Left Communism and the ICC [Archive]

Leo

13th April 2012, 23:34

This thread is mainly for left communists to answer.

What are your views of the International Communist Current? Do they subscribe more the the German/Dutch tradition of left communism or the Italian tradition? If you are a member, why?

I was thinking about joining them.

EDIT: If you are apart of another left communist organization, what is it? Why do you like that group better? I'm a member of the ICC. The ICC critically lays heritage to both the Dutch/German tradition and the Italian tradition. Theoretically, the biggest influence on the ICC could be argued to be the magazine Bilan, an organ of the Italian left in exile in the 30ies which took on several important questions, including the position on national liberation, the period of transition, the class nature of Russia, the union question and so on and evaluated the German left. It could be said the ICC comes from a split from the Italian left, which was called Gauche Communiste de France (the Communist Left of France) although an old-time militant of the KAPD was present at its foundation congress. In a way, the ICC's positions can be considered to be a synthesis of the positions of the Dutch/German and Italian lefts, although it is not a mere hybrid and the influence of the Italian left on the organizational question is apparent as is that of the Dutch/German left on the need for the workers' councils, not the party to take power. For a more detailed view of the history of where the ICC as well as other left communist currents come from, you can check this article (http://en.internationalism.org/the-communist-left) out.

Why am I a member of the ICC? Well, there are numerous reasons. First of all, because I defend the basic positions of the communist left, obviously. I am an internationalist, I am against all sorts of nationalism including national liberation movements. I think the Stalinists, Trotskyists and the social-democrats harm the struggles of the workers and the unions are an obstacle against them. I don't think permanent reforms are possible in the current epoch, am completely against parliamentarianism and I think that the world revolution is both a necessity and a possibility. I am for the dictatorship of the workers' councils, however I think communist proletarians will have an important role to play in the revolutionary struggle as a part of the class as a whole, and I feel the need to act and fight now to help make the fulfillment of this role a reality as much as I'm able to for when the time comes.

There are two main left communist organizations today, the other one being the Internationalist Communist Tendency whose main section comes directly from the 1953 split of the Internationalist Communist Party of Italy. I reckon the comrades in the ICT would agree with the reasons I've listed above, although perhaps they would phrase it differently. What then are the differences between the ICC and the ICT? First of all the ICC and the ICT have a different conception of an organization, or a different project as the comrades of the ICT call it. The ICC is an internationally centralized organization and regards this to be the correct approach while the ICT, although there's been recent moves towards international centralization, is still essentially a federation of nationally centralized sister organizations. The two organizations have a different understanding of the party, evidenced by the fact that the Italian section of the ICT is still called the Internationalist Communist Party of Italy whereas the ICC hold the position that the future world communist party has to be founded on an international basis and can't be based in a single country. The position on the period of transition towards communism is also different: the ICC sees the state as a necessary evil and an organ of force separate but subordinate to the workers' councils, while there is a tendency to define the state as the workers' councils in the ICT. The ICC rejects outright the idea of the party taking state power for it should maintain its independence as a political force and thus should be in a position to ask the resignation of any member who is elected by the workers' councils to any position within the state; while the ICT has a nuanced position where they defend the idea the party should take power although not exclusively but with the rest of the class. The ICC, while critically defending Lenin's contributions as a militant, rejects Leninism and considers it to be a betrayal of Lenin while the ICT is more vague on the question of Leninism, and it is possible to see its Italian section describe themselves as Leninists in their articles. In general, it could be said that the ICC is slightly more rigid than the ICT on questions such as parliamentarianism and trade-unionism. There are other minor theoretical, organizational and practical differences which I won't go into. The reason I'm a militant of the ICC is because I agree with the ICC and not the ICT on these questions. That is not to say I think the ICC is the perfect organization, or correct in everything it says.

Anyway, feel free to ask any other questions, or write to [email protected] if you wish.

Blake's Baby

14th April 2012, 00:03

They seem like a bunch of wankers, honestly. Anybody who regards the existence of the ICC as being even remotely relevant for the working class is living in a sad dreamworld.

because the workling class doesn't need revolutionary organisations? Or because the ICC isn't one of the organisations that the working class needs?

Whether you think the ICC and its symapthisers are wankers or sad is neither here nor there, but you could at least try to put some politics into your criticism.

Sentinel

14th April 2012, 00:48

They seem like a bunch of wankers, honestly. Anybody who regards the existence of the ICC as being even remotely relevant for the working class is living in a sad dreamworld.

I'm issuing you a verbal warning for this flamebait. Listen to Blake's Baby.

Brosa Luxemburg

14th April 2012, 01:54

@ Leo

Thank you so much. Your response was EXTREMELY helpful.

Ostrinski

14th April 2012, 02:04

Isn't that the left communist position that all existing socialist parties are bourgeois and counter-revolutionary? Shouldn't that apply to parties that call themselves left communist as well?

Dr Doom

14th April 2012, 02:33

Isn't that the left communist position that all existing socialist parties are bourgeois and counter-revolutionary? Shouldn't that apply to parties that call themselves left communist as well?

eh no, they label stalinists, trots, some anarchists etc as the left wing of capital, which is a fair point i think. they also believe in a 'proletarian camp' which includes most left communist groups and some anarchist ones, basically anyone who upholds internationalism as they see it.

Railyon

14th April 2012, 02:36

Isn't that the left communist position that all existing socialist parties are bourgeois and counter-revolutionary?

From their Basic Positions:

All factions of the bourgeoisie are equally reactionary. All the so-called ‘workers’, ‘Socialist’ and ‘Communist’ parties (now ex-’Communists’), the leftist organisations (Trotskyists, Maoists and ex-Maoists, official anarchists) constitute the left of capitalism’s political apparatus. All the tactics of ‘popular fronts’, ‘anti-fascist fronts’ and ‘united fronts’, which mix up the interests of the proletariat with those of a faction of the bourgeoisie, serve only to smother and derail the struggle of the proletariat.
http://en.internationalism.org/basic-positions

This paragraph rustled the jimmies of quite a lot of anarchists because, what the hell are "official anarchists"? I think over on libcom an ICCer said it mostly refers to anarchists participating in elections and bourgie politics (like the CNT in the Spanish Revolution), but why not fucking say so...?

Dr Doom

14th April 2012, 02:39

yeah its a pretty outdated term. which is a problem with a lot of the shit they say. i can never read any of the stuff on their website without getting a sore head. too much cheesy communist jargon.

Grenzer

14th April 2012, 02:41

This paragraph rustled the jimmies of quite a lot of anarchists because, what the hell are "official anarchists"? I think over on libcom an ICCer said it mostly refers to anarchists participating in elections and bourgie politics (like the CNT in the Spanish Revolution), but why not fucking say so...?

I agree. I'm a fan of the ICC, but I think they could have handled that particular statement with a bit more.. finesse. They seem to have a bit of PR problem in certain circles.

Blake's Baby

14th April 2012, 12:26

Devrim

14th April 2012, 13:23

I would just like to comment on Leo's explanation of the differences between the ICC and the ICT.*

Just to make my personal position clear, I am an ex-member of the Turkish section of the ICC, and also I quite familiar with the ICT.*

I will go through his points one by one:

"First of all the ICC and the ICT have a different conception of an organization, or a different project as the comrades of the ICT call it. The ICC is an internationally centralized organization and regards this to be the correct approach while the ICT, although there's been recent moves towards international centralization, is still essentially a federation of nationally centralized sister organizations."

There is certainly a difference between the way that these two organisations ate organised today. Like with most of Leo's points here, he expresses the view of the ICC on these questions, and while much of what he says is true, I am sure that the ICT would put a different 'spin' on it. I think that to people who are not directly involved in these things, the phraseology used can hide what the actual differences are.*

If we start from the similarities, both organisations say that they are for an international centralised party, and also both state that they are not that party.*

The difference comes in how they organise today, and, in my opinion, specifically in how they relate to new contacts or groups in countries where they don't have sections.*

The ICC sees itself as a single international organisation, and organises as such whereas the ICT is much more, as Leo put it, a set of fraternal organisations.*

As an example of what this means in a very practical form, the ICC has international congresses of the whole organisation whilst the ICT holds 'congresses' (I think they use a different word) of its sections. For the ICC the 'supreme body' is the congress, which elects various bodies to run the organisation in-between these congresses (how this works in practice is a different question). I am less sure about the actual organisation of the ICT (perhaps one of them could comment), but the 'centralising body' is a small meeting of delegates from each section.*

With regards to the second part of this question, contacts with people in countries where they don't have sections, the basic difference in approach seems to me to be that the ICC would try to recruit people directly into their organisation whereas the ICT would encourage *them to build an organisation in the country where they live, which they would hope would later join their organisation.*

I think we could develop a discussion around the pros and cons of each approach, but in this post I am just trying to give practical examples of what the differences are.*

"The two organizations have a different understanding of the party, evidenced by the fact that the Italian section of the ICT is still called the Internationalist Communist Party of Italy whereas the ICC hold the position that the future world communist party has to be founded on an international basis and can't be based in a single country."

I am not sure how true this is, or what it actually means in practical terms. I don't think that the formation of a world party will come about in exactly the way that anybody envisages it today, and that reality will surprise most carefully crafted theories.*

I think the thing about the name (also I think Leo is factually wrong here, it doesn't use the words 'of Italy' in it) is a bit misleading. The PCInt is the oldest organisation of the communist left today dating back to the 1940s. At the time it was formed there was certainly a disagreement between them and people who could be called the forerunners of the ICC about whether it was time to form the party. The people ho became the PCInt said it was, and the 'forerunners' of the ICC said that they were forming the party on an opportunist basis.*

Today, however, the PCInt realise that they are not 'the party', and the name is just a historical remnant. I think that not recognising this, and suggesting there is some sort of meaning in this, probably has its roots in cheap point scoring.*

"The position on the period of transition towards communism is also different: the ICC sees the state as a necessary evil and an organ of force separate but subordinate to the workers' councils, while there is a tendency to define the state as the workers' councils in the ICT."

