Left-Communism

[Rawthentic]

What precisely does Left-Communism consist of? I know it is different than "libertarian-communism" and anarchism. I think that its major proponents were Pannekoek, Mattick, Bordiga, and others.

[Raúl Duke]

Other than including the libertarian communist strands, it included Luxemborgism, Council Communist, and possibly DeLeonism.

[Rawthentic]

I actually meant what the theory of it is.

[Kropotkin Has a Posse]

Emphasis on the council rather than the state, to put it very simply.

[Devrim]

Here are links to the sites of the two main international left communist organisations.
International Communist Current: http://www.internationalism.org/
International Bureau for the Revolutionary Party: http://www.ibrp.org/

The basic positions of the ICC explain left communism quite well:


Originally posted by ICC Basic Positions
The International Communist Current defends the following political positions:
* Since the First World War, capitalism has been a decadent social system. It has twice plunged humanity into a barbaric cycle of crisis, world war, reconstruction and new crisis. In the 1980s, it entered into the final phase of this decadence, the phase of decomposition. There is only one alternative offered by this irreversible historical decline: socialism or barbarism, world communist revolution or the destruction of humanity.

* The Paris Commune of 1871 was the first attempt by the proletariat to carry out this revolution, in a period when the conditions for it were not yet ripe. Once these conditions had been provided by the onset of capitalist decadence, the October revolution of 1917 in Russia was the first step toward of 1917 in Russia was the first step towards an authentic world communist revolution in an international revolutionary wave which put an end to the imperialist war and went on for several years after that. The failure of this revolutionary wave, particularly in Germany in 1919-23, condemned the revolution in Russia to isolation and to a rapid degeneration. Stalinism was not the product of the Russian revolution, but its gravedigger.

* The statified regimes which arose in the USSR, eastern Europe, China, Cuba etc and were called ‘socialist’ or ‘communist’ were just a particularly brutal form of the universal tendency towards state capitalism, itself a major characteristic of the period of decadence.

* Since the beginning of the 20th century, all wars are imperialist wars, part of the deadly struggle between states large and small to conquer or retain a place in the international arena. These wars bring nothing to humanity but death and destruction on an ever-increasing scale. The working class can only respond to them through its international solidarity and by struggling against the bourgeoisie in all countries.

* All the nationalist ideologies - ‘national independence’, ‘the right of nations to self-determination’ etc - whatever their pretext, ethnic, historical or religious, are a real poison for the workers. By calling on them to take the side of one or another faction of the bourgeoisie, they divide workers and lead them to massacre each other in tr in the interests and wars of their exploiters.

* In decadent capitalism, parliament and elections are nothing but a mascarade. Any call to participate in the parliamentary circus can only reinforce the lie that presents these elections as a real choice for the exploited. ‘Democracy’, a particularly hypocritical form of the domination of the bourgeoisie, does not differ at root from other forms of capitalist dictatorship, such as Stalinism and fascism.

* 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.

* With the decadence of capitalism, the unions everywhere have been transformed into organs of capitalist order within the proletariat. The various forms of union organisation, whether ‘official’ or ‘rank and file’, serve only to discipline the working class and sabotage its struggles.

* In order to advance its combat, the working class has to unify its struggles, taking charge of their extension and organisation through sovereign general assembliassemblies and committees of delegates elected and revocable at any time by these assemblies.

* Terrorism is in no way a method of struggle for the working class. The expression of social strata with no historic future and of the decomposition of the petty bourgeoisie, when it’s not the direct expression of the permanent war between capitalist states, terrorism has always been a fertile soil for manipulation by the bourgeoisie. Advocating secret action by small minorities, it is in complete opposition to class violence, which derives from conscious and organised mass action by the proletariat.

* The working class is the only class which can carry out the communist revolution. Its revolutionary struggle will inevitably lead the working class towards a confrontation with the capitalist state. In order to destroy capitalism, the working class will have to overthrow all existing states and establish the dictatorship of the proletariat on a world scale: the international power of the workers’ councils, regrouping the entire proletariat.

* The communist transformation of society by the workers’ councils does not mean ‘self-management’ or the nationalisation of the economy. Communism requires the conscious abolition by the working class of capitalist social relations: wage labour, commodity production, national frontiers. It means the creation of a world community in which all activity is oriented towards the full satisfactisfaction of human needs.

* The revolutionary political organisation constitutes the vanguard of the working class and is an active factor in the generalisation of class consciousness within the proletariat. Its role is neither to ‘organise the working class’ nor to ‘take power’ in its name, but to participate actively in the movement towards the unification of struggles, towards workers taking control of them for themselves, and at the same time to draw out the revolutionary political goals of the proletariat’s combat.

OUR ACTIVITY
Political and theoretical clarification of the goals and methods of the proletarian struggle, of its historic and its immediate conditions.

Organised intervention, united and centralised on an international scale, in order to contribute to the process which leads to the revolutionary action of the proletariat.

The regroupment of revolutionaries with the aim of constituting a real world communist party, which is indispensable to the working class for the overthrow of capitalism and the creation of a communist society.

OUR ORIGINS
The positions and activity of revolutionary organisations are the product of the past experiences of the working class and of the lessons that its political organisations have drawn throughout its history. The ICC thus traces its origins to the successive contributions of the Communist League of Marx and Engels (1847-52), the three Internationals (the International Workingmen’s Association, 1864-72, the Socialist International, 1889-1914, the Communist International, 1919-28), the left fractions which detached themselves from the degenerating Third International in the years 1920-30, in particular the German, Dutch and Italian Lefts.

I would be happy to answer any specific questions.

Devrim

[Tower of Bebel]

The regroupment of revolutionaries with the aim of constituting a real world communist party, which is indispensable to the working class for the overthrow of capitalism and the creation of a communist society.


