Is LibCom being couped by the Internationalist Communist Tendency?

Yes, I'm also confused about this including the recent influx of material that can't really be considered libertarian at all.

The ICT promotes a vanguardist political model and in terms of history has been promoting a lot of pro Bolshevik stuff on the site, I've seen Brest-Litovsk resuscitation attempts and articles by Bordiga and others sincerely advocating Totalitarianism and total domination of the working class by the "proletarian party".

I'm sure much of this stuff wouldn't be welcome if you changed the author name and group acronym. I know the site has hosted stuff that's questionable before, but theirs usually an explanation for why it should be considered or an opportunity for a discussion.

Also one other thing I use a lot of anarchist/libertarian news wire services and I keep seeing ICT stuff on their because of uploads to Libcom. If the group is in touch with the people who run these services it might be a good idea to let them know so they can decide whether they want to promote a political parties propaganda?

The ICT has been invited by a libcom admin to set up a blog (you can't just set up one yourself, you need permission from the libcom team). The blog section of the website is not particularly active lately, which is why it seems like it's dominated by ICT contributions.

The ICT does not "advocate totalitarianism" nor "total domination of the working class by the proletarian party". Indeed, it is explicitly anti-parliamentarian and for the self-organisation of the class.

Reddebrek

I've seen [...] articles by Bordiga and others sincerely advocating Totalitarianism and total domination of the working class by the "proletarian party".

Amazing, since the ICT is actually critical of Bordiga and "Bordigism", including Bordiga's view of the party (see the book Bordiga Beyond the Myth).

And the fact that the CWO publish articles here is equated with some kind of takeover?! Ridiculous.

Instead of complaining about them, anarchists should thank these left communists and consider how left communist ideas can help clarify the muddled ones that are so widespread among too many anarchists today (e.g. democratism, support for nationalist projects like Catalonia or Rojava, unions, reformist identity politics, etc.)

Yep. Plus, without their analysis we wouldn’t have realised that women aren’t oppressed coz Thatcher. Gratitude due.

Noah Fence

Yep. Plus, without their analysis we wouldn’t have realised that women aren’t oppressed coz Thatcher. Gratitude due.

Well, women aren't a class. I never said they aren't oppressed (... in different ways).

Noah Fence

Yep. Plus, without their analysis we wouldn’t have realised that women aren’t oppressed coz Thatcher. Gratitude due.

What are you even talking about? What does this have to do with the ICT?

No political party should dominate here (least of all a non anarchist one) let alone one using this site to advocate vanguardism. Libcom is mostly but not exclusively supposed to be anarchist. No impossibilist material has appeared on the front page as far as i know, which i assumed was because the page was curated by an editor.

For example wtf is this doing on libcom
https://libcom.org/blog/class-party-light-struggles-iran-06122018

Dyjbas

Noah Fence

Yep. Plus, without their analysis we wouldn’t have realised that women aren’t oppressed coz Thatcher. Gratitude due.

What are you even talking about? What does this have to do with the ICT?

It was a joke. Craftwork understood it. It’s not a good enough joke to be worthy of an explanation. My apologies, no criticism of, or offence intended to, the ICT.

jondwhite

No political party should dominate here (least of all a non anarchist one) let alone one using this site to advocate vanguardism. Libcom is mostly but not exclusively supposed to be anarchist. No impossibilist material has appeared on the front page as far as i know, which i assumed was because the page was curated by an editor.

I don't think any "political party" (which the ICT isn't) does "dominate" here...

They simply publish articles with regularity, which is why they appear under "Recent Posts". You are free to do the same.

I wonder what proportion of the SPGB's membership actually regularly write articles for their press?

WithDefiance

I know the ICT in the Netherlands and Belgium

There is no ICT affiliate in the Netherlands or Belgium. You may be confusing it with some other group?

Noah Fence

It was a joke. Craftwork understood it.

Ah ok, fair enough!

It only looks a bit ICT top heavy because very few others contribute these days, which is a shame.

Party with a small p.
The stuff I've uploaded has never made the front page, why should the material by the ICT?
Also to reiterate what is this doing on libcom
https://libcom.org/blog/class-party-light-struggles-iran-06122018

jondwhite

Party with a small p. The stuff I've uploaded has never made the front page, why should the material by the ICT?

Set up your own blog and your articles will come up on the blog feed on the front page, as the ICT ones do. Simple as!

Also, the "party" that we speak of is not a parliamentary body (like that of the impossibilists), but a revolutionary organisation, it is also not a government in waiting. To avoid any further confusion, this article explains what we mean by the term:

"the International will not be a government in waiting. Its task remains the spreading of world revolution. [...] There is no possibility of working class emancipation, nor of the construction of a new social order if this does not emerge from the class struggle [...] At no time and for no reason does the proletariat abandon its combative role. It does not delegate to others its historical mission, and it does not give power away, not even to its political party."

jondwhite

which i assumed was because the page was curated by an editor.

The featured articles with photos at the top are, but not 'recent blog posts' - it just shows all the recent blog posts.

I'm here tolerated as a guest on the forum. I'm comfortable with that, even with the occasional flack for being an SPGBer on an anti-parliamentarian website

Indeed if i wished a greater role i would volunteer for admin/ moderator duties, lightening the burden of those with that unenviable task but have not.

Anarchists are against political parties including the ICT whether they contest elections or not. But im using party in a broader sense anyway to include organisations with full political platforms here (such as including afed, solfed etc).

I wouldnt expect libcom to be dominated by impossibilism but vanguardists shouldnt be given a front page platform through a blog to push vanguard parties such as here
https://libcom.org/blog/class-party-light-struggles-iran-06122018

What is 'vanguardism'?

The ICT are in favour of the class-conscious members of the working class organising together. So are the SPGB, so are the AF, so are the ACG, so are SolFed, so are all the different international anarchist groups.

The ICT are not for the 'party' taking state power. The SPGB is. Who's 'vanguardist' again?

"Only if the most advanced sectors of the proletariat recognise themselves in the political leadership of the party will we be on the road to the revolutionary socialist transformation."
http://www.leftcom.org/en/about-us

Can you perhaps explain who other than those self-declared "most advanced sectors of the proletariat" are designated the "political leadership" of the party (with the small p)? What's the process involved that others sectors of the proletariate should accept this self-proclaimed recognition should recognise them as such since it defers authority to neither the electorate nor trade union vote

I believe the SPGB puts their claim of representing the proletariat interests to a vote at the ballot box for endorsement. The traditional syndicalists subject themselves to the will of the unions' members vote.

But ICT seek to reinvent the wheel with a democracy of mass meetings. Is this the only form of acceptable democracy in action?

I think the lesson of the Bolshevik Revolution was that such elastic definition of unstructured decision-making within the soviets led to the domination of the Party (with a capital P) and certainly not social democracy of the whole class who were swiftly side-lined in the soviets.

ajjohnstone

Can you perhaps explain who other than those self-declared "most advanced sectors of the proletariat" are designated the "political leadership" of the party (with the small p)? What's the process involved that others sectors of the proletariate should accept this self-proclaimed recognition should recognise them as such since it defers authority to neither the electorate nor trade union vote

Within capitalism class consciousness can only be achieved by a minority, and so it makes sense for that minority to band together in an organisation to get across its views to other workers. It's kind of self-evident.

"Communists [are] on the one hand, practically, the most advanced and resolute section of the working-class parties of every country, that section which pushes forward all others; on the other hand, theoretically, they have over the great mass of the proletariat the advantage of clearly understanding the line of march, the conditions, and the ultimate general results of the proletarian movement."

ajjohnstone

I believe the SPGB puts their claim of representing the proletariat interests to a vote at the ballot box for endorsement. The traditional syndicalists subject themselves to the will of the unions' members vote.

But ICT seek to reinvent the wheel with a democracy of mass meetings. Is this the only form of acceptable democracy in action?

While class consciousness can only be achieved by a minority, it is the mass of the class which takes up class struggle (communism cannot be achieved by a minority!). And historically that class struggle has, time and time again, thrown up similar organs of self-organisation - mass assemblies, workers' councils and strike committees. So the ICT does not "seek to reinvent the wheel" here, rather it refuses to take legitimacy from capitalist bodies like the state or trade unions, which is what you seem to be advocating.

Like I said before, for us the party is not a government in waiting, but a political guide. "Communists have to win the right to be listened to" - not by standing in elections, but by participating in the everyday class struggle, and encouraging the autonomy of the class at every step.

Perhaps we are singing from the same hymn-sheet but maybe it is different verses or a differing chorus, Dyjbas, making distinctions without really fundamental differences.

“Within capitalism class consciousness can only be achieved by a minority”

I think despite the caveats this answers Slothjabber’s question, “what is vanguardism?”

But it is an acknowledgment that there is “uneven consciousness” among workers that necessitates the need for more enlightened leaders.

Marx was known for his very careful choice of words and in the passage from the CM quoted by yourself, Marx talks of communists “pushing forward” all others. He does not say they form a political leadership at the head of the workers' movement. He is very clear that “The proletarian movement is the self-conscious, independent movement of the immense majority, in the interest of the immense majority.”

As workers gained more experience of the class struggle and the workings of capitalism, it will become more consciously socialist and democratically organise by the workers themselves. The emergence of socialist understanding out of the experience of the workers could thus be said to be “spontaneous” in that it would require no intervention by people outside the working class to bring it about. Socialist agitation is necessary, but would be carried out by workers themselves, whose socialist ideas would have been derived from an interpretation of their class experience of capitalism. The end result would be an independent movement of the socialist-minded and democratically organised working class aimed at winning control of political power in order to abolish capitalism.

But if we are to bandy Marx’s words about, he did say, "The emancipation of the working classes must be conquered by the working classes themselves. We cannot, therefore, co-operate with people who openly state that the workers are too uneducated to emancipate themselves....’ 

I think too, Dyjbas, you make a virtue out of necessity when you talk about democracy being historically represented by “mass assemblies, workers' councils and strike committees. I don’t wish to denigrate tools that have proved very useful to our fellow-workers but they shouldn’t be promoted to a principle of self-organisation. Mostly these expressions of our fellow-workers came into being when more structured, more permanent and, yes, when more constitutional and accountable methods were not available.

Members of the SPGB believe that the working class can overthrow capitalism and build socialism without political leadership. Pannekoek said: “The belief in parties is the main reason for the impotence of the working class ... because a party is an organisation that aims to lead and control the workers.” But he also qualified this statement: “If ... persons with the same fundamental conceptions [regarding socialism] unite for the discussion of practical steps and seek clarification through discussion and propagandise their conclusions, such groups might be called parties, but they would be parties in an entirely different sense from those of today.”

A depiction of what we in the SPGB see ourselves doing, not as a party leading workers but pushing them forward by using the logic of their own arguments and experience. And when it comes to acquiring political power by capturing the state machine we are not a minority party bt simply an instrument of our class. And i will add my own caveat - the SPGB may well not be the eventual class party that arises, and may well not even be its embryo which i think relates to the way ICT also views its organisation.

