Open Letter to the WRP

AN OPEN LETTER FROM WORKERS POWER TO THE CEMTRAL COMMITTEE AND NEKBERSHIP OF THE WORKERS REVOLUTIONARY PARTY

THE CASE FOR PRINCIPLED REVOLUTIONARY REGROUPWENT.

THE CRISIS ON THE LEFT.

The great miners! strike, of 1984/5 sent.shock waves through the British left. A struggle of such magnitude was bound ta ‘have a profound effect. Sealed off fram the class struggle the idiosyncrc“es, the fetishes and the downright idiocies of the centrist left can thrive with relative impunity. Errors of a purely literary -charactér can be easily concealed and quickly forgotten. However, a mighty class battle, wheather the centrists like it or not, draws all sections of the labour movement - reformist,;.centrist and:revolutionary communist - into its vortex. Policies and program~ mas are put td:the.test. of struggle. Mistakes cannot be so easily concealed, Even groups that had previously built a brick wall. between themselves and other sections of the labour movement - Like the Héaly led WRP - cannot escape the impact of such a test.

No less significant than the. strike itself was the fact that it was defeated. Explaining that defeat in a. hundred and one different ways has intensified the turmoil on the left. The British section of the United Secretariat - the Socialist League - split. The Thdrnett group decamped from the Workers Socialist League.({the misbegotten-product of 4 marriage between the WSL and the International Communist League of Sean Matgamna).

The WRP itself has undergone a profound split with the expulsion of first Healy and then the IC inspired faction led by Hylands. The left inside the Labour Party - staffed. .by numerous ex-Trotskyists - is still going through the process of "realignment" with whole sections of the left going over to Kinnock’ and ‘Support for his witch-hunt of Militant.

' The Comnunist: Party’ s decline has continued with the ‘split between the union-bureaucrat loving Chater gang at the Morning Star and the coalition of trendies and cafeerists who now dominate the CP and purvey their anti-working class wares in Marxism Today and 7 Days.

These splits and realignments testify to the depth of the crisis’ in Gritish society today. _ Britain, after almost three years of a faltering economic recovery stards on the verge of a new recession. Four and a half million, at least, remain without work. Thatcher’s promised “new industries" have not inaterialised. Instead factories continue tb close. Even sections of the ruling class - as their own public faction fight over Westland shows - are worried. Thatcher, despite having inflicted major defeats in the working class, has not yet come near td selving the fundamental problems of ailing British capitalism.

The defeat of the miners' ‘strike Has not, as Kinnock hoped, closed the curtains on the class struggles In 1985 there were majot flare-ups - in tHe Post Office, on the railways - as well as outbreaks of localised struggles that have turned into very bitter fights - Silent Night, Contracts, Forgamasters atc. And now the printers are being drawn into battle as flurdoch and the courts try to smash their unions.

Britain's vo economic decline and the class struggle have tested the centrist and reformist left and found them wanting. ble need not speak here of those wha have joined Kinnock's bandwagon - like the ex~Trotskyist Chartist - but only of those who claim to be revolutionary Trotskyists,

MILITANT. ,

Under the leadership of Grant and Taaffe this grouping has maintained the course it set for itself in the mid-1960s. The Militant believe that the Labour Party can be captured for marxism. In the 1970s this led them to downplay any serious work in the unions. In the 1980s, in order to assist their Labour Party work and capture the block vote in the unions they set up their new Broad Lefts in unions like the CPSA and POEU, Not only did these Broad Lefts end up splitting, they also betrayed strikes - in the civil service in. particular.

The latest phase of Militant's struggle to capture the Labour Party is the fight in Liverpool. In this struggle Militant have whitewashed Kinnock's role in the interest of ‘unity', and have nefused to build a united front against the witch-hunt with other left forces. In the struggle to defend the council, flilitant used the workforce as a stage army (even threatening them with redundancy) instead of mobilising them in strike action.

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At every turn Militant! s strategy ‘involves an adaptation to reformism. Their proposed Enabling Bill to introduce socialis sm is a parliamentary road position virtually indistinguishable from the CP. Their call for a 'soctalist' war against Argentina was a social patriotic position. In sum they are a right-centrist, tama-marxist sect inside the Labour Party.

