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Only we did not dissolve into the NPA, and that's part of the point really.
And I certainly don't think NPA was destined to end up the way it has, although our comrades were aware of and warned against the risks. To have written it off from the beginning would have been wrong because I do believe there was potential and indeed a momentum. It opened up a discussion and took in new layers, it opened up the potential for a radical massparty. The end result unfortuntly reflects more negatively on the ex-LCR leadership.
And Yehuda indeed we are working in a different time, in my opinion a time where thepolitical movement of the working class as such need to be rebuilt. Of course we do not strive to build any reformist organizations, but we reckognize that in the first stage new parties might have an unclear orientation. In fact that is precisly why we want to intervene, as revolutionary tendency, into such parties and movements.
"I want to say sweet, silly things." - V.I Lenin
Actually, that's a rather simple one to answer.
The French turn was predicated on a left turn in the French, American, and Spanish SPs, among others. Actually pretty much a worldwide trend in the Second International after the right wing of the SI was discredited in Germany.
Thus the American SP for example actually came out for the dictatorship of the proletariat after the right wing walked out at their 1934 conference. Of course, Norman Thomas's interpretation of D of the P was soggy, to say the least.
The NPA, by contrast, represented a right turn for the LCR, which included, among other things, a fairly explicit repudiation of the concept of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
If the NPA had been say a left split from the SP, then one might have wanted to orient to it, depending on circumstances. But, frankly, if it had been a left split from the SP, even then it wouldn't have been a terribly left one, as one can see from the orbit of its main standard bearer, Besancenot, a crass pro-imperialist of a sort that would likely have gotten you kicked out of the French, American or Spanish SP in the mid '30s.
-M.H.-
Yes and no. Did they intend permanent cohabitation with Thomas (not Dubinsky or Hillquit, they both went with the right split out of the SP)? Well no, barring a remarkable personal transformation of the good Rev. Thomas, a la Rev. A. J. Muste in his brief better moments.
But the possibility of, not a raid, but of the left wing simply taking over the American SP and getting rid of Thomas at an opportune moment was not closed. Indeed, they did successfully take over the youth organization.
And, if the Spanish Trotskyists led by Nin had followed Trotsky's advice and entered the Spanish SP, instead of creating the centrist POUM together with Maurin and his Bukharinites, then, in the crucible of revolution, using the entry tactic to take over the Spanish SP and become the genuine revolutionary party of the Spanish working class would have been a real possibility.
Which was Trotsky's real focus of attention re: the French Turn, the Spanish Revolution being the most important revolutionary development of the 1930s.
-M.H.-
This is quite true, but I don't believe that that was the case with the NPA. I think it was born reformist, by design and by its own internal logic, and the fact is it wasn't brought to life by a mass workers' movement, but by the opportunist designs of various far-left groups.
For a Palestinian Workers' State from the Jordan to the Sea!
For a Socialist Federation of the Middle East!
For the World Socialist Revolution!
Rebuild the Fourth International!
“The Jew is a caricature of a normal, natural human being, both physically and spiritually. As an individual in society he revolts and throws off the harness of social obligation, knows no order nor discipline.” ~Hashomer HaTzair, Zionist "Marxist" movement
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Isn't Besancenot the NPA leader who quit because the NPA wasn't forthright and enthusiastic enough in its support of French imperialism in Libya? Or do I have him confused with another Frenchman?
-M.H.-
First, I'd like to thank comrades DaringMehring, A Marxist Historian, Blake 3:17 and yehuda Stern for the comradely tone of the debate and it is good to see this thread developing in this way. Arguments like these easily become facetious, with jus accusations and counter-accusations, on the internet even more so. So thank you again.
Now, since I feel you are both making essentially the same point I will adress these posts at the same time.
Firstly I do not disagree with the basic argument, that merely a combination of the existing far-left cannot in itself will into existence a new worker's party. I, and I am sure you as well, encounter this argument quite frequently, namely "why do not all of the radical left group simply combine to create a massparty?". However the reason I answer this in the negative at this stage is not because I would be opposed to a principled united front with other left-groups.
In sweden this would include the mandelites, the Communist Party, various smaller local left groups and perhaps even a leftmoving Left Party or portions thereof. The reason we are not seeing this in sweden has less to do with the individual groups and more to do with the general directions in society, or I should say the general direction is reflecting in the individual left organizations. The class struggle in sweden is still at a low, we been relatively spared from the economic crisis and while the social democracy is in deep crisis so far this has only resulted in a slight electoral shift in favour of the Left Party and arguably the Green Party, both of which are moving to the right.
In the case of the latter they have basicly operated as the centrist party of sweden, in bourgeois terms, for at the very least the past decade. The main reason they draw support from left voters is because of their, mostly verbal, slightly more radical position on social issue, like LGBT-rights and asylum rights, and of course the environment. Or at least that is how it is percieved by the public, regardless of what their actual politics are. A majority of their voters identify as "left" and they consitently draw strong support from young voters.
