
councillors. They split due to RS' "co-operation with violent
anarchists"


The new group is known as Socialistiska Förbundet ("Socialist League",
used to be the name of the Swedish Morenoists in the '80s) and their
paper is Offensiven ("The Offensive", cf. with the RS weekly,
Offensiv). They'll also be known, apparently, as "RS Västerbotten"
(Västerbotten is the region where they are based). I suppose the
latter name is for the upcoming elections.

The split and the new names was first announced on . . . Wikipedia!
The user who edited the article there says:

"The party is run by the top now, and the national leaders decided to
purge the dissenters (in the Umeå leadership) who questioned, among
other things, the party work. The split took place before they had the
time to purge the leading Umeå members. More concretely, the issues
are falsely collected Palestine money, and that RS nationally have
seeked contact with anarchist groups and co-operated with those in
violent actions."

The Umeå branch are founders of CWI in Sweden, they go back to 1973.

[Saorsa]

They split due to RS' "co-operation with violent
anarchists"


If the issue of whether the party should cooperate with anarchists is even being debated in your organisation, I think it indicates that you've allowed reformist tendencies into your ranks. And if this is a branch with councilors, I imagine there may be a link here between the pressures of conforming to parliamentary politics forcing the party branch to moderate its image and its political activism in general. The tail (councilors) wagging the dog (organisation) if you like.

That said, I don't know enough to comment with any real accuracy. I'd be interested to hear from Mayakovsky and other CWIers about this. My group has very good relations with the CWI in Australia, who have got a councilor in Melbourne, and so far they seem to have managed pretty well with keeping their revolutionary project on track and not getting sucked into bourgeois political norms. So perhaps I'm jumping to conclusions here. Do the CWI comrades think there's any truth in what I was talking about above?

[Q]

The RS was shocked by this announcement when they heard about it today. One of the members in the Umeå branch also stated that he or the comrades he talked to didn't know anything about a split or what it was all about. This points to the direction that the leadership of the Umeå branch didn't discuss these issues through with the general membership, so it is highly doubtful that the whole branch (about 150 people) splitted away. It could well be contained to a handful. The dust has to settle first.

A first reply by the RS has already been made here: http://www.socialisterna.org/sv/2/1/5374/ (http://www.socialisterna.org/sv/2/1/5374/)

One of the reasons the splitters have stated is disagreements with "working together with violent anarchists". While this is evidently false, it points towards a rightwing split.

[Crux]

[edit: hah I see Q beat me to it] Okay let me first set the record straight. Those members who have left were not "purged" (or "about to be purged" but it's a clever rhetorical trick), in fact the only way the rest of the party found out they even had left was through the bourgeois media, to whom they obviously deemed more interesting to speak to than the rest of the party. Also, it is not the entire branch, by any means. right now all this is just a couple of hours fresh to everyone but those who deiceded to split. Even members in Umeå found out about the split through the articles in the local papers just as we did.

This is the official statement of RS: http://translate.google.se/translate?js=y&prev=_t&hl=sv&ie=UTF-8&layout=1&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.socialisterna.org%2Fsv%2F2%2F1% 2F5374%2F&sl=sv&tl=en

[Die Neue Zeit]

Given the post count of the original poster, I wonder if it's another Grantite attempt at scorekeeping? :glare:

Split in IMT: Because the center expelled someone else (Espanol fiasco, Iran) or because a right-wing split at the national level (Pakistan)
Split in CWI: Because the center expelled someone else (Russia) or because a right-wing split at the national level (Sweden)

[Crux]

Also this issue about "falsely collected palestine money" was news to me. Especially considering those who "broke" that story was the Communist Party. Of course, it really has no basis in reality, and the real meaning of that article was to attack us for having a section in Israel. So now the defectors borrow slander from the stalinists? Classy. What is the origin of your quote?

Oh and again I have to stress their claims about us taking part in "violent action with anarchists" is nothing but nonsense, but I guess it's a good reason to give the bourgeois media.

[Devrim]

Also this issue about "falsely collected palestine money" was news to me.

I wouldn't be at all surprised about the CWI 'falsely collecting money'. During the British miners strike, they collected money for themselves in buckets saying 'Militant (small letters) Support the Miners (big letters)'. They have a history of doing things like this.

Devrim

[Crux]

I wouldn't be at all surprised about the CWI 'falsely collecting money'. During the British miners strike, they collected money for themselves in buckets saying 'Militant (small letters) Support the Miners (big letters)'. They have a history of doing things like this.