This is a pretty good description of the different positions. A question could be raised about how much of the difference is semantic in the sense of which organs one would describe as the state during the period of transition.*

"The ICC rejects outright the idea of the party taking state power for it should maintain its independence as a political force and thus should be in a position to ask the resignation of any member who is elected by the workers' councils to any position within the state; while the ICT has a nuanced position where they defend the idea the party should take power although not exclusively but with the rest of the class."

I am not so sure about this, and would imagine that the ICT has a position that rejects the party taking state power. I could be wrong though.*

"The ICC, while critically defending Lenin's contributions as a militant, rejects Leninism and considers it to be a betrayal of Lenin while the ICT is more vague on the question of Leninism, and it is possible to see its Italian section describe themselves as Leninists in their articles."

I don't read Italian so I am not sure whether they refer to themselves like this. My general impression though would be that the ICC is 'softer' on Lenin and Trotsky that the ICC. The ICC say that 'Trotsky never crossed the class line'. From what I have read, I would imagine that the ICT would be more critical. Again there is a lot of things that could be discussed on the subject of the degeneration of the Russia revolution.*

"In general, it could be said that the ICC is slightly more rigid than the ICT on questions such as parliamentarianism and trade-unionism."

By "slightly more rigid on questions such as parlimentarianism" in practical terms this means that the PCInt stood candidates in local elections in Italy in 1946. I think this is more than a little petty. I think both organisations have exactly the same attitude towards this question today.*

On the trade union question there is a point. ICC members ate not supposed to join a union unless they are in closed shop whereas the ICT has no rule like this.*

I hope this helps a little.*

Devrim

Devrim

14th April 2012, 13:28

black magick hustla

15th April 2012, 00:41

I used to be a sympathizer and went to some meetings, wrote some stuff for the publication, and translated some documents.

I don't want to talk too much about the ICC in specific, my criticism is mostly geared at the whole "formal" millieu of the communist left in general.

Long story short, I don't think "formal" political organizations are really that important in general. It seems to me, a lot of those folks see themselves and their orgs as some sort of treasure chest of revolutionary theory/politics that awaits to be opened by the militant working class. I don't think it works that way though. I think, something new will emerge from the class struggle, that the militant working class will rally around, which will wash away the ICC,ICT, etc. I think the "formal" communist left, is moreso a club of friends with a lot of rules, than anything else really.

It also seems to me that the "formal" millieu sees everything and everyone else in the "communist left" as irrelevant, cuz' they are not organized into central organizations. In the contrary, the dissemination of left communist ideas today is more due to informal circles and informal magazines that really anything else.

To answer Blake's Baby inquiry about "if the working class needs political organizations". They probably might, but they certainly don't need the ICC nor any "organization" that exists today.

Alf

15th April 2012, 09:42

I'm a member of the ICC. Obviously i think the working class needs 'formal' political organisations and eventually a political party, and the latter will not come into existence if today's communists are not organising towards it, whatever their differences about how the process will unfold. This is an important point of agreement between the ICC and the ICT. I just don't see how a proletarian approach can be against communists organising together, because this follows the same basic needs of working class association which gave rise to unions in the past and assemblies and councils in the present epoch.

I agree with most of Leo's points about the differences between the two organisations, although I think the ICT has evolved from some of its more ambiguous ideas about the party taking power, and consciousness coming to the working class 'from the outside'. Having read the CWO's recent pamphlet on class consciousness, there is not a huge amount I would disagree with at the general level.

With regard to anarchism, we have published a lot of articles recently which have clarified and developed our position. Rather than referring to 'official' anarchism, we prefer to make the distinction between internationalist anarchists, who we see as part of the proletarian movement, and anarchists who are essentially part of the left of capital because of their position and practice on key issues like internationalism. There are, as in all cases, grey areas in between, and a further complication added by anarchisms which seem to reflect a 'petty bourgeois' approach - individualists, life-stylists etc.

Railyon

15th April 2012, 09:55

With regard to anarchism, we have published a lot of articles recently which have clarified and developed our position. Rather than referring to 'official' anarchism, we prefer to make the distinction between internationalist anarchists, who we see as part of the proletarian movement, and anarchists who are essentially part of the left of capital because of their position and practice on key issues like internationalism. There are, as in all cases, grey areas in between, and a further complication added by anarchisms which seem to reflect a 'petty bourgeois' approach - individualists, life-stylists etc.

So I guess that is mainly leveled at what is colloquially called "neo-platformists", those that support national liberation and other dodgy business?

Most (class struggle) anarchists outright disregard "lifestylists" and "individualists" as such, but I'm with you that anarchism as an umbrella term starts to make sense less and less because of its overt fragmentation into a multitude of worldviews completely opposite from one other.

By the way, how big is the ICC or other left-communist organizations in Germany? I'm interested in attending a few meetings here and there but it does seem like left-coms are kind of non-existent where I live.

Leo

15th April 2012, 10:40

As an example of what this means in a very practical form, the ICC has international congresses of the whole organisation whilst the ICT holds 'congresses' (I think they use a different word) of its sections.I think the term the ICT uses is assembly of militants. Also, of course the ICC has conferences and congresses of its local sections as well as international congresses.

I think the thing about the name (also I think Leo is factually wrong here, it doesn't use the words 'of Italy' in it) is a bit misleading.I don't know whether it was originally used here or not, but it is commonly used to refer to the party: http://www.sinistra.net/lib/upt/comlef/art/ashohiscle.html

Today, however, the PCInt realise that they are not 'the party', and the name is just a historical remnant. I think that not recognising this, and suggesting there is some sort of meaning in this, probably has its roots in cheap point scoring.Why? I'm not the one calling them a party, they are. The ICT realizes its not the party, the Internationalist Communist Party still calls itself a party. Why still call your organization a party if you don't think it is a party?

I am not so sure about this, and would imagine that the ICT has a position that rejects the party taking state power. I could be wrong though.That one I'm basing more on what Jock told us when he was in Turkey, he can correct me if he wishes, of course.

I don't read Italian so I am not sure whether they refer to themselves like this.You can find such references in English articles as well.

My general impression though would be that the ICC is 'softer' on Lenin and Trotsky that the ICC. The ICC say that 'Trotsky never crossed the class line'. From what I have read, I would imagine that the ICT would be more critical. Again there is a lot of things that could be discussed on the subject of the degeneration of the Russia revolution.I think that is not a correct impression actually. The position of the ICT and the ICC on Trotsky seems pretty much the same, indeed saying he remained a revolutionary although he was an opportunist/made serious mistakes etc. while the ICT, or at least PCInt is clearly softer on Lenin.

By "slightly more rigid on questions such as parlimentarianism" in practical terms this means that the PCInt stood candidates in local elections in Italy in 1946. I think this is more than a little petty. I think both organisations have exactly the same attitude towards this question today.Local as well as general elections (the PCInt participated in two elections) but my point is more about how they see it today rather than them having made what I consider to be a mistake in the past. They don't rule out the possibility of using the same sort of tactics in conditions similar to late forties in Italy. Calling this slightly less rigid is fair, I think. It's not like I'm calling the ICT parliamentarians.

Thirsty Crow

15th April 2012, 11:10

What are your views of the International Communist Current? Do they subscribe more the the German/Dutch tradition of left communism or the Italian tradition? If you are a member, why?
As others have no doubt pointed out, the ICC regard themselves as a synthesis of the two historical currents in left communism (with historical ground in that the org actually came about as the result of the former militants of Gauche Communiste de France).
I'm not a member though I had contact, direct one at that (a joint meeting), with the organization as part of a (nascent)regional group. I suppose membership is always an option.

Now, the problems I have with the group is the theory of decomposition (actually, this functions as a historical periodization, which I think is fairly problematic, but to be frank, I should stud the problems posed by the theory more in depth, so I don't have a definite position on this) and the Luxemburgist bent in economic analyses (though the ICC does welcome other points of view on the problem of crisis).

I was thinking about joining them.Leo provided you with an email, but you can also contact the org via the information on the website. They're great with regard to communication and it shouldn't be a problem.

EDIT: If you are apart of another left communist organization, what is it? Why do you like that group better?You can also check out the ICT (but I'm not a member as I've said earlier).

Blake's Baby

15th April 2012, 11:20

... I don't think "formal" political organizations are really that important in general. It seems to me, a lot of those folks see themselves and their orgs as some sort of treasure chest of revolutionary theory/politics that awaits to be opened by the militant working class. I don't think it works that way though. I think, something new will emerge from the class struggle, that the militant working class will rally around, which will wash away the ICC,ICT, etc...

To answer Blake's Baby inquiry about "if the working class needs political organizations". They probably might, but they certainly don't need the ICC nor any "organization" that exists today.

Obviously this is something comes up time and time again, and in some ways I agree with you about the 'treasure chest'. I think this is in part because the existing groups are small an isolated from each other. But at the very minimum, I think the organisations that currently exist need to be a treasure chest of the history and theories that have preceeded us. Obviously, an organisation that was able to consistently intervene in the class struggle on a worldwide basis would be much better. But we haven't got one and no perspective of building one at the moment.

I agree (and so do the ICC and the ICT and the CBG and any other Left Communist group you could name, except the Bordigist groups) that none of the existing organisations 'is' the future World Party. I've even called for all the existing groups to be destroyed if they're not fit for purpose. The revolutionary organisation is a tool. If a tool's broken and can't be fixed, throw it away.

But are the current organisations so broken? I'm not convinced. None of them as currently constituted 'is' the Party, but on the other hand, where is the Party going to come from? Surely, to an extent, at least at the begining, it's going to come from the existing 'proletarian milieu/camp' which will include the existing organisations and those of us who float around them. I'm not convinced about 'washing away' the current organisations - I would rather see it as the existing organisations being the grain of sand around which the proletarian oyster... you get the drift. Or maybe, the existing organisations being the stock that makes the World Party Soup. Or something.

