Re: [Marxism] France: New Anti-Capitalist Party `a very exciting initiative'

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

PoliticNow@xxxxxxx wrote:

Unfortunately, this post does not make the questions and answers in the 
interview clear. It is always a good idea to insert "Q" and "A" when you 
crosspost such material. I dealt with this interview on my blog at: 
http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2008/12/28/the-fight-in-the-swp-conclusion-what-kind-of-party-we-need/.
 
I found the interviewee, John Mullen, to be an interesting example of 
British SWP sectarianism. Let me elaborate.

Mullen says:
> I personally would like to see the NPA declare: âThe NPA is a party which 
> has 
> some people who are revolutionaries and others are not. Debate will continue 
> within the party on these issues, while together we build all the struggles  
> which are needed to oppose the dictatorship of profit.â This is not really  
> happening. There is a tendency to hide differences. So for example, on the  
> question of whether the NPA is a revolutionary party or not, the posters will 
>  
> say âA party to revolutionise societyâ and a whole number of other 
> formulations 
> which avoid the question. 

He wants the NPA (New Anti-Capitalist Party) to be divided obviously 
among "revolutionaries" and "reformists", a formula that guided SWP 
participation in RESPECT and led to the disaster that is now threatening 
to split the SWP. Some people never learn. These categories are not very 
useful when it comes to RESPECT, let alone the NPA. Reformism is not a 
function of *ideology* but structure and institutions. You can be a 
reformist and still proclaim the need for revolution. If you ever needed 
any evidence of this, just review the writings of Karl Kautsky over his 
entire lifetime. He never said that he was for capitalist reform. He 
always insisted that he was for revolution, but only when the objective 
conditions have ripened... By analogy, take figures such as George 
Galloway and Ralph Nader. Neither one of them would ever proclaim the 
need for socialist revolution, but each in their own way posed serious 
challenges to business as usual in capitalist politics. The role of 
revolutionaries is to figure out a way to build bridges to such 
politicians and not burn them.

Mullen says:
> So, it is an ongoing question. To emphasise that the aim of the LCR is not to 
> control the NPA, the LCR is officially dissolving itself just before the  
> foundation of the NPA, and there is no plan to maintain an LCR current inside 
>  
> the NPA. I think it likely that the different currents that were in the LCR 
> will  end up setting up three or four currents in the NPA, which seems fine 
> to 
> me. As  Socialisme International, our tiny group of comrades, along with a 
> couple  of dozen others will certainly set up openly a current based on IS 
> ideas 
> (close  to British Socialist Workers Party's theories). 

Get this? The "tiny group of comrades" in France who are connected to 
Alex Callinicos's mother ship will "set up openly a current based on IS 
ideas". What ever happened to Karl Marx's proposal, I wonder:

"The Communists do not form a separate party opposed to the other 
working-class parties.

"They have no interests separate and apart from those of the proletariat 
as a whole.

"They do not set up any sectarian principles of their own, by which to 
shape and mould the proletarian movement."

(Communist Manifesto)

What's sad about Mullen's cluelessness is that it is most certainly 
shared by the Australian DSP that printed this interview in Links. When 
I proposed that the DSP should have dissolved itself as the LCR is now 
planning to do, one of their members (or ex-members, I am not sure) 
shrieked about how I had an answer for everything. I don't have an 
answer for everything, but I am pretty damned sure about the sectarian 
business.











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