Re: Where did ISO come from in Australia

["Alan Bradley" <alanb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> From: Gary MacLennan
> I can only really talk about Brisbane.  The ISO came out of the anarchist
> Self Management group plus one ex -CP and Spart named Graeme Grassie.
> The space was opened for them by the non-militant line that the SWP (DSP)
> pushed in the Civil Liberties protests.  This line was meant to push the
> ex-Mandelites into breaking discipline and providing grounds for their
> expulsion.  It had nothing to do with the attitude of the DSP to the
> protests.  It was purely opportunistic.

I wasn't around during this period, and Gary was.

However "This line was meant to push the ex-Mandelites into breaking
discipline and providing grounds for their expulsion" simply says that the
SWP leadership were fools who deliberately wanted to destroy their own
organisation.  There are alternative explanations.

This is my explanation:  the SWP position was essentially correct.  The
Civil Liberties movement, that is, the Brisbane Left, came to fetishise the
tactics of civil disobedience, to a point where it became seen as a
desirable goal for militants to be arrested.  Yes - you heard me - the Left
sought to get its militants arrested.  Every Friday evening.  This Left was
smashed.

On the other side, the SWP was influenced by the "conservative",
formalistic "mass action" tactics of the US SWP.  This tactical approach is
broadly correct, except when it gets fetishised in the manner in which the
Australian SWP did it, which I think was a manner also shared by the US
SWP.

The behaviour of the SWP was consistent with its subsequent behaviour, as
was that of the posturing fool left, so I don't see the need for a
conspiracy theory.

(Oh god, Gary, here we go again.  I was hoping we wouldn't have this debate
again...)

Alan Bradley
alanb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx