Stunt Politics No Answer to Fascism

Alastair Green looks at the way the left groups have taken up the fight against the National Front.

The street fighting of Lewisham and Ladywood has again brought up the struggle against fascism as a topical question. Above all, in the workers' movement, the way in which the organised filth of the National Front and its fascist competitors are to be defeated is the centre of debate.

Over the past few weeks the centrist and reformist organisations of the British left have spent some time providing the working class with examples of how not to fight fascism.

The revolutionary movement has always stood out firmly for the demand 'No Platform for Fascists'. This summarises the necessity to stop, by any means needed (including the use of violence), the mobilisation and growth of the fascist organisations.

DIFFERENT

These groups are very different from the traditional conservative parties of the capitalist class, which carry out the 'dictatorship of the bourgeoisie' within the parliamentary framework in periods of relative social stability.

The fascists, by contrast, offer a road of action and mass organisation to the layers of society which are least well organised and least able to defend themselves against the attacks of the bourgeoisie—the middle class and unemployed workers—especially the frustrated youth.

Feeding off the effects of the capitalist crisis - mass unemployment, poor housing, slashed social services, plunging living standards - and revelling in the betrayals of the Labour and trade union leaders who prevent the working class mobilising in action to end these conditions, the fascists act as last-ditch defenders of the capitalist system.

Their function is to divert the frustration and anger of the working class away from its proper target, and to fashion from the most confused layers of society a weapon to attack the organised labour movement itself.

They turn the anger and desperation of these people onto the immigrant and black population, exploiting the chauvinist legacy of Britain's imperialist history, and increasingly they direct against the left and the labour movement in an attempt to make the 'Reds' scapegoats for the social crisis of the capitalist system.

'ACTION'

In neither case is their campaign restricted to abuse or 'argument'. Above all the fascists offer 'action'—the promise of organised terror campaigns, racist pogroms, a chance to really 'do' something.

At present fascism is a marginal force in British politics. But even now they are the instigators of [violence on an] extensive scale.

Recent months have seen left bookshops and black community centres in London firebombed, and £10,000 worth of arson damage to the headquarters of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP).

Every day the fascists feel strong enough to engage in individual provocations, harassment of blacks, and the colonisation of pubs as fascist preserves.

They continually attempt to organise demonstrations in black areas so as to rub in the message that the 'whites' will stay on top.

But this remains a tactic towards their main objective—the destruction of the organisations of the working class.

We do not grant fascists the right to deepen this campaign. We challenge the bourgeois courts and police when they insist that fascism must be defended.

HITLER

If we are sufficiently strong in relation to the fascists then anti-fascists should follow Trotsky's advice:

"The tactical, or if you will, 'technical' task was quite simple—grab every fascist or every isolated group of fascists by their collars, acquaint them with the pavement a few times, strip them of their fascist insignia and documents, and without carrying things any further, leave them with their fright and a few good black and blue marks."

We listen very carefully to someone who should know how to destroy fascism—Adolph Hitler [sic].

His opinion should be the starting point of the fight against the National Front scum:

"Only one thing would have stopped our movement—if our adversaries had understood its principles and from the first day had smashed with the utmost brutality the nucleus of our new movement."

This understanding is, however, only the starting point. As recent events have demonstrated, the actions of the SWP and IMG, and (from a different standpoint) the Communist Party and Militant group, have served to block the mobilisation of the mass organisations of the working class to carry out the destruction of the Front and their allies.

The Communist Party, put onto the defensive by its miserable failure to join the SWP demonstration in Lewisham, had the hypocrisy to praise the thousands of militant demonstrators for their 'courage and determination' which (from the CP's view on the sidelines) was apparently 'particularly impressive' (Morning Star, August 26).

And in an attempt to bolster its anti-fascist reputation the CP has printed a eulogy by James Klugmann of the CP's role in the 1936 Cable Street mobilisation (see the last issue of Socialist Press for an exposure of their waverings before this demonstration).

None of this, nor vague talk of 'necessary confrontation with the NF' will disguise the simple fact that the whole direction of the CP's campaigns have been to ask the bourgeois state to ban the fascists while the CP has consciously sabotaged militant anti-fascist activities.