SOCIALIST GRGANTSER.

Another right-centrist grouping within the Labour Party is Socialist Organiser. The origins of its leading figure Sean Matgamna lie within the SLL. They share ‘lilitant's strategic, conception of capturing the Labour Party with all its defects. Sean Matgamna now rationalisas his break from the SLL in the 1960s in terms of a rightist critique of Healy's split with the Labour Party. ot “While the ICL (now WSL one of the sponsor's of Socialist Organiser) were pushed leftwards in the early and mid-1970's under the impact of the struggle against Heath, the dissipation. of these struggles and the experience of the 1974-79 Labour Government pushed them back to the’ right.:

Since 1970/79 SO has been a prominent advocate of propaganda blocs {eg SCLV) and | peace-pacts with left-HPs in a manner reminiscent of Healy's Socialist Outlook project.

In the last six years ‘SQ has steadily blunted the edge of the revolutionary programe. In the Foot inspired debate on the sovereignty of parliament SO abandoned the’ ‘revolutionary attitude of amashing and replacing all bourgeois government institutions by soviet-type bodies. They now call _ for” ‘workers parliaments’. They’ have followed Militant in abandoning the programme of Permanent

Revolution in Ireland and the Middle East - adopting instead a variant of the democratic stage involving capitulation to Zionism and Protestant loyalism. As a consequence of their view that the revolutionary party must arrive as a result of transforming the Labour Party they have developed 4 differential hostility to Stalinism.

_ AHE_UNITED SECRETARIAT.

The British section of this organisation has split into a pro-Mandel wing around International and a pro-SWP(US) wing around Socialist Action (SA). The Mandelites bleat about the . ‘proto-stalinism' of SA and yet do not murmur so much as a criticism - let alone call for a polit-

ical revolution - against the-stalinist Castro. They heap praise upon the petit-bourgeois FSLN in - Nicaragua. Like the Mandel of the late 1940s who quibbled with Pablo's definitions but accepted ‘entirely his premises on Yugoslavia, International quibbles with, but does not break with SA's adaption to stalinism. And in South Africa where SA uncritically hails the ANC, International sing the praises of Azapo without criticising its black nationalist limitations. Neither wing offer the ‘independent programme of permanent revolution to the black masses. ' In Britain. similarly these two groups are separated only by a hairs breadth. SA arques that there should be no challenge to Kinnock, that Arthur Scargill is a demi~god and that an ‘alliance _<for socialism’ led by Benn (if one is to. judge from the space they give him in their publications to conduct his: increasingly irrelevant ramblings) rather than a revolutionary party is needed. ; ‘International 'counterpose’ to this. a hard left (reformist) alliance under the auspices of : Labour Briefing. In vain one searches for a revolutionary critique of reformism in International. Like their mentor, Mandel, they seek blocs with reformism as a way araund the difficult task af building Trotskyist parties. They are no better than SA. They occupy the same centrist terrain on ‘the fringes. of the Labourite left. They will continue to tail whatever 'vanguard' happens to be “;in fashion.

THE ANTI-PABLOITES.

Apart from the WRP itself there are several organisations claiming to stand in the ‘traditions’ of the IC and its fight aqainst Pabloism. Many in the WRP will be looking at these groups afresh. Such openness is to be welcomed. For our part we welcome the oppartunity to seriously debate out. our differences with them. We believe that in the course of such open discussion we can demonstrate that ‘anti-Pabloism' is no alternative, and never has been, to the flilitant/USEC groupings that

7 emerged out of Pablo's FI.

The Socialist Group, which produces Socialist Viewpoint, is the descendant of Alan Thornett's WSL. This grouping was bureaucraticallyexpelled from the wWRP in 1974. It enjoyed an independent existance until 1981 then fused with the I-CL. At the time of the fusion it boasted 150 members. At the time of the split with Matgamna, in 1984, the Thornett faction numbered 35. They were joined by another QTOUPs the Bemocratic Centralist Faction, of about 20-30 comrades. In the process of ‘this unprincipled' fusion and subsequent split the Matgamnites also declined sharply in numbers.