Seriously; if we accept, more or less, that the theoretical positions of the existing groups, their elaboration of the communist programme, their actual formal politics (as opposed to their organisational practice, for a moment, because that's not entirely relevant here) are more or less correct, and we also accept that the proletariat needs a political organisation, then where is that organisation going to emerge from, if not (at least in part, probably in large part to begin with) from the milieu/camp as it exists now?

black magick hustla

15th April 2012, 11:34

Obviously this is something comes up time and time again, and in some ways I agree with you about the 'treasure chest'. I think this is in part because the existing groups are small an isolated from each other. But at the very minimum, I think the organisations that currently exist need to be a treasure chest of the history and theories that have preceeded us. Obviously, an organisation that was able to consistently intervene in the class struggle on a worldwide basis would be much better. But we haven't got one and no perspective of building one at the moment.
i think that it is cool there are some people out there that publish and translate the theory and the history, etc. i don't think that is only how the icc and the ict present itself or works though. to be in the icc, you have to pay 5 percent of your income, and more or less it is suggested that you "become a militant for life", whatever that means, and agree with a very lengthy platform. it sounds like a very elaborate brotherhood/fraternity.

I agree (and so do the ICC and the ICT and the CBG and any other Left Communist group you could name, except the Bordigist groups) that none of the existing organisations 'is' the future World Party. I've even called for all the existing groups to be destroyed if they're not fit for purpose. The revolutionary organisation is a tool. If a tool's broken and can't be fixed, throw it away.

yes, i know they don't see themselves as the "world party". i would go further and say that they won't be the central poles of the future world party, and i use the term very vaguely, cuz' to me it just means a locus of the future politicized working class which is organic in origin,

But are the current organisations so broken? I'm not convinced. None of them as currently constituted 'is' the Party, but on the other hand, where is the Party going to come from? Surely, to an extent, at least at the begining, it's going to come from the existing 'proletarian milieu/camp' which will include the existing organisations and those of us who float around them.

i think that is just wishful thinking and it is that dream that sustains the long and tortous existence of the formal communist left. its probably based on some weird and erroneous comparison to the bolsheviks, which were tiny in the beginning and suddenly exploded.

I'm not convinced about 'washing away' the current organisations - I would rather see it as the existing organisations being the grain of sand around which the proletarian oyster... you get the drift. Or maybe, the existing organisations being the stock that makes the World Party Soup. Or something.

i don't really "want" to see them getting awashed. i just think its going to happen.

Seriously; if we accept, more or less, that the theoretical positions of the existing groups, their elaboration of the communist programme, their actual formal politics (as opposed to their organisational practice, for a moment, because that's not entirely relevant here) are more or less correct, and we also accept that the proletariat needs a political organisation, then where is that organisation going to emerge from, if not (at least in part, probably in large part to begin with) from the milieu/camp as it exists now?

i don't think political leadership is a matter of "correct theory", and to be honest the malfunctioning of the organization(s) probably signal some crass theoretical error

Alf

15th April 2012, 11:48

if by getting washed away the groups simply break up under the pressure of the class struggle and their inability to respond to it, the question is what emerges in their place, and whether it will a higher form of organisation or an even more incoherent one. The latter seems more likely if the groups are simply destroyed rather than consciously fusing into something bigger than themselves.

Railyon: you can contact the German section of the ICC directly via email on the German page of the website (http://de.internationalism.org/contact), or write to their postal address: Postfach 410308, 50863 Koln. They are a bit dispersed but the main centres of activity are Cologne and Berlin.

Desperado

15th April 2012, 11:51

I think, probably, that it's more explicable in the context of politics in France, which (along with Mexico) is where the largest ICC presence is. Sections of Anarchism in France are very much tied up with the Partizans, national liberation movements, anti-Americanism, and all sorts of other bourgeois politics. The idea of 'official Anarchism' seems oxymoronic in the English-speaking world, but I suspect in French it comes accross as daringly satirical, puncturing the hypocrisy of 'anti-state-statists'.

Indeed, everything can be flipped upside down at times. For example, such anarchists as Ian Bone supported the NATO bombing of Libya, whereas to my knowledge the Anarchist Federation did not. Which, on that issue, would brand Ian Bone as official and the AF as not...

From my own experiences, those who loosely identify with anarchism and would never join an "official" organisation are often less adherent to strict anti-statism and internationalism - supporting Chavez, or a Palestinian or Tibetan state for example. Mind you, even Chomsky's done the former.

Not that I think it's much of an issue, considering there's not much concrete action which a supporter of say NATO attacking Libya can do on the issue. That is, unless they transgress more central principals and become a part of the present establishment, such as the CNT did.

black magick hustla

15th April 2012, 12:01

whether it will a higher form of organisation or an even more incoherent one. The latter seems more likely.

yea, i've heard that before. i don't really believe "political purity" is meaningful whatsoever if it has to be "forced" for many decades, long after the expiration date. i think there where many communists that came from the "communist left" that actually realized this bit but the icc calls them "modernists". either the proletariat is forced to act by necessity against the state and capital, or it doesn't act at all. no matter how many small grouplets with pristine clear platforms exist

Искра

15th April 2012, 12:44

With regards to the second part of this question, contacts with people in countries where they don't have sections, the basic difference in approach seems to me to be that the ICC would try to recruit people directly into their organisation whereas the ICT would encourage *them to build an organisation in the country where they live, which they would hope would later join their organisation.*
ICC comrades were on a meeting with group me and Menocchio here are in. They said to us that they don't wanna recuit us into organisation but that we should firstly build our local group, because that is what is most important. To me that was really interesting, because my experience from anarchist movement is that everyone just wants to recruit you for their group.

Maybe you tought that ICC doesn't like to recuit whole groups but individual by individual, but as far as I know, they did recuit whole Turkish section at the same time, right?

Anyhow, I really interesting posts from both Leo and Devrim... :) I'll soon meet comrades from Italian ICT, so these differences are really interesting to me.

Devrim

17th April 2012, 12:13

Today, however, the PCInt realise that they are not 'the party', and the name is just a historical remnant. I think that not recognising this, and suggesting there is some sort of meaning in this, probably has its roots in cheap point scoring. Why? I'm not the one calling them a party, they are. The ICT realizes its not the party, the Internationalist Communist Party still calls itself a party. Why still call your organization a party if you don't think it is a party?

Perhaps out of tradition, or the fact that it is a recognised name (I believe the PCInt is the oldest 'left' organisation in Italy)? I don't know. Why do we still call ourselves left communists?

The point is, they say they are not the party, you know that they say they are not the party, and just the fact that they still use their historical name becomes some sort point of definition between you and them. I think it is an unimportant semantic thing, and the attention the ICC gives to it is, in my opinion, petty sectarian sniping.

I don't know whether it was originally used here or not, but it is commonly used to refer to the party: http://www.sinistra.net/lib/upt/coml...shohiscle.html (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.sinistra.net/lib/upt/comlef/art/ashohiscle.html)

This is just a minor point of information, but I don't think they use it. It certainly isn't the name that appears on their publications. That isn't their source that you refer to. I think the 'of Italy' is added there for the benefit of the reader.

That one I'm basing more on what Jock told us when he was in Turkey, he can correct me if he wishes, of course.

If it is true then, either I wasn't there at the time it was said, I misunderstood it, or have just forgotten it. I have never heard anything like this, so I would like him to clarify.

You can find such references [to being Leninists] in English articles as well.

Again, I have never seen them, and a quick search through their site in English didn't bring up any instances of it. Perhaps Jock could clarify.

I think that is not a correct impression actually. The position of the ICT and the ICC on Trotsky seems pretty much the same, indeed saying he remained a revolutionary although he was an opportunist/made serious mistakes etc. while the ICT, or at least PCInt is clearly softer on Lenin.

Again, it is not the impression I have from the articles I have read from both sides. Perhaps Jock could clarify.

Local as well as general elections (the PCInt participated in two elections) but my point is more about how they see it today rather than them having made what I consider to be a mistake in the past. They don't rule out the possibility of using the same sort of tactics in conditions similar to late forties in Italy.

I have never heard them advocate any situation today where they thought it could be used. Again I would like to ask Jock to clarify.

Calling this slightly less rigid is fair, I think. It's not like I'm calling the ICT parliamentarians.

But you seem to be saying they would be if they had the chance.

Devrim

Devrim

17th April 2012, 12:22

ICC comrades were on a meeting with group me and Menocchio here are in. They said to us that they don't wanna recuit us into organisation but that we should firstly build our local group, because that is what is most important. To me that was really interesting, because my experience from anarchist movement is that everyone just wants to recruit you for their group.

I don't think that the ICC recruit anybody nor did I mean to suggest that. I don't think any left communists would propose that you join at the first meeting. I was talking more of their approach to it over time.

Maybe you tought that ICC doesn't like to recuit whole groups but individual by individual, but as far as I know, they did recuit whole Turkish section at the same time, right?

As I understand it, Individuals join the ICC (all of the members of EKS forerunner of the ICC in Turkey joined as individuals) whereas sections join the ICT.

It was mentioned at the time that we joined (though never seriously pursued) that possibly some individuals could join before others.

Devrim

Leo

17th April 2012, 22:06

Perhaps out of tradition, or the fact that it is a recognised name (I believe the PCInt is the oldest 'left' organisation in Italy)? I don't know. Why do we still call ourselves left communists?