Some similar thing's could be said of the Left Party, regardless of the actual politics of the party in parliement, muncipalities and local councils (because that is where they have their main home) they are still percieved as a relatively radical alternative by the general public.
In short the voting base is far to the left of the two parties that they vote for. this goes also very much for the social democratic voters as well. Indeed in polls among the electorate it is quite clear that a majority would support the Left Party's programme (as opposed to their actual policies) if they voted according to what they believe in issues such as privatizations, the dismantling of the wellfare state etc.
So in theory there is a huge base for a new radical socialist party in Sweden, which could at least in part be made out of the previous mentioned groups. Objectively the situation is there, however the counsciousness is not there yet, mostly as a result of the lowe-level of class struggle.
In France the situation is different, firstly there exists already a quite significant base for the radical left (in this I am thinking mainly of the LCR and the LO) and there has been an upturn in struggle from the working clas and the youth, and consequently also an upturn in in the consciousness of youth and the working class. Indeed I think the the potential of the NPA can be seen also quite clearly in it's failure, the 2/3 of the membership that has walked out and the waning support. most of these came from fresh layers of the working class and youth.
The reason why it failed has been outlined quite well in the OP I think, so I am mainly trying the counter the argument that there was no potential.
Potential is not just based on the quality of the leadership and membership of the ex-LCR and NPA but of the general tendencies in society. The decision of the LCR to dissolve into the NPA was clearly a liquidationist move and in essence a move to the right, but to look only at this when evaluating the NPA would be to ignore the general counsciosness and direction among the working class and youth. New layers did move into and towards the NPA. What was lacking was not the potential of a "broad anti-capitalist party" (and indeed a revolutionary mass working class party) but the ability and leadership of the ex-LCR to intervene in the class struggle to make it so. To decisively intervene in the class struggle and use the momentum that was there. And this also was a result of how the internal debate worked.
To have written it off before-hand because of the former LCR leadership, despite the layers that were moving towards it, would have been to lie down before the battle was over. At the very least the NPA, at least for those who are willing to learn, has served as a learning experience. And drawing the correct lessons here are important. And as I said initially what I see in the NPA's failure and the failure of the ex-LCR leadership to draw the lessons of earlier experiences (like the SSP in Scotland) is also the squandered potential that was there.
Over to you, comrades.
"I want to say sweet, silly things." - V.I Lenin
I do not reject the NPA because of the LCR leadership (well, not only because of that, anyway), but primarily because it is essentially an unprincipled political bloc. I have no problem with having discussions with other left groups (otherwise I wouldn't be here); I have no problem with those discussions leading to political agreement which in turn leads to an organizational fuse; what I do have a problem with is groups with different (sometimes even opposed) political positions forming these non-parties. The result is always political and theoretical confusion, and reformism-in-practice as a result of the groups' inability to agree on anything but the most minimal demands. It doesn't matter how much we call such an organization a potential revolutionary party; there is no revolutionary party without revolutionary theory, and such theories can only be reached by discussions and debates that the working class is made conscious of, not by muddying the waters and having middle class intellectuals deal with the theory in the background while pretending to be reformists in the eyes of the workers.
For a Palestinian Workers' State from the Jordan to the Sea!
For a Socialist Federation of the Middle East!
For the World Socialist Revolution!
Rebuild the Fourth International!
“The Jew is a caricature of a normal, natural human being, both physically and spiritually. As an individual in society he revolts and throws off the harness of social obligation, knows no order nor discipline.” ~Hashomer HaTzair, Zionist "Marxist" movement
NEW! ISL Website ISL-LRP Statement on Discussions
Remember Basem Abu Rahme, anti-Apartheid wall protester murdered by Zionist army
Bla bla bla bla anything but intransigent defense of Marxism. Opportunists sell out, then lose out, then spew out blatherous ass-covering postmortems. News at eleven.
That's still sectarianism. There's no revolutionary party without a revolutionary program, not "revolutionary theory."
"A new centrist project does not have to repeat these mistakes. Nobody in this topic is advocating a carbon copy of the Second International (which again was only partly centrist)." (Tjis, class-struggle anarchist)
"A centrist strategy is based on patience, and building a movement or party or party-movement through deploying various instruments, which I think should include: workplace organising, housing struggles [...] and social services [...] and a range of other activities such as sports and culture. These are recruitment and retention tools that allow for a platform for political education." (Tim Cornelis, left-communist)
I didn't know that. I think the broad left was asleep at the wheel on Libya.
Within the USFI there were big disagreements. On a local level, the left tends to support left wing of national diasporas. The small Libyan community here is very right wing.
Two questions:
1) Wasn't the NPA in the main the LCR plus middle class environmentalists? Were there any significant groups of subjectively revolutionary workers that were brought into the NPA? [edit: hadn't read M's last post...where are any references to these 'new layers of workers' involved in the NPA's founding, and were they revolutionary-minded?]
2) Was it not the case that the NPA stopped calling for "all out, together" in the pension struggle when the union bureaucracy yanked its chain, and that the CWI grouping did not go along with that but also did not point out that this showed the NPA leadership was an obstacle to the struggle the workers needed?