Because the establishment of socialism depends upon an understanding of the necessary social changes by a majority of the population, it cannot be left to parties acting apart from or above the workers, nor solely through Parliament. The workers cannot vote for socialism and then carry on as usual. The crucial part of the SPGB case is that understanding is a necessary condition for socialism and we see the SPGB’s job as to shorten the time, to speed up the process - to act as a catalyst. The SPGB views its function to be to make socialists, to propagate socialism, and to point out to the workers that they must achieve their own emancipation. To “make socialism an immediacy” for the working class, something of importance and value to people’s lives now, rather than a singular ‘end’. We await the mass "socialist party".

At some stage, for whatever reason, socialist consciousness will reach a "critical mass", at which point it will just snowball and carry people along with it. It may happen in a more dramatic form as an avalanche of new ideas.

When more and more people are coming to want socialism, a mass socialist movement will emerge to dwarf all the small groups and grouplets such as yours and mine that exist today. When the idea of socialism catches on, we’ll then have our unified movement. With the spread of socialist ideas, all organisations will change and take on a participatory-democratic and socialist character, so that the majority organisation for socialism will not be just political and economic, but will also embrace all aspects of social life, as well as inter-personal relationships. We’re talking about a radical social revolution.

But you have heard all this before from the SPGB...

Vanguardism is the perspective that a majority of the working class are incapable of attaining socialist conciousness. This is essentially the view propounded in the Iran article too.

This Iran article I would request is raised at the next meeting of libcom admins with a view to removal.

A point on party writers was raised earlier but I dont know what proportion write. I imagine it is small.

But if we are to bandy Marx’s words about, he did say, "The emancipation of the working classes must be conquered by the working classes themselves. We cannot, therefore, co-operate with people who openly state that the workers are too uneducated to emancipate themselves....’

A dirty way to quote... What is Marx talking about here in reality? He is not talking about a communist party or a league of advanced workers but of the "philanthropic bourgeois and petty bourgeois", that it is impossible to "co-operate with people who wish to expunge this class struggle from the movement". This is much closer to critiquing people like Bernstein than it is Lenin, Kautsky, Luxemburg and so on. "Vanguardism" does not expunge class struggle and has never claimed to be able to emancipate the workers from above, what marxists have claimed is that the party(formed by the most advanced sections of workers) can help in leading and centralizing local class struggles(to turn it from individual struggles between one group of workers and one capitalist or group of capitalists, to a struggle against capitalism).

Even if we take your "quote" at face value how does Marx theories on class-for-itself and class-in-itself fit into this?

Marx was known for his very careful choice of words and in the passage from the CM quoted by yourself, Marx talks of communists “pushing forward” all others. He does not say they form a political leadership at the head of the workers' movement. He is very clear that “The proletarian movement is the self-conscious, independent movement of the immense majority, in the interest of the immense majority.”

Marx and Engels were also clear on the roles of communist organisations like the international, to be able to coordinate the proletarian struggles and for the party to centralize local struggles, abolishing the competition between workers.

I don't think it is controversial to say most workers don't have a "socialist conciousness" and that in no period of revolution have all workers(or even intellectuals) become communists. The larger masses of workers have in previous revolutions still become revolutionary and "advanced" of course, something that is vital for any uprising, and fought for their own demands that grew organically from their situation("peace, land and bread", and so on) but that doesn't equate to them being communists.

This Iran article I would request is raised at the next meeting of libcom admins with a view to removal.

I feel like this is debate that comes up from time to time, like when people got angry at the Kautsky archives and the translated Bordiga essays. Unless the texts on libcom is suppose to build up to some libertarian communist programmee I don't see the point in curating based on politics when the ICT in reality is built very much on an autonomist(in the original sense of the word) way of organizing anyway.

Craftwork

Amazing, since the ICT is actually critical of Bordiga and "Bordigism", including Bordiga's view of the party (see the book Bordiga Beyond the Myth).

Not really mate, because at no point does the bit you're qouting say anything about the ICT. I can't believe I have to spell this out but it's usually common practise when airing concerns to be allowed to develop or talk about related issues, this is a forum not a complaint form. The bit you cut off before that was referring more to the ICT, although as the second part makes clear I've noticed similar issues with other additions to site in recent history.

And the fact that the CWO publish articles here is equated with some kind of takeover?! Ridiculous.

Sure it may not be the best choice of words but given the reactions from the ICT and yourself whenever they're questioned I think there's enough ridiculous behaviour to go around.

Instead of complaining about them, anarchistsshould thank these left communists and consider how left communist ideas can help clarify the muddled ones that are so widespread among too many anarchists today (e.g. democratism, support for nationalist projects like Catalonia or Rojava, unions, reformist identity politics, etc.)

See speaking of related issues and ridiculous statements. I find the typical framing of these disputes as a rift between a homogeneous Left Communism (a catch all term with no real meaning) and Anarchism absurd and highly dishonest.

The ICT is no more representative (Indeed much of the stuff that's been published here has been extremely hostile to others lumped in the label) of Left Communism et all than CrimeThinc of anarchism or the Alliance for Workers Liberty is for the Trots or the PSL for whatever current they've moved too now.

For starters plenty of Left Comms support Rojava and plenty of Anarchists who want nothing to do with it. Just like there are thousands of MLs fighting and dying over there and hundreds of ML articles and polemics denouncing the whole thing as a sinister US plot against one of the last bastions of defence against imperialism. Ideological positions don't work the way you seem to think they do.

We're discussing whether the ICT's brand of politics is appropriate for this site, just like how there are plenty of circle A anarchist stuff that was found not to be appropriate here. And so far in this thread there have been three counter arguments.

1: An Admin said we could stay
2: Its ridiculous to even ask
3: Pointing the finger to the SPGB instead.

These aren't counter arguments, you're just not happy things you like are facing criticism.

Reddebrek

For starters plenty of Left Comms support Rojava

Examples?

Leninist girl,

As for the quote, i feel it can be used appropriately against intellectuals, academics and activists, who try to impose their political leadership upon the working-class movement.

Why do you single out Bernstein, one time Engels secretary, although to become a revisionist, but then nearly everybody in the 2nd International turned to revisionism to various extents, didn't they? (Bernstein later restored his reputation to a degree by opposing WW1 and helping to form the Independent Socialists)

But just to be relevant to this debate was it not from Kautsky that Lenin acquired that the working class must acquire socialist consciousness from without.

“In this connection socialist consciousness appears to be a necessary and direct result of the proletarian class struggle. But this is absolutely untrue . . . Modern socialist consciousness can arise only on the basis of profound scientific knowledge. Indeed, modern economic science is as much a condition for socialist production as, say, modern technology, and the proletariat can create neither the one nor the other, no matter how much it may desire to do so; both arise out of the modern social process. The vehicle of science is not the proletariat, but the bourgeois intelligentsia; it was in the minds of individual members of this stratum that modern Socialism originated, and it was they who communicated it to the more intellectually developed proletarians who, in their turn, introduce it into the proletarian class struggle where conditions allow this to be done. Thus, socialist consciousness is something introduced into the proletarian class struggle from without and not something that arose within it spontaneously” - Kautsky

There is indeed a difference between a conscious working class and a working class without class consciousness. The difference is one of knowledge or lack of knowledge.

Yet both can and do engage in a class struggle, and organise against employers and act against the State. Marx expected the working class to develop from a mere economic category (a "class in itself" ) into a revolutionary political actor ("class for itself"). A working class "for itself" has never developed, a class consciousness of a lesser sort that at trade-unionism and Labourism, the idea and practice of the working class as a class within capitalism but which wanted a better deal within this system, not to replace it with a class-free and exploitation-free society.

Ah well, i don't think any of us can be sure why progress was not revolutionary so we can have a healthy debate about it and to comradely agree to disagree on interpretations.

Class struggle without any understanding of where we are going is simply committing oneself to a never-ending treadmill. This is where the Leninist parties go wrong. They think mechanistically that a sense of revolutionary direction emerges spontaneously out of "the struggle" thus circumventing the realm of ideology - the need to educate. It doesn't. The workers can never win the class struggle while it is confined simply to the level of trade union militancy; it has to be transformed into a socialist consciousness. Conversely, socialist consciousness cannot simply rely for its own increase on ideological persuasion. It has to link up with the practical struggle. The success of the socialist revolution will depend on the growth of socialist consciousness on a mass scale and that these changed ideas can only develop through a practical movement.

How are workers supposed to become a "revolutionary" without engaging - and eventually agreeing - with the IDEA of what would be entail in a social revolution. There is no logic that dictates that we must necessarily become revolutionary socialists. Our life experience and circumstances could just as easily turn us into Fascists or Nationalists. In other words, our engagement with the world around us is always mediated by the ideas we hold in our heads; we cannot apprehend this world except through these ideas .

This is another area of ideas where we can engage in discussion and exchange views as comrades. I have said before i am committed to being part of the "thin red line" but it does not mean consensus when explaining and advocating our positions.

We can also hold differing analysis of previous revolutions and why they did not "organically" evolve into socialist revolutions. Socialism will be established by the working class and that its establishment will result from an intensification and escalation of the class struggle. That follows almost by definition--obviously, if the working class are going to overthrow capitalism and capitalist class rule the class struggle is going to be stepped up. That's not the interesting question. The real question is what is it that is going to provoke the working class into intensifying/escalating the class struggle and/or acquiring socialist consciousness.

Socialist consciousness comes from life experience, but that being said, why are not more people achieving this consciousness? Everything from education, accepted customs, the prevailing capitalist ideology and cultural hegemony. We can say that socialist consciousness comes from life experience, but then that automatically implies that every worker should achieve it, it should have happened.

What exactly is our role? Where do we "intervene" to raise consciousness. How do we intervene? What practical measures can we take as a party (small p) or as a Party (big P)? We come to a socialist view of the world by interacting directly or indirectly with others, exchanging ideas with them. And that is perhaps the role of the revolutionary group as being - as a catalyst in the process of changing consciousness. But let us be brutally honest, there is no group on Libcom that has any significant presence within the working class.

Yes to use your terminology "advanced" workers (socialists/anarchists) are not superior to any other of society's members . Nevertheless, we do understand how the class society basically works. That is the difference to the majority of the working class, which do not understand and therefore do not see the need to abolish capitalism.

But again i have posted much the same arguments often before on Libcom. Some will say (rather ungraciously albeit) i am parroting the same old SPGB cliches. And of course many will say i go on...and on...and on...when less said is more said. My apologies, Leninist Girl.

Libcom isnt supposed to carry stuff only arguing against libertarian communism core case. Debates maybe.

jondwhite

Libcom isnt supposed to carry stuff only arguing against libertarian communism core case. Debates maybe.

