Socialism by Numbers

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Why You Should Be A Socialist By Paul Foot, Published by the Socialist Workers Party, price 35p. Reviewed by Alastair Green. Rights - an event whose completely reformist orientation has spurred on a wave of resignations from the National Abortion Campaign, and -exposed the complete inadequacy of "single issue" campaigns.

And if the IMG stand shoulder to shoulder with the Communist irarty on these policies, they manage to stand to the right of the Stalinists on the question of the Bullock Report in yet another article in the February 3rd Red Weekly.

Hoping that dropping the Trotskyist programme willl bring them closer to some imagined group of workers confused by Bullock, the IMG article astonishingly calls for:

"Full implementation of the original TUC proposals"

Even Bert Ramelson, CP Industrial Urganiser, condemnea inese proposals as 'class collaborationist'. The reason is clear. The TUC openly argue that their position is based on the concept that:

"The TUC believes... that it is тегу important to establish the essentially joint interest of labour and capitul in the enterprise lis and that management function carried out within a framework of policy making in which the workpeople, using the machinery of their trade unions, can formulate and express their interests in the direction of a company's affairs"

(General Council Report, 1976, p322, my emphasis).

Marxists of course reject such an approach. Labour and capital have distinct and opposite class interests which cannot be welded into one.

FEB 26th 1977 11am FOR WOME The Bullock proposals, tar trom offering any avenue towards workers' control, are proposals for more sophisticated control over the workers within privately owned enterprise.

Yet the IMG article does not even call for nationalisation!

Instead they give credibility to the TUC objective which is simply that of wedding workers to management:

"Only with a system of parity representation can trade union representatives be expected to feel any sense of collective responsibility for board decisions."

(TUC, p.323, my emphasis) The IMG in this article therefore throw aside the essence of the demands of the Transitional Programme - the struggle at each stage for the complete political and organisational independence of the working class from the employer and the state and for committees to fight for workers' control over management.

In place of this they substitute the craven reformism of the TUC and the reactionary so-called 'Institute of Workers' Control'.

THREAD

Running as a common thread through this catalogue of errors by the IMG each one of which has the wing and Stalinist bureaucracy, is their leadership's fundamental inability to analyse the class struggle from the standpoint of Marxism - which demands efforts to probe beneath surface appearances to grasp the real motor force of change - and continuously testing theory in practice.

If this method is not adopted, and instead impressions are taken at face value from empirical 'facts' and built into an abstract schema, any movement must lose its political bearings.

Such a method bourgeois ideology. Engels showed ! its limitations:

"At first sight this mode of thinking seems to us very luminous, because it is that of so-called sound commonsense. Only sound commonsense, respectable fellow that he is, in the homely realm of his own four walls, has very wonderful adventures , directly he ventures out into the wide world [of research]. And the metaphysical mode of thought [empiricism, justifiable and necessary as it is in a number of domains whose extent varies according to the nature of the particular object of investigation, sooner or later reaches a limit, beyond which it becomes one-sided, restricted, abstract, lost in insoluble contradictions.

In the contemplation of individual things, it forgets the connection between them; in the contemplation of their existence, it forgets the beginning and end that existence; of their répose, it forgets their motion. It cannot see the wood for the trees"

(Socialism, Utopian and Scienatic. Pathfinder, p.41)

EMBARRASSMENT There is little doubt that acute embarassment at the wrong orientation they have adopted will bring belated empirical adjustments to the IMG's line on many of these questions.

But there is absolutely no doubt that without a radical change in their method of analysis, similar episodes will continually recur.

In this the IMG are the legitimate British representatives of the socalled 'United' Secretariat of the Fourth International within which empiricism is the predominant doctrine.

The origins of this method in the USec go back to the impressionism of Michel Pablo, formerly the Secretary of the International Secretariat of the Fourth International.

