Trotskyism in Sri Lanka

[Tommy4ever]

Why did Trotskyism succeed in establishing itself as a major force in Sri Lanka ahead of other socialist tendencies yet failed to make an impact elsewhere in Asia and indeed, almost without exception, anywhere else in the Third World?

[CesareBorgia]

Very good question. Hope to see some answers.

[caramelpence]

yet failed to make an impact elsewhere in Asia and indeed, almost without exception, anywhere else in the Third World?

I'll let others answer in relation to Sri Lanka, but the Trotskyists were a meaningful force, the biggest single Third World section of the Fourth International in fact, in China in the 1930s and 40s (despite being suppressed by the CPC, the KMT, and the Japanese) and they were also important politically in Vietnam before being suppressed by the Stalinists and French colonial government operating in tandem with one another. There have been entire books written about the role of Trotskyists in these countries and in other parts of the Third World. Though many are out of print, you might be interested in the books available on Revolutionary History (http://www.revolutionaryhistory.co.uk/rhbooks/books.html), which include a book on Trotskyism in Sri Lanka. There are also several good articles and theses in the MIA section on the history of Trotskyism - link (http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/index.htm).

[RedTrackWorker]

Why did Trotskyism succeed in establishing itself as a major force in Sri Lanka ahead of other socialist tendencies yet failed to make an impact elsewhere in Asia and indeed, almost without exception, anywhere else in the Third World?

As caramelpence said, they were also important in China and Vietnam...and to add Bolivia.

Think about what we're comparing here. In the 1930's, what Marxist tendencies were a major force anywhere in the "third world" outside of China? And it was precisely in China that Trotskyist ideas won their greatest number of adherents outside of Russia in the 30's, despite, as caramelpence points out, repression and persecution by the Stalinists, Chinese nationalists and Japanese imperialists.

Second, consider that, whereas in the 1930's, the main goal of the NKVD was the destruction of the Trotskyists, Stalinism (and later Maoism) had state power backing the spread of its ideology.

Third, revolutionary ideas will only spread to the masses, in general, under conditions of a rising class struggle. The success of Stalinism containing the post-WW2 revolutions and upsurges meant that the conditions for building a revolutionary movement were greatly weakened (see http://www.lrp-cofi.org/book/chapter6_postwarworld.pdf).

Fourth, and in some ways key, is the subjective failure of the Trotskyist movement itself in the post-war period. Trotskyism had only the strength of its ideas in explaining the world and leading the working class to power. On that basis, facing the repression from state powers including the Stalinists and without a state backing them, they were able to spread their ideas to many different parts of the globe but increasingly after the war, that revolutionary perspective was being lost (http://www.lrp-cofi.org/book/chapter7_degenerationtrotskyism.pdf). Crucially, in 1952 in Bolivia, the Trotskyists abandoned the strategy of permanent revolution, adopting an essentially Stalinist approach to the main questions of the revolution, leading to the failure of that revolution and a reaction and the Fourth International went along with this.

If, even in defeat in Bolivia, the Trotskyists had instead carried out the actual revolutionary content of Trotskyist policy, they would have set an example that I suspect would've have inspired other revolutionary-minded workers looking for answers. Instead, Trotskyism became part of the same crap as the Stalinists and Maoists (to oversimplify).

[Kléber]

The Lanka Sama Samaja Party was formed during the Popular Front (1934-1939), at a time when the Soviet bureaucracy was opposed to anti-colonial struggles against the empires of Britain and France, because it wanted alliance with "liberal" imperialist states at the expense of world revolution. Trotsky defended the right of oppressed people to rebel. That is the main reason why thousands of communists in the colonized world rejected Stalin's revisionist line and joined the Fourth International.

[red cat]

Why did Trotskyism succeed in establishing itself as a major force in Sri Lanka ahead of other socialist tendencies yet failed to make an impact elsewhere in Asia and indeed, almost without exception, anywhere else in the Third World?

In the third world, particularly in south Asia, a party can become a big force acknowledged by the bourgeois parliamentary parties as long as it concentrates mainly on participating in the electoral system and abstain from organizing the working class for armed struggle. In addition to this, Sri Lankan Trotskyites were part of a government that brutally put down an insurrection led by ML forces. If a party does these things, obviously it will be an asset of the ruling class for derailing workers' struggles.

[graymouser]

Charles Wesley Ervin's book Tomorrow is Ours is considered the best history of Sri Lankan Trotskyism in its formative phase. I confess it's one of the books that's been sitting on my shelf for quite a while; I simply haven't had the time to get to it. But anyone interested should read it. Also, on Bolivia there's Sandor John's Bolivia's Radical Tradition that looks at the rise of Trotskyism there.

[Devrim]

Why did Trotskyism succeed in establishing itself as a major force in Sri Lanka ahead of other socialist tendencies yet failed to make an impact elsewhere in Asia and indeed, almost without exception, anywhere else in the Third World?

In itself it is an interesting question in a sort of historical sense. I think that the questions that it raises are more important though. What was the nature of the Trotskyists in Sri Lanka?