The point is, they say they are not the partyIt isn't as if we say we are not left communists but are still calling ourselves that for brand recognition.

you know that they say they are not the partyActually, I know that the ICT says its not the party. I know that the CWO says its not the party. I don't, however, know if the PCInt says its not the party and don't think that's the case. Calling yourself something you don't consider yourself to me makes little sense no matter the reason. The initial position was that it was possible to have the party in a single country, I don't know if a criticism of this position developed within the PCInt afterwards and I haven't read anything to suggest that it did. So, I'd say that at best the PCInt's position is vague, or that it is the party in Italy and that it is possible for the party to exist in a single country alone. Aside from thinking that a position on this shouldn't remain vague if it is, or disagreeing with the premise that the party can be formed and maintained in a single country, I don't have a particular problem with a position such as this, and don't think it is a position outside the communist left at all. Nor do I think it is the way forward to sweep in under the carpet.

This is just a minor point of information, but I don't think they use it. It certainly isn't the name that appears on their publications. That isn't their source that you refer to. I think the 'of Italy' is added there for the benefit of the reader.They used it in their own publications in Italian as well: http://www.leftcom.org/it/articles/1982-10-31/statuto-del-partito-comunista-internazionalista

"È qui riportata la premessa dello statuto del Partito Comunista Internazionalista d'Italia in quanto significativa della natura dell'organizzazione stessa"

In any case, this really is a minor point and I don't think it matters at all.

If it is true then, either I wasn't there at the time it was said, I misunderstood it, or have just forgotten it. I have never heard anything like this, so I would like him to clarify.I might as well have misunderstood it, of course. In any case, it wasn't like the party takes power by itself in a substitutionist way, but a part of and along with the class. I remember thinking it was a rather ambiguous position personally, if I recall correctly the comrade made the argument on the grounds that "we can't run away from the responsibility".

Again, I have never seen them, and a quick search through their site in English didn't bring up any instances of it.Well, Onorato Damen's article here is full of such references.

http://www.leftcom.org/en/articles/2010-03-17/centralised-party-yes-centralism-over-the-party-no

There are many other similar articles in Italian, and the Instituto Onorato Damen also claims to be in line with the Leninist tradition, and I presume it didn't come out of nowhere.

I have never heard them advocate any situation today where they thought it could be used.Obviously they don't advocate using parliamentarianism today. What I remember to be their position is that they don't rule out the possibility of participation in a similar situation to that of the PCInt in the late 1940ies, or rather in a situation which they would evaluate as the PCInt evaluated the late 40ies I suppose.

Calling this slightly less rigid is fair, I think. It's not like I'm calling the ICT parliamentarians. But you seem to be saying they would be if they had the chance.I am not saying anything as such, and I'm getting rather tired of the assumption that I am trying to portray the PCInt in a negative fashion in order to score sectarian points. I'm trying to put forward their positions and differences as clearly as possible and as far as I am aware of, and that is it. What they say is that the possibility can't be entirely ruled out.

If anyone is wondering what I personally think about all this, I don't think they'd do it despite saying it can't be ruled out, because I have a feeling that their position is as such so that they can see the brief electoral practice of their tradition more acceptable and not (or less) contradictory with their principles. My opinion on this doesn't change the position though.

Jock

18th April 2012, 11:54

Devrim is right Leo is trying score petty little points for the ICC against the ICT by his twisted presentation of our history and theory. I would not have responded but he even attributes to me the opinions he is posing as facts. The Internationalist Communist Party from 1943 (from which the Bordigist International Communist Party split in 1952 (not 53 as Leo says) has never included "of Italy" in its official title and as Leo well knows was present in 4 countries until the Bordigist split. When it was founded it saw itself inthe same internationalist tradition as the "Communist Party of Italy, section of the Third International" (and not the Italian Communist Party which was the name the Stalinists led by Togliatti took in 1945). When Devrim points out to Leo he got this wrong the ver incorrigible Leo then quotes a Bordigist site (not ours) to show that "of Italy" is sometiems added by the Bordigists. This is to do them an injustice as they are no less internationalist than any other section of the communist left. I wish we agreed on more. The "of Italy" is sometiems added not as a title but as geographcial description of where the organisation is based (e.g in the International Conferences). And it is only in that sense that we use it as they are now the Italian affiliate of the ICT.

Leo then pretends to be incapable of understanding why "The Internationalists of Battaglia Comunista" as they usually sign their leaflets still retain inthe backgorund the old party title even though they do not consioder themsleves to be the future international party of the proletariat. The reason is the one Devrim gave. It is the oldest continuously existing organisation of the Communist Left. We did not split from the Bordigists as Leo keep asserting but they split from the original Internationalist Communist Party founded by Damen in 1943 (with Stefanini and others) and to whcih Bordiga never adhered. In fact the first polemic Bordiga made against the party was to say that it was a mistake that it had been formed. Only after a couple of years of discussion did the Bordigists turn round and found a party of their own ("the party Bordiga did not want" as Damen wrote at the time). Since 1952 the Bordigists have split several times and there are at least four International Communist Parties. Each split would have loved to take on the title of teh Internationalist Communist Party to enhance its prestige but by not abandoning the title to them it has preserved its historic character. iT is not teh only organisation which preserves its historic name even though it no longer accurately represents the ideas of the organisation. The CWO was named when we identified much more with the KAPD and the German Left (Essen Tendency). I gave up 20 years ago trying to convince my comrades to change the name. We have been known (everything is relative!) as the CWO, they argue, so we will stick with it.

On the question of parliamentarism we are all agreed that the proletariat cannot come to power through parliament, indeed it can only transform itself in the course of a revolution (see the German Ideology) to become fit to found a new society. Everything else though is about a tactical evaluation of how best to raise the consciousness of the working class. In post-war Italy the monarchy was on the way out and the Republic replaced it. In the elections that took place in those years the bourgeoisie guaranteed the right of a platfrom in the piazze (public squares) to any party putting up candidates. And for this reason the party of abstentionism put up candidates, not to win votes but in particular to campaign against the Stalinists. In acertain sense it was successful as the party grew to several thousand (I don't the exact figure). But it seems to us that this was a unique occasion. We cannot envisage a repeat of it in the future. For example if the proletariat succeeds in overthrowing the parliamentary order in any one state there may be calls for a Constituent Assembly to draw up a new constitution based on workers' councils. But it is likely that these would be manouevres of the ruling class to hold on whilst they waited for the class movement to lose its steam. Our task in this case would be to expose the trick and to call for the instant assumption of power by the EC of the Congress of Class wide bodies. However this would be based on strategic adn tactical evaluation of the precise situation at the time. It is the same for the trades unions. We hold the same class analysis of the tus as the ICC but we think that we should keep in contact with workers wherever we find them (and by definition that is always in one capitalist category or another until the revolution). Obviously we don't particapte inthe permanenet structure of the union and our purpose for being theri is only political but again that is our tactical evaluation (I understand that we would not need to be in the unions to take part in mass meeting in Spain or France so we would
approach the question differently there.

I would like to thanks Alf for his comment (No 19) on our real position on the party and class in the revolution as he has just read our pamphlet on class consciousness. I should point out that this is now translated into (or is being translated into) Italian, Greek Farsi and all the languages of the ICT so it is no longer just a CWO pamphlet). Alf's comment seems much more in the spirit of recent exchanges between our two organisations. I won't go into the argument here (but I would state that our position is based on Damen's 1952 statement that "the working class does not delegate its power to anyone not even to its own party"). What we have done is built on it (largely on the basis of new evidence about the Russian Revolution).

One final comment. I was surprised to hear that the ICC were encouraging the comrades M and K to build a real group in the territory where they find themselves. AS I understood it in the past the ICC declared any group of 3 a section and they just had to translate the ICC's politics into the local situation. If this is a new development it is most welcome as it is precisely the premise on which our ICT "project" is based.

Alf

18th April 2012, 17:33

I welcome Jock's clarifications. Regarding the name of the ICT's Italian affiliate, there are still important theoretical differences here going back to the conditions for the formation of the party and related issues, but they do need to be based on the best possible grasp of other comrades' positions. I don't agree that Leo entered into this discussion with a 'point-scoring' attitude, but we do need to be conscious that such attitudes continue to exist in both organisations, and try to go beyond them.

A small clarification of our own: I don't think that what we said to the Croatian comrades was particularly new. We have said the same thing to groups in Latin America, Australia, and so on. Certainly if a group is really in agreement with our positions, we are only too happy to integrate them, but this is not an overnight process. Prior to that it is necessary for groups to consolidate themselves through their own activities and discussions as well as discussion with the ICC and other proletarian groups. Joining the ICC might be the outcome of this process but we don't see it as the only possible one.

Devrim

18th April 2012, 20:22

Devrim is right Leo is trying score petty little points for the ICC against the ICT by his twisted presentation of our history and theory.

I don't think that this is what he is trying to do, which possibly makes it even worse in some ways.

and I'm getting rather tired of the assumption that I am trying to portray the PCInt in a negative fashion in order to score sectarian points. I'm trying to put forward their positions and differences as clearly as possible and as far as I am aware of, and that is it.

As I said, I don't assume that you are trying to do it. I think it is what you end up doing nevertheless, and the reason that you end up doing it has its roots in some of the ICC's practices.

Let's look at the thing about the party and try to draw some examples from that:

The two organizations have a different understanding of the party, evidenced by the fact that the Italian section of the ICT is still called the Internationalist Communist Party of Italy whereas the ICC hold the position that the future world communist party has to be founded on an international basis and can't be based in a single country.

Really what is this? I don't think that we can lay out exactly how some possible international party would be formed in the future. Now that doesn't mean that we can't have some ideas on the subject nor that it shouldn't be discussed. However, I think that in a future revolutionary period, lots of things will happen in a way not only different from how we think that it actually should happen, but different from how we conceived it could happen.

Basically you can have all of the nice theories that you want, but many of them will get blown away by reality.

The ICC though takes positions on lots of issues. I don't think this is very healthy. Nor do I think that the way they arrive at these positions is either.

First let's discuss the method that they arrive at these positions. The ICC has always given off the impression to everybody that it is some sort of monolith, and has always tried to stress, to no avail, that it is not a monolith, and that it has lots of internal discussion.