It's frankly bizarre that you keep repeatedly saying stuff like this. A lot of what you yourself have added will be against the anti-parliamentary communist position too, the Socialist Studies archive for one example... Do you want that taken down now?

ajjohnstone

... it not from Kautsky that Lenin acquired [the idea] that the working class must acquire socialist consciousness from without.

“In this connection socialist consciousness appears to be a necessary and direct result of the proletarian class struggle. But this is absolutely untrue . . . Modern socialist consciousness can arise only on the basis of profound scientific knowledge. Indeed, modern economic science is as much a condition for socialist production as, say, modern technology, and the proletariat can create neither the one nor the other, no matter how much it may desire to do so; both arise out of the modern social process. The vehicle of science is not the proletariat, but the bourgeois intelligentsia; it was in the minds of individual members of this stratum that modern Socialism originated, and it was they who communicated it to the more intellectually developed proletarians who, in their turn, introduce it into the proletarian class struggle where conditions allow this to be done. Thus, socialist consciousness is something introduced into the proletarian class struggle from without and not something that arose within it spontaneously” - Kautsky.

That seems to pretty definitively state that Kautsky's view is that socialist consciousness is acquired from outside the working class, not something that arises within it. Are you saying that Lenin didn't get this view from Kaustky, because you think Lenin didn't have it, or because you think Lenin did have it but he got it from somewhere else?

The majority of Left Comms don't think that socialist consciousness is brought to the working class from outside, we see socialist consciousness as being a creation of the class itself. The political organisations of the proletariat (and I'd include the SPGB and the ACG and others here, not just Left Comm groups) are created by the working class and group together what Marx calls 'the most advanced and resolute' section of the working class (OK, he and Engels are talking about parties but the argument I think holds for a situation where we're not the 'left wing' of anything any more).

"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.

The Communists, therefore, are on the one hand, practically, the most advanced and resolute section of the working-class parties of every country, that section which pushes forward all others; on the other hand, theoretically, they have over the great mass of the proletariat the advantage of clearly understanding the line of march, the conditions, and the ultimate general results of the proletarian movement."

Some workers start critiquing capitalism before other workers. That's the vanguard, those who more-or-less understand 'the line of march, the conditions, and the ultimate general results of the proletarian movement', the 'the most advanced and resolute' section of the working class. I repeat - that includes the SPGB and Anarchist groups as well as Left Communistss and Council Communists. It doesn't mean that those groups take state power (whatever the SPGB and the Bordigists say), it means that everywhere the communists try to see what is in 'the common interests of the entire proletariat' and put that course of action forward to the class - but the class decides.

The idea that Left Communists believe that the working class cannot acquire socialist consciousness is a nonsense. We believe that the working class creates socialist consciousness. But in capitalist conditions, because 'The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force' it is difficult for the working class. There will be no mass socialist consciousness in capitalist society because capitalist idea are the ruling ideas. But we have become communists have we not? All workers can potentially become communists under capitalism, but not all workers will, because despite the 'contradictions' (always thought that term is something of a euphemism) of capitalism, not all workers, probably the majority, will not see that socialist society is a realisable project, while under the conditions of capitalist society.

While socialist society will be the conscious creation of the workers, we see that the destruction of capitalism will be something else. Left Communists do not expect the working class to build a socialist society - at the behest of a few dozen Left Comms no less! - from nothing. We have become communists because we took on lessons from workers' struggles taht we have been involved in or that we have seen or heard about that inspired us - and some, because we have read Marx. But I didn't become a socialist because I read Marx, I read Marx because I was a socialist. I became a socialist because I saw the 1984-5 Miners' Strike and the role of the state and capitalist society against the working class - and also saw the solidarity of other workers with the miners. It was the experience of class struggle that 'created' me as a socialist. I think most of us will have trajectories that are similar in outline if not in detail.

This is the process, I would say, that Left Comms tend to see happening in the revolution. In strikes, even big ones, the working class produces minorities. Small numbers of workers begin to question the entirety of capitalist society. In truly massive confrontations larger numbers of workers will seriously question society. It will be the process of fighting that teaches the working class in general how, and why, to fight. Socialist consciousness isn't brought from outside (no matter what Kautsky says) and it isn't taught to dumb workers by a socialist elite (no matter what the SPGB says, and no matter that the socialist elite is drawn from the working class), it is developed, in struggle, by the working class as a whole.

So, yes, if you think that the idea that all workers can by our own collective efforts develop socialist consciousness rather than being taught it by an enlightened few is 'vanguardism' then go ahead, but please, understand that the SPGB's elitist conception of socialist consciousness is not widely shared.

darren p

jondwhite

Libcom isnt supposed to carry stuff only arguing against libertarian communism core case. Debates maybe.

It's frankly bizarre that you keep repeatedly saying stuff like this. A lot of what you yourself have added will be against the anti-parliamentary communist position too, the Socialist Studies archive for one example... Do you want that taken down now?

How is an archive spanning 25 years and a variety of positions (but all within libertarian communism) comparable to a blog post advocating a vanguard party? I dont understand your perspective?

jondwhite

darren p

jondwhite

Libcom isnt supposed to carry stuff only arguing against libertarian communism core case. Debates maybe.

It's frankly bizarre that you keep repeatedly saying stuff like this. A lot of what you yourself have added will be against the anti-parliamentary communist position too, the Socialist Studies archive for one example... Do you want that taken down now?

How is an archive spanning 25 years and a variety of positions (but all within libertarian communism) comparable to a blog post advocating a vanguard party? I dont understand your perspective?

It's outside the anarchist-communist (libertarian communist) tradition not within it.

I don't think 'libertarian communist' is necessarily a synonym for Anarchist. We've been through this before on libcom, as to what counts as libertarian communism, and the general understanding of the term that has emerged is that Council Communism, Impossiblism and Left Communism (with the exception of the Bordigists) are all 'libertarian communist' because they don't see a 'party' seizing state power (of course the SPGB does but that's by-the-by, I think most anarchists give the SPGB a pass on that one because the SPGB's conception of the party is so broad - it doesn't see the party taking power 'over' the working class because it sees the majority of the working class being in the party anyway)... though there probably always will be some people who disagree with that definition.

Libcom is not synonymous with Ancom but it does exclude vanguard parties, or at least advocating for them over and above non-vanguard parties in libcom spaces.

Go tell Socialist Studies they are 'libertarian communist', you'll get a good clip round the ear.

But you still haven't explained why you think the ICT is 'vanguardist' because it doesn't think the proletarian party takes power, but the SPGB isn't, when it does.

The SPGB and the ICT agree that some workers come to socialist consciousness before others. This is the vanguard. So what exactly do you mean by the 'vanguardism' of the ICT?

Reddebrek

We're discussing whether the ICT's brand of politics is appropriate for this site, just like how there are plenty of circle A anarchist stuff that was found not to be appropriate here. And so far in this thread there have been three counter arguments.

1: An Admin said we could stay
2: Its ridiculous to even ask
3: Pointing the finger to the SPGB instead.

These aren't counter arguments, you're just not happy things you like are facing criticism.

Well no, they're not counter arguments, certainly not ones used by anyone on this thread. As you'd say, "I can't believe I have to spell this out but" here's what's actually been said:

1. An admin invited us to set up a blog here. See comment #3.
2. It's not ridiculous to ask whether ICT politics belong here, it's ridiculous to say the ICT publishing articles here is equivalent to some kind of takeover/coup. See comment #4.
3. It was jondwhite who brought up the question of impossibilist material on here in the first place. See comment #9.

Good criticism is something to welcome, spurious "criticism" like this:

Reddebrek

For starters plenty of Left Comms support Rojava and plenty of Anarchists who want nothing to do with it.

Is hardly worth responding to.

darren p

Go tell Socialist Studies they are 'libertarian communist', you'll get a good clip round the ear.

Left Comms don't take to it either, but that's by-the-by. Just because we reject the terminology that doesn't stop the people who don't reject it using it to describe the theory and practice of the Communist Left. Most of us anyway.

If 'libertarian communist' means 'advocating free-access communism and not advocating that the political organisation of the proletariat takes state power' then the ICT (and others of course) are libertarian communists, though I'm sure they would reject the term (I've never actually had this discussion with the ICT but I know the ICC rejects it and I know I do and I don't think I'm an outlier here, and I don't think the ICC is either).

So while a Stalinist or Trotskyist conception of a 'vanguard party', an organisation that advocates state capitalism while attempting to run the national economy, is far outside the scope of libertarian communism, the majority of the Communist Left isn't because it doesn't have this conception.

Slothjabber’s interventions on this thread have been excellent, but I suspect his asking for evidence that the ICT calls for a vanguard party #37 is going to be no more successful than AnythingForProximity #27 asking Reddebrek for evidence that, in his/her words, “plenty of Left Comms support Rojava “. Debate becomes somewhat difficult when people either wilfully distort the positions of others, or just havent bothered reading what they claim they are critiquing. On the other hand, I do wish left coms would stop using the fecking words ‘party’ or ‘vanguard’ as the words do seem to trigger a pavlovian response in the more excitable amongst us.

“In this connection socialist consciousness appears to be a necessary and direct result of the proletarian class struggle. But this is absolutely untrue . . . Modern socialist consciousness can arise only on the basis of profound scientific knowledge. Indeed, modern economic science is as much a condition for socialist production as, say, modern technology, and the proletariat can create neither the one nor the other, no matter how much it may desire to do so; both arise out of the modern social process. The vehicle of science is not the proletariat, but the bourgeois intelligentsia; it was in the minds of individual members of this stratum that modern Socialism originated, and it was they who communicated it to the more intellectually developed proletarians who, in their turn, introduce it into the proletarian class struggle where conditions allow this to be done. Thus, socialist consciousness is something introduced into the proletarian class struggle from without and not something that arose within it spontaneously” - Kautsky.

Maybe a shaky take but isn't the Kautsky quote historically accurate? All the communist theory and theoretical understanding of class struggle(it's prospects and results) has come from non-proletarian elements, something that is true for both marxist and anarchist currents, and even those currents that existed before both(utopians, "blanquism", etc). Of course, the actual movement and struggle between classes was needed for people like Marx and Engels to be able to actually understand class struggle, theory is not something that falls from the sky.

Like the average factory worker in the 19th century did not have access to the scientific knowledge, resources or even time to be able to formulate something like the theory of mutual aid in the way that Kropotkin did, it basically had to be done by a monarch scientist.

Furthermore, the fact that Kautsky(and Lenin in What is to be done?) thought socialist theory comes from "above" in this way doesn't mean they thought intellectuals should run the party or lead the working-class. On the opposite Kautsky wrote that the intellectuals need to be subordinated the worker in party work. To quote his text Intellectuals and Workers,

An ideal example of an intellectual who thoroughly assimilated the sentiments of a proletarian, and who, although a brilliant writer, quite lost the specific manner of an intellectual, who marched cheerfully with the rank-and-file, who worked in any post assigned to him, who devoted himself wholeheartedly to our great cause, and despised the feeble whinings about the suppression of one’s individuality, as individuals trained in the philosophy of Nietzsche and Ibsen are prone to do whenever they happen to be in a minority – that ideal example of the intellectual whom the socialist movement needs, was Wilhelm Liebknecht. We might also mention Marx, who never forced himself to the forefront, and whose hearty discipline in the International, where he often found himself in the minority, was exemplary.

darren p

Go tell Socialist Studies they are 'libertarian communist', you'll get a good clip round the ear.