In addition to this, Sri Lankan Trotskyites were part of a government that brutally put down an insurrection led by ML forces. If a party does these things, obviously it will be an asset of the ruling class for derailing workers' struggles.

Red Cat, who is somebody I very rarely agree with on here, has a point.

I don't think the JVP movement was in any way what people today would consider 'ML', but it certainly did mobilize many of the most exploited workers and much of the poor.

Whatever we think about guerilla movements, and all of the left communists on here have been very clear that we think that these sort of organisations offer absolutely nothing to the working class, we certainly don't support the state massacring these people.

The JVP uprising was put down with over 25,000 deaths, murdered workers and peasants.

Any so called 'left' organisation which gives or gave support at the time, to butchers like this, regardless of whether they call themselves 'Trotskyists' or whatever is an enemy of the working class.

Devrim

[Kléber]

In the third world, particularly in south Asia, a party can become a big force acknowledged by the bourgeois parliamentary parties as long as it concentrates mainly on participating in the electoral system and abstain from organizing the working class for armed struggle.
Just the opposite, the Fourth International grew in countries like Sri Lanka and Vietnam precisely because it struggled for socialist revolution and national liberation while the revisionist Comintern limited itself to demanding "democratic reforms" within the framework of British and French colonial systems.


In addition to this, Sri Lankan Trotskyites were part of a government that brutally put down an insurrection led by ML forces. If a party does these things, obviously it will be an asset of the ruling class for derailing workers' struggles.The LSSP leadership sold out, yes, just like every Maoist party that ever joined a bourgeois government or ran one. By participating in Bandaranaike's govt, the LSSP ceased to be a socialist party, let alone Trotskyist, and was kicked out of the Fourth International. Revolutionaries in the party who rejected the LSSP's "Great Betrayal" split to form LSSP(R).

Your "ML forces," the JVP, may have waged a heroic though adventurist and fruitless uprising in 1971, but today they are just Sinhala chauvinists, since the 80s they have engaged in anti-Tamil pogroms, they supported and voted for the government's repression and murder of Tamil civilians. They have a history of stabbing political opponents (Trotskyist, Maoist, Tamil nationalist or other) to death on college campuses.


In itself it is an interesting question in a sort of historical sense. I think that the questions that it raises are more important though. What was the nature of the Trotskyists in Sri Lanka?
What was the nature of the Left Communists in Sri Lanka? I can say one nice thing about them: they never made any mistakes.

[RedTrackWorker]

In the third world, particularly in south Asia, a party can become a big force acknowledged by the bourgeois parliamentary parties as long as it concentrates mainly on participating in the electoral system and abstain from organizing the working class for armed struggle.

"No investigation, no right to speak" right? Then please explain how the Trotskyist in Bolivia, China, Vietnam or Sri Lanka lived at the behest of the bourgeois parties in the 30's and 40's?


In addition to this, Sri Lankan Trotskyites were part of a government that brutally put down an insurrection led by ML forces. If a party does these things, obviously it will be an asset of the ruling class for derailing workers' struggles.

Yes, they did do that. The policy is called the "Popular Front"--perhaps you're familiar with the political tendency that codified it and fought for it to be acceptable internationally? It's called by some "Marxism-Leninism." By others "Stalinism." So the Trotskyists did that in Sri Lanka--and to a lesser degree in Bolivia--betrayed their political tendency's revolutionary content. When a Stalinist party joins such a government, they're fulfilling their political tendency's reformist content.

[RedTrackWorker]

Why did Trotskyism succeed in establishing itself as a major force in Sri Lanka ahead of other socialist tendencies yet failed to make an impact elsewhere in Asia and indeed, almost without exception, anywhere else in the Third World?

My first comment only indirectly answered the question. Kleber added the important point that it happened when the Stalinists were against anti-colonial struggles in colonies of France and Britain.

I think another important--more general--aspect is the inverse of the point in my first post on this thread that revolutionary ideas when masses of followers in periods of rising struggle--not defeats. Trotsky explains this very well in an interview published under the title Fighting Against the Stream (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1939/04/stream.htm):

Our situation now is incomparably more difficult than that of any other organization in any other time, because we have the terrible betrayal of the Communist International which arose from the betrayal of the Second International. The degeneration of the Third International developed so quickly and so unexpectedly that the same generation which heard its formation now hears us, and they say, “But we have already heard this once!”

He points out later that this is uneven. That not all went through those betrayals and so are "fresh"--the youth in general are and some sectors--I would posit like the Sri Lankan workers--were still open to the ideas of the Trotskyists.

Viewed a-historically, the extensive reach of Stalinism and Maoism compared to Trotskyism in the imperialized world makes Sri Lanka looks like an exception to the rule. Given the context and history presented in my first post on this thread, I would rather say the case in the 30's and 40's with those countries was: "In so far as we have been capable of approching them, we have had good results."