Devrim
Well, I was there alright. We either had the name of our own organization or our israeli organization clearly printed. We also used slogans against the gaza war, which I think is quite defensible on a gaza demo. Really, it was just the CP trying to make some bizzare point about the money "going to Tel Aviv", because our Israeli sections hq happens to be in Tel Aviv. Really I doubt you'd be behind their slander if you'd seen it first hand.

[Devrim]

Well, I was there alright. We either had the name of our own organization or our israeli organization clearly printed. We also used slogans against the gaza war, which I think is quite defensible on a gaza demo. Really, it was just the CP trying to make some bizzare point about the money "going to Tel Aviv", because our Israeli sections hq happens to be in Tel Aviv. Really I doubt you'd be behind their slander if you'd seen it first hand.

I don't have any comment to make on whether this allegation is true or not. In my opinion the fund raising tactics of the Militant, and their descendent groups are quite misleading, and have consistently been shown to be so. I think that most people seeing these collections think that they are donating to either the Palestinian cause or to the striking miners in Britian, not to a small political group that supports this struggle.

There is a discussion on this method of fund raising on this thread:
http://www.revleft.com/vb/campaign-raise-money-t89811/index.html?p=1244731#post1244731

My comment on this event is that I find it completely believable and it fits in with the mode of operation of these organisations.

Devrim

[Crux]

Our primary goal is to spread our politics, I don't see anything possible that could be gained from pretending to be anything else.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Yawn.

I'm sure this new split is the new way for Socialism. Leading us to revolution eh....:rolleyes:

[Tower of Bebel]

Split in CWI: Because the center expelled someone else (Russia) or because a right-wing split at the national level (Sweden)
A split because the center expelled someone else? According to the center the split 'expelled' (silenced) the center and all those who supported it.

[Voloshinov]

Our primary goal is to spread our politics

... and to build the movement in general at the same time, I hope.

[Crux]

... and to build the movement in general at the same time, I hope.Well, yeah, but that's a given.

[Yehuda Stern]

Our primary goal is to spread our politics, I don't see anything possible that could be gained from pretending to be anything else. How about... money?

[Crux]

How about... money?
Of course we want to raise money as well, that doesn't mean there's anything to be won by misrepresenting. It's not like we're known for hiding what organization we come from.

[Patchd]

More concretely, the issues
are falsely collected Palestine money, and that RS nationally have
seeked contact with anarchist groups and co-operated with those in
violent actions."
I'm sure the revolution will be carried out over a nice cup of tea.

[Voloshinov]

I'm sure the revolution will be carried out over a nice cup of tea.

And smashing the window of a bank makes all the difference... The question is not the morality of violence an sich, but the efficacy of a violent method to reach a certain goal.

[bolchevique]

here: http://www.socialisterna.org/sv/2/1/5374/ (http://www.socialisterna.org/sv/2/1/5374/)

One of the reasons the splitters have stated is disagreements with "working together with violent anarchists". While this is evidently false, it points towards a rightwing split.[/QUOTE]
Now according to your ideas and everybody can take part your internal problems and you have to inform about everything , this is a nonsense, and people like CWI are going to receive your own medicine, as we say in Spanish, but the working class isn't interested in the problems of a insinificant organization like CWI, as they are no interested in the problems of the IMt , only a bunch of people which don't have much to do, but it's really funny and pathetic what certain have been saying here lately, from my part,what happens to CWI is irrelevant

[Dimentio]

Interesting that this is the first and only post of the OP.

[vyborg]

As I cannot read swedish, it is impossible to me to assess the problem. For sure, if someone considering himself revolutionary speaks with the burgeois press instead of discussing with his own comrades is not revolutionary at all. Anyway I hope that if the splitters have something to say they will translate their thoughts

[Dimentio]

I've read the article. It seems like the splitters are afraid of being associated with the Revolutionary Front, a Gothenburg-based anarchist group. Given the ratings of Swedish anarchist groups, I understand their sentiments (even though I appreciate anarchism). I think it is a vote-maximising factor.

[lipmeister]

Although the splitters seem opportunist, I can't blame them for leaving. Lately the CWI has been orrientating a lot towards anarchists and sometimes its members adopt anarchist rhetoric. They even make concessions to anarchism


Peter Taaffe

Alan Woods has recently written long screeds on the clash between Marx and the anarchist Bakunin in the First International. He writes: “Anarchism is the communism of the petty bourgeois and the lumpenproletarian.” His sweeping characterisation of anarchism - which is typical of his lazy method - is not historically accurate and is insensitive, to say the least, to some - particularly young people - who are initially attracted to anarchism because of hostility to Stalinism and the right-wing bureaucratic leadership of the labour movement. Not all anarchists have been ‘petty bourgeois’ or part of the ‘lumpen proletariat’. Some workers, even in Russia during the revolution, were attracted to their ideas as were workers in Spain - in the small workplaces in Catalonia - for instance.

