New international
Socialist Press1981 1981-03-11Read it in the scan (PDF), scan page 6 →
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MIKE, I GONNA BOMB NOPE..
A meeting of 65 people assembled in Caxton Hall, London on February 28 to hear Nahuel Moreno, leader of the Argentine PST, Paddy Healy of the Irish LWR and speakers from the British SLG proclaim the launching of the Fourth International (International Committee).
The FI(IC) was formed at a conference held in Paris at Christmas organised by the Parity Committee, which had for a year previously brought together • Pierre Lambert's Organising Committee for the Reconstruction of the Fourth International, Moreno's Bolshevik Faction, and the Leninist Trotskyist Tendency.
The Christmas conference adopted a series of 41 general theses on world politics and established an international committee claiming to represent groups in 40 countries.
The February 28 rally/forum however offered those present little conception of the work being done in 39 of those sections-though Paddy Healy's contribution focussed on the LWR's fight for supporting strikes and general strike action in Ireland to back the republic. an 'H' Block hunger strikes.
Moreno in contrast stuck almost exclusively to the realm of history in his contribution, portraying the FI(IC) as the continuity of orthodox Trotskyism.
He gave little clue as to the tangible form taken by such orthodoxy in Latin America or elsewhere in the world.
Speakers had been invited from the IMG, Workers Power, ICL and Workers Socialist League to take part in the forum. But the IMG, clinging to their position of ignoring the very existence of the FI(IC) refused to participate, and no speaker from the ICL arrived.
Diatribe Workers Power representative Stuart King presented a Spartacist-style diatribe against Moreno and Lambert which demonstrated above all the sectarian degeneration of his organisation which has nothing concrete to offer in the task of reconstructing the Fourth International.
From the WSL, John Lister welcomed the opportunity to argue the political positions of the Trotskyist International Liaison Committee, which fights for the political reconstruction of the Fourth International.
Pointing to the growing working class challenge both to imperialist rule and to the Stalinist bureaucracies, he underlined some of the political and programmatic questions to be confronted by Trotskyistsnone of which have been resolved by the FI(IC) Theses.
He underlined political differences between the TILC and both Moreno and Lambert, and, while attacking the IMG's failure to participate in the forum, sharply criticised the sectarian stance of the FI(IC)'s British section who rejected a similar invitation from the TILC last summer.
Ihere is a need for a thorough, open and objective discussion on the political tasks for the Trotskyist movement, argued Comrade Lister-insisting that such discussion could only be impeded by sectarian proclamations that any particular international current must be regarded as "the" Fourth He pointed to the TILC's document The Transitional Programme in Today's Class Struggle' as a contribution to such a discussion. It is to be hoped that the SLG and FI(IC) will continue the dialogue begun at the rally as part of the fight for the reconstruction of the Fourth International.