It is by-the-by unless any Socialist Studies are on libcom admin team.

Vanguardism is the perspective that a majority of the working class are incapable of attaining socialist conciousness. This is essentially the view propounded in the Iran article too.

The SPGB dont take the view that the majority are incapable of developing socialist consciousness or that only the SPGB or membership of, can raise socialist consciouness.

Im not saying leftcoms should be stopped from contributing - only the article advocating vanguardism in Iran should be challenged especially since impossibilist articles used to be prefaced with disclaimers.

jondwhite

Vanguardism is the perspective that a majority of the working class are incapable of attaining socialist conciousness. This is essentially the view propounded in the Iran article too.

Can you provide any examples from history when the majority of the working class attained socialist consciousness in a non-revolutionary period?

Because the CWO-ICT view is that "before revolution breaks out communist consciousness is only attained by a minority of the class. It is the act of revolution which turns this into the necessary mass consciousness of the class. Necessary because communism cannot be built by a minority."

I don't like to say, but...

Ultimately, it's just words. Malatesta talked about the anarchist party, some anarchists in the past used terms like 'vanguard' to mean something very different from the Leninist idea of vanguard. Other anarchists/libertarian communists, use terms like 'leadership of ideas', etc, etc.

As a dyed in the wool anarcho-communist, I have my disagreements with the CWO, but I welcome them to libertarian communist circles (even though they themselves might reject the term), more so than I would some elements who happen to call themselves anarchists or the odd bit of leninist detritus that occasionally washes up on these pages.

Dyjbas

jondwhite

Vanguardism is the perspective that a majority of the working class are incapable of attaining socialist conciousness. This is essentially the view propounded in the Iran article too.

Can you provide any examples from history when the majority of the working class attained socialist consciousness in a non-revolutionary period?

Because the CWO-ICT view is that "before revolution breaks out communist consciousness is only attained by a minority of the class. It is the act of revolution which turns this into the necessary mass consciousness of the class. Necessary because communism cannot be built by a minority."

no because socialist society has never happened before.

jondwhite

Dyjbas

jondwhite

Vanguardism is the perspective that a majority of the working class are incapable of attaining socialist conciousness. This is essentially the view propounded in the Iran article too.

Can you provide any examples from history when the majority of the working class attained socialist consciousness in a non-revolutionary period?

Because the CWO-ICT view is that "before revolution breaks out communist consciousness is only attained by a minority of the class. It is the act of revolution which turns this into the necessary mass consciousness of the class. Necessary because communism cannot be built by a minority."

no because socialist society has never happened before.

In other words you agree that mass socialist consciousness cannot be achieved before a revolutionary rupture. It follows then that before the socialist transformation only a minority possesses socialist consciousness. So according to your own logic, that makes you a "vanguardist" too. Welcome to the club. :D

Dyjbas

jondwhite

Dyjbas

jondwhite

Vanguardism is the perspective that a majority of the working class are incapable of attaining socialist conciousness. This is essentially the view propounded in the Iran article too.

Can you provide any examples from history when the majority of the working class attained socialist consciousness in a non-revolutionary period?

Because the CWO-ICT view is that "before revolution breaks out communist consciousness is only attained by a minority of the class. It is the act of revolution which turns this into the necessary mass consciousness of the class. Necessary because communism cannot be built by a minority."

no because socialist society has never happened before.

In other words you agree that mass socialist consciousness cannot be achieved before a revolutionary rupture. It follows then that before the socialist transformation only a minority possesses socialist consciousness. So according to your own logic, that makes you a "vanguardist" too. Welcome to the club. :D

no. You cannot have a revolution without first having majority socialist consciousness. This has never happened before but it is possible whereas you are saying it is not possible. I'm not trying to label leftcoms but the article on iran is inappropriate here.

jondwhite

no. You cannot have a revolution without first having majority socialist consciousness. This has never happened before but it is possible whereas you are saying it is not possible. I'm not trying to label leftcoms but the article on iran is inappropriate here.

Who's saying it's not possible? Did you even read my comment? Mass socialist/communist consciousness is necessary for a revolutionary process to be successful.

Again, "before revolution breaks out communist consciousness is only attained by a minority of the class. It is the act of revolution which turns this into the necessary mass consciousness of the class. Necessary because communism cannot be built by a minority."

Just a couple of quick notes.

To slothjabber, Lenin cited Kautsky approvingly on consciousness coming from the outside. Until he became renegade Kautsky, Lenin was a fairly orthodox 2nd Internationalist albeit with narodnik influences who some say later modelled his Russia on Germany.

To Leninistgirl, How did Marx and Engels describe a fairly humble artisan, a leather tanner worker? - "Our philosopher" - self-taught, an autodidact. Many workers were and still are.

And my favourite quotes from Joseph Dietzgen are

" If a worker wants to take part in the self-emancipation of his class, the basic requirement is that he should cease allowing others to teach him and should set about teaching himself."

"The terms anarchist, socialist, communist should be so "mixed" together, that no muddlehead could tell which is which. Language serves not only the purpose of distinguishing things but also of uniting them- for it is dialectic."

"For my part, I lay little stress on the distinction, whether a man is an anarchist or a socialist, because it seems to me that too much weight is attributed to this difference."

"While the anarchists may have mad and brainless individuals in their ranks, the socialists have an abundance of cowards. For this reason I care as much for one as the other....The majority in both camps are still in great need of education, and this will bring about a reconciliation in time."

(I believe Engels frowned on Dietzgen accommodation with anarchists)

I've said this also before on libcom, we have all arrived at certain agreed positions by various different routes and on the different roads, we have acquired our ideological baggage including the terminology we use. Sometimes it is only our choice of words that separates us all - as Dietzgen implies and what this thread has turned out to be about. i think any neutral reader will see a considerable overlap in these posts on what we are all trying to say.

I may be the only member of my party (but i don't believe so) who recognises the validity of Crump's description of the "Thin Red Line" I believe it's there but getting thinner all the time, (look around and see how few there are of us and how old we have all become) but also that we have the basis of comradely cooperation and that our mutual hostility is misplaced (we in the SPGB have our infamous clause and many others have their own unwritten clause.)

Something is going to have to change if we are to make change. Isn't that the dialectic? We are talking in grand terms of consciousness of the working class, but what of our own?

Dyjbas

jondwhite

no. You cannot have a revolution without first having majority socialist consciousness. This has never happened before but it is possible whereas you are saying it is not possible. I'm not trying to label leftcoms but the article on iran is inappropriate here.

Who's saying it's not possible? Did you even read my comment? Mass socialist/communist consciousness is necessary for a revolutionary process to be successful.

Again, "before revolution breaks out communist consciousness is only attained by a minority of the class. It is the act of revolution which turns this into the necessary mass consciousness of the class. Necessary because communism cannot be built by a minority."

no. Majority consciousness is a precursor, you are saying it is not possible to predate the revolution.

"The emancipation of the working class must be conquered by the working classes themselves".

This is a rejection of the view that socialism can be introduced for the working class or that the working class can be led to socialism by some enlightened minority.

But it seems between Dyjbas and jondwhite there is a difference in when consciousness arises and how.

A minority remains a minority until it becomes a majority - that is the truism. But the issue at hand is what does this minority do as a minority [edit] and how does it becomes a majority.

We both reject the reformist path of gradualism to socialism. We both reject insurrectionism or putschism. (We'll differ i think on whether the latter is Leninism). But from history we have evidence that neither has created socialism as promised.

If during the revolutionary moment that Dyjbas says will result in the transformation of the minority holding consciousness into the majority who have not yet acquired it, what does the minority do when the majority impedes it by the lack of revolutionary will within the majority? This is the issue that Martov faced.

Are an enlightened minority of revolutionists justified in ignoring the views of the unenlightened majority in order to carry through the revolution?

It has been a question many times in history. Jacobinism, Babeufism, Blanquism, Bolshevism and it comes to the validity of what is now mis-represented by the Left the "dictatorship of the proletariat" and "permanent revolution"

For communism/ socialism to be successfully established the mass of the people must understand the nature and purpose of the new society. Again on Libcom, i have rebutted the argument that the SPGB stands for the 50% + 1. It is about an effective political majority to capture the State machine, not number-counting. It is about gaining a functional majority and one that is acknowledged as legitimate.

However, it is essential for the revolutionary process that this "majority" suffices to make socialism work as a system of society and the deciding factor on the "majority" is going to be how many of the population will be willing to make socialism actually work.

Again, apologies for yet another didactic post

EDIT just read this which is related to this thread i believe
https://libcom.org/forums/news/gilets-jaunes-seen-my-workplace-13122018#new

It's not the socialists that make the revolution, it's the revolution that makes socialists. What is the minority to do? Advocate for revolution - as it says in the Manifesto, we "point out and bring to the front the common interests of the entire proletariat". It's not the party that makes the revolution but the working class. The political organisation puts the perspective for working class action before the class, and the class decides. Our job as 'the most theoretically-advanced section' (ie, those who've groped to something like socialist consciousness somewhat ahead of the rest of the working class) isn't to direct the rest of the class, we can only advise. Sometimes our advice will even be wrong, because we don't know everything. If we did we'd all agree about the road ahead (because I think there is generally agreement on LibCom about what socialist society will look like, the disagreements are about how to get there).

This obviously doesn't have much to do with whether the ICT is taking over LibCom however. Maybe we should have another thread about these questions.

From an earlier post of mine

socialist consciousness cannot simply rely for its own increase on ideological persuasion. It has to link up with the practical struggle. The success of the socialist revolution will depend on the growth of socialist consciousness on a mass scale and that these changed ideas can only develop through a practical movement.

Slothjabber - "I think there is generally agreement on LibCom about what socialist society will look like, the disagreements are about how to get there"

And that common goal must be where we start reconciling our positions, slothjabber, and begin to recognised our very nuanced interpretations of tactics and strategy.

And yes, we indeed may be wrong misreading changing conditions and circumstances of the time, but we should be minded that if we do not assume the role of "political leadership" of the movement, we cannot do harm by our mistaken advice into taking it down the wrong path. This is where those genuine vanguards - Trotskyist/ Leninist parties (SPEW SWP) are a particular danger.

This was not the thread it was originally intended but i think hopefully it has clarified some misconceptions and assumptions. Family disputes are often the most bitter over trivial differences but yes, what separates us are not trivial although i dare say when future generations look back they will find it difficult to discern real disagreements on basic principles.