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JUnteteere t

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Wa detail these figures not because we want to carp in a philistine manner about small groups. We are the object of too much carping on that score to indulge in it ourselves. No, wa simply wish to demonstrate that in over a decade Thornett's policies have led to a diminution of cadres, indeed a squandering of cadres. . oO, : Ti : .

In our view the WSL of the 1970s, despite many healthy political positions,..failed to make . a decisive break with Healyisn. Whilst: it. rejected the sectarian aspects of tha WRP's politics thay Held. fast to the. Healyite -imathod of party building. Despite their: smaliness they tried in the style of the SLL, to be the ‘alternative leadership'. This led them to build a miniature version of a future mass party: (a ‘mini-mass party’), complete with a Women's and Youth paper. Members were bussed. around the country to interventions to ‘prove' the mass. nature of the WSL. The level .of activism called for was out of all proportion to the WSL's size. “ore important it deflected the organisation from the programmatic and. theoretital tasks that were necessary for it to make a real break with Healyism. : fos A a

The. mini-mass party perspective and the lack of. programmatic foundations demoralised members, led to two splits to the Spartacists, the setting up and then splitting of the TILC, with the loss of-nore members and finally the fusion and split with fatgamna. | .

Since the split with Matgamna, Thornett and Socialist Viewpoint have steered a right-wing course. In the first issue an article on the NHS .was: headlined, "Wanted: A Scargill .to lead. health service struggles"? What happened to the ‘revolutionary leadership’ call of the 1970s? Clearly the stay with Matgamna had had an effect in pushing Thornett rightwards. This was confirmed last October at a national conference of iliners' Support Groups, At that conference Yorkers Power supported resolutions that called for the building of a rank and file movement.

‘In our. view the lack of such a movement during the strike allowed the bureaucratic betrayals and defeat to take place. Thornett who was prominent in opposing this resolution explained in Socialist Viewpoint that the conference, "rejected a controversial resolution” that called for., the building of “a militant minority movement" (ilo. 8). He does not, explain why. this: resolution was defeated. It- was because he, in a bloc with others, opposed-any strategy that would. bring the finers’ Support movement into conflict with left sections of the NUM bureaucracy.

Thornett's evolution since the split with Healy has been uneven. In our view had the discussions that the WSL begun with us in 1979 been carried through then a principled: fusion might have been possible. Thornett broke off these discussidn in. favour of an unprincipled ‘fusion: with the rapidly rightwards moving Matgamna. The result was a catastrophe - the loss of cadres and the appearance of Socialist Viewpoint - itself indicating a marked ‘shift to the right by -his grouping since’ the -1970s.- oo, : . SO

Another group of ‘anti-Pabloite' coritenders for the WRP's attention are the Socialist Labour

Group (SLG), the British section of Lambert's Fourth International (International Centre of Reconstruction). Formally established in 1979 this group: has its origins in the, Bulletin Group. ‘Its politics have been.mare consistent than THornett's, guided as they are by Pierre Lambert. They have been consistently right-centrist. In particular they, like Militant, have a strategic conception of Labour Party membership. In their case however, this is boosted by profound Stalinophobia and a preferential attitude to social democracy; that is, the SLG consistently. underestimate: the countar-revolutionary and bourgeois politics of social democratic reformism. The SLG, like Lambert's PCI, believe that social democracy's independence from the Kremlin and its commitment to (bourgeois) democracy lays the basis for this preference. In fact this distinction leads to nothing other than opportunism, ignoring as it does the dependence of social democracy on imperialism and its own bour~ geoisie. , In particular, the central slogan of the SLG, “Labour to Power’, (which echoes Healy's 1950s/60s schema,) posits a social-democratic government as a necassary and inevitable outcome of struggles against Thatcher. Such a view is profoundly mistaken and in practice uigarms militants faced with Kinnock doing all he can to demobilise the class struggle now, so that he can “take the power” through an election in the’ future.