On August 13 in Lewisham, helped by their hangers-on in the Militant grouping, the CP built and supported their local version of the Popular Front, the All Lewisham Committee Against Racism and Fascism (ALCARAF).

They marched with the local Anglican church hierarchy to implore the Home Secretary to ban provocative fascist demonstrations—and to implore trade unionists who were there not to join the SWP's demonstration that afternoon.

Their excuse? A claimed lack of mass mobilisation, the absence of the labour movement. But did these toadies of the labour bureaucracy try to mobilise the masses?

Did they say openly that if the forces are favourable that they were prepared to smash this fascist demonstration?

Did they take seriously the organisation of defence squads who could have dealt with the fascists in the right circumstances?

RESPECTABILITY

No—they prefer to maintain their respectability, to insulate the workers' movement from the danger of fascism, to cling to the hope that a beneficient bourgeoisie will help them out of their dilemma with a ban on the National Front's activities.

Members and supports [sic] of the centrist SWP and the "Trotskyists" of the IMG have obviously fought hard and courageously at these demonstrations.

But both of these organisations and in particular the SWP have avoided the struggle to mobilise the widest possible united action of the organised working class against the fascist thugs, and have consistently separated the mobilisation of anti-fascists from the overall struggle against the reformist bureaucrats.

They too have repeatedly slipped into legalism and opportunism (more pronounced in the case of the IMG whose 'unity' campaign brings them closer and closer to the 'democrats' of the middle class and Stalinists of the Communist Party).

ADVENTURES

But at the same time they have lapsed into sectarian adventures and attempts to substitute themselves for the working class (more obvious with the SWP, whose insatiable desire for publicity only matches its empty arrogance in declaring itself 'the revolutionary party').

Starting off from the half-expressed feeling that fascism is a special, extraordinary threat, these organisations feel a need to employ 'special' and, they hope, instantly effective methods, rather than make the fight against fascism a part of a consistent battle for leadership in the working class.

It is of course difficult and slow to raise the question of serious anti-fascist activity in the trade unions and to expose the Labour Party on this subject.

In their haste centrists ignore this vital work and turn to the state with pleas for bans or to the limited forces that they themselves can immediately bring out onto the streets.

SUICIDAL

The turn to the bourgeois sta[te] is a suicidal breach of Marxi[st] principles that belongs to reformis[m] and not to a revolutionary orga[nisation].

Let us compare the SWP a[nd] IMG with the reformists a[nd] Stalinists on this question.

The Labour Council [in] Lewisham had only one programm[e] in the fight against fascism—M[r] Home Secretary, ban this mar[ch] and stop the violence.

The Communist Party in [the] Morning Star of August 26 stat[ed] the wish:

" . . . to secure a complete and effective ban on all racist activity and propaganda . . . to campaign for these events to be banned."

The IMG in the Socialist Challenge Special Issue on Lewisham and Ladywood:

"We too are in favour of imposing a ban on the fascist marches."

Kim Gordon, SWP candidate at the Ladywood by-election:

"We don't want any riots. What we do want is to register our protest in front of the press. We are going to ask the police to get the National Front to stop their meeting."

(Quoted in The Guardian, August 16).

In Leamington the SWP have demonstrated under the central slogan of 'Prosecute the Racists' after four men were charged with criminal damage for painting out fascist slogans.

Trotsky's opinion of such calls was very clear:

"To turn to the state, that is, to capital, with the demand to disarm the fascists means to sow the worst democratic illusions, to lull the vigilance of the proletariat, to demoralise its will." 'War and the Fourth International', Writings, 1933-4.

These demands can hardly co-exist with a serious attitude to the mobilisation of the working class against the fascists.

ILLUSIONS

To take this position, to say that the blocking of the fascists is the 'job of the police' makes it more and more difficult to argue for anything other than demonstations [sic] and activity whose aim is to pressure the police into acting on behalf of the working class.

To point out the fundamental nature of the state, to educate workers in reliance on their own organised strength is a task that conflicts sharply with any suggestion that this or that action of the state is accidental, a product of the wrong policemen being in control.

Besides encouraging illusions in the neutrality and democratic nature of the capitalist state machine the position of demanding bans on the fascists and prosecutions for racial hatred has the immediate and practical effect of encouraging the climate of public opinion that is favourable to state control of and interference into the activities of 'political extremists'.