I'm happy to call many non-SPGBers comrades- ----even if they deign not to recognise that we are the parliamentary wing of anarchism ;-) ----- had to get that in somewhere

ajjohnstone

... we should be minded that if we do not assume the role of "political leadership" of the movement, we cannot do harm by our mistaken advice into taking it down the wrong path. This is where those genuine vanguards - Trotskyist/ Leninist parties (SPEW SWP) are a particular danger...

I don't understand what you think this means. Of course we must assume 'political leadership' otherwise what is the point of being a socialist? The only thing the SPGB does is propagandise for socialism. What would it do if it didn't do that? The problem (for the rest of us) is not that the SPGB goes too far but that it never goes far enough. It may try to assume political leadership of the class but it has never done so effectively.

But the party (whatever it is, however it is constructed... at the moment the 'most advanced' workers are grouped in and around some tiny organisations that are closer to sects rather than, I think, the 'party' Marx had in mind) does not 'take' the working class down the wrong path.

It is necessary for (pro-)revolutionaries to organise together. It is through discussion and analysis of the experience of the working class that we come to arrive at 'correct' (for any given value of correct) orientations. That is better done collectively than individually. Socialists are not lone prophets wandering the streets shouting out doctrines, or sitting under trees gathering our disciples. The development of class consciousness comes from collective work, surely. That, as far as I'm concerned, is 'the party', and it includes Anarchists and the SPGB as much as the Left Communists and Council Communists. But I think the Left Communists are the clearest (read 'best' if you like) parts of 'the party', the sections around which the rest of the advanced section of the proletariat will come together. I could of course be wrong. History may prove that in fact it was the anarcho-syndicalists that had it right all along, and all the Left Communists and the SPGB may have to say 'no we were wrong and the CNT was right, we're all anarcho-syndicalists now'.

That won't be because the Left Comms or the SPGB led the working class 'down the wrong path' because parties don't 'lead' and workers 'follow'. Parties 'suggest' and the working class 'decides'. The working class isn't an inert vessel that needs to be filled with socialist vinegar and set on its way, it's a dynamic mess of contradictions that pushes, and is pulled, in a variety of directions. Our job is to analyse those dynamics and present them as clearly as we can back to the class. But it's not up to us to decide what the class does.

EDIT for a post-script. Re-reading the thread and trying to see where we are misunderstanding and talking past each other, I have to say AJJ, I really do appreciate the time and care you're taking to not mis-characterise others' points of view; yes partly because we are using different words to mean the same thing, or the same words to mean different things, it is difficult to communicate but that should be a reason for more discussion not breaking it off. The 'Thin Red Line', as far as I'm concerned, is real. The ICT has talked of 'the proletarian camp'. The ICC refers to the 'proletarian political milieu'. Whatever the precise composition of these particular conceptions of the notion of 'proletarian politics', there is a recognition that beyond whichever groups we are closest to, there is a wider constellation of people and groups that constitutes a place where discussion and engagement is necessary. It's heartening when someone from the SPGB - a group that I consider to be composed of 'comrades with whom I have disagreements' - is both trying to explain, and understand, so thanks for that. But I really think we should be discussing this on a different thread.

What i meant is that we cannot substitute the Party for the working class until it is indeed a full mass socialist party and i have thought my examples of the SPEW and SWP were sufficient to show what i meant...manouvering dishonestly into positions of power within workers' movements to lead it, frequently, if not all the time, down a path that the workers are not willing or are reluctant to go. As the CM says we disdain to conceal our views and openly proclaim them and i think you and i have enough savvy to know how these vanguard parties operate.

The SPGB does differentiate as you know from party activity and individual members activity. We don't direct or dictate what our members do within unions or other organisations. Some members of the party have engaged in official union office and in R and F union activity and i remind you of the SPC connection with the OBU, something that is often overlooked and a project that failed due to an alliance of bosses, the State, the traditional trade unions and the Communist Party.

But i don't think it is constructive to engage in a pissing contest to see who pees the furthest or the highest. But very obviously from our respective memberships we hold that we are in the clearest and best organisation.

Ultimately, who will choose will be our fellow-workers and it is to them that we must present our arguments. In that you are right. So far they have chosen wrongly, as i said in earlier post, deciding that the possibilists and the minimum programme is the way forwards. All the SPGB can do is show how wrong that choice was by continuing our propaganda in a war of words with those that still advocate that policy and who have no history to help them. We cannot overlook that there is the battle of ideas to be won.

AnythingForProximity

Examples?

Dyjbas

Is hardly worth responding to.

Uh, yeah the four Worker Communist Parties in Iran and Iraq, probably the largest Left Com parties in the middle east that have links in both expat/exile communities and in their Kurdish minorities.

One of the Central Committee members of the WCPIran even has a dual language Youtube and tv channel where this is covered.

Here's just a couple

Kurdish independence a source of hope for people in region and world, Bread and Roses TV

https://youtu.be/G7o3SYzfodk

It's raining women in Rojava; Bread and Roses TV

https://youtu.be/rnhU8BKP_2k

These aren't the only examples I've been watching this channel on and off for over a year and several other videos will contain brief statements of sympathy.

On the off chance that this was just a quirk of a single CC member I had a brief look at the parties English language website, found a few things supporting what they call the Syrian revolution,

http://wpiran.org/english/?p=190

From the viewpoint of the Syrian people and their heroic revolution, a revolution which was drowned in blood, the very existence of the Assad regime is at the heart of what is called the Syrian crisis. This crisis is the result of the response of the Syrian regime and the various reactionary forces in the region and around the world to a revolution which the Syrian people started two and a half years ago. These forces are now aligned around the Russian and American blocs. However, the cause of the current situation is not the rivalry between these two blocs. Furthermore, the Syrian crisis is not the result of the West’s war with political Islam, what our party called the “war of terrorists”. Such analyses belong to the past, to the time of the Cold War, to the world after 9/11, and not the world after the Tunisian revolution.

And while it does go to great lengths to include most factions in the Syrian conflict it never includes the Rojava groups. So we have an Operaismo party that expresses sympathy with the Syrian revolution, is hostile to the Syrian government and the Islamic factions with at least one leader running a platform plugging them on several occasions.

Its also very hostile to Turkish military operations in Kurdish areas of Syria.
http://wpiran.org/english/?p=830

The “fault” of the people of Afrin is that they have freed themselves from Bashar al-Asad’s dictatorship, and making use of the existing peculiar and unstable political situation are trying to experience a form of self-governance in their villages, cities, and their lives.

On the off chance this was a fluke I checked out the other three.

The Workers Communist Party of Iran Hekmatist, the split from the WCPIran, I had a look at their English section, this was a bit difficult it doesn't appear to have a search function and several sections of the site don't appear to work, but I did find on the front page a statement on Syria

http://www.hekmatist.org/english/index.php/component/k2/item/174-political-developments-in-syria-people-demand-a-free-secular-none-religious-and-none-tribal-system

Like the WCPIran it expresses sympathy for what it calls the Syrian revolution and doesn't include the YPJ in its long list of people responsible for the bloodshed their.

It also states this,

5- The current crisis and civil war in Syria has brought the Kurdish question, as a political factor, forth. The experience of the people living in the Kurdish areas running their own affairs and staging a mass resistance against Da’esh terrorism in Kobani are amongst positive experiences in the midst of crisis, war and dark scenario in Syria and the Middle East. Resolving the Kurdish question is a major factor in any plan for Syria’s political future. Any new law or political arrangements in Syria must recognise the abolition of gender, tribal and religious discrimination; and honour equal rights to all citizens. Our political preference is that the people in Syria and the region, irrespective of their national and/or religious adherence enjoy equal citizenship rights under a free, progressive, secular and humane system.

The Left Worker Communist Party of Iraq (the split that works with the Worker Communist Party of Iran) their English which also doesn't appear to have a search function, is largely outdated, most english articles are from 2012-11, but even there it seems to be sympathetic to the Syrian Revolution line held by the other two.
http://www.socialismnow.org/html/wli270212.htm

The eighth of March this year coincides with the outbreak of successive revolutions, both around the world and Arab world known as the "Arab spring". These revolutions that led to sweeping changes and removal of dictators like Hosni Mubarak, Ben Ali, Gaddafi, and soon Bashar al-Assad, and others, was one of the biggest achievements of the revolutions in the region. Women have played a clear role in achieving all of these achievements.

They also split from the Communist Workers Party of Iraq because they wanted to maintain links with the Worker Communist Party of Iran, so that suggests that even if they don't share the same sympathies on this issue the divide isn't strong enough to provoke the burning of bridges.

The Worker Communist Party of Iraq, all the links I've found to its English language section and those of its affiliated societies are dead. I did find via wayback machine an early 2011 statement on the Arab Spring that was very similar to the others but a lot can happen in seven years, so its possible despite the links with WCPIran Hekmatists its the one that bucks the trend.

That's 3-4 middle eastern operaismo/autnomist influenced parties in the region, some of which have extensive international contacts and surprisingly high profile (for small communist groups anyway) platforms to promote their views. And these are just formal political groups Iwas already generally speaking aware of.

So I don't really buy this alleged incredulity on the part of users here, these groups aren't exactly unknown in general never mind the topic concerns the region they're based in. The ICC doesn't like them (personally I'm not keen on any of them either, though as news sources go they're a bit more reliable than Tudeh or the ICP) but its criticism at least acknowledges their presence. But you have proved my point for me, what a lot of users on this site mean when they talk of "the Left Communist perspective" is in reality just a sectarian substitution for the particular strain you happen to be most sympathetic too.

shug

is going to be no more successful than AnythingForProximity #27 asking Reddebrek for evidence that, in his/her words, “plenty of Left Comms support Rojava “. Debate becomes somewhat difficult when people either wilfully distort the positions of others, or just havent bothered reading what they claim they are critiquing.

???? Its been less than a day, maybe give it some time before you make comments like this, yeah?

Reddebrek, so you don't have any examples, because the Worker Communist Parties in Iran and Iraq are not left communist.

Dyjbas

Reddebrek, so you don't have any examples, because the Worker Communist Parties in Iran and Iraq are not left communist.

See case in point, you use the term Left Communism in the same way SPEW use Socialism, a narrow sectarian tool unique to yourselves. No True Scotsman elevated to a political principle.

On the original point, we've changed the front page 'recent blog posts' to only include ones that are explicitly marked by editors to appear on the front page (which is the case for some other front page stuff, but wasn't for blogs). Regardless of whether it's the CWO/ICT or not (readers of the comments on their blogs will know I'm not a huge fan of many of their posts), someone posting three blog posts in a row shouldn't be listed three times.

I personally don't think that original historical material (i.e. translations of pieces by Karl Radek) should be on blogs, they should be in the library - can always do a blog announcing the translation.

We have critical intros on most/all Radek stuff because he was one of the founders of National Bolshevism, but it's a bit weird having to critical intro a blog post and it looks a lot more 'official' than things in the library which is obviously archival. Will bring this up with the other admins.