* 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.

So, in what way does this real world communist party differ from 'leftist organisations'?

[Vargha Poralli]

Left-Wing Communism Subject Archive (http://www.revleft.com/index.php?act=Post&CODE=02&f=36&t=64988)


Originally posted by Marxists Internet Archive
The Left Communists were those Marxists who supported the 1917 Russian Revolution, but differed with Lenin and Trotsky over a number of issues including the formation of the Soviet government in the U.S.S.R., the tactics of the Comintern in Europe and America, the role to be given to autonomous and spontaneous organisations of the working class as opposed to the working class political parties, participation in Parliament, the relationship with the trade unions and the trade union leadership.

There are two main currents of “Left Communism”: on one hand, the Communist Left or “Council Communists” (the term used by the Dutch and German Left Communists after 1928) criticised the “elitist” practices of the Bolshevik Party, and increasingly emphasised the autonomus organisations of the working class, reminiscent in some ways of the anarcho-syndicalists and left communists of the pre-World War One period, rejecting “compromise” with the institutions of bourgeois society, while rejecting the new forms of working class rule created by the Russian Revolution. The main point of difference with the Bolsheviks was over the role of the Party and a workers’ state. On the other hand, there were “Ultra-Left” communists (especially some of the English and the Italians) who upheld the role of a Party in leading the working class and the aim of a workers’ state, but criticised the Bolsheviks for various forms of compromise, such as advocating participation in Parliament and the conservative trade unions.

The main figures of Left Communism were: Karl Korsch, Anton Pannekoek, Paul Mattick, Herman Gorter, David Wijnkoop, Otto Rühle and Willie Gallacher; Amadeo Bordiga, Sylvia and Adela Pankhurst represent other ultra-left currents. Not all of these remained Left-wing Communists throughout their life.

Regardless the claims Rosa Luxemburg was never a Left Communist.

[Leo]

Regardless the claims Rosa Luxemburg was never a Left Communist.

I know, Trotskyists would like to turn her into a figure of theirs. Unfortunately, you don't make Rosa a Trotskyist or whatever by saying "She was wrong on every theoretical issue including national liberation, accumulation of capital, unions, imperialism, decadence of capitalism, her criticisms of the Bolshevik regime etc. etc. but she was an eagle".

The positions of left communists, especially the complete rejection of all kinds of nationalism and national liberation, the understanding of imperialism as a world epoch instead of a local stage, the rejection of unions as instruments of capital, the criticism of the Bolshevik regime because of the decreasing workers control in Russia etc. are all positions originating from Rosa Luxemburg.

And marxists.org is a very inaccurate website to look for information about left communism - even wikipedia would probably be far more reliable on that subject.

[Devrim]

From last time when whether Rosa was a left communist was discussed:


Originally posted by Devrim
Luxembourgism is basically left communist or council communism. It was more or less an alternative to Marxist-Leninist doctrine.
That would be what council communists would like us to believe, but, no, it is not true.

Luís Henriue [/b][/quote]
Well, it is certainly untrue to say that Rosa was a councilist as I don't think the term was even used during her lifetime. She was, however, a part of the left wing of the German Party alongside the currents that later became the left, and council communists. She was murdered before the split in the KPD, so it is pretty pointless to speculate about, which side she would have taken. Her analysis of imperialism, and the concept of decadence certainly form the basis of the left/council communist currents. She sided with the left on the trade union question, but disagreed with them on the parliamentary question. The period of her political life was one of immense change within the workers movement. It is important to remember that at the opening of the first world war, the groups that would later develop into the Leninist, Trotskyist, Bordigist, Left-Communist, and Councilist tendencies were members of the Second International linked more by the fight against revisionism than they were separated by differences that would later emerge between them.

On reflection though I think that it is possible to say that there is a qualities difference between Lenin, and Luxembourg's theories of imperialism, and that the position that the councilists held, and the communist left holds today are based on a development of her work in the Janus pamphlet.
[/b][/quote]

Devrim

[Vargha Poralli]

I know, Trotskyists would like to turn her into a figure of theirs.

Did i say that Rosa was Leninst or Trotskyist ?

Anyway she is dead and any one can claim that she is their goddess.

I think everybody made mistakes in the past. That includes Lenin and Trotsky too. You cannot build a perputual machine.What we can do is learn from them.I have been reading every body and learning from every body. I don't label anybody anything

[Leo]

Did i say that Rosa was Leninst or Trotskyist ?

No, you did not, to be fair. Yet many people, Trotskyists and even Stalinists and Hoxhaists often claim that Rosa Luxemburg was a Leninist, although she was wrong in everything she said differently from Lenin of course.


I think everybody made mistakes in the past. That includes Lenin and Trotsky too. You cannot build a perputual machine.What we can do is learn from them.I have been reading every body and learning from every body. I don't label anybody anything

Well, okay... you just constantly give the impression of a sectarian attitude towards the positions of the communist left.

[Rawthentic]

Thanks. I've actually been wanting to read Worker's Councils by Anton Pannekoek, but I know that my parents won't buy it for me. I don't know how to get hold of it.

So, what is the basis of Left-communist organization? Is it non-hierarchical, etc? I'm starting to think that the League somehow fits into what Left-communism is because of how we see worker's councils and assemblies as the basis of worker's democracy and our constant internationalism.

[Tower of Bebel]

worker's councils by Anton Pannekoek (http://www.marxists.org/archive/pannekoe/1936/councils.htm)

[Rawthentic]

I actually want to physically have the book, even though I suppose that I can print it out little by little.

Leo, how large is the left-communist movement? Are there any branches of the ICC in the U.S? It seems that the website you gave me is not very popular because there isn't much to it.

[Rawthentic]

Raccoon, it doesn't seem that the link you gave me is the whole book. I think that its just an article.