SOPHISTICATED

The lists of anti-fascists arrested at each demonstration prove conclusively that the state would use any powers of banning to repress the left and the labour movement.

The Public Order Act of 1936 was introduced ostensibly to stop the fascists. Its provisions have only ever been used against the left and the IRA.

The most sophisticated excuse for this reformist desire to 'pressure' the state is the SWP's argument that this will 'expose' the nature of the state.

For our part we would rather not have that proved by having one of our demonstrations banned or by seeing a left wing organisation proscribed.

Is the action of the state at Grunwicks or Lewisham not sufficient exposure? The bourgeoisie is quite capable of launching sharp attacks on democratic rights without the kindly efforts of self-styled 'revolutionaries'.

On the other side of the coin is the sectarianism and adventurism shown in the way that the SWP in particular has mobilised for these demonstrations.

As with the IMG in Red Lion Square in 1974 the SWP attempts to substitute the organisation of leftists for the military organisation of the working class.

Our position is entirely different from that of the Communist Party.

NO SUBSTITUTE

We are in no way opposed to small (or large) groups of left-wingers teaching the fascists a lesson in conditions where this does not involve a futile confrontation with the police.

But this can be no substitute for a mobilisation of the working class fighting to establish workers defence squads based on the trade unions.

The (then Trotskyist) Socialist Workers Party of America in the 1930s was able to use its trade union base to form big defence guards which chased the fascists out of town on a number of occasions.

Everything has to be diverted to achieving this sort of organisation. Of course this will not come without a political struggle or in a short time on any significant scale.

But the fight for this perspective coupled with full participation in demonstrations and actions aimed at the fascists will prepare the ground for the effective arming and military organisation of the working class.

EXPERIENCES

The Transitional Programme of the Fourth International, drawing on the experiences of the American Trotskyists summarises this approach:

"Only armed workers detachments, who feel the support of tens of millions of toilers behind them, can successfully prevail against the fascist bands . . . Only with the help of such systematic, persistent indefatigable courageous agitational and organisational work, always on the basis of the experience of the masses themselves, is it possible to root out from their consciousness the traditions of submissiveness and passivity." (p. 18).

The method of the SWP and the IMG (who would like the same mistakes to be repeated by everybody on the left in a united effort) is to engage in numerous confrontations with . . . not the fascists, but the police.

These conflicts generally result in the beating up of numerous militants, and invite repression, in conditions where the left is relatively isolated from the big workers organisations.

Red Lion Square illustrated the dangers of this with great clarity, whilst the identical tactics of the French Pabloites of the LCR led directly to the banning of that organisation after a head-on assault on the heavily armed police guard of a fascist meeting in Paris in 1973.

The origins of this perspective, which results in a series of stalemates between the left and the police, lie in the refusal of the centrists to consistently, and in an all-round fashion, tackle the dominance of reformism and Stalinism in the working class with an alternative, independent political programme.

CRISIS

This refusal appears in a pointed way in relation to the anti-racist and anti-fascist activity of the centrist groups. For the Workers Socialist League, racism and its organised expression, fascism, are produced by the crisis of capitalism and by the defence of that outworn system by the trade union and Labour leadership.

With no organised and determined fight taking place on a national level against the attacks of capitalism it becomes easy for the fascists to offer a 'solution' which has nothing to do with the destruction of capitalism.

It is the same misleaders who refuse to fight fascism that refuse to fight wage cuts, unemployment or the oppression of minority groups and women. For us, every struggle of the working class or oppressed groups has to be turned against the existing leadership and every attempt made to break the working class in action away from that old leadership.

This means that the fight for workers defence against fascism should also be coupled with a fight for an all-round political programme to defend jobs, living standards and social services and to lay down a fundamental challenge to the established leadership of the working class.

And each mobilisation against the fascists has to be organised as far as possible through a struggle inside the trade unions and the Labour Party, and not by 'outflanking' the existing organisations of the working class.

The way forward in the combatting of the neo-Nazi thugs has to be through the building of a united front of working class organisations on a wide scale, and the formation of workers defence guards as the advance guard of that united front.