As with every other thread about whether Bordiga should be on the site or not, I can't stand Bordiga but I don't see any reason to ban it from the site. I posted some Lenin recently (to bash Leninists over the head with it, but still), stuff like https://libcom.org/library/how-we-should-reorganise-workers-peasants-inspection. Doesn't mean we're going to post State and Revolution - some things are hard to find elsewhere, some things aren't.

Reddebrek

Dyjbas

Reddebrek, so you don't have any examples, because the Worker Communist Parties in Iran and Iraq are not left communist.

See case in point, you use the term Left Communism in the same way SPEW use Socialism, a narrow sectarian tool unique to yourselves. No True Scotsman elevated to a political principle.

Do you think Anarcho-capitalists are Anarchists, Reddebrek?

The Worker-Communist Parties of Iran and Iraq aren't Left Communists, they didn't come out of the organisations expelled from the Third International in the 1920s (primarily the Dutch/German Left around the KAPD, and the majority of the CPI who didn't submit to the 'Bolshevisation' of the party), they have no organisational links with those organisations, and they have no programmatic links to those organisations.

The CWO has previously stated that there were no left communists in the UK prior to the 1970s though, which explicitly excludes Pankhurst:

CWO/ICT

In the 1970s the ideas of the communist left first came to the UK.

Pankhurst was:
- someone who was referred to by name by Lenin in 'Left Wing Communism'
- wrote Open Letter to Lenin in 1922.
- joined the KAI along with the KAPD (Essen faction iirc) in 1922: https://libcom.org/history/extracts-leading-principles-kai

So if we're going to be arguing for consistency of definitions, maybe people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

The only responses when I raised this at the time:

21C

I believe by 'communist left' they mean specifically the intellectual tradition emerging out of the Italian Fraction of the PCd'I

Which would be like anarcho-syndicalists saying that anarcho-communists aren't anarchists.

And from Dyjbas
Dyjbas

Regarding your nitpick comment on when the ideas of the communist left first came to the UK, 21C has already addressed this abov

You can't have it both ways.

Slothjabber wrote

Socialists are not lone prophets wandering the streets shouting out doctrines,

Speak for yourself comrade.

Reddebrek

Dyjbas

Reddebrek, so you don't have any examples, because the Worker Communist Parties in Iran and Iraq are not left communist.

See case in point, you use the term Left Communism in the same way SPEW use Socialism, a narrow sectarian tool unique to yourselves. No True Scotsman elevated to a political principle.

No it's not. The Worker Communist Parties in Iran and Iraq do not even identify themselves with the left communist tradition. You're the first person I've heard call them that.

That current came out of people who broke with MLism around the 80s/90s. Nowadays they seem to have some connection to Third Camp Trotskyism.

Very spurious. Never heard of any of the Worker-communist parties being left communist, nor the Communist Party of Iran/Komalah either. It's all getting a bit silly this is.

Dyjbas

No it's not. The Worker Communist Parties in Iran and Iraq do not even identify themselves with the left communist tradition. You're the first person I've heard call them that.

Not a regular reader of 'communist voice' then? https://www.communistvoice.org/37cWCPI.html

I'm less interested in whether the WCP/Hekmatists are left communist (I don't think they claim that for themselves, but the 'worker communism' thing definitely prompted the ICC and others to take a close look at them a while back, even if they decided after all that they weren't in the proletarian camp). More interested in whether you're still claiming that left communism only reached the UK in the 1970s though, because that's a completely bizarre claim.

Dyjbas

No it's not. The Worker Communist Parties in Iran and Iraq do not even identify themselves with the left communist tradition. You're the first person I've heard call them that.

So a party formed by a man influenced by Operaismo, which came out of the Italian Left, doesn't count because they don't use the right label? You know the Trotskyists in Spain originally called themselves the Left Communists of Spain before splitting into POUM and the Bolshevik Leninists.

I don't think self identification alone is particularly useful in politics.

Bob Gould who met with members of the Iraqi party describes them as Council Communists. https://www.marxists.org/archive/gould/2004/20040120.htm

The ICC's criticism of them also talks about "exposing" them as not really organisations of proletarian resistance. If these parties really are so obviously not up to measure it wouldn't need to bother.

http://en.internationalism.org/wr/293_wpiran.html

It also states that at least one of the groups is interested in workers councils.

That current came out of people who broke with MLism around the 80s/90s. Nowadays they seem to have some connection to Third Camp Trotskyism.

Not really no, their calls for a Third Camp are about opposition from foreign interventions and Islamic fundamentalists, somehow I don't think that was what Trotskyist parties in the 1930s had in mind when they called for a Third Camp. The only place I've seen them referred to as Trotskyists is on Wikipedia with a [citation needed] stamp.

As far as I'm aware the American DSA has also called for a third camp, I'm fairly certain they don't mean the same thing as either the Trots or the Worker Communists.

Mike Harman

Not a regular reader of 'communist voice' then? https://www.communistvoice.org/37cWCPI.html

No? I don't particularly care for anti-revisionist ML rags like the Communist Voice? If that's where you take your understanding of the communist left from then I'm not surprised it's so skewered.

Mike Harman

More interested in whether you're still claiming that left communism only reached the UK in the 1970s though, because that's a completely bizarre claim.

Don't know why you're so obsessed with that quote. We have a whole pamphlet on Sylvia Pankhurst. No one's denying the existence of a communist left in Britian in the early 1920s. But we come from a slightly different current which only really arrived in the UK in the 1970s.

Reddebrek

So a party formed by a man influenced by Operaismo, which came out of the Italian Left, doesn't count because they don't use the right label?

Operaismo did not come out of the Italian Left.

Reddebrek

Not really no, their calls for a Third Camp are about opposition from foreign interventions and Islamic fundamentalists, somehow I don't think that was what Trotskyist parties in the 1930s had in mind when they called for a Third Camp. The only place I've seen them referred to as Trotskyists is on Wikipedia with a [citation needed] stamp.

They collaborate with the AWL, a third campist group. Take it as you will.

Dyjbas

Don't know why you're so obsessed with that quote. We have a whole pamphlet on Sylvia Pankhurst.

You also link to the WCP Hekmatist from your website, but this apparently is not an endorsement. Although it does say that links are included based on "evaluat[ion] of their congruence with the themes of this site".

I'm not sure why I'd be 'obsessed' with your previous extremely restrictive and ahistorical definition of left communism in a published article on your site and resposted here, on a thread where you're expounding a very restrictive and ahistorical definition of left communism in the context of your blog posts on this site. Why post stuff up if you don't expect people to read it?

Dyjbas

No one's denying the existence of a communist left in Britian in the early 1920s.

CWO/ICT

In the 1970s the ideas of the communist left first came to the UK.

Me

Why ignore that history and the later APCF?

21C

If I'm reading it correctly, I believe by 'communist left' they mean specifically the intellectual tradition emerging out of the Italian Fraction of the PCd'I

Dyjbas

Regarding your nitpick comment on when the ideas of the communist left first came to the UK, 21C has already addressed this above

Looks like denial to me, or perhaps erasure, since we're being all precise with our words and all.

Reddebrek

So a party formed by a man influenced by Operaismo, which came out of the Italian Left, doesn't count because they don't use the right label?

Operaismo "came out of the Italian Left" in the same sense that Eurocommunism came out of the Italian Left. They both have little to do with the communist left around Bordiga et al.

BTW, in the writings of Mansoor Hekmat that are online, neither Bordiga, Damen, Korsch nor Mattick are mentioned, not even once. Neither the KAPD nor the PCInt. Pannekoek gets a single mention in a list that includes Trotskyism and Eurocommunism. "Left communism" is mentioned once, critically:

From the viewpoint of worker-communism, one cannot deal with the Soviet experience with the same laxity as that done by the 'radical' critics of the Bolshevik revolution within Left Communism, the New Left, etc.

Whatever "Left Communism" means here, Hekmat does not seem to have been too fond of it.

I think it's safe to say there's no important relation between the communist left and the Hekmatists. Some of their positions may be similar but then, the positions of some anarchosyndicalists were close to the Dutch-German communist left, but we still distinguish between the two (and historically, they themselves were pretty adamant about making that distinction, for good reasons or bad).

Mike Harman

You also link to the WCP Hekmatist from your website, but this apparently is not an endorsement. Although it does say that links are included based on "evaluat[ion] of their congruence with the themes of this site".

Ehh yes it's just under "Other interesting political websites"?? They're not left communist.

Mike Harman

Looks like denial to me, or perhaps erasure, since we're being all precise with our words and all.

Mike, what is your point exactly?

Dyjbas

Mike, what is your point exactly?

That you put forward an ahistorical definition of 'left communism' which only includes the Italian fraction of the communist left and their direct ideological/organisational descendants, and excludes the groups actually discussed in 'left wing communism, an infantile disorder'. To the point of ignoring over a decade of anti-parliamentary communist organising in the UK in order to assign the sole incarnation of that tendency to your sect (and maybe the ones it split from/split from it).

Cool. Though you're well aware now that in fact we've previously written about all the groups discussed in Left-Wing Communism: an Infantile Disorder. That includes the Workers’ Socialist Federation. However the initial reference point for the groups of the communist left which sprung up in Britain in the 1970s (i.e. World Revolution, Revolutionary Perspectives and Workers' Voice) was generally the KAPD and the German Left (the CWO's turn towards the Italian Left came about a bit later) - rather than Pankhurst et al.

You're really grasping at straws here.

Also, just saw this:

Mike Harman

We have critical intros on most/all Radek stuff because he was one of the founders of National Bolshevism, but it's a bit weird having to critical intro a blog post and it looks a lot more 'official' than things in the library which is obviously archival. Will bring this up with the other admins.

I can relieve you then, because we do include critical introductions on all these translations. Indeed they even mention Radek's descent into national-bolshevism.

"The irony is that for all the bitter opposition of Radek and others put up to the signing of Brest-Litovsk within a few months they would be accepting that it had been a necessary step and, even later, both Radek and Bukharin came to defend one or other aspect of the counter-revolution they so feared in the spring of 1918. In Radek’s case he would stoop to defending national-bolshevism (and an alliance with the Nazis) in the so-called Schlageter Line in 1923. His career is in itself a salutary lesson for would-be revolutionaries today."

Dyjbas

Cool. Though you're well aware now that in fact we've previously written about all the groups discussed in Left-Wing Communism: an Infantile Disorder. That includes the Workers’ Socialist Federation. However the initial reference point for the groups of the communist left which sprung up in Britain in the 1970s (i.e. World Revolution, Revolutionary Perspectives and Workers' Voice) was generally the KAPD and the German Left (the CWO's turn towards the Italian Left came about a bit later) - rather than Pankhurst et al.

You're really grasping at straws here.

Writing about a group and having an extremely restrictive definition of something that excludes that group aren't mutually exclusive though.

Except the article does call Pankhurst a left communist. So I don't quite understand what you're still on about.