[RedLenin]

I think one thing needs to be clearly understood about Left Communism. It is true that Left Communists place heavy emphasis on workers democracy and workers councils, but that doesn't make them unique. Trotskyists also put a heavy emphasis on these things. What really makes Left Communists unique is their rejection of unions, parties, and parliment. Left Communists refuse to work in trade unions or workers parties, a move that I consider a tragic mistake.

By refusing to go where the workers are, the Left Communists are in effect isolating themselves from the class they claim to represent. Lenin covered this very well in his Left-Wing Communism: An Infantile Disorder (http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1920/lwc/index.htm). By refusing to work in the trade unions and workers parties, you are only making stronger the bureaucractic and reactionary leadership. Quite simply, I don't think Left Communists will ever get anywhere because of their refusal to go where the workers are.

[Tower of Bebel]

Can someone please answer my question? What will be the difference between the 'real world communist party' and the existing communist parties?

[Rawthentic]

RedLenin, for the sake of objectivity, would you mind providing the response to Lenin's Left-Wing Communism from a left-communist? I know that Leo put it out once, but I don't know who did it.

[Devrim]

Open Letter to Comrade Lenin (a reply to Left Wing Communism...):
http://www.marxists.org/archive/gorter/192...etter/index.htm (http://www.marxists.org/archive/gorter/1920/open-letter/index.htm)
Devrim

[Devrim]

Full text of Workers' councils:
http://www.geocities.com/~johngray/wcontitl.htm

[Devrim]

By refusing to work in the trade unions and workers parties, you are only making stronger the bureaucractic and reactionary leadership. Quite simply, I don't think Left Communists will ever get anywhere because of their refusal to go where the workers are.

The workers are in the workplace.

Devrim

[Rawthentic]

Leo, can you respond to what RedLenin said? I want to get a clear picture of what left-communism is. It would be nice if you also responded to what I asked about 3 posts of mine ago.

Peace

[which doctor]

Originally posted by [email protected] 05, 2007 10:46 am
So, what is the basis of Left-communist organization? Is it non-hierarchical, etc? I'm starting to think that the League somehow fits into what Left-communism is because of how we see worker's councils and assemblies as the basis of worker's democracy and our constant internationalism.
I would hardly call the CL a left-communist organization, and I'm sure some of its members wouldn't like you to apply that term to the CL. For instance, the CL supports such parliamentary organizations as the Iraqi Freedom Congress. Doesn't the CL also encourage union activity?

[Rawthentic]

No, we are not left-communist, its just the post-revolution workers council democracy that might be in line with it.

We do support the Iraqi Freedom Congress, but don't mistake it to be reformist. Its made of mostly all working people and from the worker-Communist Party of Iraq.

It is not that we encourage union activity, but this is where workers are: in the workplace, and we agitate not for mere economical demands but political ones as well which challenge the state power. We have some members that are in unions.

[Leo]

RedLenin;


By refusing to go where the workers are

Where workers are isn't the unions or workers parties. Where workers are is the workplace.


By refusing to go where the workers are, the Left Communists are in effect isolating themselves from the class they claim to represent.

No, this is not true. The great majority of left communists are proletarians and most of them had more experience with class struggle more than anyone I had met, and I was raised by a Stalinist family who had been involved with big leftist movements.

The aim of the movement is not going to where the bourgeoisie wants workers to go, it is being among the working class, arguing for class struggle and for communism which flowers from class struggle.


I don't think Left Communists will ever get anywhere because of their refusal to go where the workers are.

Left communists don't refuse to go where the workers are. Left communists already are among the working class. What the left communists refuse and oppose is workers going to where the capitalist class wants them to go; whether its a popular front with the bourgeoisie or its an imperialist wars, whether its a so-called "workers" party, or a so-called "workers" union...


By refusing to work in the trade unions and workers parties, you are only making stronger the bureaucractic and reactionary leadership.

How so? Did communists make their national bourgeoisies stronger by not going to war during WW1? Did the Kerensky government become stronger because the Bolsheviks were not in the government?

It is completely absurd to think that your enemy will be stronger if you don't join it!

"Workers" parties have nothing to do with the working class. They are controlled by one class and they serve the interests of one class: the bourgeoisie. The idea that the existing order can be changed through parliamentary or democratic means is the main obstacle that the workers movement is confronted with at every step.

Social democracy (those so-called "workers" parties), which defends the ideology of democratic rights and liberties, and the change of the existing equilibrium in favor of the working class by means of reforms, which are no longer possible under capitalism, is because of its position a tool to create a middle point between the dominant class, and the working class, which defends the interests of the bourgeoisie.

While Social Democracy does not constitute an obstacle to the dominant class, it is anti-working class, and takes a counter revolutionary position in times that proletarian movements arise, and constitutes a collaborative ideology of the class enemy on behalf of the bourgeoisie.

This is something elementary for communism: Reform or Revolution.

And as for working in the unions, the only thing that the unions do in reality is to divide workers into different sectional groups, and pull their class interests as a whole behind social democratic slogans. Not only are the unions incapable of undertaking revolutionary action but also they are incapable of defending worker’s basic living conditions in the here and now. The unions are always against the working class, and they always sabotage class struggle if they are able to. The union is controlled by the union leadership, which has different class interests with the workers who are members of the union.

Marx says that: "The Communists are distinguished from the other working-class parties by this only: 1. In the national struggles of the proletarians of the different countries, they point out and bring to the front the common interests of the entire proletariat, independently of all nationality. 2. In the various stages of development which the struggle of the working class against the bourgeoisie has to pass through, they always and everywhere represent the interests of the movement as a whole."

In other words communists support the unity of the working class as a whole. That means workers from unionized workers from different sectors of different unions, uniting with proletarian who are not unionized. After that point, the unions are destroyed by the "formation of the proletariat into a class", with its own independent, political organs; workers councils.