Working solely on the basis of superficial impressions, Pablo developed in the early 1950s the theory that "objective processes" - specifically an impending Third World War - were forcing the development of "revolutionary tendencies" within the mass Stalinist parties of Europe. He claimed that:

"this [Stalinist | movement will develop revolutionary tendencies, not through the conscious will of its leadership, but through the pressure of the situation evolving towards war". (For a Devisive 1952).

FALSE

On the basis of this completely false analysis, Pablo proceeded to advocate the deep entry of Trotskyist forces into these mass CPs • - "entry sui generis" -threatening to totally liquidate the Trotskyist cadre and its independent programme.

This line led by 1953 to a split in the Fourth International, the effect of which continues to this day. Those who backed Pablo in the split now lead the majority faction of the USec.

And while these leaders (most notably Ernest Mandel) have verbally abandoned some of Pablo's more riduculous positions which led up to that split, none have probed to the roots of the method that led him to such wrong positions, and them to defend him.

As a result, empiricism flourishes today not only in the IMG, but also, for example, in the USec party in Portugal, the LCI, which went so far as to join a "United Revolutionary. Front" with the Stalinists in defence of the bourgeois sixth provisional government!

MARXISM

This is why we insist that while it is possible for many of the cadres of the USec to be won to a position of revolutionary Marxism, it is only possible if they are prepared undertake a serious reexamination of the history of the Fourth International and the questions of method raised by that history.

Only in this way can empiricism be consciously fought and the tool of Marxist analysis brought into play New Year's Day saw the "transformation" of the International Socialists into the Socialist Workers' Party. By heavy recruitment of new members this organisation of syndicalists and agile opportunists hopes to displace the Communist Party as the "recognised" left party.

Paul Foot's pamphlet Wht You Should Be a Socialist, is intended to persuade the SWP's fellow travellers to enrol in the crusade. It is impossible to review such a book without looking first at the origins of IS's new "turn' The upsurge in working class militancy over the past few months (starting with the anti-racist activity of last summer) has brought new forces to the declining IS, whose activity and size (the organisation claims 3,000 members) makes it a pole of attraction for certain militants and left-wingers.

The fact that it has no clear revolutionary programme to distinguish it from the Stalinists and the left bureaucrats has made this accretion of forces easier.

All that is required to join the SWP is a vague belief in socialism and a liking for activity.

The quick growth of the group and a recovery of confidence by its demoralised membership persuaded the IS leadership that the time had come to make a bid for the big time.

SIX MONTHS

At the September 1976 'Party Council' (a leading body, of the swe which meets every three months) the decision was taken to launch the Socialist Workers' Party over the 'next six months or so' Things have evidently gone so well that a mere three months sufficed and the 'new' party has been launched without the promised "founding event of some kind' It is highly symptomatic of the IS that the decision to proclaim the revolutionary party could be taken without the convention a national Conference.

Despite admittedly "slender" forces the resolution of the Council insisted that "in the short term (!) we have to replace the Communist Tony Cliff, leader of the SWI and prime exponent of the 'state are in the same league' as the CP.

VOTES

He bases this assertion on the higher vote that IS obtained in Walsall North when compared to the CP candidate at the last General Election.

And he adds to his case the claim that the CP and the SWP have a similar active membership. This is the laurching pad for his bandwagon theory of revolution.

'A mass revolutionary party of sorts' is needed to take advantage the impending revolutionary situation:

«The conclusions for us are clear. If, when the revolutionary crisis comes to Britain we have 40,000 members there is no question- that we can grow to 400,000 or perhaps half a million.

If on the other hand, the revolutionary organisation has only a few thousand members, it is even possible that the party appears as irrelevant and does not grow at all. A certain size is necessary for take off" (Socialist Worker, 8.1.77)

With a philistine disregard for politics Cliff reduces the crisis of working class leadership to recruitment! The sort of party be is after is clearly shown by his reference to events in Portugal "At the same time, the purpose of recruitment must be clearer now than ever before. The events in Portugal, where a revolutionary party (?) has been, and is being, frittered away (!), underline the key role of a revolutionary party in transforming a revolutionary situation into a victory for the working class".