Iranian left communist group 'Internationalist Voice' have published a series of critical articles on "Worker Communism", 'Worker Communism, radical conscience of the left of capital':

http://internationalist.ueuo.com/en/texts.htm

In-so-far as "left-communists" support party dictatorship and a host of other non-libertarian positions, the fact they are allowed to post here at all seems like a joke in-and-of-itself.

As well as posting the likes of Bordiga (whose disasterous leadership of the CP helped ensure the victory of fascism), we are also being subject to hagiographic accounts of Marx and Engels activities and ideas.

I'm all in favour of council communists and other Marxists who had some notion of what genuine liberty and communism means posting here, but would-be Bolsheviks... well, not so much. Let them utilise their own resources to punt their nonsense rather than be parasitic on the anarchist movement.

Except as you know because we've been discussing it for ten years the Left Communists who post here don't believe in 'party dictatorships'... so that isn't a problem, is it?

Anarcho

In-so-far as "left-communists" support party dictatorship and a host of other non-libertarian positions, the fact they are allowed to post here at all seems like a joke in-and-of-itself.

Only a few left communists support party dictatorship. For most that I've come across, they support the rule of the workers' councils.

Anarcho

Bordiga (whose disasterous leadership of the CP helped ensure the victory of fascism)

Meanwhile "anti-fascist" anarchists jumped into bed with Stalin, and supported the war effort of Allied imperialism during WW2...

Bilan, journal of Italian communist left in exile in Belgium/France

"In Italy, it was a government containing the representatives of democratic antifascism who stepped aside for a ministry led by the fascists, who thus gained a majority in this antifascist and democratic parliament even though the fascists had only had a parliamentary group of 40 out of 500 deputies. In Germany, it was the antifascist Von Schleicher who stepped aside for Hitler, who had been called in by that other antifascist Hindenburg, the chosen man of the democratic and social democratic forces."

Prometeo, 1943

"How to crush Nazism? To overthrow the war machine that oppresses the German proletariat, do not call on the aid of another war machine (Anglo-Saxon or Russian) but sow among the ranks of the German troops the seeds of fraternisation, antimilitarism and the class struggle"

If the post remains, then the message from a libcom blog post to the majority of workers in Iran under capitalist society is you cannot develop socialist consciousness and are incapable of doing so as a precursor to revolution. This is fundamentally vanguardist and a rejection of the basic libertarian communist case that a majority of workers can attain socialist consciousness before a revolution even if it has never happened before.

ajjohnstone

I'm happy to call many non-SPGBers comrades- ----even if they deign not to recognise that we are the parliamentary wing of anarchism ;-) ----- had to get that in somewhere

Why are you trying to make the SPGB considered "the parliamentary wing of anarchism"? Are you serious about that or is that supposed to be a joke?

I think ocelot made an excellent post explaining why the SPGB doesn't meet the criteria to be considered a libertarian communist organisation. You are obviously familiar with it, although I don't think you ever made a proper response.

I think you will find, Agent, that I did offer a reply even though you may disagree that it did not address your concerns

Yes I do indulge in some provocative word-play based on the relationship between the IRA and the Sinn Fein, deliberately aimed at those who do not consider there exists a link between ourselves and many of this forum because of our version of political action.

However, I do consider the SPGB a libertarian organization, perhaps more so than many past and present platformist anarchist groups. I think there may well be others who are active on this forum who accept that a comradely relationship exists between us

I have repeatedly explained that I consider that there is a broader grouping described as the Thin Red Line, those who share agreed goals but who may differ on their tactical choice of route particularly focused on the practical conditions we face in the UK as do many others on this discussion list. And of course as obvious from the thread we hold different interpretations of history.

I am guilty of advocating that we acknowledge but reconcile our differences to form a more effective party with a small p and have in the past received criticism from my own party members and those that share their same intransigence on Libcom regard the fetish of "parliamentary" action and "anti-parliamentarianism".

However if you feel we do not "meet the criteria" of a libertarian communist organisation I think you should contact admin and make formal protests at our participation and of course all other posters who fail to meet your requirements. Then of course do a cull of the archives and sympathetic references to all other non-libertarian communist writers and groups on the archive. After all that is the type of sectarianism is where this could lead towards.

My own attitude to political and economic action is a bit like the SLP'S sword and shield, the roles interchangeable depending on events and circumstances.

I also share Connolly's criticism of the IWW deletion of the political clause in that nothing will stop members of the working class using the ballot when they see fit.

It is the political maturity of our class which will determine if it is used constructively, just as the political immaturity showed itself when the Kiel workers council naively offered its chairmanship to the future butcher Noske who was intent on dismantling such councils.

ajjohnstone

I think you will find, Agent, that I did offer a reply even though you may disagree that it did not address your concerns

I'm not going to re read that entire thread. From what I can recall from memory, after ocelot's post, you proceeded to respond to other posters.

ajjohnstone

However, I do consider the SPGB a libertarian organization, perhaps more so than many past and present platformist anarchist groups. I think there may well be others who are active on this forum who accept that a comradely relationship exists between us

I don't really doubt that the SPGB is probably more libertarian than many anarchist groups or individuals. That's kinda meaningless. What I take issue with is when groups such as the Libertarian Socialist Caucus of the DSA e.g. having such broad and watered down politics, so much so that it's undeserving of being placed in the tradition of libertarian socialism.

ajjohnstone

I am guilty of advocating that we acknowledge but reconcile our differences to form a more effective party with a small p and have in the past received criticism from my own party members and those that share their same intransigence on Libcom regard the fetish of "parliamentary" action and "anti-parliamentarianism".

However if you feel we do not "meet the criteria" of a libertarian communist organisation I think you should contact admin and make formal protests at our participation and of course all other posters who fail to meet your requirements. Then of course do a cull of the archives and sympathetic references to all other non-libertarian communist writers and groups on the archive. After all that is the type of sectarianism is where this could lead towards.

There really is no need to be upset by this at all. Nor does it mean that libertarian and non libertarian socialists can't be on friendly terms. It's just that when somebody calls themselves a 'libertarian socialist', I expect something more than it just being a fancy label. And judging groups or individuals to a certain criteria is something we all do already. That the SPGB isn't a libertarian organisation isn't really a controversial opinion among posters of this forum.

This is another anti libertarian communist piece that should not be on here
https://libcom.org/blog/founding-comintern-then-now-03032019

jondwhite

This is another anti libertarian communist piece that should not be on here
https://libcom.org/blog/founding-comintern-then-now-03032019

Frankly it's bizarre that you think you should have a say what should or should not be on this website. Especially since you belong to an organisation that is not of the libertarian tradition and itself has a strong history of being against non platforming.

Yeah I just want to say that I'm heartily in favor of all the stuff that is currently available on libcom.org, so people can learn about, make their mind up and discuss those things (different texts/currents/strategies/etc.) with others who come from a shared, but really roughly defined "libcom" position. Clearly people with quite different interpretations can get behind that term but they don't all necessarily support the specific limits that others draw around it.

Or in other words: I think those limits (libcom city limits?) should be drawn as wide as is reasonable, and include the whole body of disagreements instead of drawing them to exclude some of it.

spacious, as Mao said
"Let a hundred flowers blossom and a hundred schools of thought contend"

People on Libcom will pick what resonates best with them.
Admin, will I am sure, make certain there is no abuse of privilege

ajjohnstone

spacious, as Mao said
"Let a hundred flowers blossom and a hundred schools of thought contend"

People on Libcom will pick what resonates best with them.
Admin, will I am sure, make certain there is no abuse of privilege

ok I guess ;)

As we used to say in the Khmer Rouge: "We have a line, a strategy and a tactic; each of them almost more correct than the others".

darren p

jondwhite

This is another anti libertarian communist piece that should not be on here
https://libcom.org/blog/founding-comintern-then-now-03032019

Frankly it's bizarre that you think you should have a say what should or should not be on this website. Especially since you belong to an organisation that is not of the libertarian tradition and itself has a strong history of being against non platforming.

I think its bizarre that the ICT and other anti-libertarians post here -- that article was not only inaccurate (as regards actual libertarians like Bakunin) but was also pro-Bolshevik. I'm not sure how praising the leaders of a state-capitalist party dictatorship which had already used troops against protesting workers is remotely libertarian -- or acceptable.

No one is arguing that the ICT should be non-platformed but that they should not be provided with resources which should be used to promote libertarian ideas -- rather than non-libertarian and non-communist ones.

We've been through similar arguments many times in the last 10 years or more, but it looks like we have to do so again.

In what sense are the ICT 'anti-libertarian'?

The understanding on LibCom as has been thrashed out over the years is that groups that do not promote a party dictatorship are within the working definition of 'libertarian'. And the ICT does not promote the idea of a party dictatorship. For the ICT, the workers organised in the councils are the decision-making bodies of the revolution. As Onorato Damen put it, “the working class does not delegate its power to anyone, not even its class party.” I can't for the life of me see how that is less 'libertarian' than, say, Rocker, who said "Everything for the councils! Nothing above them!". I have no problem with that, except I think that "for the international power of the workers' councils" is snappier. I don't think there's anything regarding the theory and practice of the ICT that makes them less 'libertarian' than, say, the AF or the ACG.

I'm also not sure where you think the ICT supports or has supported using troops against striking workers. Maybe you could quote something to that effect so we could respond properly.

In only one way is the term 'libertarian' not appropriate, in that the ICT doesn't see 'libertarian/authoritarian' as a valid dichotomy in terms of describing revolutionary organisations. However, if one accepts that 'libertarian' means something, then the ICT fall into the 'libertarian' camp on the above criteria; it applies to the ICT even if we don't recognise it. Just as the AF is a communist organisation (even if it doesn't claim to be) because its theory and practice aim to wards communist society, the ICT are 'libertarian' in that its theory and practice aims at a society that is recognised as 'libertarian' by people who accept the label.

Saying that an organisation is ‘for workers councils’ while being for the Party doesn’t reveal much about the relationship between party & class. The fact that the ICT write historically deceitful articles like this; http://libcom.org/blog/founding-comintern-then-now-03032019 (which was rightly critically shredded in the comments below it) shows their ambiguity on the question; they whitewash the counter-revolutionary role of Lenin & his Comintern so as to glorify it as a supposedly still-relevant model for today.

Lenin’s influence and Bolshevik manipulation of the communist movement is glossed over and not seen, as it should be, as a crucial element in understanding the role of counter-revolution within the revolution; which suggests that ICT & co are fine with that kind of relation of party to class. Any proletarian power of that nature and tiny left-comm groups’ relation to it is far from a practical issue at present. But on the ideological level that they mainly operate on the defense of, or excusing of, such things certainly isn’t compatible with anything libertarian or what they call “revolutionary praxis” then or now – and the blood of anarchists, left-SRs and left communists repressed by the Cheka still proves it, however much they might try to airbrush them from their deceitful Lenin-glorifying ‘histories’.

