Follow up to DP’s discussion paper 2 August, and group discussion write-up, contributions by GB, 8 August, and below, 13 August.

8 August  

In looking at the Labour Party we have to say that is a capitalist party. At its heart is a set of compromises which mean that it has never had anything like a conception of socialist society. This is tied to its origins in trade unions (often weighed down with bureaucracy) and various political groups. Some of the political groups seem to have been closer to socialism than others.

However, we have to reflect that when it was largely working class it had dynamics which could have led to an overturn of the established leadership. Simply examining the formal politics of a body and sticking a label on it is a way of thinking that fails to reflect the fluidity and movement of real life.

The direction and speed of development of a movement cannot be revealed by a study of an “economic base”. Indeed one of the interesting things about DP’s talk was that he started off saying that he would offer a ‘materialist perspective’ and thankfully he did no such thing.

My core objection to the SPGB approach is that its politics are static. Finding the right label and then ‘educating’ us all squeezes the life out of politics. Marx pointed out that it people change their own lives and we do not passively respond to material circumstances. Interestingly, he went on to argue that the view of the educator implies a division of society into two in which one part is superior.

The long tradition of Marxism- Leninism seems to me to be founded on this sense of superiority. Like the SPGB the Leninists have a ‘science’ which provides answers which those of us who lack the alchemy will never reach. However, the Leninists go about it differently. Here the approach is to ‘provide leadership’. Like the educator, the leader stands above the mass. S/he is above the masses for a similar reason to the SPGB. The Leninist has the knowledge of Marxist ideology. This is said to enable its holder to understand the totality of social relations and thus see the way forward. Without a course in the wonders of Lenin’s ‘What is to be Done?’ the rest of us cannot reach the heights of leadership. Thus, both the schoolmasters and the Leninists share a sense of their own superiority.

As I said, for the SPGB the Labour Party is simply not Marxist and therefore a waste of space. The Leninist sees it a bit differently. S/he agrees that it is not a Marxist Party. However, most (but not all) say that some or even most of it can be won to Marxism. This may be by demonstrating the superiority of an alternative or joining and convincing from within. The tactics vary but the belief in the superior wisdom of the Marxist party persists.

What does this have to do with Labour?

DP rightly gave a sense of historical perspective to his introduction.

The period around the birth of the Labour Party was one of deep social crisis. The pressures that led to World War 1 were building up, with inter-imperialist rivalry growing fierce. The mass trade unions of unskilled workers were growing and ran a serious of major and often successful strikes. JT argues that the ‘labour aristocracy’ of craftsmen was central to the formation of the Labour Party, but I am sure that the rise of unskilled workers’ unions was more important.

Linked to this, the Liberal Party was in crisis (an irony as it was at this time the most successful ever Liberal Government). The transformations of late nineteenth century/ early twentieth century capital were important here. However, the cutting edge of the crisis about the ideas of the Liberal Party. At its centre was the issue of whether liberalism was a group of ideas that made the free market central to its whole programme. This older view was challenged by the new liberals who wanted a strong state which would work to ensure full employment, provide social benefits and limits the market. These ideas are remarkably similar to the Fabians, except that the Fabians labelled them socialist. Essentially a large benevolent state knocks the rough edges off of capitalism and helps to avoid social conflict.

As DP pointed out at the meeting, a series of battles in the courts saw the unions stripped of many of their powers. The new liberals were keen to hold the labour movement inside their party. They were unable to do so. The broad crisis threw up a new party. Looking back it seems inevitable. However, it did not happen in the USA where the Democrats were able to hold the unions in their orbit. Arguments about the inevitability of processes, based on an analysis of an ‘economic base’, have to be seen as pretty futile. Labour emerged as a major party from a period of confusion in which there was no inevitable result to be found in looking at the entrails of the economy.

Labour Now

The point of going back to the period around World War 1 is to point to the parallels with today. Again we have a capitalist class deeply divided about how to proceed. Since 1979 the predominant thrust has been to reinvigorate capitalism by a sweeping programme of privatisation and direct attacks on the gains of the post war years. None of these gains led to socialism nor could they. However, they did make life better for millions of people and, for capital, kept class struggles within acceptable limits. The reinvigoration of a direct capitalist attack on the gains of the post-war years has progressed in most countries to varying degrees.

However, the old pre-Thatcherites are gaining support by those who fear that simply jumping on the working class will force a reaction. The stability of the post-war political system has gone. The Tories don’t know whether to hug a hoodie or press on with the Thatcher revolution. New Labour recognises that the reformism of the Attlee years is dead. The Blairite alternative has proved a mess. It ran up against a brick wall over Iraq as imperialist dreams are turning to dust.

The differences between the major parties are based on less and less. I think that we are now in a similar period of confusion and instability to that before World War 1

JT seems to be suggesting that the Labour Party could still be an important site of class struggle. We cannot know for certain but for the reasons DP pointed out at the meeting this looks very unlikely.

Meanwhile, the working class has lost all sense of political direction. The old support for Labour has died (lots still vote but reluctantly). The little parties to the left of Labour have all lost their way. None has scooped up the broadly left body of feeling which is available but homeless. An analysis of why each has failed would be worth a fuller discussion, but they have a lot of similarities with each other.

