Left Unity.org / People’s Assembly
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alanjjohnstone wrote:If this was the first ever attempt at unity, a totally new venture, never ever tried before, then perhaps some of us would be more receptive. But it is not , is it? What is being forgotten is that there has been repeated attempts at this unity and if we have failed in our approach, those, too, have failed Obviously, situations and circumstances do change and offer some hope that the outcome may be different but when history is deliberately and purposefully ignored and all those previous unity moves never discussed or debated and i am not just talking about the past decade or two but over a 100 years because it may challenge and undermine the prevailing narrative which has to be one of optimism. Spoil-sports who cast some well-founded doubts like ourselves are most unwelcome and not permitted. The promise of open broad church has been demonstrated to be false by Stuart who grabbed the ball and went away home in a huff because we don't accept claims by assertion but rather demand evidence and proof that we question and quiz for clarity. That type of investigation into political ideas is our scientific socialism. “There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact.” ― Arthur Conan Doyle
The left unity should be called the left disunity because the historical experience has shown that from those groups new splits have always emerged
Left Unity Founding Congress Saturday 30 November 2013 – 9.00am to 5.00pm Venue: Royal National Hotel, Bedford Way, London WC1H 0DG Volunteers welcome to hand out Party Literature to delegates to Left Unity Founding Congress at the Royal National Hotel, registration begins 9.00am, congress starts 10.00am
ALB wrote:jpodcaster wrote:Also let's not forget that, whatever your views on the "wishy-washy reformism" of LU, the organisation contains a significant minority of men and women with a commitment to a socialism virtually indistinguishable from that envisaged by the SPGB, including ex-members and sympathisers.Does that mean that Robin Cox's World in Common group has decided to "enter" the new party?
AdamJust to be clear – the World in Common Group is no more "Robin Cox's group" than the SPGB is " Adam Buick's group". And, no, WIC has not decided to "enter the new party" since that would be completely at variance with its stated purpose. WiC embraces a diversity of currents or tendencies within the non-market anti-statist political sector – including, of course, SPGB-style impossibilism – and is not to be linked with any one particular tendency or current, Party or group. It therefore has nothing to say as an organisation on the matter under discussion though individual members are free to reach their own conclusions. Wic is not, and never has been, a political party. Speaking personally, I do not know enough about this proposed new political party to comment authoritatively on it.. I live in Spain so forgive me if political developments happening in that far flung rain-sodden little island somewhere off the North West coast of Europe appear a little remote. I do occasionally pop in and have a nosey around on the SPGB forum (which, I have to say, does the SPGB much credit) which is how I came across your comment above. I have a lot of other things on my plate at the moment and wouldn't normally be drawn into a discussion these days but could not let your comment pass unanswered. Speaking personally, from the little I know of LUP, and here I obviously stand to be corrected, I am slightly puzzled by Stuart's preference for some other platform than the "socialist platfom". I would have thought that thatwould have been the more obvious one for a socialist to support – although am I correct in saying it has attracted the usual suspects in the form of disaffected trots, cpgbers. and the like and that this perhaps might be the reason why Stuart is disinclined to support this platform? Perhaps he can enlighten me on this? I would also add that while reference has been made to the Second International, it is not enough simply to possess a "correct" understanding of what socialism is about. The Second International amply displayed such an understanding in elaborating its revolutionary maximum programme yet, at the same time, pursued a minimum programme of reforms. Inevitably the latter crowded out the former and, like the Cheshire Cats proverbial grin, any vision or hope of a genuine socialist alternative to capitalism faded with the rising political fortunes of these fake "socialist" Social Democratic cum Labour type parties. In truth, that is what would concern me most about LUP. What guarantee is there that it would not go down the same road and arrive at the same dead end, assuming it were to take off as a political party? On the other hand, there is the perennial question of "what to do in the meantime" which, I quess, is something that the LUP is trying after a fashion to address and which, unfortunately, the SPGB has yet to adequately address. Putting the case for socialism is all very well – and, of course, absolutely indispensable – but is it compelling enough on its own to make a difference? Inadvertently it comes across as an invitation to abandon what matters in the here and now for the sake of a long term goal – however much you insist that socialism is your immediate goal. Realistically, and this is the point, most workers dont consider it is anywhere near immediately attainable even if this boils down to a self fulfilling prophecy as far as they are concerned. So what are they to do in the meantime? More to the point what are we to say in the meantime if reformism is not the answer? That, I guess, is the real dilemma we constantly face as revolutionary socialists
I was thinking about something Stuart said – about the glaring space left of Labour Party that is vacant, ready to be filled by LUP. Isn't the reason it is there because everytime a left-reformist party tries to occupy such a position, it invariably gets drawn back into the mainstream arena of reformism since that is where a reformist actually has any real significance? Over the years several parties have tried and failed to take advantage with left recipes that are supposedly more radical than Labour's, the old ILP, for instance, (who remembers the Socialist League of the 1930s) and like some of the Left groups they too had the personalities such as Maxton, but the right-ward drift despite language always manifested itself. Even Germany's Die Linke are likely to form part of the SPD revival, just as the Green Party was integrated into the SPD. Just a quick thought that requires me building upon it more
Welcome back, Robin. People had been wondering what had happened to you
robbo203 wrote:WIC has not decided to "enter the new party"That's good news, but it's interesting to speculate on what an individual socialist or group of socialists could do if they decided to "enter" and bore from within, like the Trots do, a non-socialist party such a the new LU party (or, for that matter, the Green Party or the Labour Party)Most of the discussion in such parties will be about which reforms to advocate and prioritise and, presumably, socialists wouldn't have much to say about that except to bang on about their temporary nature, how they couldn't solve the problem, etc. In fact, they'd be doing what we do outside any party: trying to convince fellow-workers that the capitalist system cannot be reformed so as to work in the interest of the majority class of wage and salary workers and that the only way out is to convert the means of production into the common property of all under democratic control so that they could be used to satisfy people's needs not to make a profit for their owners.I would imagine that sooner or later the non-socialists in the party would be questioning what people putting such arguments are doing in their party. They might even have more respect for people like us who stay out and argue our case independently. I would guess that this is the position of Andrew Burgin, one of the leading promoters of the new party, who Stuart says likes us. He has in fact visited our offices a number of times to buy up old pamphlets and books and back issues of the Socialist Standard to sell in his bookshop.