Never mind the qualit! - :*. the width! It was not the politics :: IS's ally, the syndicalis PRP. *27 mattered 625.:

1a is, inat portics are decisive a revolutionary situation. The Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries were far larger than the Bolsheviks February but they lost the day in October - and not for lack of paper sales.

Sober reality will dispel these misty fantasies about half a million members. In terms of a firm base in decisive sections of the working Class there is no comparison between the IS and the CP. The CP is far better placed in bureaucratic positions in the unions to derail struggles than the SWP is to initiate Foot them.

By contrast the SWP lacks a stable, authoratative core of militants in leading positions in important industries.

The IS has been notorious for its steady consumption of trade union militants who are recruited on a non-political basis, promising help and support in the pursuit of militant action.

Paul Foot in the last chapter of his pamphlet argues for the 'lonely hearts club' conception of the party as the organisation which helps unite the activists - "for the socialist who argues or organises on his own, life becomes increasingly diffi difficult. People see him as a bit of a crank"

But without a political struggle against a trade union outlook, without a fight to get a politically educated membership such militants easily drop out of politics or drift towards the Stalinists.

Vaunted Birmingham AUEW workers, big Coventry Chrysler branches . . . are examples of important groups of workers whom IS failed to hold or develop.

Nowadays the SWP has no significant presence in the mines, in British Leyland or Fords, or in transport.

RIGHT TO WORK

The SWP claims to be the only organisation fighting on the issues facing the working class today. They point to the Right to Work campaign and the Campaign against Racism' as the sort of work that has forced IS to recognise its true role as the party.

The Right to Work campaign is the gimmick designed to replace the ill fated Rank and File Movement:

It is a protest movement, condemned by its lack of clear political perspective and programme, and by the lack of any forces in the unions capable of carrying out even its limited demands (such as an overtime ban) to an existence of angry demonstrations and wasted energy.

It constitutes a diversion froz the serious work that remars to be done in building a revoluterar alternative in the unions.

The Campagn agairs Rass=" *ES x=2de0e:: = 1=000 0n antracist work.

What distinguishes the IS position on racism is its complete failure to connect the growth of racism and the fascists with the Tory policies of the Labour government In a single minded fashion the connection between racism and Nazism is pounded out. What matters for IS is anti-fascist activity irrespective of whether political lessons are being learnt by those mobilised.

What is most significant about this "fighting organisation" is its absolute failure to take up any fight over the central question of wage control.

In the last few issues of Socialist Worker there has been increasing reference to the Social Contract as the opposition in the working class began to emerge in the open. "Smash the Social Contract" is tacked on to the end of titles of public meetings.

But the fact remains that on this issue, which is rapidly emerging as the question in the workers' movement , and the point of sharpest conflict with the reformists, the IS/ SWP have simply waited on events and abstained from the necessary fight.

Hardly a mention is given to the situation today. Instead we are regaled with three chapters on the statistics of inequality and the superiority of socialism.

STATE CAPITALIST

This is followed by a chapter expounding the view that the Soviet Union is 'state capitalist, ensure that the SWP is not associated with the Stalinist bureauvidy The last two chapters of the booklet, although occupying only 18 out of 93 pages, reach to the heart of things.

Foot scorns any mention of a fighting. programme that could mobilise the working class on the political struggle against the employers and their Labour government - there Is literally half a sentence observing in passing that a 35 hour week and an overtime ban would be useful in combatting unemployment.

All he calls for are 'an organised rank and file movement' and a 'strong socialist party' In a hypocritical obeisance.to internationalism Paul Foot says that the confidence to argue the international case depends fundamentally on socialist organisation across national boundaries.

REFUSED

The IS has always refused establish clear international links the basis of common politics.

Instead they have retained "fraternal' relations with an assortment of Maoists, half anarchists and syndicalists who have big working class otganisations and are 'doing' something.