The SLG compensate for their opportunist slogans with. fantastic perspective. Their view of reality is only a little less blinkered than Healy's. Despite the setbacks in the class struggle they argue (Fourth International Nov-Dec 1985) that Oritain is in a pre-revolutionary situation. For marxists this term has a precise meaning. Trotsky, writing on France on the eve of the upheavals that accompanied the Popular Front in 1936, described the situation (4p 1934) as pre-revolutionary, He was right. French capitalism was in a severe crisis, pronounced ogApartist tendencies developed in the state, fascism began to grow as a mass force, the proletariat pushed its parties towards unity against the right. For Trotsky this situation meant that arming the proletariat was a task of the day lest the pre-revolutionary situation turn into a counter-revolutionary one. In other words he linked his understanding of the situation to his slogans on the principle that:

‘Qut the most striking features of our epoch of capitalism in decay are intermediate and transitionals situations between the non-revolutionary ond the pre-revolutionary, between the prerevolutionary and the revolutionary or . . . the counter-revolutionary. It is precisely these transitional stages which have decisive importance from the point of view of _ Ralitical strategy.” (Gnevw Ayain Whither France?)

Yet .the SLG imcke no such distinctions betwean the stiayes. For thea the defeat of tho wninars' strike alters nothing, since the 1°55 riots have apparently kept the ‘pre-revolutionary situation! on the.boil. This-is to render the turm ‘pra-rovolutionsry! tcaningless. It is to substitute phrases and formulas for a concrate amailysis of the ruality uf the class struggle. Above all it ignores what Trotsky described as the ‘reciprocal action of objective and subjective factors". It exudes faith in the objective histarical process. In 3 word it is unragenerute dealyisa of tha 1850s and 50s vintage. ; :

In pleco of:.a concrete analysis with appropriate sloyans wo get generalities abaut "dif Ficult and comlox" situatiiuns requiring “the broadest possible front of workers in struggle. So, the SLG offer: “a pfe-revolutionary situstion which, to go foruvard, requires a Labour yovernment under Kinnock und -a united front with only vaguely specificd gocls. In Fact the SLE and the tayalo Lenbertist formation has a stratagic and not a tactics] view of ‘the united front.

4m embrace with the SLE and Lanbertisn would also be to turn onas back on a break with Healy. isu's record of capitulation to petit-bourgeuis democratic forces. They heve abandoned the programe .

of Permanent Revolution in favour of the revolutionary democratic programe. For Trotskyists, revo~- lutionary Gemocratic seman’s and asirations can bu {South Africa today) oxtrainsly importent levers in the proletarian rovolution. Mut they presuppose the indesendence and leadership of the vorking class undgr revolutionary coimunist Leadership if they arc to be successful. The Lawbartists, on

the contrary, cow-tow to the existing leaderships of the anti-dipericlist struyyle. Newsline's past -

uncritical attitude to Sinn Fein and firafat ere painful reninders of the undorlying political unity between Lanvert and Huslyism - despita the 1871 split.

If.the WP menbers really want to break with Healyism, and we ‘think they do, «than thoy will .

also nave to rebuff - through open cliscussion not burseucretic obstructiun - the advances of the The final “anti-Pobloite” suitors that the HAP have encountered at their meetings are the Spartacists. Ue will wast: few words here on this degenerate ond sectarian grouping. Our book. on the Fourth International deals with their whole history. Suffice to say that this oryanisstion broke with any sanblance of Trutskyism whan in 1981 it called for the crushing of Solidurnose by Soviet tanks. It 415 a stalinuphile sect. Little wonder that its oun guru, Jisics Robertson of the SL(US),

set up a ‘Yuri Androvov GBrinadat in his youth section. Rolicnce on the stalinist burgaucracy and. .

despair in the working class are Spartacist hallwarks.

WHERE NOW FOR THE WRP?

The bIRP has inade a break with Healy. The political process underway in the URP indicatus ‘that a political braak with tcalyism - catastrophisin, destructive and sectarian suthods af party buildiny, false* Uialectics, and the capitulation to lcft-reformism and petit-bourgeois nationalism - is currently" taking: place.

Tf this process is to be consleted then che, open discussion, vpromisuy ty the leadership, iwust leave no ston: unturned. Every crim: for which tealy's reyiac was responsivle must be accounted for, aiid wherever possible rectified. Necessarily ¥RP leadurs who were in one way or another oither guilty of or complicit in such crimes (violence in the Labour movement, unprincipied cullaboration with bourgvofs natiunolists etc.) must publicly account fur and repudiate their former actions. Such a process is necessary not in order to exuct retribution, but in orcer to clear tha way to a fresh start undur a trusted leadurship.