Clearly this analysis departs from the analysis of anarchism by Militant and the CWI before the split.

[Devrim]

Of course we want to raise money as well, that doesn't mean there's anything to be won by misrepresenting. It's not like we're known for hiding what organization we come from.

No, but I think that the Militant and its descendants are quite well known for collecting money for their own organisation while making it appear, without goşng as far as actually lying about it, that they are collecting for something else.

Devrim

[Die Neue Zeit]

A split because the center expelled someone else? According to the center the split 'expelled' (silenced) the center and all those who supported it.

So I was wrong on Russia and should have lumped it with this Sweden episode? :confused:

If so, I stand corrected.


Interesting that this is the first and only post of the OP.

That's what I said earlier. :p

[Q]

Now according to your ideas and everybody can take part your internal problems and you have to inform about everything , this is a nonsense, and people like CWI are going to receive your own medicine, as we say in Spanish, but the working class isn't interested in the problems of a insinificant organization like CWI, as they are no interested in the problems of the IMt , only a bunch of people which don't have much to do, but it's really funny and pathetic what certain have been saying here lately, from my part,what happens to CWI is irrelevant
We have nothing to hide, as opposed to the IMT. I'm sure that all details regarding this issue will be exposed in due time.


As I cannot read swedish, it is impossible to me to assess the problem.

Google has a very good translation service. Mayakovsky already provided a link using this service.


Although the splitters seem opportunist, I can't blame them for leaving. Lately the CWI has been orrientating a lot towards anarchists and sometimes its members adopt anarchist rhetoric. They even make concessions to anarchism

Clearly this analysis departs from the analysis of anarchism by Militant and the CWI before the split.
Maybe English isn't your native language and so you perhaps misunderstood the quote, but Peter Taaffe was simply saying here that we shouldn't be oversimplifying things by saying stuff like "anarchism is petit-bourgeois". This would unnecessarily repel people which could be very open to the ideas of Marxism. The quote however says nothing about adopting anarchist tactics, no concessions towards violence is made. As the Swedish section made clear we stand for mass organisation, not violence of a few.

[vyborg]

Google has a very good translation service. Mayakovsky already provided a link using this service.

I meant the splitter position. And I dont think google works so well anyway

[Crux]

I meant the splitter position. And I dont think google works so well anyway
It has already been pretty much outlined in the OP.

[Crux]

I've read the article. It seems like the splitters are afraid of being associated with the Revolutionary Front, a Gothenburg-based anarchist group. Given the ratings of Swedish anarchist groups, I understand their sentiments (even though I appreciate anarchism). I think it is a vote-maximising factor.
I repeat myself but:
Oh and again I have to stress their claims about us taking part in "violent action with anarchists" is nothing but nonsense, but I guess it's a good reason to give the bourgeois media.

[vyborg]

if the splitter will decide to tell something please let us know.

[BOZG]

If the issue of whether the party should cooperate with anarchists is even being debated in your organisation, I think it indicates that you've allowed reformist tendencies into your ranks. And if this is a branch with councilors, I imagine there may be a link here between the pressures of conforming to parliamentary politics forcing the party branch to moderate its image and its political activism in general. The tail (councilors) wagging the dog (organisation) if you like.

You're certainly correct that this split is clearly of a reformist character but I would oppose phrasing it as that we allowed reformist tendancies into our ranks. Any organisation that operates with internal democracy and doesn't operate an exclusionary policy of insisting on every member being able to quote the complete works of Marx, Engels, Lenin Trotsky will inevitably come across reformist tendancies. The real question is how you deal with it? Do you automatically expel or exclude anyone displaying this or do you debate and argue against those tendancies? We operate on the latter basis. If we can't win them over, then the likelihood is that they will depart company with us as have some of the people in Umea but it was absolutely correct to continue the debate and discussion with them as we did.

The likelihood is that this won't be the last time that reformist tendancies appear and we will deal with them as they come but we're not in favour of shutting our doors to activists who might not yet be revolutionaries but who have the potential to become ones, particularly if we're open to them working alongside us.

As for whether this was a result of us having two councillors, I couldn't tell you as I'm not sure of the ins and outs of the Swedish section. Being involved in parliamentary democracy always involves risks but as you referred to with the example of Australia, it doesn't inevitably mean a turn to reformism.

