Revolutionary Communist Party UK 1980s
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Just uploaded to libcom, a pamphlet on how information was used in the RCP UK to stifle debate and maintain an authoritarian structure
http://libcom.org/library/one-step-beyond-smash-revolutionary-communist-party
Interesting and informative. I see 'The Wages System Under New Management', specifically the chapter on the ideology of state-capitalism, gets a mention in the Footnotes.
jondwhite wrote:At some point RCP dropped Leninism and became spiked onlineSpiked Online occupies the former offices of the RCP together with the Institute of Ideas, an organisation founded by Claire Fox, a regular panellist on the BBC Radio Four programme, The Moral Maze and ex-member of the RCP.
jondwhite wrote:At some point RCP dropped Leninism and became spiked onlineAre you sure they've rejected Leninism. There's some pretty shitty stuff that gets written through Spiked.
DJP wrote:jondwhite wrote:At some point RCP dropped Leninism and became spiked onlineAre you sure they've rejected Leninism. There's some pretty shitty stuff that gets written through Spiked.
Good question, it is I suppose possible they are deep undercover, not sure if I heard this suggested once. Publicly they are not leninists so presuming there was a disavowal somewhere, but open to correction on this.
During the Big Strike, they had some strange ideas which seemed at times to be close the the Union of Democratic Mineworkers. In the North East the were given the title the Ray Chadburn Party.. Their paper "the next step" was nick named "the Last Stop"We debated them in Newcastle at the Tyneside Cinema in June '87, with Steve Coleman representing the Party. From recollection I recall feeling embarrased for the poor sucker put up by the RCP.The debate is on the wikipedia site and is referenced as tape no 6 in the tapes library. If a link was available it would be great to see if my recollections are correct.
jondwhite wrote:DJP wrote:jondwhite wrote:At some point RCP dropped Leninism and became spiked onlineAre you sure they've rejected Leninism. There's some pretty shitty stuff that gets written through Spiked.
Good question, it is I suppose possible they are deep undercover, not sure if I heard this suggested once. Publicly they are not leninists so presuming there was a disavowal somewhere, but open to correction on this.
After 1991, the party metamorphosed from a self-professed Trotskyist group into one which publicly took a libertarian humanist position. It was disbanded in 1997, although a number of former members maintain a loose political network to promote its ideas. Some of those members now take the position that the terms 'left-wing' and 'right-wing' no longer carry any meaning (ring any bells?). George Monbiot, for what's it's worth, has argued that the RCP became part of the "pro-corporate libertarian right".
Quote:In 1988, it (the RCP) set up a magazine called Living Marxism, later LM. By this time, the organisation, led by the academic Frank Furedi, the journalist Mick Hume and the teacher Claire Fox, had moved overtly to the far right. LM described its mission as promoting a "confident individualism" without social constraint. It campaigned against gun control, against banning tobacco advertising and child pornography, and in favour of global warming, human cloning and freedom for corporations. It defended the Tory MP Neil Hamilton and the Bosnian Serb ethnic cleansers. It provided a platform for writers from the corporate thinktanks the Institute for Economic Affairs and the Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise. Frank Furedi started writing for the Centre for Policy Studies (founded by Keith Joseph and Margaret Thatcher) and contacting the supermarket chains, offering, for £7,500, to educate their customers "about complex scientific issues".https://www.theguardian.com/education/2003/dec/09/highereducation.uk2
gnome wrote:the terms 'left-wing' and 'right-wing' no longer carry any meaning (ring any bells?).Yes. Hardy used to say this. The renegade!
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