The book ends with a rousing call to join the SWP, on the basis that all who oppose capitalist barbarism must stand up and be counted.

But no amount of energy, of "the commitment of workers who laugh and love , will allow the IS to jump over its own head.

Without political clarity and a working class cadre this Jamboree will waste those workers' commitment and dissipate their energies in protest actions and the abstract preaching of socialism.

Scan page 8

rage 8 While Callaghan and Healey today carry out a historic level of betrayal, implementing their package of Tory policies under the name of a Labour government, the scale of this treachery flows from the depth of the crisis - not from anything new within the Labour leadership itself.

Indeed the same policies, with the same arguments to back them, have been trotted out time and time again by preceding Labour governments - not one of which has broken in any way irom seeking to maintain and simply "reform" capitalism.

The Labour leadership are caught in a vice - leading on the one hand a party with a working class base which wins its electoral support by promising reforms; yet on the other hand at the same time being committed to running a crisis-ridden capitalism which cannot concede reforms.

Wilson's 1964-70 Labour government - Britain's fifth Labour government - in this way followed the line of its inglorious predecessors. It came to power in October 1964 at a time of rapidly maturing economic crisis. - a crisis which could only be deepened by concessions to the working class.

While Wilson at once dropped all attempts to bring about these reforms, the strength of the working class both within the unions and within the Labour Party left the social democratic leadership paralysed in its efforts to solve the crisis on behalf of capitalism.

NO LOYALTY 1964-70 was a courtship stage. While the trade union bureaucracy was prepared to cuddle close to the Labour government, they were still prepared at times to complain that it had gone too far, to register a fairly sharp verbal protest.

Much of this protest was but the hot air of left talk, but in that period, the trade union leaders did have some qualms about the total signing away of the unions' independence from the Following the end of the Tory pay pause in March 1962 the TUC had refused to accept any responsibility for the government's policy of restraint on wages.

The Rookes v. Barnard High Court decision had weakened the legal position of unions, threatening the closed shop and making union officials liable for damages following industrial action.

The trade union movement, including its leadership, was for this reason wary. But while remaining on its guard, the movement was also strong. The boom period had strengthened the ability of the shop floor to make gains and the shop stewards movement had emerged, powerfully representing and expressing this strength of the working class.

It was the shop stewards movement, the independence of the SOCIALI working class that the bor rgeoisie and the Labour governmen needed to suppress.

In October 1964 the government was formed with Parliamentary majority of a mere six seats.

It faced a situation of financial crisis with a balance of payments defficit of £800 million. Wilson, who had no intention of carrying out the manifesto pledges if it meant the slightest challenge to capitalism, later wrote that:

"We had now reached the situation where a newly elected government with a mandate from the people was being told not so much by the Governor of the Bank Wednes 'ay l6th February , 1977 of England but international speculators, that the policies on which we had fought the election could not be implemented, that the government was to be forced into the adoption of Tory policies to which it was fundamentally opposed [by] the sheer compulsion of the economic dictation of those who exercised decisive economic power.

"FORCED"

Notice that Wilson shifts immediately from describing the capitalist opposition to Labour's programme to accepting that the government was being "forced into the adoption of Tory policies" and that he blames not so much British capitalists' interests (against which he might be expected to act) but foreign speculators "beyond his control".

In other words, Wilson's position shows that a reformist government will only adopt socialist policies if the capitalists agree! The same reactionary logic underlies today's savage attacks by the Callaghan-Healey government.

Immediately after its election therefore, the 1964 Labour government refused to implement even such a minor, humanitarian and emotive a reform as the raising of the old age pensions.

But of course the TUC bureaucracy failed to challenge their betrayal on this issue. The only lead in opposing Wilson and campaigning for the pension increase to be implemented came from the Young Socialists under the political direction of the Trotskyist Socialist Labour League, (SLL) who organised a series of lobbies and protests.

The trade union bureaucracy

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effect of bringing workers more under the influence of the right

capitalist theory of the Soviet Union, is of the opinion that we