It is true that Left Communists place heavy emphasis on workers democracy and workers councils, but that doesn't make them unique. Trotskyists also put a heavy emphasis on these things.

Now this is the crux of the issue... The Trotskyist emphasis on workers councils is only rhetoric, just like the words: "revolution", "socialism", "communism", "class struggle" etc. being only rhetoric to Trotskyists as well as Stalinists, Maoists and other "radical" left-wing groups. None of the leftist groups regard communism as a real, material alternative of the working class. Some are interested in getting higher votes in the parliamentary elections, some are interested in getting higher votes in the elections to become higher ranked union bureacrats, some are interested in finding more people who would join their band of paramilitaries in cities, some are interested in finding more people to get them join their army in the mountains... This is why the left is supporting "glorious" national liberation wars in the middle east where thousands of workers kill each other, but condemning actual strikes because they are against the interests of the "progressive" bourgeoisie in the area.

They don't even care to know what the workers councils are while emphasizing them, it is just a little, meaningless ornament which they put on their package, among other colorful decorations they use to make the historical background they memorize look pretty. If Trotskyists today knew what workers councils meant, they would have never even emphasized them: if they knew that it meant all of the independent hopes they hold towards their parties or unions which they are high-ranked members of, sinking into the bottom of the ocean, then workers councils would be silently taken of from the pretty package.

Raccoon;


Can someone please answer my question? What will be the difference between the 'real world communist party' and the existing communist parties?

The real world communist party will not have have any "interests separate and apart from those of the proletariat as a whole". It will not aim to take power itself, but it will be among the working class which is taking power with its independent political organs. The real world communist party will be the organic unity of communists internationally. It will be a product of class struggle instead of being a formation which has illusions about being the source of class struggle.

Hastalavictoria;


Leo, how large is the left-communist movement?

It is not huge but it's growing. There are left communist groups in about 25 countries that we have, at least indirect, relationships with.


Are there any branches of the ICC in the U.S?

Yeah, there is an ICC branch in the US, they publish a paper called Internationalism and a magazine called International Review.


It seems that the website you gave me is not very popular because there isn't much to it.

Ah... it wasn't me who gave the link... It must be Devrim, he is from the same organization that I am, we have the same avatars.

Anyway, here's their site in English:

http://en.internationalism.org/

You can find their press from those places:

http://en.internationalism.org/outlets/usa

You can contact them from here:

http://en.internationalism.org/contact

[Devrim]

The IBRP also have sections in North America. They can be contacted at:
[[email protected]] [[email protected]] [[email protected]]
Devrim

[Rawthentic]

Quite interesting Leo. Say, are the branches or contacts you gave me in California, active? Are they doing any projects or something? Thanks

[Janus]

Regardless the claims Rosa Luxemburg was never a Left Communist.
No not officially, but she was one of the pioneers of the council communist/left communist movement.

[Leo]

Quite interesting Leo. Say, are the branches or contacts you gave me in California, active? Are they doing any projects or something? Thanks

Well, the ICC usually organizes public meetings but I don't know how they actually work in the US. Perhaps you should e-mail them...

[Rawthentic]

I did email them, I did it on the US site you provided..hopefully they respond because I live only about 2 hrs from them.

Here's the other thing: it seems like the ones in Berkeley and San Francisco are just bookstores? These are the ones I live close to.

[Leo]

No, those are not branches, they are outlets selling the ICC's press but probably they do have militants near the places they can get their press distributed.

[Rawthentic]

But one can establish branches if theres the possibility correct?

I'm still in the process of learning about left-communism, and I'm doing it as a way of becoming more objective, since I've already read Lenin and the Bolshevik Revolution.

[RedLenin]

Where workers are is the workplace.
Yes, but the workers, when they enter into struggle, always head to the traditional mass organizations first. Most workers are not interested in politics in times of relative prosperity. When workers do enter into struggle, they always tend to enter through their traditional mass organizations, not some “revolutionary communist party“ on the sidelines. This is a historical fact.


The aim of the movement is not going to where the bourgeoisie wants workers to go
Nevertheless, the workers do begin by moving through their traditional mass organizations. Yes, the leadership of these organizations serves the bourgeoisie. But the rank-and-file workers move through these organizations because these organizations are the historic weapons of the working class. The tasks of Marxists is to conduct revolutionary work within these organizations and attempt to win over the rank-and-file. If we do not do this, we will find ourselves an isolated sect while class struggle errupts around us.


How so?
The leaders of the traditional mass organizations serve the bourgeoisie. We have established this. However, the masses always enter into struggle through these mass organizations. By establishing yourself as a sect outside of these organizations, you are helping to secure the illusions of the workers in the leadership. On the other hand, by conducting revolutionary work within these organizations, you can win over significant portions of the rank-and-file workers and push for a struggle against the bourgeois leadership. It is a tremendous error to see the bourgeois leadership and then claim that the unions themselves are bourgeois. You need to differentiate between the leadership and the rank-and-file. Only then can you work out the correct perspective of how to relate the unions.


"Workers" parties have nothing to do with the working class.
A workers party is a party that is based mainly on the trade unions. The same things I said above applies to these parties. We need to work within them and win over the rank-and-file activists, while challenging the leadership.


This is something elementary for communism: Reform or Revolution.
Yes, but it is a huge error to confuse the tactic of conducting revolutionary work within the mass organizations with reformism. Marxists are clear on the fact that capitalism cannot be reformed into socialism. The whole point of entryism was never to foster illusions in reformism. On the contrary, the point of enteryism is to break these illusions by going to the rank-and-file and struggling against the leadership.