The emphasis here though is on the discussion being internal. For most of its existence the ICC has insisted on 'deepening, and clarifying' these discussion internally, and then presenting a 'united face' to the class. As you yourself know this has gone to such extremes as the one where a criticism of myself was sent from ICC centre to the Turkish section for questioning the approach to an article on Darwinism on the ICC forum.

There are two things about this. First the ICC shouldn't be at all surprised if it is viewed as monolithic if this is how it presents itself, and secondly the class isn't listening anyway. Nevertheless, the ICC persists in this.

Once it has adopted an 'organisational position', it then tries to engage with other groups in a discussion around these organisational positions, and we come to something like this:

The initial position was that it was possible to have the party in a single country, I don't know if a criticism of this position developed within the PCInt afterwards and I haven't read anything to suggest that it did. So, I'd say that at best the PCInt's position is vague, or that it is the party in Italy and that it is possible for the party to exist in a single country alone. Aside from thinking that a position on this shouldn't remain vague if it is, or disagreeing with the premise that the party can be formed and maintained in a single country, I don't have a particular problem with a position such as this, and don't think it is a position outside the communist left at all.

The ICT doesn't come across to you as having a clear position on this. To you it comes across as being 'vague'. As far as I know, and I could very well be wrong, they don't have a detailed 'blueprint' on how the future party will be formed. This leads to problems when 'you try to put forward their positions and differences as clearly as possible and as far as you are aware of', and when the ICC tries to engage them in 'polemics' based around various ICC positions.

To digress slightly for a moment, one of the questions which I never received a satisfactory answer to when I was in the ICC was why if the future party that we imagine is one which would have multiple tendencies, why should an organisation today have such a tight theoretical basis.

The ICC, for whatever reasons, has chosen to go down that road. I tink that this was one of the things, but not the only one, that caused the then IBRP to state that it 'had a different project' to the ICC, not because it didn't want to relate to the ICC, but because it felt that it couldn't.

Devrim

Leo

19th April 2012, 09:39

Devrim is right Leo is trying score petty little points for the ICC against the ICT by his twisted presentation of our history and theory. This is pretty discouraging and disappointing to be honest.

from which the Bordigist International Communist Party split in 1952 (not 53 as Leo says)Surely you are not trying to suggest that this is a conscious effort to score a petty point rather than an actual mistake.

never included "of Italy" in its official titleAs I said: "I don't know whether it was originally used here or not, but it is commonly used to refer to the party". I of course did provide the necessary quotations. Among which is your own website. I also said that this does not change anything at all about the nature, that is the internationalist nature of the party. What exactly am I being accused of here?

and as Leo well knows was present in 4 countries until the Bordigist split.Well, it had members in four countries, but the total of its members in the other three countries didn't exceed dozens whereas the figure was actually thousands in Italy. The members in the other countries were told to join the party in Italy once it was founded. I don't think I'm the one trying to portray it as something it isn't.

When it was founded it saw itself inthe same internationalist tradition as the "Communist Party of Italy, section of the Third International" (and not the Italian Communist Party which was the name the Stalinists led by Togliatti took in 1945).And are you saying that I have disputed this in any way? Could be that the expression "of Italy" used in several sources is actually a reference to the name of the old party among stating the geographical base.

When Devrim points out to Leo he got this wrong the ver incorrigible Leo then quotes a Bordigist site (not ours) to show that "of Italy" is sometiems added by the Bordigists.Again, I have also quoted your website, and the other article I quoted has been written before the split.

This is to do them an injustice as they are no less internationalist than any other section of the communist left.Yes, I am a wicked manipulator trying to do them an injustice. :glare:

The "of Italy" is sometiems added not as a title but as geographcial description of where the organisation is based (e.g in the International Conferences). And it is only in that sense that we use it as they are now the Italian affiliate of the ICT. Again, not things I'm disputing either.

Leo then pretends to be incapable of understanding why "The Internationalists of Battaglia Comunista" as they usually sign their leaflets still retain inthe backgorund the old party title even though they do not consioder themsleves to be the future international party of the proletariat. The reason is the one Devrim gave. It is the oldest continuously existing organisation of the Communist Left.Very well, are there any public documents of the PCInt explaining this?

We did not split from the Bordigists as Leo keep asserting but they split from the original Internationalist Communist Party founded by Damen in 1943 (with Stefanini and others) and to whcih Bordiga never adhered. In fact the first polemic Bordiga made against the party was to say that it was a mistake that it had been formed.One which I would actually agree with Bordiga, but regardless, I never asserted that the Damenists split from the Bordigists, or visa versa. I refer to the incident as the split, and have little interest in who split from who. Obviously, it is known that the Damen-Stefanini tendency had a majority.

Only after a couple of years of discussion did the Bordigists turn round and found a party of their own ("the party Bordiga did not want" as Damen wrote at the time). Since 1952 the Bordigists have split several times and there are at least four International Communist Parties. Each split would have loved to take on the title of teh Internationalist Communist Party to enhance its prestige but by not abandoning the title to them it has preserved its historic character.If I'm not mistaken, the Bordigists too kept on to the title of the Internationalist Communist Party until they changed it into the International Communist Party in early sixties, to mark that their party had become "truly international" as they called it.

iT is not teh only organisation which preserves its historic name even though it no longer accurately represents the ideas of the organisation. The CWO was named when we identified much more with the KAPD and the German Left (Essen Tendency). I gave up 20 years ago trying to convince my comrades to change the name. We have been known (everything is relative!) as the CWO, they argue, so we will stick with it.As poor as brand recognition is a reason to hold on to something, surely the Communist Workers' Organization is a much more modest name and one which wouldn't result in most people to say "ah they are council communists" when hearing it. Nor would you say, we are called the Communist Workers Organization, but ours isn't actually an organization of communist workers. I think the source of the confusion is the usage of the term party still.

On the question of parliamentarism we are all agreed that the proletariat cannot come to power through parliament, indeed it can only transform itself in the course of a revolution (see the German Ideology) to become fit to found a new society. Everything else though is about a tactical evaluation of how best to raise the consciousness of the working class. In post-war Italy the monarchy was on the way out and the Republic replaced it. In the elections that took place in those years the bourgeoisie guaranteed the right of a platfrom in the piazze (public squares) to any party putting up candidates. And for this reason the party of abstentionism put up candidates, not to win votes but in particular to campaign against the Stalinists. In acertain sense it was successful as the party grew to several thousand (I don't the exact figure). But it seems to us that this was a unique occasion. We cannot envisage a repeat of it in the future. For example if the proletariat succeeds in overthrowing the parliamentary order in any one state there may be calls for a Constituent Assembly to draw up a new constitution based on workers' councils. But it is likely that these would be manouevres of the ruling class to hold on whilst they waited for the class movement to lose its steam. Our task in this case would be to expose the trick and to call for the instant assumption of power by the EC of the Congress of Class wide bodies. However this would be based on strategic adn tactical evaluation of the precise situation at the time.So yeah, I consider this to basically verify what I've been saying on this.

our real position on the party and class in the revolution as he has just read our pamphlet on class consciousness. I should point out that this is now translated into (or is being translated into) Italian, Greek Farsi and all the languages of the ICT so it is no longer just a CWO pamphlet).Fair enough, I haven't read your new pamphlet and was citing memory regarding what is apparently your old position.

Leo

19th April 2012, 09:48

As I said, I don't assume that you are trying to do it.Well, thank you.

Really what is this? I don't think that we can lay out exactly how some possible international party would be formed in the future. Now that doesn't mean that we can't have some ideas on the subject nor that it shouldn't be discussed. However, I think that in a future revolutionary period, lots of things will happen in a way not only different from how we think that it actually should happen, but different from how we conceived it could happen.

Basically you can have all of the nice theories that you want, but many of them will get blown away by reality.Perhaps it will, perhaps it won't. I'm trying to explain the position.

The ICC though takes positions on lots of issues. I don't think this is very healthy. Nor do I think that the way they arrive at these positions is either.

First let's discuss the method that they arrive at these positions. The ICC has always given off the impression to everybody that it is some sort of monolith, and has always tried to stress, to no avail, that it is not a monolith, and that it has lots of internal discussion.

The emphasis here though is on the discussion being internal. For most of its existence the ICC has insisted on 'deepening, and clarifying' these discussion internally, and then presenting a 'united face' to the class. As you yourself know this has gone to such extremes as the one where a criticism of myself was sent from ICC centre to the Turkish section for questioning the approach to an article on Darwinism on the ICC forum.

There are two things about this. First the ICC shouldn't be at all surprised if it is viewed as monolithic if this is how it presents itself, and secondly the class isn't listening anyway. Nevertheless, the ICC persists in this.I don't think this has got anything to do with why you think I'm scoring petty points without intending to.

The ICT doesn't come across to you as having a clear position on this. To you it comes across as being 'vague'. As far as I know, and I could very well be wrong, they don't have a detailed 'blueprint' on how the future party will be formed. This leads to problems when 'you try to put forward their positions and differences as clearly as possible and as far as you are aware of', and when the ICC tries to engage them in 'polemics' based around various ICC positions.I am not trying engage in any polemics, and the ICT comrades are free to come in and show where I didn't manage to explain their positions well enough.

In any case, if they don't have a detailed 'blueprint', then their position on it is vague. It can be vague. Am I supposed to say it isn't vague when it is? Besides as you explain it yourself, it isn't a necessarily negative thing that their position on this is vague. It isn't even a necessarily negative thing that their position isn't actually vague and they envisage a Communist International type future world party, with different national parties coming together in a centralized federative structure. What sectarian points did I exactly score by highlighting these different positions?

Devrim

19th April 2012, 11:25

As I said, I don't assume that you are trying to do it. Well, thank you.

That is because I know you well, and don't think that that is the way you would deliberately work. The first time I said it though I put the word 'trying' in italics because I do think it how it comes across. Obviously you have come across that way to Jock, who doesn't know you very well at all, and to other posters who have written to me on the subject of this thread, whether you intend to or not.