JT does not like the formulation of a ‘workers’ party’. As I said at the meeting I think it is better than anything else around. The idea of Marxist or a revolutionary party built on some dogma is hopeless. Parties articulate interests. The basis of socialism is not the wisdom of the central committee but the consciousness that life is intolerable under capital. A ‘party’ based on a narrow body of ideas can never advance that consciousness because it is too full of its own pre-formed notions. Nor can it achieve sufficient unity because the dogma will need a high priest (or at least a General Secretary or Chairman) to interpret the real meaning of everything.

Paul’s point seems to be that people do not see life under capital as intolerable. If they did they would surely find it more interesting that the trash of Big Brother. At the moment he has a point. However, the turn to escapism whether into rubbish on TV or excessive drink or whatever, says that life is not that good. As we are getting richer social tensions are rising but they are not generally expressed politically. It seems to me that politics is so important to the way that life is lived that in the longer run it is inescapable. I think that my differences with CM, BE and JT are around the way in which that political movement will take shape.

GB

PS In the meeting I pointed to the Communist Party losing about 40% of its members over Hungary. A lot of the ex-members went on to play a part in the early days of CND.

13 August, from GB again:

I seem to have provoked a couple of interesting responses to my comments.

CM’s points are important because they go deeply into what we are about. Yet the excellent quotation from E.P. Thompson seems to undermine the paragraph pointing to the merits of the SPGB. CM says ‘What’s useful about the SPGB is that it doesn’t change, always pointing out the futility of trying to reform capitalism…’ While we can agree that capitalism cannot be reformed out of existence I worry about the broad approach. I ask can ideas stop changing. If you try to maintain the same ideas you will fail. This is simply because ideas only have meaning in the context of society. As society changes so must ideas even if the same words are said. The ideas resonate differently in society at large and they do a different job of work for the person who holds them. Ideological comfort blankets are not much use for social revolution. A few general truths discovered long ago and reiterated lose their life and dynamism.

In times when there is no hope for socialism in the foreseeable future there has been a tendency for revolutionaries to do one of two things. Either to hold fast to principles which are increasing dislocated from the world around them or to let go of the principle and simply become radical(ish) left(ish) parties. I think my time reflecting on life in the WRP told me that these two paths are more similar than they seem. Neither is completely worthless. As CM finds a lot of people who have learnt something of socialism from the SPGB I have found people who think much more highly of what they learnt from the WRP than I do. They would also point to the reading of Marxist literature and discussion around it (generally in the WRP this was better the further you were from London). But the ossification of the ideas of the most dynamic thinker of the nineteenth century is the destruction of their essence.

The other approach was to play down the principles and get on with practical politics. Its strength was that it meant that working people’s real lives were dealt with and often improved. The weakness was that any broader idea of a better society was left aside. It is interesting that so many New Labour ministers were once on the left.

CM’s question about how the movement can take shape is approached (not really answered) in the discussion below.

BE’s point about the CPGB and Hungary is well made. I have taken for granted a figure I picked up from somewhere years ago. However, even losing 20% was pretty devastating. I think it is fair to say that over Western Europe and the USA the CPs went into decline from then and that ‘68 pushed that decline on.

BE’s spiritual home fits my picture above pretty well. Today there is an enormous advance from the period when there was just the CPGB. Now we have a whole cluster of CP’s. Some follow the logic of the British Road to Socialism into vaguely leftist reformism. Others go for the exotica of real Maoism (ideologically this seems like third period Stalinism to me).

I must say that I have no real answers to BE’s points about leadership. I am certain that leadership as practiced by Leninists is elitist and incapable of leading to socialism. The revolution is the possession of the working class not a leading clique. Without the capacity to experiment, get things wrong, etc. millions of people cannot learn how to create a new society.

BE says, “If you are anti leaders and political parties/movements then I sense an awful trust in the innate goodwill of mankind, something I find hard to share.” I do think that humanity is capable of creating socialism and that does not need me to be dewy eyed about real life now. I think that by struggling to turn society over, millions can see how to live in a more harmonious way. If I turn BE’s comments round I can say that if people cannot freely live in harmony you have a Stalinist model. This is one in which an iron dictatorship will make people obey. It is a recipe for a society which is even worse than the one we have now. If humanity does not have in itself the ability to construct socialism, no dictatorship can create it. All it can do is make hell on earth. [See CM’s response to BE’s point.]

However, having said what I am sure will not work I am very unsure about what would. Leaders arise in all situations. They emerge from movements as those most able to take the struggle forward. The anarchist notion of a completely leaderless movement is a fantasy. One of the areas which needs serious work is how such leaderships can emerge, can be stopped from forming into bureaucracies and can be effective in forwarding the struggle.

Is there a role for people like us? I think there is. But it is a much more limited one than the old movements ever thought. We can use our understanding to point to ways forward to fill the movement with ideas that are not commonplace in society now. What I think we cannot do is claim some special leadership status based on our ability to worm into books.

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