The unions are always against the working class
That is an absurd position. Again, you are not differentiating between the rank-and-file and the leadership. Of course, in the last analysis, unions will not be the organizations that lead the workers to socialism. But, within bourgeois society, unions are the traditional organs of class struggle. More than that, significant portions of the working class are concentrated in the unions, and the masses of workers enter the struggle by going through the unions. Marxists need to work within the unions if we want to reach the workers and radicalize them. Sitting on the sidelines and yelling at the top of your lungs about the “bourgeois” nature of the unions is not going to get the ear of the rank-and-file workers. You effectively doom yourself by sitting on the sidelines.


The Trotskyist emphasis on workers councils is only rhetoric
Not at all. We see workers councils as the basic organs of proletarian dictatorship. But we do not fetishize them to the point of ignoring the movement of the masses, which always initially takes place through the traditional mass organizations. The workers will only realize the limitations of these traditional mass organizations by experience. If a genuine Marxist tendency is already there, this process can be dramatically shortened. Both Trotskyists and Left Communists are in agreement about workers councils being the organs of proletarian power. We differ on tactical lines.

Anyone who claims that the tactic of entryism is the equivalent of reformism simply has no understanding of entryism. The Bolsheviks themselves participated in unions and even the czarist parliment. Yet no one is going to call Lenin a reformist. Entryism is a revolutionary tactic aimed at going where the masses are, radicalizing the rank-and-file, challenging the leadership, and pushing the struggle forward. To not utilize this tactic is to make yourself into an irrelevant sect on the sidelines of the labor movement. If we want to move forward, we need to use the entryist tactic.

[Rawthentic]

I like how this is going.

Can the left-communists elaborate on why they think that anarchism and "Leninism" are only variants of the capitalist left?

[Devrim]

Originally posted by RedLenin
Yes, but the workers, when they enter into struggle, always head to the traditional mass organizations first. Most workers are not interested in politics in times of relative prosperity. When workers do enter into struggle, they always tend to enter through their traditional mass organizations, not some “revolutionary communist party“ on the sidelines. This is a historical fact.

Does stating that something is a historical fact make it true? Time, and time again workers entering into struggle have formed their own organisations. The mass assembly, strike committee, and ultimatly the workers councils are the natural form of working class organisation, which have constantly been formed by workers in struggle from 1905 onwards. What you call 'their traditional mass organizations' are organisations which today are on the side of capital, and act against workers struggles. It is true that many workers have illusions in these organisations, and still see them as 'their own'. That does not mean that the task of the communists is to reinforce these illusions. The task of the communists is to support the self activity of the working class. We are not claiming that workers will struggle through our organisation, 'some “revolutionary communist party“'. Workers will construct their own organisations. The task of a communist organisation is to intervene in the struggle.

By the way the phrase 'always tend' is a contradiction in terms.


Nevertheless, the workers do begin by moving through their traditional mass organizations. Yes, the leadership of these organizations serves the bourgeoisie. But the rank-and-file workers move through these organizations because these organizations are the historic weapons of the working class. The tasks of Marxists is to conduct revolutionary work within these organizations and attempt to win over the rank-and-file. If we do not do this, we will find ourselves an isolated sect while class struggle errupts around us.

It is not only the leadership of these organisations, but the very organisations themselves that serve the bourgeoisie. No revolutionary work can be accomplished within them.


The leaders of the traditional mass organizations serve the bourgeoisie. We have established this. However, the masses always enter into struggle through these mass organizations. By establishing yourself as a sect outside of these organizations, you are helping to secure the illusions of the workers in the leadership. On the other hand, by conducting revolutionary work within these organizations, you can win over significant portions of the rank-and-file workers and push for a struggle against the bourgeois leadership. It is a tremendous error to see the bourgeois leadership and then claim that the unions themselves are bourgeois. You need to differentiate between the leadership and the rank-and-file. Only then can you work out the correct perspective of how to relate the unions.

Again, we see this assertion that 'the masses always enter into struggle through these mass organizations'. Unfortunately it isn't true. A simple look at the proportion of wildcat strikes compared to official strikes would tell one that.

It is interesting how the leftists are saying that we are 'helping to secure the illusions of the workers in the leadership'. To me it seems precisely the opposite. It is the leftists who talk about things like 'forcing the unions leadership to fight'. It reminds me of the first time I was involved in a large strike as a postman back in the 80's, two young students from the SWP were talking with some of the lads on our picket line. The students point was that the workers had to get the union leadership to call a national strike. The postmen were quite bemused by this argument, patiently explaining to these students that we already had a national strike. In the end of course, as ever, it was the union that sabotaged the struggle. It seems quite clear to me that it is the leftists who are reinforcing illusions in the unions, not the left communists who put forward the needs of the struggle, and explain how the unions will act against it.

This phrase about 'differentiating between the leadership and the rank-and-file' is the same tired old leftism. Of course they recognise that the union leadership is anti-working class, but they fail to see that the problem is any deeper than that, so they campaign for a new 'left' leadership, or democratisation, or any other such nonsense, completely failing to see that the unions will always act against the working class.


That is an absurd position. Again, you are not differentiating between the rank-and-file and the leadership. Of course, in the last analysis, unions will not be the organizations that lead the workers to socialism. But, within bourgeois society, unions are the traditional organs of class struggle. More than that, significant portions of the working class are concentrated in the unions, and the masses of workers enter the struggle by going through the unions. Marxists need to work within the unions if we want to reach the workers and radicalize them. Sitting on the sidelines and yelling at the top of your lungs about the “bourgeois” nature of the unions is not going to get the ear of the rank-and-file workers. You effectively doom yourself by sitting on the sidelines.

I presume that you are young, and don't have much experience of the trade unions in practice. When you actually are involved in a struggle, it doesn't seem that absurd a position at all. Workers experience today is that the unions are in open collaboration with the management. It might seem strange to you sitting in you classroom, but the first time that I went on strike, the managements immediate response was to phone the district committee of the union who promptly sent somebody down to tell us to go back to work.