I don't think this has got anything to do with why you think I'm scoring petty points without intending to.

The next line I wrote was this;

Once it has adopted an 'organisational position', it then tries to engage with other groups in a discussion around these organisational positions, and we come to something like this:

This is the key to it. Most groups do not have these positions on all of these things. The ICC does, and in fact you yourself just said on the subject:

The ICC though takes positions on lots of issues. I don't think this is very healthy. Nor do I think that the way they arrive at these positions is either.

To try to restate what I was saying, I think the problem comes from the way that the ICC engages with other groups. The ICC has a position on an issue, and it makes a polemic against other groups based upon attributing a position to them, which as most groups don't have a position on almost everything is not the position of that group, but merely based on a few sentences from an article that they once published.

Now I am sure that you can remember a particular article published in France, and signed not by an individual member, but instead ICC, which we we in extreme disagreement with. How would you react to somebody then extrapolating on the statements made in that article to construct an 'ICC position'. This is effectively what happens.

Then there is the whole ICC style of 'polemic'. I am equally sure that you remember that when I looked for examples of the bad faith that I feel the ICC polemics have been conducted in that I only had to pick up one random copy of IR to find a 'polemic' referring to some councilist group as 'halfwits', which is not in anyway a political comment, but merely a term of abuse.

When added together, I think that these things give an indication of why ICC members end up looking like they are scoring petty points. Particularly when many of the 'positions' of other groups that they refer to are not those groups positions, but what they have read in old issues of IR are their positions.

To try to clarify, I don't think that the ICC are the only group that does this, but given the relative size and international spread of the ICC, and the fact that the members of many left communist groups are ex-members of the ICC (either from organisational splits, or on an individual level), I think that the ICC has to shoulder the majority of the blame here.

I am going to finish this point though with one example that doesn't come from the ICC though, but from the ICT.

There was an article that they published early last year about the ICC (http://www.leftcom.org/en/articles/2011-04-17/marxism-or-idealism-our-differences-with-the-icc). Now compared to some 'polemics' by groups in the past this wasn't in any way near the worst. Nevertheless, I remember talking about it with one of the comrades in Ankara who said something like 'It is all distortions and half truths'. I'd invite you to read it and see what you think. Then consider whether the articles that the ICC had published about other groups in the past are any more accurate.

Do you not think that some of it (and also the ICC's past 'polemics') comes across as petty point scoring?

To make a step further do you not think the entire history of interaction of the modern (post 68) left communist groups is generally something full of moments that we, collectively, should be deeply ashamed and embarrassed about?

To the extent which the ICC are to blame for this, I don't think that it comes from malevolence, or the members being bad people, but from their very organisational practice, which is what I have been trying to explain in this discussion.

I am not trying engage in any polemics, and the ICT comrades are free to come in and show where I didn't manage to explain their positions well enough.

I know that you are not trying to, but the whole ICC mode of operation, seems to make every discussion into something resembling a polemic. It can't be explained by 'bad faith', but in the whole way the ICC relates to other organisations, the worst example of all being when they ran around screaming 'parasite' at virtually everybody. Now although you had nothing to do with that, and even disagreed with it, there are things behind it, which are deeply embedded in the conceptions of the ICC.

Finally, as a last example, to return to the party thing, you wrote:

Actually, I know that the ICT says its not the party. I know that the CWO says its not the party. I don't, however, know if the PCInt says its not the party and don't think that's the case.

They wrote in the article I linked to above, which I don't know if you have read (and you might have missed it anyway as it is hidden away in the footnotes):

One of the ICC’s favourite lies is the claim that our Italian sister organisation, PCInt (Battagla Comunista) is "Bordigist", and that it claims to be the sole nucleus of a future revolutionary Party. In every edition of their paper, our comrades stress: "Noi siamo per il partito, ma non siamo il partito, ne`l´unico suo embrione" ["We are for the party, but we are not the party, nor its sole embryo”].

Can you understand why people get annoyed about it and think that it is a "twisted presentation of [their] history and theory", and that however "discouraging and disappointing" you may find this, this is how it comes across?

Devrim

Leo

19th April 2012, 13:26

The first time I said it though I put the word 'trying' in italics because I do think it how it comes across. Obviously you have come across that way to JockTo whom I believe I've given the appropriate response.

and to other posters who have written to me on the subject of this threadI am uninterested in what anyone told you or someone else in private about this subject at the moment.

This is the key to it. Most groups do not have these positions on all of these things. The ICC does, and in fact you yourself just said on the subject:

The ICC though takes positions on lots of issues. I don't think this is very healthy. Nor do I think that the way they arrive at these positions is either. That was actually meant to be a quote of what you yourself said here. In any case, I do think the ICC takes positions on lots of issues, some of it indeed is not very healthy, and there are problems with the way some of these positions are arrived as well, although I wouldn't include the organizational question in there. It think that is a question where there needs to be a position, but anyway.

To try to restate what I was saying, I think the problem comes from the way that the ICC engages with other groups. The ICC has a position on an issue, and it makes a polemic against other groups based upon attributing a position to them, which as most groups don't have a position on almost everything is not the position of that group, but merely based on a few sentences from an article that they once published.For the last time, I am not trying to make polemics about anything. If I was, my responses would have been entirely different.

Now I am sure that you can remember a particular article published in France, and signed not by an individual member, but instead ICC, which we we in extreme disagreement with. How would you react to somebody then extrapolating on the statements made in that article to construct an 'ICC position'.I would explain, I wouldn't start throwing accusations.

Then there is the whole ICC style of 'polemic'. I am equally sure that you remember that when I looked for examples of the bad faith that I feel the ICC polemics have been conducted in that I only had to pick up one random copy of IR to find a 'polemic' referring to some councilist group as 'halfwits', which is not in anyway a political comment, but merely a term of abuse.

When added together, I think that these things give an indication of why ICC members end up looking like they are scoring petty points.So you are basically saying that the reason I appear to be scoring petty points is basically because the ICC threw lots of insults at people in polemics in the past.

... which I've never done once when referring to the ICT or any other left communist group, and which the ICC itself doesn't do anymore.

Do you not think that some of it (and also the ICC's past 'polemics') comes across as petty point scoring?Yes. What I don't think is trying to explain the positions and the differences of the two organizations counts as petty point scoring, especially when not a single criticism let alone an insult is included in my posts. It is evident that my knowledge of the ICT is not as wide as my knowledge of the ICC, and that I can make mistakes in my explanations of their positions. But no. I then become the evil manipulator who tries to twist the ICT's positions to score petty points because... I referred to them as the Internationalist Communist Party of Italy.

To make a step further do you not think the entire history of interaction of the modern (post 68) left communist groups is generally something full of moments that we, collectively, should be deeply ashamed and embarrassed about?Shame and embarrassment are not constructive feelings. I think the post 68 history of left communism is generally something full of mistakes, the evaluation of which we should collectively try to make and move forward from without trying to blame each other, or accuse each other.

They wrote in the article I linked to above, which I don't know if you have read (and you might have missed it anyway as it is hidden away in the footnotes):

One of the ICC’s favourite lies is the claim that our Italian sister organisation, PCInt (Battagla Comunista) is "Bordigist", and that it claims to be the sole nucleus of a future revolutionary Party. In every edition of their paper, our comrades stress: "Noi siamo per il partito, ma non siamo il partito, ne`l´unico suo embrione" ["We are for the party, but we are not the party, nor its sole embryo”]. Well, I presume it's not just Battaglia doing that but all the publications of the ICT for that is the official position of the ICT, it is actually from the ICT's About Us text. I never said that the ICT or the PCInt claimed to be the world party. How this is actually stressed in every issue of Battaglia Comunista is the publication of the ICT's About Us text.

We can quote the relevant part of the ICT's About Us text in more detail if necessary:

Only if the most advanced sectors of the proletariat recognize themselves in the political leadership of the party will we be on the road to the revolutionary socialist transformation.

The Internationalist Communist Party (Battaglia Comunista) was founded with these objectives during the Second World War (1943) and immediately condemned both sides as imperialist (...) In the Seventies and Eighties it promoted a series of conferences that led to the creation of the International Bureau for the Revolutionary Party and finally the Internationalist Communist Tendency (2009).

We are for the party, but we are not the party or its only embryo. Our task is to participate in its construction, intervening in all the struggles of the class, trying to link its immediate demands to the historical program; communism.

Join us! Support the Internationalist Communist Tendency!How they view the PCInt's role in Italy remains rather vague to me. Hence why I'm asking Jock whether the PCInt has a text, a resolution, an evaluation or whatever in regards to what changed about how they officially view their organization.

And what the ICC traditionally called the PCInt was semi-Bordigists rather than Bordigists, but it isn't a particularly important detail, and there was an orientation text (which is still under discussion according to the ICT website) written by a leading member of the PCInt and the then IBRP which argued that "the IBRP is the only possible “intermediary” form of organisation today between the scattered revolutionary organisations in the world and the future party" although this isn't really relevant to the current discussion.

Can you understand why people get annoyed about it and think that it is a "twisted presentation of [their] history and theory",I can, but at the end of the day its their positions to clarify or not, and if they choose to throw accusations at me instead that's not my problem.

black magick hustla

24th April 2012, 11:55

Android

24th April 2012, 20:29

this is just nothing

As are the large chunk of discussions on this forum and others. Still doesn't mean its wrong, silly or whatever to correct people who go out of their way to try and score petty points.

black magick hustla

29th April 2012, 13:05

As are the large chunk of discussions on this forum and others. Still doesn't mean its wrong, silly or whatever to correct people who go out of their way to try and score petty points.

idk, i think a sober judgement would say that leo wasn't lying and made an honest mistake. i mean for godsake, we are talking about the name of some obscure and minuscule organization that only some thousand people even acknowledge the existence, its pretty easy to make a mistake

Leo

29th April 2012, 13:24

Incidentally, the name I used, supposedly in order to score some petty points, is one which has been used on the website of the ICT itself, as I have quoted.

