Left doesn’t unite shock
Well-mannered and inoffensive – the Convention of the Left illustrated the problem the left faces, writes Chris Strafford
“It’s official – the left unites!” That is the bold claim made by the Convention of the Left in its September 22 bulletin. Those present agreed to the statement of intent that was developed by the CL organising committee. The declaration was put forward by John McDonnell MP and supported by Respect councillor Salma Yaqoob.
While the convention brought 300 or so people together in the same building, that, unfortunately, is not quite the same thing as the left uniting. The CL postponed any discussion on motions or decisions on actions, etc until the recall conference some time in November. We said that the CL would be a talking shop and we were right.
It is true that the convention did see some debate and it was organised in a way that was more open and inclusive than most left events. The problem, however, is that the so-called ‘20% that divides us’ was skirted around. It is only by tackling our differences head-on that we can hope to achieve real unity. And, of course, there is no intention on the part of the organisers to aim for that unity to take party form.
After the weekend the number of participants dropped considerably, yet sessions were reasonably well attended for weekday meetings. The CL made space for discussions on a wide range of issues, but what was missing, and indicative of how the majority of our movement approach unity, was the lack of time given over to assess what has gone wrong and how we are going to fix it. The view that if we stop arguing about what our disagreements are and just get on with working together on the basis of the ‘80% where we agree’, then everything will be fine. In reality it is a recipe for unprincipled lash-ups and inevitably splits further down the line.
Despite this lack of clarity the CL is seen by some as the start of a process to rebuild the base organs of our class. They hope that the spread of the CL across the country could begin to build up better coordination and confidence amongst the working class and its campaigns. For this to happen, it would need not only the full commitment of the main left groups, but the drawing in of thousands of others. Neither of those things are about to happen – the Socialist Workers Party and Morning Star’s Communist Party of Britain have hardly thrown themselves into the CL, while the Socialist Party stayed away altogether.
A more likely scenario will be the holding of a few poorly attended local conventions, set up by comrades who might have or might not have participated in the Manchester convention. A recall conference will hardly be a mass event and will perhaps be even less representative of our movement. It would certainly lack the organisational clout needed to move it forward, given that nobody involved at the top is even aiming for a principled Marxist party.
The CL ended on September 24 with a session entitled ‘Question time of the left’. The panel was made up of an ‘official communist’, the CPB’s Robert Griffiths, Mark Serwotka, the shibboleth-dropping Lindsey German of the SWP, left nationalist Colin Fox (Scottish Socialist Party), the left’s favourite Green, Derek Wall, the ever-present John McDonnell MP and left liberal Hilary Wainwright (Red Pepper). Unfortunately George Galloway MP did not attend and was replaced by Manchester Respect member Clive Searle.
The whole affair was well-mannered, inoffensive and illustrated perfectly the problem the left faces. Everyone agreed on the need for better public services, a windfall tax and opposition to war. What no-one touched upon was the chronic failure of the left to come together in a single, democratic party of working class socialism. Just what went wrong with Respect, the SSP, the Socialist Alliance, Socialist Labour Party …? Why has the left shrunk even further into the political wilderness? Far from being the ‘historic moment’ that was claimed by some, CL ‘unity’ is built on such a fragile and superficial basis that it is destined, just like its forerunners, to fall at the first hurdle.
Apologetics versus solidarity
The CL hosted a debate between Campaign Iran and Hands Off the People of Iran on September 24 – though it took time to convince some on the organising committee that a session featuring two organisations with such different approaches would have anything at all going for it.
SWP member Naz Massoumi opened the meeting for Campaign Iran by outlining the continuing imperialist threats against Iran and the growing media offensive aimed at justifying a military strike. Comrade Massoumi declared that Iran was definitely not trying to develop nuclear weapons and was under threat because of its oil reserves.
He claimed that the “victories of the Iranian people” (he meant the establishment of the Islamic republic) constituted a massive blow against the US. What he did not discuss was how the 1979 revolution ended in counterrevolution which eventually resulted in the slaughter of thousands of leftwing militants. He repeated the tired old argument that any criticism of the Iranian regime at the moment is tantamount to aiding the imperialists as they prepare for war.
Chris Strafford (Hopi and CPGB) responded by stressing the need for a twin-track approach – while imperialism poses the greatest threat to the Iranian people, the theocratic regime is no progressive force. It is essential to do all in our power to stop the drive to war, while simultaneously acting in solidarity with the working class and democratic movements in Iran in their struggle to defeat the theocracy.
Vicky Thompson (Hopi steering committee and Permanent Revolution) also emphasised that the greatest threat to the Iranian people is posed by US-led imperialism. She spoke about the developing movement of workers, students and women that is breathing fresh hope into the struggle against both imperialism and the Islamic republic.