" WIC has not decided to "enter the new party" since that would be completely at variance with its stated purpose."Out of curiousity what arguments pro or con were raised in this WIC decision? Did a debate on the question actually take place?BTW, my browser raises a malware warning when i tried to go to World in Common website, something to look into. Often they are false alarms but it scared me off and probably others.
alanjjohnstone wrote:" WIC has not decided to "enter the new party" since that would be completely at variance with its stated purpose."Out of curiousity what arguments pro or con were raised in this WIC decision? Did a debate on the question actually take place?If I can reply for Robin. To say that someone has "not decided" to do something is not the same as saying "they decided not to" do it.
Hi Alan – yes, the World in Common website was hacked and malware introduced – all the files have been removed and disinfected now (although the warning still appears in some browsers).JP
alanjjohnstone wrote:" WIC has not decided to "enter the new party" since that would be completely at variance with its stated purpose."Out of curiousity what arguments pro or con were raised in this WIC decision? Did a debate on the question actually take place?BTW, my browser raises a malware warning when i tried to go to World in Common website, something to look into. Often they are false alarms but it scared me off and probably others.Not sure how an internet discussion group can "enter a new party" anyhow?JP
ALB wrote:alanjjohnstone wrote:" WIC has not decided to "enter the new party" since that would be completely at variance with its stated purpose."Out of curiousity what arguments pro or con were raised in this WIC decision? Did a debate on the question actually take place?If I can reply for Robin. To say that someone has "not decided" to do something is not the same as saying "they decided not to" do it.
The unity i will gladly join despite the background and politics of some of the signatories. http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/nov/21/fight-attack-trade-unions
This thread got me to thinking, whatever happened to the local trades councils?In ye olden days the Communist Party and Trotskyists saw them as the embryos of the soviets, and there was a lively struggle to dominate them and replace the "moderates" of the trade union bureaucracy but even that has disappeared. At best they organise a local May Day ? Or maybe take part in the selection of a local Labour Party candidate? But what else?Surely if we are to talk about a re-vitalised united trade union movement against the austerity cuts, at a local level, the co-ordination of town and city union branches must be somewhere on the agenda. But i fail to see any re-birth of the trades councils. Am i mistaken and in some parts of the country there exists active trades councils? I'm not suggested any role for the SPGB but raising it as an issue for trade unionists and all those who strive for unity.
When Left Unity does not mean unity.From the Glasgow LU grouphttp://leftunityglasgow.org/Some in Glasgow LU supports independence and the development of a separate left organisation in Scotland and others in Glasgow LU oppose independence"Left Unity as an organisation remains officially agnostic on Scottish independence and allows its members and contributors to campaign freely and openly for whichever position they support." I see Hillel Ticktin has addressed LU on what a socialist sociarty will be like. http://vimeo.com/76883435 Bit too long for my server to broadband to download
alanjjohnstone wrote:The CPGB take on co-ops here.http://www.cpgb.org.uk/home/weekly-worker/988/co-op-scandal-labour-is-the-real-targetAnd i have never read such a stalwart defence of the Labour Party"…the bourgeoisie, even now, does not quite trust the Labour Party, and would rather it ceased to exist, or were at least relegated to a position of impotence. This would emphatically not be good news for the left. For many, Labour still represents some sort of independent representation of workers. Its reliance on a working class, and left-leaning voter base, is evidenced by Ed Miliband’s quiet dumping of the New Labour project and fractional moves to the left. Despite all the recent attacks by the right, Labour is still the most likely port of call for the millions outraged by austerity, not any of the ‘Labour mark two’ projects being hawked around. Genuine Marxists must engage in order to highlight the contradictions of Labour and build a pole within it – not hold their noses for the sake of ‘revolutionary purity’…"The eventual and inevitable route of the new Left [Unity] Party ?This group is infiltrating both the new Left [Unity?] Party and the Labour Party. They're worse (got even less principles) than the Trotskyists. They're going to have a problem at election times, though, with half of their members campaigning for one candidate and the other half for another.
I have never seen a left unity.. My personal experiences have always shown to me that left unity means more disunity more cliques, and more splits
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