Sut in waking this total break with Healyism the "Pe faces serious tkinuers. If it hus nothing to replace lloalyism with then the danger of replacing secbiristiisia uith sppportunica is u rgal one. Thornett's history dewonstratas this all too clearly. In our view it would be as much a mistake For the WRP to try and continue the “anti-Pabloite” tradition as it would for them to join hands with Pablo's descendants in the USEC. ,

The groups that we have briefly surveyed in both chesa traditions remiin begyed dawn in’ tho quiyaire of cantrisia. Since the procrauastic callapse of the FI at the 1951 Conyross, none of these traditions ropresent the continuity of. Trotskyism.¢Their politics are a sharp ramindor that that continuity was shatterud.

The sajor groups in Gritain outside of these traditions - the SUP anc tha RCP - will be no

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allies of the post-dealy WAP. Soth grouys explicitly reject the Pundanentals of Trotskyisia aabodied in the Transitional Programe. Both disavow the nud, for - simuLtanavusly building an international “tendency. Maither’ regard the USSR as any Form of vorkers! state. Far the SUP it ds stato-capitalist, for the ACP it is defiitwd siiaply by anc of its features burwaucratic wastefulness! Ia the class ‘ strugyle the Sup! S‘ecunamism lusds it to twist agg: turn according to the pace and direction of the , Class struggle. Thus xecent defeats have witnessed it moanin) that the ‘downturn! iagans that revolutiunaries cdn do Little or nothing to affect the class struygle. The RCP, on the other hand, have scant regard fur the actual class struygle and the real ‘labour OVETICNE « Through a nuinbor of Front organisations - Workurs Against Nucism, the Irish Freedom fovewent ete - they have ‘created their oun ‘purfuct' Inbour sovemont. It way only inelude a couple

“of hundred’ people at’ the most, but it is not marred by the reformist politics that. dominate the

actual, milliéns strong. labour movement. .The RCP are classic sectarians whose fantasy world is sustdined for thei by the numerous video-makers: they have recruited from one of their-prime areas of intervention - media studies courses ‘in the colleges!

We believe that the WRP must decide im which direction it is going, during the open discussion period. If it does not then it risks the fate of reproducing the politics of one variety of centrisia or another.

Indeed, a pre-requisite for a Fruitful discussion is to first of all reject the simple division of the political world into ‘counter-revolutionaries’, 'CIA agents’ and the revolutionary party ‘(WRP). The political spectrum is occupied mastly be varieties of centrism, some leftward, some rightward moving. The WRP inust examine all groups in a spirit davoid of sectarian malice and without ignoring the political defects of groups (SLG, SV) simply because they were once the victims of Healyism. Certainly, in this case tuo wronys, do not make a right.

REVOLUTIONARY REGROUPMENT.

The open discussion must, therefora, set itself a clear objective. We believe that that of jec— tive should be revolutionary regroupwent on a principled basis through a fusion with Workers Power. We submit that our politics have avoided the twin dangers of opportunism and sectarianism. In the . fost recent acid-test, the miners’ strike, we fought for the general strike to helj) tha miners to

victory. But wa did not invoke spectres of Bonapartism in order to lend this sloyen credence. We rooted it in the unfolding dynamic of the strike and raised it in a focused way at key moments - during the docks strike, when the NUi's assets were seized, during the ‘TUC Congress.

Horeover, while we gave critical support to. Scargill whenever he acted in the interests of the winers and of the working class, we never fell into the uncritical stance of preaching reliance on Scargill that was so fashionable on the left, including, it must be said, in your oun ranks. Throughout the strike and since we have called for the building of a militant jainority movement in the NUM. Most importantly. these political positions were not mere literary exercises.. Despite our limited size, our organisation threw itself into every aspect of the strike, Our work enabled us to launch and sustain a. special bulletin for miners, The Red Miner.

