Effective left agitation: Lassalle, PSUV, Sinn Fein, etc.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Based on what has transpired in US politics since Occupy, these old discussions have come back to my mind:

Is agitation inherently undemocratic?

"We are the 99%" was not a slogan made by Occupy's fetish for consensus and prolonged deliberation, but rather a brilliant push marketing message by Adbusters, the non-profit organization that inspired Occupy in the first place. It was developed with no participation by its audience and disseminated whether that audience liked it or not.

"Labour monarchy": strawman?

Strict unity of will, indeed.

So what has historically and contemporarily characterized effective left agitation?

1) It's difficult to find the right one or two buzzwords to describe this, but a singular charismatic leader does not do. Charisma is very important, but it is more important to have charismatic leaders at the local and regional levels. The infamous slogan "cadres are the key to everything" very much applies to the charisma beyond that of the top leader.

2) Formal military command structure and language: The Partido Socialista Unido de Venezuela utilizes formal military command structure and language - not just centralized, vertical, and one-man management - to fulfill one key function of agitation in the most effective but transparent way: mobilization.

http://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/4929

A socialist battalion is the basic building block of the party [...] Each socialist battalion elected a recallable spokesperson. These spokespeople went on to form “socialist conscriptions” that then elected delegates

They even have Units of Battle Hugo Chávez.

3) Stand By Your Man in the midst of personnel controversy: "Sinn Féin prides itself on its militaristic discipline in staying on-message"

http://www.thejournal.ie/readme/sinn...63358-Nov2014/

To paraphrase Enda Kenny, any one of these scenarios would see any other leader of any other political party gone in five minutes.

If Ferdinand Lassalle had been criticized by the emergent German worker-class movement for his affair with another aristocrat's wife, instead of for his political attitudes towards Bismarck, that breakdown in message discipline would have salivated the bourgeois press back then. Today, Donald Trump's supporters among the "white working class" don't fawn over him like the pundits would have us believe, but they do overlook whatever publicly perceived moral failings he might have.

4) Uniformity in public and private expression: Comrade Rafiq said it well when collective self-sacrifice was a historic left virtue. The uniformity expressed in red-shirted political rallies is second to none. Also, political education is the place for thoughtful dissent, not political agitation. There are (gosh) benefits to command-based groupthink, as demonstrated in the business world.