[Marxism] re: Marxism] Militant, Spain etc

[DAVID MURRAY <dmurray@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

PF
By contrast, the DSP, whatever their faults - and I've some important
disagreements with them - struck out on their own and grew and developed
as a serious left current which is probably bigger now than the US SWP,
despite Australia only being 1/14th of the population of the US.
DM
I severely doubt that the DSP is bigger (both numericaly or in Specific weight).
>From recent accounts the membership of the DSP has fallen to below 250 for the 
>first time
since the early 1990s, but critically, some of their ex-members do a lot of 
their factional
work in the Socialist Alliance.
The difference between the US SWP and Australian DSP is largely cosmetic. Only 
the DSP don't
always have such hyper-hyperbolic statements on their publications as the US SWP
(my favorite being "Imperialism has lost the Cold War"). But they maintain the 
rather stupid comparison, "Iraq: A new Vietnam".
In common, the DSP and SWPUSA use guerilla romanticism is a tool for 
recruitement of youth in the
absence of politics. They both have adopted Stalinist positions (Stalinism 
without Stalin), only the DSP has given a kind of ham-fisted theoretical 
justification for their neo-stalinist politics.
They also both hold an extremely sectarian position within the trade union 
movement, although
it manifests itself in different ways.
Most importantly, both parties are incapable of relating themselves to workers, 
especially during elections. In the recent NSW council polls, for the most part 
the Socialist Alliance (front of the DSP with a few independents and small 
groups) oscillated between Parroting (spelling?) the Greens and raising 
ultra-leftist demands.


David Murray



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