We do not ask. the WRP to judge us purely on the miners strike. lWe are prepared to submit documents and to enyaye in joint work and discussions to prove that our record in the miners' strike was no accident. On the key questions of reformism, the unions, the FI, key revolutionary crises around the world, Stalinism and many other questions, we have maintained consistantly revolutionary positions in contradistinction to the waverings of the centrists. We believe that an honest discussion on the positions we have. developed - in. full view of and even with the participation of any of the centrist groups we have listed - can prove this to the WRP and help it make its final break with Healyism without falling prey to opportunism.

A fusion of our forces at the and of such a process would enable an organisation Zumbering hundreds, with a firni orientation to the ‘working class, to raise the banner of authentic Trotskyism in Britain and mount a serious challenge to the domination of the far-left by centrism in its sectarian and opportunist forms. Goth our organisations have a responsibility to seize such an opportunity.

The defeat of the miners' strike has not marked the end of the class struggle. Gut it makes the conduct of that struggle more difficult. Defeat has strenothened the strangulating grip of Kinnock and the union bureaucracy on workers organizations. Struggles tend to be longer. Defeats are more comdon, The bureaucracy, for their own purposes, are leading the retreat. The defeat of the miners’ strike has left the left-reformist bureaucracy, personified by Scargill, winded and unable to stay the retreat. Yet, at the same time, the Tories ara divided and unable to capitalise on their victories. Dut they will be able to do so if the retreat of organised Labour continues.

Stapping that retreat means challenging the reformist leadership and building a new leader-

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SONNE reece tee tant ptr apm niet oy oe tae mes ayes LOTT oar eCINTESR re ee

ship, a revolutiona: ty leadership, accountable to the rafk and file. Solving the crisis of leadership cannot be done overnight. Pratending that an ‘oryanisation ‘of Aundteds is already the alternative leadership merely resolves the crisis of mankind in thé heads of ‘éhe organisations inombors not in reality. tle contend that a revolutionary regroupment of our forces would be a sinmall but significant step in the direction of building a real revolutionary party ih Oritain. It could rally many’ new recruits, standing, as it would, as an alternative pole of attraction to the centrist groups, : : '

It could produce a weekly paper that is neither just propagandist or agitational but combines both functions. It wouldnot merely report struggles, but offer a strategy for winning them. It would be open to debate and polemic without for a minute deflecting from its primary pre-occupation with the class struggle. Such a‘paper, used effectively b. y an organisation of revolutionary cadres orientated to the class struggle, is desperately neaded in Britain today. Revolutionary regroupment could lay the basis for suchia paper.

POLETECAL Gt! BUTTS FOR ELS

OMe

It is our view that only a thorough discussion between our organisations can ascertain whether or not principled fusion is possible. We wish to point out to you the politital guidelines that underly uur proposal for regroupment. In 1975 we were expelled from the International Socialists Following the 1974 miners’ strike and Labcur's e@lectotal victories there was a ferment on the left not dissimilar.to that which exists today. The class struggle was the catalyst for turmoil within centrism. The fact that between revolutionisi and reformisin centrism exists and that it is not counter-revolutionary, but transitory, was clearly demonstrated. Furthermore our own split from centrisin shows that revolutionary communists can be won from the ranks of centrist organisations. It is imperative to know how to relate to centrisin if winning more subjective revolutionaries form its ranks is to be achieved.

A concrete ansiysis of which direction centrism is moving in ~ leftwards or rightwards - is essential. Oy ascertaining the direction of an orgafisation appropriate tactics can be developed. In our view these tactics revolve around encouraging, through debate and polemic, a process of splits and fusions. Splits must be made from cantrism towards revolutionary communism. Fusion between comrades carrying through such splits and oe wine revolutionary groups must be attempted. However, this whole process must be conducted in an honest political fashion and not via factional manoeuvres. Unprincipled manoeuvres will, in our experience; weaken the chances for revolutionary regroupment. In 1975 we attempted to apply the tactic of splits and fusions in an honest fashion. tle split from the IS and fused with Morkers’ Fight to form the I-CL. That fusion failed as a result of Matyamna's dishonest and unprincipled methods.