The only actual mistake I got was to get the ICT position on the party and the state wrong - well actually it was their old position I cited whereas apparently they have a new position which I didn't know of. So very manipulative of me.

SHORAS

29th April 2012, 13:55

Only a Jury of Honour will suffice!

Android

30th April 2012, 03:57

idk, i think a sober judgement would say that leo wasn't lying and made an honest mistake. i mean for godsake, we are talking about the name of some obscure and minuscule organization that only some thousand people even acknowledge the existence, its pretty easy to make a mistake

Well, I would have originally assumed Leo made an honest mistake or whatever as well because from the few times I have talked to him, he didn't come across like a dick, quite the opposite to be honest. But it was not the first time he has pursued this rather pointless argument about what BC calls itself or sees itself as. He has made this argument on more then one occasion now and been been corrected on it but continues to state it as if the previous discussions never happened and the answer to question he raises has any political significance.

It makes virtually no difference politically in my opinion what BC calls themselves within the terms of what is being discussed, so what is the big deal about it. As far as I am concerned it is like complaining about how the ICC is called the International Communist Current and not the Internationalist Communist Current.

The only possible political point I could read into Leo's posts on the significance of the issue for him relates to the process of the formation of the world party, whether it is a process that can occur on a national level or whether it necessarily unfolds on a world scale. Maybe that is reading too much into it since it is not clear that is what his point is.

Only a Jury of Honour will suffice!

Proper comedian aren't you! Call me a bore if you want but I don't really find it funny when you consider the negative and destructive role such concepts and the political culture and hehaviour they had been created to justify have had on the communist movement, specifically in Western Europe over the last four decades.

Leo

30th April 2012, 10:08

Well, I would have originally assumed Leo made an honest mistake or whatever as well because from the few times I have talked to him, he didn't come across like a dick, quite the opposite to be honest. But it was not the first time he has pursued this rather pointless argument about what BC calls itself or sees itself as. He has made this argument on more then one occasion now and been been corrected on it but continues to state it as if the previous discussions never happened and the answer to question he raises has any political significance.

The point I'm making about what BC calls and sees itself as is a political point, although not a criticism. I keep making that point because I'm neither satisfied nor convinced by the answer. I have asked for whether there were any documents about this more than once, and was met with silence. I'm not making a criticism here, the PCInt is entitled to its own positions, and even having a vague position is not necessarily a bad thing as I've already admitted.

It makes virtually no difference politically in my opinion what BC calls themselves within the terms of what is being discussed, so what is the big deal about it.

As I said, I find it hard to believe how what an organization calls itself has got nothing to do with how it sees itself. Nevertheless, if it is the case (or even if its not) please quote a text, a statement, a resolution, anything explaining how the PCInt sees itself so we can clarify this.

As to what's the big deal, at most its simply one of the historical as well as contemporary differences between the ICC and the ICT and a point we should clarify when asked. If the PCInt still thinks its the party in Italy, as the ICT's basic position points out that it did (Only if the most advanced sectors of the proletariat recognize themselves in the political leadership of the party will we be on the road to the revolutionary socialist transformation. The Internationalist Communist Party (Battaglia Comunista) was founded with these objectives during the Second World War), then that's their position. I might criticize it, or I might not, but stating it would not be criticizing it by itself, surely. If the position is kinda vague because on the one hand the PCInt numerically grew weaker and on the other it still wants to hold on to the tradition of the name and this is seen as more important than clarifying the actual position, than the position is vague and again, stating this is not a criticism if this is the case. Devrim, incidentally argued that it might even be better for a position as such to be vague.

As far as I am concerned it is like complaining about how the ICC is called the International Communist Current and not the Internationalist Communist Current.

I wasn't complaining or criticizing the PCInt for being called the party.

The only possible political point I could read into Leo's posts on the significance of the issue for him relates to the process of the formation of the world party, whether it is a process that can occur on a national level or whether it necessarily unfolds on a world scale. Maybe that is reading too much into it since it is not clear that is what his point is.

My point was to try to explain the main theoretical differences between the ICC and the ICT as fairly as possible because someone interested in the ICC asked about other left communist organizations. Nothing less, nothing more.

Alf

30th April 2012, 16:40

Android is right that the question of the 'Jury of Honour' is no mere laughing matter. It may well be that the ICC has mis-used this concept and that the results have consequently been destructive. It may also be in part another problem of words: 'jury' might sound legalistic (perhaps the term tribunal is better, or simply commission) and 'honour' is certainly a term that has been horribly dishonoured (cf 'honour killings). But the underlying concept is not our invention: it was a practise of the past workers' movement, based on the recognition that the different organisations shared a fundamental solidarity and a common morality, and therefore should be able to work together on problems of security and safety posed to the whole movement, which obviously involved responding collectively to forms of behaviour which put the movement in danger. Can it be argued that the revolutionary movement today is better off without such a practice and such a recognition?

Android

30th April 2012, 17:07

I keep making that point because I'm neither satisfied nor convinced by the answer.

Not a lot members of the ICT can do in that case. What is it about the answer that is not satisfactory for you? As I said if you are not prepared to accept at face value the explanation Jock has given not much more can be advanced on this point.

I have asked for whether there were any documents about this more than once, and was met with silence.

[...]

As I said, I find it hard to believe how what an organization calls itself has got nothing to do with how it sees itself. Nevertheless, if it is the case (or even if its not) please quote a text, a statement, a resolution, anything explaining how the PCInt sees itself so we can clarify this.

I will quote the statement published by the ICT after the meeting in Milan in which it changed its name from being the IBRP to the ICT:

When the Bureau was founded in 1983-4 we set out some clear guidelines to which we have adhered to this day.

1. We were not the party, nor even a prefiguration of that party, but an organisation to which those wishing to be part of the fight for a future international and centralised party of the working class could adhere in order to struggle, discuss and work together towards that goal. We expected that wider movements of the working class would bring new class organisations into existence with new contributions and issues not to mention that they would inevitably have many confusions and challenges. It was one of our major tasks to bring the experience of previous workers struggles as encapsulated in the evolution of the internationalist communist left to any new generation of workers who were ready to take up the class fight.

2. We also did not want to create postboxes or warehouses which simply repeated the orthodoxy of the most dominant and experienced organisation. We recognised that only by having a real experience in each area/state where they lived could the present nuclei develop into real communist organisations which would be able to bring their experiences to enrich the practices of the future party.

3 Our orientation has always been towards the working class as a whole rather than to the existing political groups however near to us we felt there positions to be. Although we have from time to time engaged in polemical exchanges with other groups our aim was not simply to unite groups of intellectuals or the educated but build real organisations which sought to find ways to link to workers struggles on the ground in order to maintain a continuity of consciousness from one struggle and one area to the next. This is why we continue to advocate the need for bodies of the party organised in the class such as the factory or workplace groups and territorial groups which regroup militant workers in the same neighbourhood.

We have not deviated from these basic premises throughout the quarter century of our existence and the groups in France, Canada and USA, and Germany which have entered the Bureau have operated within this framework. What we have asked affiliating groups to do is to have a basic document defining the organisation, regular publication, a definite orientation towards the working class, and a continuous practice to reflect this. This was among the reasons why we had to refuse the entry of the RKP, formerly GIK (Austria) into the Bureau in 2005.

Source (http://www.leftcom.org/en/articles/2009-10-26/the-international-bureau-for-the-revolutionary-party-becomes-the)

That is a statement of the ICT, maybe it is not specific enough for you. I think it is fairly clear about how they see themselves.

Leo

30th April 2012, 18:05

Not a lot members of the ICT can do in that case. What is it about the answer that is not satisfactory for you? As I said if you are not prepared to accept at face value the explanation Jock has given not much more can be advanced on this point. What Jock's saying is basically this: they [the PCInt] do not consioder themsleves to be the future international party of the proletariat. Obviously this is true and has been for quite a while - in fact I myself said that neither the PCInt nor the ICT considers itself as such.

He says: it [the PCInt] is not teh only organisation which preserves its historic name even though it no longer accurately represents the ideas of the organisation. I am not sure whether this is to refer to the fact that the PCInt doesn't see itself as the world party now (which I don't think it ever did) or as the party in Italy now (which I'm still not sure if it does or not) or something else.

What is not clear to me is the actual position that changed. One thing which seems to have changed is that the PCInt no longer sees itself as the sole founders of the future world party which they presumably did when it was founded in 1943. This too, I never disputed.

What is the situation today? The Internationalist Communist Party is the Italian section of the Internationalist Communist Tendency, which as a body doesn't consider itself to be the party or its sole embryo. From this it also logically follows, since the PCInt is the Italian section of the ICT, that it doesn't claim to be the international party either.

Now what have I said? In my first post, I said: The two organizations have a different understanding of the party, evidenced by the fact that the Italian section of the ICT is still called the Internationalist Communist Party of Italy whereas the ICC hold the position that the future world communist party has to be founded on an international basis.

Afterwards I said: So, I'd say that at best the PCInt's position is vague, or that it is the party in Italy and that it is possible for the party to exist in a single country alone.

So the reason I find the answers unsatisfactory is because they don't actually address my point, not because I'm not prepared to accept what Jock says at face value. For apparently unlike his opinion of myself, I trust he doesn't have any ill intentions.

My point is about how the PCInt officially sees itself and its role in Italy and whether it thinks the vanguard party can be formed in one country before being formed on a world-scale.

So, as I said in my last post, there are three options to this mystery:

1) The PCInt still really considers itself to be the party in Italy.

2) The position is vague because on the one hand the PCInt numerically grew weaker and realized its not the party even in Italy and on the other it still wants to hold on to the tradition of the name and this is seen as more important than internally clarifying the actual position.

3) The position has officially changed and the PCInt doesn't consider itself to be the party in Italy, but still choses not to change the name because it still wants to hold on to the tradition of the name and this is seen as more important than externally clarifying the actual position.