Apart from that, the topical ICT articles posted on this site are so predictably formulaic; state one of capitalism’s numerous problems and show that reformism won’t cure it – then conclude ‘one solution, revolution’. ‘Correct’ in a boring obvious way but not very practically useful or even really very theoretical. The process of actual struggle by which the desired outcome might come about seems to trouble them little and implies that ‘class consciousness’ and formation of councils will simply occur when sufficient numbers have converted to their ideology. ICT remain (in claimed historical lineage and ideology if not practice), like most present left-comms, semi-Leninist - so of course they’ll get stick for it here.

Red Marriott, you're being highly dishonest here. We do not glorify Lenin nor praise the suppression of anarchists, Left-SRs or left communists (the latter especially is just absurd).

Dyjbas

Red Marriott, you're being highly dishonest here. We do not glorify Lenin

Where is the criticism of Lenin in this article? https://www.leftcom.org/en/articles/2015-01-21/lenin-s-legacy

We host a couple of Lenin's later writings where he's critical of the party bureaucracy and/or Stalin's nationalism. However whereas the CWO/ICT (and CLR James) see these as Lenin remaining true to communist ideals, they can be seen as more of him simply supporting the reformist wing of the bureaucracy, having spent the previous half-decade suppressing workers self-organisation. Why host them? Because while their criticism of the bolshevik state is belated, muted, and self-serving, they do show Lenin identifying trends that both Trotskyists and Stalinists insist were invented by anarchists (or liberals). So Lenin's own writing can (sometimes) be a way for people to break with Stalinism and Trotskyism (with CLR James and Hal Draper being examples of this trajectory), but this is useful only really for people on their way to discovering anti-state communism more generally, I wouldn't recommend them to others except to know they exist in order to argue with Leninists more effectively.

The 'Lenin's Legacy' article rather than doing this, whitewashes Lenin altogether, for example completely fails to mention Lenin's exile of Miasnikov. https://libcom.org/library/bolshevik-opposition-lenin-paul-avrich

CWO/ICT

In the first place they are wrong because the brutal party dictatorship which collapsed in 1992 had nothing to do with Lenin's idea of communism.

But what did Miasnikov say about this to the time, directly to Lenin himself?
Miasnikov

The trouble is that, while you raise your hand against the capitalist, you deal a blow to the worker. You know very well that for such words as I am now uttering hundreds, perhaps thousands, of workers are languishing in prison. That I myself remain at liberty is only because I am a veteran Communist, have suffered for my beliefs, and am known among the mass of workers. Were it not for this, were I just an ordinary mechanic from the same factory, where would I be now? In a Cheka prison or, more likely, made to 'escape,' just as I made Mikhail Romanov 'escape.' Once more I say: You raise your hand against the bourgeoisie, but it is I who am spitting blood, and it is we, the workers, whose jaws are being cracked.

ICT/CWO

Unlike the Stalins and Kamenevs in the Bolshevik Party, when the war-sick Russian population finally rose against the tyranny of Tsardom in February 1917 Lenin saw no reason to stop struggling for socialism.

'Lenin was nothing like Stalin or Kamenev' - except when in 1922 he was working with them to expel left communists from the Bolshevik party.

Avrich

The following day, February 21, 1922, Lenin instructed Kamenev and Stalin to publish his letter to Miasnikov, or at least substantial extracts, to show that, before expelling Miasnikov" he had endeavored to reason with him.(44) For there was still widespread reluctance within the party to take extreme measures against veteran members, especially one with Miasnikov's reputation for courage and dedication. Lenin himself shared these hesitations, Yet his patience with Miasnikov had been exhausted.

And not only this, any criticism of Lenin is conflated with ruling class distortion:

ICT/CWO

Our rulers would have us believe that this monster was the natural outcome of the October Revolution in I917. Above all they want us to think that Lenin was the architect of it all. They want workers to remain ignorant of their own class history and have what Lenin really stood for buried for ever.

Miasnikov also wrote that,

"it is only by returning to the revolutionary traditions of revolutionary Marxism (Bolshevism), which regulated the life of the party from its inception up until 1921, that proletarian democracy can be restored to the party. To accomplish this, however, a proletarian party is necessary, not a bureaucratic party. “That which was born to crawl, cannot fly.”" (Miasnikov, 1930)

He did not share the anarchist position on Bolshevism or the party question, and anarchists appropriating him now to argue against left communists is a bit rich. In any case, we are currently working on a longer piece about Miasnikov which some here may find interesting.

if you think that Red Marriott or Mike Harman are anarchists, you've not been paying attention. not that there's anything wrong with not being an anarchist; some of my best friends aren't anarchists...

Dyjbas

He did not share the anarchist position on Bolshevism or the party question, and anarchists appropriating him now to argue against left communists is a bit rich. In any case, we are currently working on a longer piece about Miasnikov which some here may find interesting.

It is perfectly reasonable to cite Miasnikov's contemporary statements against Lenin when criticising current left communists who write hagiographies of Lenin. I didn't claim he's an anarchist, just that he's a harsher critic of Lenin than the ICT/CWO. Seems a bit rich for an organisation that writes hagiographies of Lenin to appropriate one of the people Lenin had expelled from the Bolshevik party and exiled.

Well Miasnikov also wrote that

"Lenin, when he was a Marxist revolutionary, did not conceive of a proletarian State without Workers Councils, without that “association” by means of which the proletariat administers production instead of the bourgeoisie, after the latter is defeated. Following Marx and Engels, Lenin saw in these Councils “the political form at last discovered under which to work out the economic emancipation of labour”. And “except on this last condition, the Communal Constitution would have been an impossibility and a delusion”. Stalin, Bukharin & Co., however, are devoted to hauling off to the dungeons of the GPU, under the accusation of being counterrevolutionaries, all workers who have the audacity to talk about organizing these Councils. And yet they still dare to call themselves Marxist-Leninists!" (Miasnikov, 1930)

Both you and Red Marriott deny that Lenin was ever a Marxist revolutionary who took the idea of workers' councils seriously. We don't (which doesn't mean we are uncritical of Lenin, as e.g. HERE, unlike your strawman argument goes).

Black Badger

if you think that Red Marriott or Mike Harman are anarchists, you've not been paying attention. not that there's anything wrong with not being an anarchist; some of my best friends aren't anarchists...

You have friends? Sellout!

Dyjbas

Both you and Red Marriott deny that Lenin was ever a Marxist revolutionary who took the idea of workers' councils seriously.

I don't particularly try to impute intentions to Lenin most of the time because I don't think that's especially useful. What I tend to do is look at what he did (and wrote) in power as well as what he wrote out of power. And also attempt a close reading of what he wrote and how much it is actually putting forward a communist position vs. an argument for state capitalism of some variety. Chris Wright is someone who takes Lenin seriously but also finds him extremely lacking https://libcom.org/library/contra-state-and-revolution

Also even though I have an extremely low opinion of Lenin in general, I can respect that some people who had a very high opinion of him (CLR James, Martin Glaberman, Hal Draper) still had extremely important insights into the failure of Leninist organisation, trade unions, the sect system and other things, while retaining disagreements in other areas (such as their opinions on anarchism, or CLR James not fully breaking with statist pan-Africanism like his support for Nyerere). However with those three they were all on a trajectory out of Leninist/Trotskyist organisations which is not the case for 21st century left communists.

Dyjbas

We don't (which doesn't mean we are uncritical of Lenin, as e.g.

HERE, unlike your strawman argument goes).

It's not a strawman, you have an article which praises Lenin while making absolutely zero criticisms. Unlike this site, which is an archive, this is a published political article by your organisation. Instead of defending that article on its merits, all you're able to do is try to distract from it by whining about anarchists quoting Miasnikov.

Even this: "Lenin, when he was a Marxist revolutionary" implies that there was a time when Lenin was not a Marxist revolutionary - this implication is not made by the article I pointed out, so it's still more critical than you.

Dyjbas

Red Marriott, you're being highly dishonest here. We do not glorify Lenin nor praise the suppression of anarchists, Left-SRs or left communists (the latter especially is just absurd).

No, you just uncritically glorify the Party & Comintern which he led and, as MH points out, write glorifying simplistic articles about his legacy. With the obligatory left-comm cop-out excuse of the supposed "tragedy" of greater historical circumstance absolving the Bolsheviks of any responsibility for counter-revolution. The Bolsheviks are portrayed as masters of history in 1917 and helpess victims of it when they start to get repressive. After 100 years your analysis/apologetics are a century behind the anarchists, Left-SRs & left-comms who developed serious critique of Bolshevism in practice. Whereas your idealist 'analysis' is to always quote bureacratic holy scripture & dusty text rather than analyse the concrete social relations of society under the Bolshevik state.

Nor did I say you "praise the suppression" by the Bolsheviks of more radical opponents - read more carefully before claiming others are "dishonest". I said you 'airbrushed them from your deceitful 'histories' '.

I don't need to "defend" that article. It echoes what I said above ("Communists today are not in the business of turning Lenin into an icon nor do we support everything he did or said"). We outline our criticisms of Lenin, and talk about the repressions by the Cheka, etc., in other articles. How about this, on Lenin's support for the "dictatorship of the party" in 1920:

"This is mysticism not materialism. It has more in common with the fascist myth that the Führer/Duce is the real expression of the will of the nation than with the Marxist materialist Lenin of 1917-18." (CWO, 2003)

But Mike and Red Marriott - you're not actually interested in what we say or believe. You've already decided that we are "uncritical Leninists" and to this end you're willing to twist our politics. So what is the point of this discussion?

Dyjbas

But Mike and Red Marriott - you're not actually interested in what we say or believe. You've already decided that we are "uncritical Leninists" and to this end you're willing to twist our politics. So what is the point of this discussion?

I have not said that you are 'uncritical Leninists', I've said you published an uncritical hagiography of Lenin, which you personally are now refusing to even defend, and that Miasnikov, an actual real life bolshevik, was more critical in his letters to Lenin than your article. For someone so concerned about being misrepresented you don't seem to be able to engage with what people are actually arguing at all.

What's your argument though? That not every ICT article contains what you want it to contain?

In any case, I'll take one "uncritical" article about Lenin over selling Gramsci sweatshirts! ;)

I never knew of the existence of that website and have no association with it - but if that's the best response you can come up with to specific criticism it only reinforces the impression of a formulaic dogma being repeated ad infinitum. I originally raised the question of relations of Party & class but you can't seem to engage to defend anything of what you say except by quoting holy scripture.

Red Marriott, if you're actually interested in our understanding of the relationship between party & class this recent document is a good starting point.

But to me it seems like you were more interested in accusing us of uncritically glorifying "the Party & Comintern", quoteing "bureacratic holy scripture" and "airbrushing" Cheka repressions. I'm sorry but a cursory glance at our website and publications should be enough to see that none of this is the case (indeed even the article on the Comintern, which you hate so much, doesn't say what you claim it says). You can't expect me to defend views I don't hold. That's not how you start a discussion.

Working Class History is a project affiliated to libcom.

And in 'reply' - rather than replying directly yourself you reference another holy tablet ...