Draper on the Micro-Sect and Organization

[graymouser]

This is mostly intended as a discussion of the following two articles by Hal Draper - there is a considerable redundancy between them, but both are worthwhile.

Toward a New Beginning (http://marxists.org/archive/draper/1971/alt/index.htm)
Anatomy of the Micro-Sect (http://marxists.org/archive/draper/1973/xx/microsect.htm)

Draper was probably the most important writer to come out of heterodox Trotskyism (that is, the tendency that followed Max Shachtman out of the SWP in 1940), and his essay "The Two Souls of Socialism" remains a keystone of left-Shachtmanite politics. But I want to talk about his organizational theory.

In 1971, Draper left the International Socialists, a group he had helped to found a few years earlier. He classified the IS as a "sect," that is, a small grouping that defines itself primarily by its program rather than by its relationship to the social struggle. I think this definition is interesting, because while it means that most socialist groups in the US are sects, it lacks the capriciousness of the word as commonly used - that is, to be a cuss word that dismisses all rival groupings, as for instance the Grantites have always referred to everybody else as "the sects."

The alternative that Draper poses is of looser circles without the rigidity of the sect form of organization. Each of these circles is then in contact with one or more "political centers", which in 1973 mostly meant magazines and newspapers - and there were actually such organs, such as the Guardian and Monthly Review, that had substantial followings outside of the organized grouplets - and Monthly Review at least is still around. But the landscape has changed, and I would argue that it's changed in ways that make Draper's proposed model much more viable than it was at the time.

In 2010, anyone can go out and establish a political center by putting up a blog. Of course you can get better and more elaborate centers, by grouping together multiple people around a central site - I'd argue that Kasama, while I don't agree with its politics, is a signal example of what can be achieved. Now there's some chance that Kasama might give birth to a new sect, but for the time being it's playing a role more like the Guardian played than the October League or Revolutionary Union. And I think it encourages more creativity and self-thinking among activists to have a serious ongoing discussion like that.

Of course there will always be small groups claiming to be the party, or the nucleus of a future mass party. But I think, especially in the period we find ourselves facing, that Draper's concept of loose political associations around political centers is a much more potent and flexible form of self-organization than trying to build up a Leninist party when you only have ten, fifty, a hundred or even a thousand people.

So: what do folks here think?

[Q]

I think Draper made some very valid points, but I also disagree with him on very basic issues. One is his definition of a sect. While I disagree with using the term as a mere slur against all other groups, I do not think a sect can be characterized by its programme. A sect more properly can be identified by its rigid following of certain theories, that are established dogma's within this sect. These ideas are designed to keep the sect "unique" from other groups and thus serves as a reason to exist.

As I pointed out here (http://www.revleft.com/vb/illusion-being-master-t146166/index.html?p=1950280#post1950280), these dogmatic ideas serve another purpose, namely to establish "correct" political positions that are in line with these ideas. What follows is an organisation in which there exists an "educational dictatorship" which holds the holy shrine of these ideas and strives for "clarity" towards the rest of the membership to create a homogeneous membership in ideas. What you create, effectively, is an organisation of followers.

To overcome this dire situation, that indeed most of the far left is in, we need to base ourselves on a different method to establish "correct" political positions. I'll just repeat myself here:

I think Ben Lewis nails it in his critique on democracy within much of our movement. There is a fundamental different method for establishing the "correct" political line that is really at debate here. One method, for example used by the Bolsheviks back in the day, focuses on debate. After all, in concrete debates dealing with tactical, strategical, programmatical or theoretical issues, your ideas get tested in the class struggle, "on the streets" so to speak. The experiences of these get feeded back in the running debate. Only this dialectical method, in which viewpoints and experiences can clash, can establish a scientifically "correct" political line.

In these circumstances any dissenting view is objectively progressive, as it helps to strengthen the party. Such a party can unite vast layers of the class around a common programme and is consequently a genuine class party.

So yes, we need programmatical unity (that is, unity in action) and a sense that we need to "agree to disagree" and debate our differences openly.

[graymouser]

I think Draper made some very valid points, but I also disagree with him on very basic issues. One is his definition of a sect. While I disagree with using the term as a mere slur against all other groups, I do not think a sect can be characterized by its programme. A sect more properly can be identified by its rigid following of certain theories, that are established dogma's within this sect. These ideas are designed to keep the sect "unique" from other groups and thus serves as a reason to exist.
I can't agree with this perspective. In the situation we're in, a small group such as Solidarity or the Socialist Party (and I've been in both) that deliberately avoids these "established dogmas" is not the answer either, and I think your formulation leaves the door open to such a group. These formations inevitably heads toward the politics of its own least common denominator, which is certainly not what Draper was attempting to work toward. Inevitably the politics degenerate into something of a mess, although the internal life tends less toward sectarian nightmares and more toward a bland listlessness.