The debate was sharp, with several comrades damning the SWP and Campaign Iran for its lack of solidarity with the Iranian working class and social movements. Peter Grant from Aslef spoke about how his union was internationalist and was committed to building links with workers across the globe as well as fighting the drive to war. Other comrades tried to get the meeting to take a vote on whether Hopi should be allowed to affiliate to the Stop the War Coalition, but the chair refused point blank to allow this.
Robbie Folkard
Chris Strafford and the CPGB have taken a very negative approach to the Convention of the Left. The CoL brought together more than 300 militants, trade unionists and socialists from many organisations and from none. They came together in the middle of the most serious financial crisis for decades and after a traumatic period for the British left – a period that has seen attempts to set up militant socialist alternatives to New Labour end in splits, collapse and recrimination.
In its limited aims of bringing the British left, in and outside the Labour Party, together to start a discussion of the problems that face us, the CoL was an undoubted success. If leading members of the CPGB had spent more time in the CoL sessions, and less time hanging around their stall outside, they would have heard a serious and very democratic discussion of important issues facing the left.
Where else would you have found an interesting debate between leaders of the Labour Party left in parliament and those who want to break from Labour – a discussion about the trade union link, disaffiliation and possibilities of changing the LP? Where else would you have found leading members of the FBU, RMT, PCS engaging in discussion with rank and file militants over the problems of getting a new party, rebuilding the trade unions, and fighting the pay freeze? Where else could you have found a lively 90 minute discussion of the state of the women’s movement, involving the National Assembly of Women, Feminist Fightback, a female Labour MP defending Labour’s record, and the Abortion Rights campaign?
And all these debates were conducted in a comradely fashion, in a structured debate that ensured huge numbers of floor speakers, in welcome contrast to the normal “top table” domination of such meetings. The debates tested peoples arguments, made people think, and informed us all of the different campaigns and discussion forums going on all over the country.
Yet at the very start of this process, at its very first meeting, you dismiss it as a talking shop and “certainly not a serious attempt to forge organisational unity”. Maybe the debate did not reach the dizzy heights that goes on in the Campaign for a Marxist Party – but doesn’t the CMP also do a lot more “talking” than campaigning? Isn’t this the pot calling the kettle black?
The CoL is an experiment. Its initial success should not blind us to the problems. How do we get the balance right between debate on policy, on resolutions and agreement for common action? How do we develop a means of working and discussing together and coming to conclusions without blowing the whole thing apart? How do we prevent the conference packing, manoeuvring and stifling of debate that is the habit on the far left? There are no easy answers, but it does mean moving forward carefully, democratically and above all developing trust between the forces involved.
Your article declares the CoL organisers raise their sights “no higher than better coordinated campaigns and perhaps a few local forums that are bound to be short lived”. Firstly this is not true. It has been made absolutely clear that the aims of the CoL will be for its supporters and activists to develop. Secondly, developing base organisations with roots in local communities, campaigns, trade unions etc. is the only way the CoL can grow and go forward. You say “Working together does help build links, but to what end?” – to the end of strengthening working class organisation and its ability to fight back, comrades.
If we can work together in local CoL’s or forums, join them to local struggles and campaigns, make them centres of discussion of policy and action, we can strengthen our movement and at the same time clarify our ideas. If we can do this together, without placing the building of our own organisations and fronts above that of the interests of the working class and its struggles (the real definition of sectarianism) then we will start to rebuild trust on the far left and perhaps make a contribution to organisational and political unity.
It is would be easy for the CPGB to sit back and take a sniffy attitude to the CoL, to declare in advance that “it will all end in tears”. But this would be a shame. The CPGB and Communist Students have something to contribute to this development on the left. To pass up the opportunity to intervene in the debates, by sitting silently on the sidelines as you did last weekend, would be a mistake. Perhaps it will need a re-thinking in your own political practice, a re-thinking that was very evident amongst many of the participants in the debates at the CoL.
Hi Stuart,
No-one would dispute that getting people together in the same room and discussing is ‘a good thing’. But what comes out of it? Has progress really been made even if only in ideas, not action?
The irony is that as the death of the social democratic parties reaches fever pitch, all the CoL offered politically was rehashed Labourism and Keynesian economics. Most of the participants, if we’re honest, were marxists from the organised left. Given the reformist politics that most of these groups were putting on display, I doubt very much that any of the few Old Labourites in the audience were won to revolutionary politics.
The CoL was in no way an attempt to seriously assess the failures of the left in the 20th century, which were largely due to the dominance of Stalinism and Social Democracy; forces to the right of communism dressed in pro-worker colours. Instead we saw marxists acting as uncritical cheerleaders for left Labourism. The absence of unaffiliated youth at the convention was not surprising given the almost complete bankruptcy of both varieties of top-down ‘socialism’.
The reformist projects of the left are partly due to a crisis of confidence in our own ideas after the defeats of the 20th century. This is exacerbated by the distortion of marxist theory to justify the dilution of politics for sectarian gain (viz. RESPECT). Enough halfway houses and stillborn resurrections of ‘old Labour’. We need a SERIOUS assessment of the failure of the left, and a return to the ruthlessly critical and radically democratic politics of real communism.
