Thoughts on Solidarity(L.A.)

[Prometeo liberado]

I went into it with the best intentions and open mindedness. After close to 8 months it was very clear that this was a disaster of open bleeding, kinda like hurricane Katrina. Solidarity is a liberal Marxist group of slight Trot blend. Highly populated by those in academia. Very open and unstructured yet loathe to change or listen if it smells of revolutionary thought. Take for instance Syria. Unable to construct a thoughtful analysis or stand the subject is tabled. MayDay unity? Don't talk about it and we won't have to make a decision. Occupy? Went to a meeting and it seems "they" like using hand signs. Street work? On your own, I got papers to watch my intern grade. Recruitment? W are not like the RCP or PSL.

So in keeping with keeping it short maybe I just don't get it? What is their purpose. Thoughts?

[GoddessCleoLover]

A number of observations. First, "highly populated by academics" This is a recipe for organizational disaster. Lack of structure, fear of militancy, inability to make concrete decisions, tabling difficult decisions, etcetera are all hallmarks of the "professor-tariat".

Have to agree with them about Occupiers and their hand signs. IMO Occupy-style "direct democracy" is so excessively structured that is actually impedes the free flow ideas. Must be a generational thing, but on this one issue I sympathize with the academics whom I presume are older than the Occupiers in general.

Lack of interest in recruitment could also stem from the almost fugue-like psychological state into which some parts of the American left have fallen. Those of us who were active in the 70s remember when the left actually had some relevance to the popular culture. The debacle of the left in the 80s and 90s have almost literally left many veterans from the past in a type of "shell shock" Some qualified mental health professionals believe that some left activists experience a sort of post-traumatic stress disorder stemming from the disaster that is the recent history of the American left. IMO there is great merit in this analysis.

[Lenina Rosenweg]

Solidarity was formed out of the left Shachtmanite tradition and evolved into a Trotskyist regroupment project, similar to Kasama being a Maoist inspired regroupment project.

Solidarity's website has interesting material and is worth checking out once in awhile. Solidarity is famous for being "economistic", that is they are highly labor oriented (they originally sponsored Labor Notes, a leftist union initiative) but their members won't publicly say they are socialists or identify themselves as members of their organisation. This is the opposite of what Marx and Lenin warned us against.

They do have some good labor activists-Steve Early and (I think) Doug Henwood and others.

[GoddessCleoLover]

Sadly, American hostility to socialism and communism has led some honest comrades to forge careers as labor advocates while hiding the fact that they are "red". This certainly explains their aversion to "red" political activities and kudos to Lenina Rosenweg for her analysis.

I hope the younger generation that is represented on this forum never forgets the basic fact that when one goes into labor activism as a surreptitious leftist, the inevitable result is that revolutionary theory recedes further with time until their comes a point when it disappears altogether.:(

[Prometeo liberado]

have we learned nothing from the infamous Leo Mazzochi and the Labor Party activist?

[Zeus the Moose]

I've been an official sympathiser of Solidarity for a number of years, and had a period where I was somewhat active in their internal life, but have pretty much dropped out of activity with them for a while. I wrote a little bit (http://www.revleft.com/vb/anyone-here-member-t176290/index.html?p=2532963#post2532963) about my perspectives on the group when Ostrinski asked about them last month.

[Prometeo liberado]

Are ther any other Solidarity members on this site?

[sixdollarchampagne]

Are ther any other Solidarity members on this site?

Years ago, I was in Solidarity for some months, in Massachusetts. Nice people, not much activity, that I could see. I made friends with another Solidarity person, and the two of us distributed antiwar leaflets at a couple of demonstrations, as I remember, but that was about it, in terms of activism. Solidarity seems to be very proud of a connection it has with Teamsters for a Democratic Union (TDU?), and, IIRC, that is an organization that drags the Teamsters union into court periodically.

Because of all that, I was interested to read Lenina's description of Solidarity as "Trotskyist." As someone who was in the old YSA, back in the sixties, I have to say I never saw anything even vaguely "Trotskyist" about Solidarity, certainly not their enthusiasm for that "tactic" of suing unions in the bosses' courts (I doubt Cannon would ever have resorted to that.)

I left after they published, I believe it was, a laudatory article about a Democratic Party member of Congress, a certain US Representative Lee, if memory serves, an act by Solidarity which hardly translates, in my mind, to "independence" from bourgeois politics.

[Prometeo liberado]

I agree that the Trot element is very subtle. Revolution is not a word spoken frequently amongst these people. They truly want to give the liberal Dem's and union leaders more of a say yet have no faith in themselves.

[Zeus the Moose]

I agree that the Trot element is very subtle. Revolution is not a word spoken frequently amongst these people. They truly want to give the liberal Dem's and union leaders more of a say yet have no faith in themselves.

I'd say Solidarity's Trotskyism is primarily historical, though they do keep an official connection to the biggest Fourth International (whose connection to Trotskyism is also somewhat more historical than real, admittedly.)


I left after they published, I believe it was, a laudatory article about a Democratic Party member of Congress, a certain US Representative Lee, if memory serves, an act by Solidarity which hardly translates, in my mind, to "independence" from bourgeois politics.

That Rep. Lee might be Barbara Lee from California? IIRC, one of Solidarity's branches in California (possibly Los Angeles) is on the right wing of the organisation in terms of their political attachments; they actually advocate working with/supporting the Democrats in order to develop greater connections with unions (I believe that was the explanation I was given, this was almost four years ago.) This is an unusual minority position even inside Solidarity, though it does seem to be a bit of a logical conclusion for people who adapt to wings of the union bureaucracy.