So yes, we need programmatical unity (that is, unity in action) and a sense that we need to "agree to disagree" and debate our differences openly.
This is different to what Draper was, and I am, driving at. Specifically - what is "unity in action" in a situation where there is little or no action? Inevitably, even with the very best of intentions, it degenerates into unity in thought. And what is necessary in a revolution can be monstrous in day-to-day life outside of a revolutionary period. What we need is to develop new and better political centers outside of the framework of the propaganda group or the "small mass party," that do not try to organize "their own" national groups. This means things like Kasama and like Monthly Review, although I think the politics should be somewhat different than either.

[Q]

I can't agree with this perspective. In the situation we're in, a small group such as Solidarity or the Socialist Party (and I've been in both) that deliberately avoids these "established dogmas" is not the answer either, and I think your formulation leaves the door open to such a group. These formations inevitably heads toward the politics of its own least common denominator, which is certainly not what Draper was attempting to work toward. Inevitably the politics degenerate into something of a mess, although the internal life tends less toward sectarian nightmares and more toward a bland listlessness.
I was not trying to imply to create a group of the "lowest common denominator". Said otherwise, I wasn't saying we should unite on the "80% we all agree with" and shut up about the other 20%. On the contrary, let us disagree on these 20% and debate openly and lively on it!

What I'm saying is that we need to build a class party based on what we do. What tactics, strategies and programme we come up with is determined by the majority of the party. And any minority should be able to grow to a majority. This can only happen on the basis of open debate.


This is different to what Draper was, and I am, driving at. Specifically - what is "unity in action" in a situation where there is little or no action? Inevitably, even with the very best of intentions, it degenerates into unity in thought. And what is necessary in a revolution can be monstrous in day-to-day life outside of a revolutionary period. What we need is to develop new and better political centers outside of the framework of the propaganda group or the "small mass party," that do not try to organize "their own" national groups. This means things like Kasama and like Monthly Review, although I think the politics should be somewhat different than either.
I think your idea leaves open the interpretation of merely setting up discussion groups, not a class party. While getting on debating terms is a first step, we certainly need more than that.

[graymouser]

I was not trying to imply to create a group of the "lowest common denominator". Said otherwise, I wasn't saying we should unite on the "80% we all agree with" and shut up about the other 20%. On the contrary, let us disagree on these 20% and debate openly and lively on it!

What I'm saying is that we need to build a class party based on what we do. What tactics, strategies and programme we come up with is determined by the majority of the party. And any minority should be able to grow to a majority. This can only happen on the basis of open debate.
Unity on the "80% we all agree with" is a fine idea, and can be the basis of a mass party. The tactics you are describing are fine and valid, when there are thousands of workers signing up for membership and genuinely ready to create the revolution. A handful of people - even a couple thousand, which would be larger than any group currently in the US - cannot be such a party, and can't even set up the forms of such a party, except as a sort of grotesque parody.


I think your idea leaves open the interpretation of merely setting up discussion groups, not a class party. While getting on debating terms is a first step, we certainly need more than that.
First, I would object to calling them "discussion groups," I think that in fact these should also be "action groups" engaged in movement work, at the local level. The political center itself should not pretend to have activity but to connect groups of such activists. But more deeply I think the problem is that "set up a class party" is not an option we are faced with today. You can set up what is called a "fighting propaganda group" in the Trotskyist tradition, around a hardened political program, and attempt to create the cadre who will lead the party come the revolution. Or you can set up a looser circle of socialist activists, who coordinate - but are not in a relationship of discipline and conferences and "democratic centralism" and program - with other activists through a political center, or several political centers.

The question isn't, in my mind, "Do we need a class party?" Yes, I think we need it, and I think we need to work on getting there. But - I don't think you can get there by setting up the party in miniature and going through the motions with 10 or 50 or 100 or 1000 people. Sects are not building the mass party; they become things-for-themselves, justifying their own existence and requiring that socialists with relatively similar ideas waste their time creating dozens of parallel organizations with similar papers and programs and leadership structures and so on. Having a class party is something that is determined by larger forces than we have today; it will come about because of the requirements of protracted class struggle and cannot be hothouse-forced into existence by making a sect, even the very best one. The question is what we do until then, and I think that Draper's model of loose activist circles connected by political centers is the most viable route that I've seen.