Wcg,
Laurie Smith, CS exec
Obviously I’m looking at the Convention of the Left from a looooong way off, so this is an honest question: would you really count the CoL as one of the “halfway houses and stillborn resurrections of ‘old Labour’” like the Socialist Alliance, RESPECT, the CNWP, etc? All these were based on the idea: “We need a united organisation (more precisely: a united candidacy for some election!), and then we can discuss programme. The CoL is about discussing programme, without any prospects for a common organization or – Dog forbid! – a common electoral bid. Now I can’t tell what the discussions were like, but with the low expectations I described, it seems like a positive balance sheet is justified. If you had high expectations of the left getting together and forming a revolutionary party, then I can see why you’re disappointed.
You’re far off, but not wrong Wladek! It’s true that the CoL doesn’t have any pretentions to forming a party, but I’m pointing out that the politics espoused at the event are a dead end when put into practice.
There is nothing wrong with regroupment and discussion as such, and members of CS have been active in setting up Manchester’s Marxist Radical Forum (link below). This is explicitly marxist, and there is nothing wrong with debating reformists also. But at the CoL there WAS no debate on the fundamental question of reform or revolution; marxists gagged themselves and subordinated their politics to the right of the worker’s movement. No progress was made in ideas- none.
This underhandedness is based on the idea of rebuilding the grassroots organisations of the class after a period of defeat, which will then learn through action and progress to socialist consciousness etc etc. What this translates to is building the trade unions, which in GB are now small, generally rightist, and highly bureaucratised.
This approach forgets entirely that the trade union left is informed and galvanised by the parties of the left. It is naive to think that signing up thousands of raw recruits would necessarily tip the unions to the left (if such mass recruitment were even possible; understandably, the unions are hardly an exciting prospect for young workers in Britain). Of course comrades should be involved in their unions, but it is not a road to sorting out the socialist movement. That will require tackling head-on the failures of the 20th century; one of the biggest being capitulation to Social Democracy and the bourgeoisification of the workers movement. Let’s not keep reformism on life support as it lies on it’s death bed. Let us destroy it- be proud of our history and ideas and argue for them!
http://radical-forum.blogspot.com/
Wcg,
Laurie Smith, CS exec
here’s an answer from PR in this week’s Weekly Worker:
“Having decided in advance that the Convention of the Left was going to be no more than a talking shop, I suppose the Weekly Worker was obliged to justify its presumption; maybe this is why Chris Strafford’s report on the CL is so full of contradictions (‘Left doesn’t unite’, September 25).
So there was debate, very sharp debate, as described by Robbie Folkard in another article about the Iran meeting (‘Apologetics versus solidarity’); yet the “20% that divides us was skirted around”. In point of fact, Mark Hoskisson of Permanent Revolution made exactly the point in the ‘Where next for the left?’ session that the 80-20 coalitions that have characterised the recent period are doomed to failure. Yes, there were those who argued that we should just stop arguing and unite, but that is in the nature of an event like the CL, which is the beginning of a process, not the end.
Chris’s statement that no-one involved in the CL’s organisation was interested in unity taking a “party form” just isn’t true. PR were involved, and we have made no secret of the fact we want to see the left united behind a common revolutionary programme. Nor was there some secret agenda-wielding cabal at work behind the CL – anyone who came to organising meetings could play a part.
Chris claims that the CL avoided the question, “Why has the left shrunk even further into the political wilderness?” But this was exactly the motivation behind holding the convention. What was so clear to everyone bar the Weekly Worker, apparently, was the urgency of the desire to face up to what needs to be done and where necessary explore new approaches.
As to no-one asking questions such as what went wrong with Respect – I guess Chris wasn’t at the anti-deportation session, where Respect’s record came in for a hammering from all sides. As far as I can see, the only people wanting to avoid such questions are Respect itself and the Socialist Worker Party. PR have been keen enough to present our analysis of a predictable disaster in which we are happy to say we played no part.
I also find it bizarre that Chris should predict that the CL will only lead to a “few poorly attended local conventions”, when CPGB members in South Wales have been helping to build the Cardiff Radical Socialist Forum (www.radicalsocialist.org), which, among other things, is putting Hands Off the People of Iran on the map in this area. As with the CL, support from the biggest groups on the left has been absent, but, as at the CL, this has been no disadvantage in creating the kind of open debate which attracts both young activists and older lapsed Marxists – both represented in the 30 or so forum attendees so far. Nor has it been a meaningless exercise in fake unity, but a platform for the exposition of revolutionary Marxist ideas.
If similar forums can be built around the country, then we can draw new forces into the process, and the recall convention in November may indeed be the focused, decision-making occasion you would like to see and, as far as I understand, the CL organisers intend.
Jon Blake”
I’m surprised the CPGB has been so negative – even Luke Cooper of Students Power wrote a generally positive report: http://www.workerspower.com/index.php?id=166,1722,0,0,1,0