I don't think any of the options would position the PCInt outside the communist left in any way whatsoever, or mean that I won't see them as comrades. Nevertheless I would have criticisms of all the options.

Искра

30th April 2012, 18:16

Android

30th April 2012, 18:37

So, as I said in my last post, there are three options to this mystery:

1) The PCInt still really considers itself to be the party in Italy.

2) The position is vague because on the one hand the PCInt numerically grew weaker and realized its not the party even in Italy and on the other it still wants to hold on to the tradition of the name and this is seen as more important than internally clarifying the actual position.

3) The position has officially changed and the PCInt doesn't consider itself to be the party in Italy, but still choses not to change the name because it still wants to hold on to the tradition of the name and this is seen as more important than externally clarifying the actual position.

I don't think any of the options would position the PCInt outside the communist left in any way whatsoever, or mean that I won't see them as comrades. Nevertheless I would have criticisms of all the options.

I am not sure which one of your options is most accurate. My impression would be that 2 or 3 would be closer to the mark although I don't think either of them means a lack of internal or external clarity.

When I was in Italy last year and I heard members of BC call themselves 'the party' and then when I asked them, they said that they are just an organisation and that it is the historical name and tradition. To be honest I have not come across anyone before you who has made a point about this so I am not sure where the lacking in clarity to the outside world comes in.

I don't know if BC made a declaration pre-1984 on whether they see themselves as a party or not. It just seems like an odd obsession with words.

I still fail to see the significance of such minutiae.

Devrim

30th April 2012, 18:52

I have to say that I don't understand what's Leo writing on BC (PCInt). Members of PCInt refere to their organisation as Party, but they do that because they used to be party in the past and they'd like to become that again. Today they consider themselves as an organisation in the much the same way as British CWO is (at least this is what I got from talking to members of their Rome section). TBH, I really don't see what's all this fuss about.

Leo, look at how your are coming across even to people who we know are very sympathetic to the ICC. It must also be quite clear to you that you have pissed off the two CWO members who are posting here, and I don't think that you will be gaining much sympathy amongst people who are not so close to the ICC as Kontrrazvedka.

He says: it [the PCInt] is not teh only organisation which preserves its historic name even though it no longer accurately represents the ideas of the organisation. I am not sure whether this is to refer to the fact that the PCInt doesn't see itself as the world party now (which I don't think it ever did) or as the party in Italy now (which I'm still not sure if it does or not) or something else.

I think it has been made pretty clear in this thread with direct quotations from them:

We are for the party, but we are not the party or its only embryo.

We were not the party, nor even a prefiguration of that party,

I really don't think that it could be any clearer.

So, as I said in my last post, there are three options to this mystery:

1) The PCInt still really considers itself to be the party in Italy.

2) The position is vague because on the one hand the PCInt numerically grew weaker and realized its not the party even in Italy and on the other it still wants to hold on to the tradition of the name and this is seen as more important than internally clarifying the actual position.

3) The position has officially changed and the PCInt doesn't consider itself to be the party in Italy, but still choses not to change the name because it still wants to hold on to the tradition of the name and this is seen as more important than externally clarifying the actual position.

I don't think that there is any 'mystery' at all. It all seems quite clear to me. Obviously the closest of these three choices is the third. It has been 'clarified externally' though.

Really don't you think that anybody who knows enough about left communist politics to know about our views on the party might have read enough about left communism to have read the basic position statements of the ICT?

It is just a name. That is it, nothing more. I think everybody, who is not interested in petty point scoring, pedantry and semantics can understand this. The world proletariat is not sitting their confused about whether BC sees itself as the party or not.

To just go back to the earlier part of the discussion as I haven't had that much time to write long responses on here recently:

this is some pretty silly and petty shit to get pissed off. god knows in what century we live in when someone reads this shit. sooner or later someone is going to complain about a misquoted no. of languages fausto atti spoke, because surely if someone claims he was monolingual it means he is implying he is less internationalist!

the communist left is littered by stuff like this. it is pretty petty and insignificant imho. i guess it doesn't seem like that to people involved in this because obviously organizational life takes a huge chunk of their lives but in terms of things that actually matter this is just nothing

BHM has a very valid point here. Much of this comes across as ludicrous. Surely their must be a better way of dealing with these things. One of the things that I think would help to deal with it better would be more mutual respect, and less antagonism between the two sides, which anybody reading this thread can see is sadly lacking.

So you are basically saying that the reason I appear to be scoring petty points is basically because the ICC threw lots of insults at people in polemics in the past.

... which I've never done once when referring to the ICT or any other left communist group, and which the ICC itself doesn't do anymore.

I don't think that it is true that the ICC doesn't behave like this any more. Yes, it may do it less in its press, but anyone who was at the last International Congress knows full well that the ICC still behaves like this.

But yes, the fact that the ICC has behaved like this means that you need to be extra careful about these things, or people will think it is just the same old practice.

...and lines like this:

Yes, I am a wicked manipulator trying to do them an injustice. :glare:

Don't fit quite well together with statements like this:

I would explain, I wouldn't start throwing accusations.

Devrim

Leo

30th April 2012, 19:02

TrotskistMarx

30th April 2012, 19:18

I like the ICC, I think that they follow Karl Marx's writtings. Compared to other leftist political parties that are too reformists. If the world was ruled by the ICC the world would be a paradise !!

Bump, after 16 minutes? Seriously?

Really, if you're that impatient, the ICC probably isn't for you. I was a contact/sympathiser for eight years before they thought about asking if I might like to discuss the idea of joining, and that was five years ago. I'm still not a member, though for my own reasons and not because they're dragging their feet.

Species Being is right, they see themselves as embodying the best work of both the Italian and the Dutch/German Left currents.

I regard the existence of the ICC as being a precious thing for the working class, though obviously the vast majority of the working class has no idea of the existence of the ICC. But then again, I regard all the organisations of the Communist Left as being important and precious. Organisations exist to serve the working class; the fact that any revolutionary organisations exist at all is important, even if those organisations are at present tiny, disunited, and virtually unknown.

There's a thread in the Left Communist user group with contact details of some of the current organisations that claim to embody something of the heritage of the historic Communist Left. It might be worth checking out.

Leo

30th April 2012, 19:25

It is just a name. That is it, nothing more. I think everybody, who is not interested in petty point scoring, pedantry and semantics can understand this. The world proletariat is not sitting their confused about whether BC sees itself as the party or not.So the reason you think its just a name and "who is not interested in petty point scoring, pedantry and semantics can understand this" is because... nobody cares about BC's position on the party anyway?

Well, that's one approach to theory I suppose.

I think it has been made pretty clear in this thread with direct quotations from them:

We are for the party, but we are not the party or its only embryo.
We were not the party, nor even a prefiguration of that party, I really don't think that it could be any clearer.I am not referring to the position of the ICT in general, or the PCInt about being/becoming the world party, but how they see it in regards to Italy.

I don't think that it is true that the ICC doesn't behave like this any more. Yes, it may do it less in its pressNo, not less - not at all.

but anyone who was at the last International Congress knows full well that the ICC still behaves like thisCongresses of the ICC are events where participants speak their minds in private, in the confidence of being among comrades.

Yes, there were very problematic ideas expressed in the last congress - ideas I personally criticized as I'm sure you remember as well. It is nevertheless equally problematic that these ideas, even if they are the ideas I myself criticized, are being expressed in public by anyone other than those who voiced them.

But yes, the fact that the ICC has behaved like this means that you need to be extra careful about these things, or people will think it is just the same old practice.Yes, this is a fair point and there is a need to be extra-careful.

...and lines like this:

Yes, I am a wicked manipulator trying to do them an injustice. :glare: Don't fit quite well together with statements like this:

I would explain, I wouldn't start throwing accusations. Why? Is protesting about being unfairly accused the same thing as accusing someone? Apparently people have the right to accuse me of all sort of things and I'm supposed to say thank you very much for your kind words in return.

Devrim

13th May 2012, 13:26

Congresses of the ICC are events where participants speak their minds in private, in the confidence of being among comrades.

Yes, there were very problematic ideas expressed in the last congress - ideas I personally criticized as I'm sure you remember as well. It is nevertheless equally problematic that these ideas, even if they are the ideas I myself criticized, are being expressed in public by anyone other than those who voiced them.

I think that your use of italics in the first sentence there speaks volumes of your attitude towards me.

On the actual point though, iif you think that what is being said at congresses of organisations is something that shouldn't be mentioned outside of those congresses, I would suggest that you read through old copies of your own organisations publications and call them out on it.

In addition I don't think that if it were somebody saying glowing things about the ICC, you would take the same attitude. The problem here is that I criticise the ICC and its positions, and that I, like some other posters on here, and like many on the communist left think that the ICC's position on 'parasitism' has been quite possibly the thing that has done the most damage to the communist left in the last thirty years of its existence.

More so, the fact that I also say that despite all of the ICC's recent bluster about the 'culture of debate' etc, I still think that the ICC is a deeply sectarian organisation, and that there has been very little change in those attitudes.

Of course I remember you criticising these things at the congress, but that doesn't in any way change the fact that these are still the dominant attitudes within the ICC. Should that not be said?

If these attitudes were kept " in private... among comrades" perhaps it wouldn't be quite so bad. The fact is though that they are not. I don't pay that much attention to what the ICC get up to nowadays, but going back to when I left, I can remember that less than a month before, they were taking up the time of some workers meetings at some railway station in Paris objecting to the presence there of some people who used to be members of their organisation.

I am not referring to the position of the ICT in general, or the PCInt about being/becoming the world party, but how they see it in regards to Italy.

Which I think has been made pretty clear.

So the reason you think its just a name and "who is not interested in petty point scoring, pedantry and semantics can understand this" is because... nobody cares about BC's position on the party anyway?

Well, that's one approach to theory I suppose.

No, that isn't at all what I said.

Devrim