In other words I'm claiming that for the 30's and 40's and somewhat 50's, the examples of Trotskyism's reach in the "third world" were examples that showed the ideas' potential to spread there, but the objective limitations of a weak organization overwhelmed and isolated meant the ideas were not spread further. (Can a Stalinist or other cite examples from the 30's or 40's were Stalinist ideas spread further and faster than Trotskyist ideas--if the Stalinists weren't backed up by bayonets of course?)

It was of course not simply objective limitations. For instance, the SWP (Socialist Workers Party--U.S. section of the 4th) failed in the 1930's in particular to focus enough on Black liberation or enough on Latin America. (Though of course one could argue that resulted from objective limitations as Trotsky was pushing them to do better but with a resource-poor international organization facing so many tasks--such as not getting killed by the Stalinist state and exposing the lies of a state propaganda machine and so on--they could only do so much.)

[red cat]

Just the opposite, the Fourth International grew in countries like Sri Lanka and Vietnam precisely because it struggled for socialist revolution and national liberation while the revisionist Comintern limited itself to demanding "democratic reforms" within the framework of British and French colonial systems.

While the policies of the Comintern were very harmful for the south Asian CPs, those might not have been the main reason why Trotskyism grew in Sri Lanka. For example, this revisionist line was also very much prevalent in the CPI, but that caused the revolutionaries within the CPI to conduct armed struggle from the ground level and not drift towards Trotskyism.


The LSSP leadership sold out, yes, just like every Maoist party that ever joined a bourgeois government or ran one. By participating in Bandaranaike's govt, the LSSP ceased to be a socialist party, let alone Trotskyist, and was kicked out of the Fourth International. Revolutionaries in the party who rejected the LSSP's "Great Betrayal" split to form LSSP(R).

Thank you for admitting this, but they had become sellouts as early as 1936.


Your "ML forces," the JVP, may have waged a heroic though adventurist and fruitless uprising in 1971, but today they are just Sinhala chauvinists, since the 80s they have engaged in anti-Tamil pogroms, they supported and voted for the government's repression and murder of Tamil civilians. They have a history of stabbing political opponents (Trotskyist, Maoist, Tamil nationalist or other) to death on college campuses.


Very true. Sectarianism from cadre with petit bourgeois backgrounds was a huge problem in any revolutionary party at that time. Also, after the main revolutionary force was slaughtered and tortured in prison, the party became revisionist, and it happened well before the 80s.

[Devrim]

What was the nature of the Left Communists in Sri Lanka? I can say one nice thing about them: they never made any mistakes.

Is what you are suggesting that as there were no left communists in Sri Lanka the Trotskyists were somehow justified in joining a bourgeois government? That seems a pretty irrefutable argument to me.

Devrim

[red cat]

"No investigation, no right to speak" right? Then please explain how the Trotskyist in Bolivia, China, Vietnam or Sri Lanka lived at the behest of the bourgeois parties in the 30's and 40's?

The Sri Lankan CP participated in the electoral system in 1936, when it was not implementing any independent revolutionary programme. This election was within the direct colonial rule itself and an open mockery of the right to self determination by the colonial masses. The leadership had betrayed the working class even before it had became openly Trotskyite. Such was the extent of their revisionism, that they considered even the highly revisionist CPI to be an "extremist" force.


Yes, they did do that. The policy is called the "Popular Front"--perhaps you're familiar with the political tendency that codified it and fought for it to be acceptable internationally? It's called by some "Marxism-Leninism." By others "Stalinism." So the Trotskyists did that in Sri Lanka--and to a lesser degree in Bolivia--betrayed their political tendency's revolutionary content. When a Stalinist party joins such a government, they're fulfilling their political tendency's reformist content.The popular front tactics is supposed to unite all revolutionary elements against the ruling classes. Let alone the popular front, the actions of the LSSP do not fit even within the broader notion of tactical alliance. Any tactical alliance is always supposed to be with a lesser enemy against a greater enemy. If that was a tactical alliance by the LSSP then you have to admit that revolutionaries rather than the ruling classes were a greater enemy of the Sri Lankan Trotskyites. The subordination of their contradiction with ruling class parties to that with a revolutionary group proves that the LSSP was a tool of the ruling classes as well.

[Tommy4ever]

OK, so what I understand from this thread was that during the 30s and 40s the Trotskyists' more revolutionary policies when compared to the Comintern was reasonably successful in gathering support. In China, Vietnam, Bolivia and Sri Lanka they gained significant support. In China and Vietnam the M-Ls destroyed them and in Bolivia things didn't go well. So that left only Sri Lanka. The main reasons for the failure of the Trotskyists to further spread their ideas were material limitations. Is this a decent idea of what went on?

[RedTrackWorker]

OK, so what I understand from this thread was that during the 30s and 40s the Trotskyists' more revolutionary policies when compared to the Comintern was reasonably successful in gathering support. In China, Vietnam, Bolivia and Sri Lanka they gained significant support. In China and Vietnam the M-Ls destroyed them and in Bolivia things didn't go well. So that left only Sri Lanka. The main reasons for the failure of the Trotskyists to further spread their ideas were material limitations. Is this a decent idea of what went on?

In outline, I think yes.