[FSL]

I'm sure the revolution will be carried out over a nice cup of tea.


There is a revolutionary war in Sweden? The things you learn here

[Jammer]

here:

One of the reasons the splitters have stated is disagreements with "working together with violent anarchists". While this is evidently false, it points towards a rightwing split.
Now according to your ideas and everybody can take part your internal problems and you have to inform about everything , this is a nonsense, and people like CWI are going to receive your own medicine, as we say in Spanish, but the working class isn't interested in the problems of a insinificant organization like CWI, as they are no interested in the problems of the IMt , only a bunch of people which don't have much to do, but it's really funny and pathetic what certain have been saying here lately, from my part,what happens to CWI is irrelevant[/QUOTE]

Yes indeed comrades are perfectly free to debate what happens in our organisation, especially now that it is public.

You'll notice no one from the CWI is throwing their toys out of the pram, wailing about other people discussing the goings on in their organisation like... like... whats the name of that organisation again... hmmm can't seem to remember.

[vyborg]

Now according to your ideas and everybody can take part your internal problems and you have to inform about everything , this is a nonsense, and people like CWI are going to receive your own medicine, as we say in Spanish, but the working class isn't interested in the problems of a insinificant organization like CWI, as they are no interested in the problems of the IMt , only a bunch of people which don't have much to do, but it's really funny and pathetic what certain have been saying here lately, from my part,what happens to CWI is irrelevant

Yes indeed comrades are perfectly free to debate what happens in our organisation, especially now that it is public.

You'll notice no one from the CWI is throwing their toys out of the pram, wailing about other people discussing the goings on in their organisation like... like... whats the name of that organisation again... hmmm can't seem to remember.[/QUOTE]

Yes you can't remember, there are medicine for this disease you know...
anyway I will remember for you.

Some smart guy published on the internet internal materiali before the discussion even started. In doing it, he decided to put in peril, politically and even personally, comrades in other countries.

Here, we have some member of the CWI who split. No internatl material involved, as I can see, no international problems. Something that is contained in Umea.

If you cannot see the difference, again, this is a curable disease.

[BOZG]

Yes indeed comrades are perfectly free to debate what happens in our organisation, especially now that it is public.

You'll notice no one from the CWI is throwing their toys out of the pram, wailing about other people discussing the goings on in their organisation like... like... whats the name of that organisation again... hmmm can't seem to remember.

Yes you can't remember, there are medicine for this disease you know...
anyway I will remember for you.

Some smart guy published on the internet internal materiali before the discussion even started. In doing it, he decided to put in peril, politically and even personally, comrades in other countries.

Here, we have some member of the CWI who split. No internatl material involved, as I can see, no international problems. Something that is contained in Umea.

If you cannot see the difference, again, this is a curable disease.[/QUOTE]

The split in the IMT and the split in the Umea are of two different characters and scales.

One involves disagreements on your raison d'etre, that defines you from most other organisations on the left and what consigns other groups to political redundancy and ultra-leftism in your eyes. Not the mention the massive disagreements relating to internal democracy. There's an element of a political life and death struggle involved in the IMT split because of the scale of this battle.

In the CWI split, a single branch in a single section who's leadership has moved to the right and have become disillusioned left the organisation. Hardly comparable.

As for issue of material, none of our comrades had any inkling that a split was on the cards. There was no factional struggle or no indicators that this was nothing but a temporary disagreement that would be rectified easily enough. It's unlikely that there was any real material produced for it.

[vyborg]

There's an element of a political life and death struggle involved in the IMT split because of the scale of this battle.

Life and death yes....but only of some smart guy not of the organization. luckily, this is very much gone. or, better, they are very much gone...since a long time

[Q]

Life and death yes....but only of some smart guy not of the organization. luckily, this is very much gone. or, better, they are very much gone...since a long time
Yes, losing 3/4 of your organisation in the last two years certainly made all the troublemakers disappear. Congratulations on that.

[vyborg]

Yes, losing 3/4 of your organisation in the last two years certainly made all the troublemakers disappear. Congratulations on that.

Its not my fault if your information are completelt wrong. neither I will correct them.

[Patchd]

There is a revolutionary war in Sweden? The things you learn here
Not at all, but if you aren't willing to engage in direct action against the bosses and their state then I have no confidence in you to do so when it comes to a point when you need actually need to confront the state en masse as a class, in a revolutionary situation. Fact of the matter is the state and the capitalist class is already engaging in a class war against us, if you can't recognise that, then do you believe we are living in a classless society?