Today where I work, a large car factory which may strike in the very near future, I have only heard one worker say anything good about the union, and even he admitted that they would probable screw us over the pay claim, but stressed that they do some good things on a small level. When we say to workers that the unions are against the working class it finds echoes in their own experience.

Those leftists who accuse us of 'sitting on the sidelines' are actually the ones who are isolated from the working class in their dead branch meetings where their actions only serve to create the illusion that the unions are still 'their' organisations.


A workers party is a party that is based mainly on the trade unions. The same things I said above applies to these parties. We need to work within them and win over the rank-and-file activists, while challenging the leadership.

The argument that parties like the British Labour Party has any connection to working class struggle is absurd. This party is the government for god's sake. It is responsible for co-ordinating the attacks of capital upon the working class.

Devrim

[Luís Henrique]

Originally posted by Leo [email protected] 05, 2007 01:00 pm

Regardless the claims Rosa Luxemburg was never a Left Communist.

I know, Trotskyists would like to turn her into a figure of theirs.
Because, of course, those are the two only possibilities in the world. Either you are a left communist, or a Trotskyist.

She was not a "left-communist", because she did not partake the wrong conclusions left communists took from the defeats of 1914-1923, and she was not a Trotskyist because she rejected the substitutionism implied in Leninism, to which Trotsky and his followers adhere.

It is not that difficult to understand.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

Originally posted by [email protected] 05, 2007 05:34 pm
The workers are in the workplace.
Yes, it is the place of our enslavement. We want to be everywhere else, and just not there.

Luís Henrique

[Rawthentic]

Can someone respond to my last post?

Luis, I understand that we want to be everywhere, but isnt the workplace where we are exploited and where we strike and protest?

What does wanting to be everywhere else have to do with it?

[More Fire for the People]

Originally posted by Luís [email protected] 06, 2007 08:40 am

She was not a "left-communist", because she did not partake the wrong conclusions left communists took from the defeats of 1914-1923, and she was not a Trotskyist because she rejected the substitutionism implied in Leninism, to which Trotsky and his followers adhere.
Just out of curiousity, what are these wrong conclusions?

[Leo]

Luis;


She was not a "left-communist", because she did not partake the wrong conclusions left communists took from the defeats of 1914-1923

She was not a left communist because left communism didn't exist when she was murdered. Yet she sided with the left wing of the party on every question expect the parliamentary question and most of the economic theories of left communists have their basis in Rosa Luxemburg.


Yes, it is the place of our enslavement. We want to be everywhere else, and just not there.

If you want to be everywhere else, why don't you go to, say, war zones? That's a place, right? Why don't you join right wing parties? Why don't you join the intelligence services? What you say doesn't make any sense.

Hastalavictoria;


Can the left-communists elaborate on why they think that anarchism and "Leninism" are only variants of the capitalist left?

Well, it is not that simple. What is at the center of the left communist theory is the international unity and independence of the working class. What makes so called Leninists or anarchists variants of the capitalist left is not the historical analysis which they have memorized, it's their positions today, them working for getting elected to the parliament or to the union leadership, them organizing a putsch, them supporting national liberation struggle, in the end them trying to get to somewhere in the capitalist system with the illusion that they will be able to change something then. Left communists, on the other hand, are trying to abolish that capitalist system.

[bcbm]

them working for getting elected to the parliament or to the union leadership, them organizing a putsch, them supporting national liberation struggle, in the end them trying to get to somewhere in the capitalist system with the illusion that they will be able to change something then

Eh? Leninists may do some of this, but I've not met many anarchists interested in leadership positions, elections, putsches or national liberation struggles...

[Leo]

Eh? Leninists may do some of this, but I've not met many anarchists interested in leadership positions, elections, putsches or national liberation struggles...

Support for national liberation is quite common in the anarchist movement (so-called Platformists of the Wayne Price variety), and entryism to unions is even more common. And of course there are anarcho-sydicalists. Also, I have seen the anarchists advocating voting in several times, also historically there is the betrayal of the CNT-FAI by joining the bourgeois republic government etc. etc.

Of course there has been and there are some quite solid, internationalist anarchists, both historically and currently, but I am not talking about them.

[bcbm]

Support for national liberation is quite common in the anarchist movement (so-called Platformists of the Wayne Price variety), and entryism to unions is even more common. And of course there are anarcho-sydicalists. Also, I have seen the anarchists advocating voting in several times, also historically there is the betrayal of the CNT-FAI by joining the bourgeois republic government etc. etc.

Ah, fair enough... I suppose in my interactions with anarchists, I just forget about all the stupid ones I don't deal with.

[Devrim]

Originally posted by black coffee black metal+--> (black coffee black metal)Ah, fair enough... I suppose in my interactions with anarchists, I just forget about all the stupid ones I don't deal with. [/b]

Yes, it is easy to do this. I think that it is the 'stupid' ones who are the majority though. I think that if you look at anarchism today the two strongest currents are Platformism, and the IWA. To me Platformism seems to be the most leftist current within anarchism. Basically if you discount their stance on elections (which is difficult for anarchists to change due to historical reasons) their politics are exactly the same as the Trotskyists with a little 'anti authoritarian' vocabulary spread over them.


Originally posted by hastalavictoria+--> (hastalavictoria)Can the left-communists elaborate on why they think that anarchism and "Leninism" are only variants of the capitalist left?[/b]

I think that this comes from this line:


[email protected]
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.

It does say 'official' anarchists, which implies that there are others. Leo explained it one way, I would like to try it another.