In 1979/80 we attemsted to conduct an honest discussion with Thornett. We were repaid by being shunned while the ill-fated deal with Matgamnaa was hatched. The lesson we draw from both experiences is not that splits and fusions are impossible but that both must be carried through on an honest, principled and exclusively political basis. Thus we reject absolutely raids, the sending into other organisations of spi2s, ‘moles’ etc + provocative manoeuvres that characterise the IST and are counterproductive of political clarification and regroupment. Sects and cults can be built in this way not communist organisations. We pledge and promise a politically loyal discussion and wherever possible practical united action with the WRP. Ue believe that the WAP must effect a complete political split with Healyism and toyyther with Workers Power work out a principled basis for fusion. We suamit to you the key plants of a programe for regroupment in a suwmarised form. These planks will, of ccurse, have to be developed in discussion: g

1. Defence of the incspandence of the working class in all spheres of the class struggle. We oppose all alliances the: sudvordinate the working class in any way. We fight all forms of class collaboration. ite reject all reformist strategies for the achievement of socialism.

2. Recognition that the Labour Party is a bourgeois workers party which is, in essence, a counter~ -revolutionary instrunent of the bouryzoisie within the workers’ movement. A recognition that the bureaucratic caste who dominate tise unions are, likewise a counter~revolutionary caste. We refuse to preach relience on any section of the Labour leadership or the union bureaucracy by the working class since we recognise that the left within the LP and unions, while they reflect the pressure of the advancing masses, are also, in Trotsky's phrase, a ‘brake’ upon the masses.

3 Recognition that Stalinisa is a counter-revolutionary, reforinist trend within the workers’ movement, Stalinisna is not singly an expression of tha Soviet bureaucracy. Parties can break

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with the soviet bureaucracy and remain stalinist as the experiance of Yugoslavia and China demonstrates. This indicates that Stalinism has, as Trotsky predicted, broken up along social patriotic lines as a result of the reactionary theory of 'socialism in one country’,

Flowing from the fact that social~democratic and stalinist reformisin dominate most of the world's labour iovements, the revolutionary use of the united front tactic is a necessary element of the fight to win communist leadership and to break the influence of reforaism through struggle. The united front is not the uncritical bloc that the principal centrist tenJencies pretend it is. It is unity in action in the interests of the working class and full freeduin of criticism within the united front.

In Britain today against the majority of the centrists we deny that total entry into the Labour Party is the necessary and permanent form of the united front. Likewise we condemn the abstentionism of the SUP and the RCP with regard to the LP. tie argue for fraction work in the LP on the model of the early CPG. The aim of this work is to build a revolutionary tendency on a full revolutionary programme which can wage a fight with the Labour leaders with the objective of winning Labour's base to communist. At the same time the revolutionary fraction will be obliged to undertake a series of united fronts against the right, without ever liquidating itself into centrist or left- reformist groupings.

We regard strugyle in the unions and workplaces as the key focus for cevelutionaried They ¢ far more than Labour Party wards, are at the sharp end of the class struggle. In. tha’ unions

‘we seek. to build communist fractions around industry-appropriate bulletins. At the same time

we recognise. that militants who are not yet communists are prepared to fight both the bureaucrats and the capitalists. To unite in struggle with these militants we seek to build anti-capitalist, anti-bureaucratic rank send file movements. While we fight for communist Political leadership in such movements we do not seck to make them -the organisatipnal property of tha party. Our aim in the unions is to transform the unions into ravolutionary instruments of struggle.

We give full support to the struggles of all oppressed groups in capitalist society. We fight

. for the full liberation of women, but we reject the feminist notion that women can be sexually

liberated under capitalism or separately from the struygle against Capitalism. We fight to build a working class women's inovement and ‘seek to win communist leadership of it. We apply variants of this tactic to other sections of the o,pressed - blacks, youth, gays and lesbians ~ in order to give their strugyle against oppression a working class content that links it integrally with the struggle against capitalist exploitation. The fact that such struggles have been or are led by white-collar or petit-bourgeois elements should in na way lead comnunists to neglect these struggles or adapt to backward clements in the consciousness of workers within capitalist society (workerism).