We didn't start the war, they did, and as revolutionaries, we should engage in direct action as a form of raising consciousness, confidence and politics.

[vyborg]

Not at all, but if you aren't willing to engage in direct action against the bosses and their state then I have no confidence in you to do so when it comes to a point when you need actually need to confront the state en masse as a class, in a revolutionary situation. Fact of the matter is the state and the capitalist class is already engaging in a class war against us, if you can't recognise that, then do you believe we are living in a classless society?

We didn't start the war, they did, and as revolutionaries, we should engage in direct action as a form of raising consciousness, confidence and politics.

I agree but you have to put forward actions that can be understood by your classor t least the avant-garde or you will be irrelevant

[Crux]

http://rsumea.wordpress.com/2010/03/19/internationell-socialism-eller-reformpolitik-i-en-kommun/

A longer statement from the swedish EC on the new Umeå website.
So far the only confirmed defections are five people, where two sit in the city council. Of course the dust has to settle first, but I am confident that most of our members will chose to stay with the national organization and the CWI.

[Yehuda Stern]

Of course we want to raise money as well, that doesn't mean there's anything to be won by misrepresenting. It's not like we're known for hiding what organization we come from.
Money is exactly what you can win by misrepresenting. That was my point. I know the IMT's fund raising tactics and I have to believe it's entirely possible that the CWI uses them as well.

[Crux]

Money is exactly what you can win by misrepresenting. That was my point. I know the IMT's fund raising tactics and I have to believe it's entirely possible that the CWI uses them as well.
Don't the IMT tend to be vague about what organization they are from though?

[vyborg]

no we are not. thanx for the link anyway

[Crux]

Official number of defectors is now 15, no definite number of how many that will stay with the party, but people keep phoning in to the party hq to change so that their money do not go into the defectors account, as as we said before the dust has to settle, but again it seems the defectors by far have overestimated their strength quite a bit.

[lipmeister]

On the swedish debate-site "Socialism (.)nu", they say that in Umeå only very
few, one identified member and a small handful at the most, has remained in the
"national" RS and that the others has joined the new local/regional party

socialism (.) nu/showthread.php?t=3893&page=15

[Crux]

Yes but they said they already had the whole section, so bit by bit they have to back from these claims. They think they will be able to steal our name for the election. Too bad for them that's in violation of the election laws. I predict no luck for them.

[Antid Oto]

We have nothing to hide, as opposed to the IMT. I'm sure that all details regarding this issue will be exposed in due time.

What do I have to say about a possible CWI split? Nothing at all, because unlike sectarians, I don't get involved in other organization's internal matters.

About the IMT, world congress is still to be held, sorry if we woud like to discuss things inside our own organization before starting with public statements!

[Benghazi]

Of course IMT comrades have the right to privately discuss what is happening in their own organisation.

However it is now publicly known that the IMT has recently had two breakaways. In this situation surely the IMT leadership has the responsibility to explain what, in their view, are the political “mistakes” of these breakaways are?

The idea of keeping silent is not in the tradition of the movement. Within weeks of the 1940 split in the US SWP Trotsky wrote an article “Petty-Bourgeois Moralists and the Proletarian Party” that was publicly published in the SWP’s then paper, the “Socialist Appeal” on May 4, 1940. Subsequently the SWP published Trotsky’s and Cannon’s main articles and letters during the SWP debate in the book collections “In Defence of Marxism” and “The Struggle for a Proletarian Party”.

The Swedish CWI comrades immediately published an initial statement on the sudden breakaway of some councillors and others in Umeå.

The IMT’s hesitation to publish material is not new. As the CWI has repeatedly pointed out the IMT has not yet published on its own websites all the political documents relating to the 1991/92 debate and split in the CWI. All these documents are available on the CWI site marxist.net.
Interestingly the IMT’s reluctance to publish material extends to Ted Grant and the RCP majority’s 1940s material arguing against the proposal that then all the British Trotskyists should join the Labour Party. None of Ted Grant’s writings on this debate have been published in his internet archive. Perhaps the CWI will have to publish RCP documents like "Comments of the RCP PB on (Healy's) British Labour and the Tasks of the FI" December 1945; “The ILP - a reply to Stuart", March 1946 and "The Real Situation In Britain", March 1947. Extracts of these documents are already available in the item “A note on Ted Grant's explanation of Entrism in the 1940s” on the Marxist.net site.

[vyborg]

As I said I cannot analyze deeply the split. We can safely say, anyway, that even an open organization can grow reformist tendencies as well as organization doing entrist work.