United Front vs People's Front

[Black Sheep]

I was talking with a trotskyist and he proposed this way of class struggle:

Common parliament participation with social-democratic,socialist,communist, green and general 'liberal' (not neo-liberal) parties as a common front against neo-liberalism, in order to be able to propagandize and speak with people who are not left radicals and make them revolutionaries. (that includes participating in coalitions whose majority are social democrats)

as opposed to the communist parties' strategy of battling alone with exclusively class-struggle oriented syndicates and parties.
(he said that this tactic was anti-marxist)

Now he called the one 'united front' and the other ' peoples' front' or popular front, i can't translate from greek :blushing:

Anyway what's the big picture,because my mind is a bit messed up about this.

[Die Neue Zeit]

That's actually a popular front reeking of coalitionism:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1203523&postcount=32 (article series)

Reform coalition, or mass strike? (http://www.cpgb.org.uk/worker/618/McNair%20-%20Strategy3.htm)

[Tower of Bebel]

The united front should solve the split within the workers movement, nog the devision amongst so called progressive parties. It is the workers' movement which has the key to socialism, not some specific "anti-fascist" parties in parliament.

The popular front is not aimed at uniting the working class. It is aimed at uniting every "anti-fascist" party against fascism.

[Black Sheep]

I would greatly appreciate it if you could give me a brief explanation of each strategy.

[Armand Iskra]

This idea is applied in the Philippines back then, however, the difficult is that the political line must be stressed whether it was National Democratic, Social, or Liberal Democratic. Most of the organizers belong to the National Democratic line, which was and is connected to the Maoist Communist Party.

Perhaps, the idea of a united front of people's coalitions following a particular line is better than a united front of people's coalitions with different political lines, it may cause arguments in spite of its goal being set. In fact, it started in Philippine History, The La Liga Filipina seperated into two, the compromisarios and the Katipunan, then the Katipunan was seperated into two out of different ideas, Bonifacio stood for the masses while Aguinaldo stood for the Bourgeoisie, And so is in the political fronts.

[Yehuda Stern]

It's much more than that. The popular front means that the working class party enters the bourgeois government or even leads it, while a united front means unity in action, but no organizational unity, certainly not joining the government.

[Black Sheep]

Is the popular front in practice today?

[Yehuda Stern]

Well, it was in Italy not too long ago - the Prodi coalition ("The Olive Tree") was a classic popular front, only this time the threat used as an excuse for class collaboration by the left parties was a Berlusconi government and not a fascist dictatorship. However, given that the left in the world today is a pale shadow of what it was in the 1930s, there are hardly too many places where the popular front could be applied. The support given by leftists to the PPP in Pakistan, Castro in Cuba, Chavez in Venezuela and other populists in Latin America follows the logic of the popular front, but without the strength to actually become partners in a government, the left's actions, while opportunist and treacherous towards the working class, can still not truly be termed popular frontist.