At Zimmerwald those opposed to the First World War broke with social democracy which had supported the war. The betrayal of the SPD in voting for war credits was condemned. Revolutionaries do not take sides in capitalist wars. All of the parties mentioned above have supported different factions in capitalist wars at one time, or another. It is this betrayal of internationalism, and subordination to the interests of different capitalist factions, which leads us to characterise them as anti-working class.


Raccoon
Can someone please answer my question? What will be the difference between the 'real world communist party' and the existing communist parties?

In that it would be communist. All of the leftist parties today are not only not communist but they are also anti-working class.

Devrim

[Tower of Bebel]

but they are also anti-working class.

How? Because it's parliamentary?

[Raúl Duke]

All this stuff about left-communism is really interesting....
is there a site where I can learn the basics (or could you please 're-cap' all the positions of left communism that you mentioned?)

[Rawthentic]

Johnny, those are in the first page.

And so, in practice, left-communists don't want to agitate in the unions but only in the workplace correct?

[RedLenin]

Time, and time again workers entering into struggle have formed their own organisations.
Not immediately. Typically the workers begin by moving through the mass organizations and, only when they realize the limitations of these organizations, do they form their own. Unions are organs of class struggle within capitalist society, they cannot lead the workers out of capitalism. Yet the working class is going to go to the unions first, and if revolutionaries can be there and attempt to radicalize the rank-and-file, we can shorten this process. It is a simple equation really. The revolutionary leadership needs to understand the movement of the class and then go where the class goes. The leadership is at the head of the class.


but the very organisations themselves that serve the bourgeoisie.
No. Unions were born through the struggle of the working class and exist to fight for immediate demands within the confines of capitalist society. True, in times of relative prosperity, the bourgeoisie can often afford to grant concessions. In times like these, unions more or less serve the bosses. But, in times of crisis, when the bourgeoisie cannot grant concessions, unions can become pests in the eyes of the bosses. Unions are organs of class struggle. But, they are limited in that they are only organs of class struggle within capitalist society. Why should revolutionaries not work within these organs of class struggle? I’ve yet to hear a really valid reason.


them working for getting elected to the parliament or to the union leadership
Working in parliament is only for propaganda purposes. Even the Bolsheviks participated in parliament. If you are not in a position to take power, you are only boycotting yourself by boycotting parliament. The masses of workers do vote, and you can use that for propaganda purposes. The goal is not to grap the reigns of government and bring about socialism through parliamentary means. The goal is strictly propaganda. As far as unions, we do not work to get union leadership. We work among the base and use the slogan of democratizing the unions and encourage them to challenge the leadership.


them supporting national liberation struggle
It is in the interest of the proletariat to not be dominated by an imperialist power. National liberation movements are movements of the oppressed to rid the country of imperialists, a goal that communists should support. However, we must not support the petty-bourgeois leadership of these movements. We must support the right of oppressed people’s to defend themselves against imperialism, while at the same time trying to unify the class and turn the struggle into a class struggle. I doubt any serious leftist is going to blindly support the leadership of Hamas.

[gilhyle]

Originally posted by Leo [email protected] 05, 2007 07:48 pm

Where workers are isn't the unions or workers parties. Where workers are is the workplace.

Did communists make their national bourgeoisies stronger by not going to war during WW1?

The Trotskyist emphasis on workers councils is only rhetoric, .....They don't even care to know what the workers councils are while emphasizing them,
Leaving aside the silly (and maybe unintended) claim that there are no workers in trade unions, the concept of 'location' here is a false friend. Its not just a matter of 'being there' - on that logic you could do all your politics in the Shopping Mall. Its a question of the capacity in which they are there, of the nature of the activity they undertake in the different social locations the working class happen to be it.

Its also not about finding a forum to address the class - those passive ignorant masses in need of your educational assistance - its about building a class movement : that is about building unions and class parties.

For the record: bolsheviks and others JOINING UP during WW1 did make a big difference. Communist agitators who joined up to agitate at the front made a huge contribution. SO yes, communists standing aside from the political process in elections, in trade unions, in political campaigns etc. makes capitalism stronger.

You are correct about one thing : Trotskyists talk about soviets is almost always empty rhetoric.

[beltov]

Originally posted by [email protected] 06, 2007 04:11 am
I like how this is going.

Can the left-communists elaborate on why they think that anarchism and "Leninism" are only variants of the capitalist left?
First, our position on the nature of the so-called 'Workers' Parties' is given in point 13 of our political platform. Briefly,


All those parties or organisations which today defend, even ‘conditionally’ or ‘critically’, certain states or fractions of the bourgeoisie whether in the name of ‘socialism’, ‘democracy’, ‘anti-fascism’, ‘national independence’, the ‘united front’ or the ‘lesser evil’, which base their politics on the bourgeois electoral game, within the anti-working class activity of trade unionism or in the mystifications of self-management, are agents of capital. In particular, this is true of the Socialist and Communist parties.

These parties, which were once real vanguards of the world proletariat, have since undergone a process of degeneration which has led them into the capitalist camp. After the death as such (despite the formal survival of their structure) of the Internationals to which these parties belonged (2nd International for the socialists, 3rd International for the communists), they themselves survived to be progressively transformed, each one separately, into (often important) cogs in the bourgeois state apparatus in their respective countries, into faithful managers of the national capital...

All the so-called ‘revolutionary’ currents – such as Maoism which is simply a variant of parties which had definitively gone over to the bourgeoisie, or Trotskyism which, after constituting a proletarian reaction against the betrayal of the Communist Parties was caught up in a similar process of degeneration, or traditional anarchism, which today places itself in the framework of an identical approach by defending a certain number of positions of the SPs and CPs, such as ‘anti-fascist alliances’ – belong to the same camp: the camp of capital. Their lesser influence or their more radical language changes nothing as to the bourgeois basis of their programme, but makes them useful touts or supplements of these parties.
http://en.internationalism.org/node/618

That being said, we appreciate that individuals within such organisations (and within the many varieties of anarchism) may defend internationalism and begin to call into questions some of the counter-revolutionary positions, to look to clarify what are genuine proletarian positions. Our aim is to act as a catalyst in this process of the development of genuine class consciousness.