We recognise that imperialism has divided the world into oporessed and oppressor nations. lle unconditionally support the struggle of oppressed nations against imperialism (Argentina against Gritain, clicaragua against the US etc.). te yive unconditional support for all genuine national liberation movements (IMA, PLO etc.) even where they are not led by the oroletariat. In the imperialist countries we apply the principle’ of unconditional but critical support to such movements. We apply the tactic of the anti-imperialist united front with such forces in the colonies and semi-colonies themselves. That is we unite with them in struggle against imperialism but at the same time we defend the independence of the working class. We are for the building of revolutionary parties in the colonies and sewi-colonies based on the programme of permanent revolution. That is we recoynise that denocratic tasks can gonly be finally resolved via the proletarian revolution.

While we defend bourgeois and petit-bourgeois nationalist regimes im the imperialised countries against imperialism (regardless of their political nature) we do not extend them our political support. To do so would be to abandon the independence of the working class and its struggle for power in these countries.

We regard the USSR as a doyenerated workers’ state, requiring a political revolution led by a Trotskyist party to facilitate the transition to socialism. We regard all of the the Stalinist states in Eastern Europe, Asia and Cuba as workers’ states which were degenerate from birth and, like the USSR, cannot progress to socialism without political revolutions led by new revolutionary parties. In East Germany in 1953, Hungary in 195G and Czechoslavakia in 1964 we stood four square with the workers against the Soviet tanks. In Poland in 1980/81 we stood with Solidarnosc against the bureaucracy and against Jaruzelski. We unconditionally defend

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10.

11.

all the workers’ states against attacks from imperialism.

We, together with groups in the Movement for a Revolutionary Comaunist International (MRCI) with whom we have fraternal relations - Arbeiter Standpunk (Austria), Irish Workers Group, Pouvier Guvrier (France), Gruppe Arbeitermacht (ulest Germany) and comrades in exile from Chile believe that. the Fourth International no longer exists as a revolutionary international. Its major Fragnents, the USEC, the Lambortists, the International Workers Leaque of Moreno, the International Comaittee etc, are centrist caricatures of Trotsky's revolutionary international. They are the products of the Fi's death ayony which led to its total collapse into centtism at tha 1951 Worls Congress which abanduned the prograwne of political revolution with regard to Yuyoslavia. At that point the continuity of Trotskyism waa shattered. It must be re-established through the re-foundiny of a Leninist-Trotskyist International. To this end the HRCI, through collective discussion is seeking to accumulate common programmatic positions which alone can lay the basis for international democratic centralism and a re~-founded International. , The party in Sritain and internationally that we seek to build will be based on the principles of scientific socialism laid down by Marx, Engels, the struygles waged by the Bolshevik Party for a revolutionary course in the Second International, the first four congresses of the revolutionary Coinintern and the Transitional Programme of the FI. But we recognise that the programmatic collapse of the FI obliges us to re-elaborate the programme, to encompass new developments (the expansion of Stalinism etc) and to rescue its demands from the distortions they have suffered at the hands of the centrists. However, we stand for the re-elaboration of the Transitional Proyramna on the firm basis of the revolutionary method enshrined in that pragramme itself.

These eleven points are a sumaary of our programme. te are willing to supply. you with documents that substantiate and develop each of these points. They are the points around which agreement needs to be established if a principled fusion is to take place.

HOW SHOULO WE PROCEED?

To facilitate a process of regroupment we propose the following:

, That we be allowed to have observer status at the UWRP's forthcoming conference.

The establishing of regular formal discussions between our leading cosnittees.

: The establishing of links between our branches/union fractions etc, for both political and

educational discussions and the carrying out of united work in the labour ovement. —

fin exchange af key documents, to be decided upon by a weeting of the leading committees and the establishinent of a joint discussion bulletin open to contributions from any member of either of our tendencies.

The holding. in the spring of a joint membership meeting on the histary of. the SLL, Stalinisn and the FI, open to participation from other invited grouys.

The production by both organisations of balance sheats of the discussions held, in the Late spring to ascertain whether or not fusion proceadinys can coumence. a Congresses of the respective organisations to vote on whether or not fusion is possible fol-

lowing this discussion process. , Y

We submit this letter and these proposals to the WRP for your consideration.

Yours fraternally,

WORKERS POUER Political Committee. February 16th, 1956.

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