On the trade unions its first important to say that we are FOR the class struggle - not against it! We think that the best way to serve the interests of the class is to be honest and point out the methods and forms of struggle that have proved most effective for the class, based on the history and lessons of the workers' movement. So, it's not a question of calling workers to leave the unions: the struggles of the class show time and time again that in the current period there is a clear tendency for workers themselves to call into question the union framework and seek to break out of it, to take the organisation of their struggles into their own hands. The trade unions constitute a powerful barrier to the development and unification of the class struggles towards the mass strike. We see that these organisations have been lost for the class since the first world war, when they were integrated into the apparatus of the capitalist state. Again, our position on the unions is given in more detail in Point 7 of our Platform:
http://en.internationalism.org/node/612

Beltov,
for the ICC.

[ern]

Hi Johnydarko

Glad you are finding this discussion on the Communist Left interesting and you will find a lot of information about the Communist Left on our website - International Communist Current (http://www.internationalism.org) as well as links to the other groups of the Communist Left

Ern
For the ICC

[gilhyle]

Originally posted by [email protected] 07, 2007 10:26 pm
So, it's not a question of calling workers to leave the unions: the struggles of the class show time and time again that in the current period there is a clear tendency for workers themselves to call into question the union framework and seek to break out of it, to take the organisation of their struggles into their own hands. The trade unions constitute a powerful barrier to the development and unification of the class struggles towards the mass strike. We see that these organisations have been lost for the class since the first world war, when they were integrated into the apparatus of the capitalist state.
I find this formulation confused - you think the unions are lost to the working class but you DONT call on workers to leave them ? Why not ? In any case are you sure you dont, cos it sounds very like it a lot of the time ?

Lets remember the credible alternative against which you are arguing aginst which is:

fight within the unions to prevent the leadership selling out struggles;

argue in and out of the union fora for the methods which will win the strike;

build rank and file movements which will democratise the unions and take them unions back from the (mostly) unelected officials

You are fighting against this approach, as I understand it, on the basis that there is no point fighting matters out within the fora of the union.

BTW, Devrimakara you might reflect on whether you seriously think those who argue against you do so because they are students or young ? Right or wrong, it is surely true that there are many comrades of mature age working in factories, experienced in factory floor struggle who would also disagree with you - and there would be many who agree with you who also are still at their books. What, seriously is the relevance ?

[ern]

gilhyte

You are right we do not defend any form of struggle to win the unions to revolutionary leadership etc. As for whether we call on workers to leave the unions or not? As you say the whole thrust of our position is that workers should not be trapped in the unions either physically or ideologically. On an individual level when discussing with militant workers who are questioning the unions we obviously point out the contradictions of being in a union. On a wider level, in our press, in our intervention in the struggles etc we do not make calling for workers to leave the unions a point of principle. The central point is the needs of the struggle, which are the development of the autonomous struggle of the working class, which means at this period spreading and self-organising the struggles. This clearly leads into confrontation with the unions. However, we are under no illusions about the weight of union ideology on the proletariat at present and so to abstractly call on workers to leave the unions would be meaningless: this does not mean not pointing out the role of the unions or that the class needs to breakout of the union prison, which is a central part of our press and intervention, but without a massive movement to go beyond the unions for us to call for workers to leave the unions as a slogan would not contribute to the development of the struggle.
This is a bit abstract, but it is hard to answer this question briefly. Nevertheless, for a practical example of our intervention please read the leaflet we have produced on the struggles in Airbus in Europe Airbus (http://en.internationalism.org/icconline/2007/march/airbus)
We also have a pamphlet on the question of the trade unions against the working class (http://en.internationalism.org/pamphlets/unions.htm) which goes into the whole question in more detail. An updated version of this pamphlet should be out fairly soon
Hopefully this answers some of the points you raise

[ern]

Hastalavictoria

The following link gives a more detailed analysis of our understanding of the relationship between class consciousness and organisation (http://en.internationalism.org/pamphlets/classconc/2_cconc/orgn)

[Djehuti]

There are a few kinds of leftwing communism, the dutch/german left (also called council communism, represented by Mattick, Gorter and Pannekoek among others) and the italian left (Bordiga etc).

The council communist laid focus on the spontanity and autonomous struggle of the working class, distanced themselves from the state and work within unions and advocated a form of organisation based on workers councils. The italian left held similar positions and put forward that capitalism was not about who owned the means of production but about if the value ruled over the economic relations. Thus they put forth the importance of abolishing the market, the wage labour and the commodity form. The italian left did not oppose the idea of a communist party, but they did have a different party-theory than te bolsheviks.

Leftwing communism in it self is not very interesting today, but the ideas they developed was very important in bringing communist theory to a new level (and they were very important for groups such as the situationists). Now, advanced communist are going beyond the ultra left...

Link:
http://www.riff-raff.se/en/8/

[Devrim]

Originally posted by gilhyle
BTW, Devrimakara you might reflect on whether you seriously think those who argue against you do so because they are students or young ? Right or wrong, it is surely true that there are many comrades of mature age working in factories, experienced in factory floor struggle who would also disagree with you - and there would be many who agree with you who also are still at their books. What, seriously is the relevance ?

Yes, you are right. I just objected to RedLenin's patronising approach as he explained the doctrine of one of the most right wing Trotskyist groups straight from a textbook. I feel quite sure that he is some schoolkid from his use of language, and the way he argues. I patronised back. You are right though, it is not the correct way to argue.

Devrim