We’re having a party
Inspired by his first Left Unity meeting, Mark Perryman wonders what it means to be a party
I’ve been around the Left block enough times, the old Communist Party in the Thatcher years, in and out of Respect, I now vote Green in most elections. But mostly for the past twenty years I’ve felt that parties have had their day. I prefer a political culture of resistance, mixing ideas with entertainment. So it takes quite a jolt to get me excited, but that was kind of how I felt last Thursday in a room of around 50 meeting up to discuss Left Unity in Brighton. Sure there were some of the familiar acronyms, members of Socialist this, that or the other, with a paper to sell too, what a surprise. But much more encouraging was the fact that the majority who spoke were enthusiastically looking for something new, something different. And this was cross-generational too, the young students fresh from the Sussex University occupation finding common cause with those who spoke about Greenham Common and anti-Poll Tax Unions. Campaigns that took place before these students were born but sharing a politics of direct action and horizontal organisation. You know the idea, sitting in circles, listening to one another, affinity politics to get things done.
But the nagging question remains, why a party? Why not a campaign, a movement, or a coalition linking campaigns together? This is what got me thinking about what would make a new Left party both different, and necessary.
Firstly, to have an ideology. The editors of the journal Soundings have recently started producing a free online 12-part manifesto After Neoliberalism. It’s an excellent initiative and points to the need to confront neoliberalism with an alternative vision of the world and our place in it. That’s not something Labour offers: an ideology, a philosophy, a values-led politics. And it’s not necessarily something any longer simply labelled ‘socialism’ or ‘communism’, while ‘marxism’ is but one version of both. But in order to develop a new vocabulary, a new way of understanding and opposing neoliberalism we need a process as well as fine words. A party should provide the means to involve hundreds, thousands, in the process of deliberation and discovery on the road to establishing our ideology, philosophy and values . This should surely be Left Unity’s first task.
Secondly, to bind together. The process of establishing an ideology will define Left Unity. The days of strong power, vertically-organised left parties are numbered. What will bind Left Unity together are the values we identify and share. This needs to be a bottom-up movement of ideas, not being afraid of the messy and the incoherent because that’s how life is. A party made strong because we all, not just those we elect on to committees, have made it happen. Using to the maximum social media but recognising that the simple act of meeting together and sharing a conversation to develop common ideas is vital too.
Thirdly, to learn together. An old piece of leftist jargon is the idea of the ‘organic intellectual’. No, not academics who munch on pesticide-free carrots. Rather the idea that a party must educate itself via its roots in communities and social movements. This will not only be key to the party establishing a distinctive ideology but as a function of our organisation too. We learn together, not just ideas but practical skills too. Not a self-selecting ‘cadre’ but all of us. This should be crucial, its something we get out of being members, this is the ‘organic’ part, we learn as individuals and the party learns from us.
Fourthly, to practice what we preach. No party is an island but our ideas and values are essentially worthless if we cannot put them into action. In the first instance that means how we organise ourselves, connecting the personal to the political at the core of our party’s practice. How we do our politics becomes why we do our politics. To seek forms of engagement that represent what we believe in through practical means.
Fifthly, to contest elections. Local conditions, other parties standing, even electoral systems will differ. And there will be contrasting views on the centrality of local councils, the House of Commons, the European Parliament to political change. But elections are a key test of the success or failure of our ideas. And whilst electoral turnout is falling voting remains for many people how they define their politics. A party provides the means to win, or not win votes, to abdicate that role indicates a surprising lack of faith in our own ideas.
Sixthly, to make politics fun. Of course there are tasks to be fulfilled, some tedious, yet if that is all what our party can offer then its membership will be narrowed by the cult of the activism in the same way all those socialist this that and the other parties have been. We should want to break that model apart. Our party should value the pleasure our members have in taking part every much as the efforts they put in, more actually.
Such a party won’t be anything like the others, and not much like what has preceded, either. Good. When can I join?
37 comments
37 responses to “We’re having a party”
Left Unity is active in movements and campaigns across the left, working to create an alternative to the main political parties.
About Left Unity
Read our manifesto
Left Unity is a member of the European Left Party. 
Read the European Left Manifesto
ACTIVIST CALENDAR
Events and protests from around the movement, and local Left Unity meetings.
ongoing
Just Stop Oil – Slow Marches
Slow marches are still legal (so LOW RISK of arrest), and are extremely effective. The plan is to keep up the pressure on this ecocidal government to stop all new fossil fuel licences.
Saturday 27th April: national march for Palestine
National demonstration.
Ceasefire NOW! Stop the Genocide in Gaza: Assemble 12 noon Central London
Full details to follow
More events »
GET UPDATES
Sign up to the Left Unity email newsletter.
CAMPAIGNING MATERIALS
Get the latest Left Unity resources.
Who can be candidates?
Agree with this
All seems quite wishy washy to me.
So socialism/communism is out, and fun and loose, ineffectual networks are in? The point about organic intellectuals is surely that being rooted in a community surely means participating in its struggles and experiencing the same daily living conditions ie. developing a political community of shared identity and practiced solidarity.
That may not be social-networked enough for you, but it is the only way of building an antineoliberal or dare I say it anti-capitalist party (for show me the non-party formation capable of both achieving change and remaining accountable to its participants) especially over a long term basis.
The political strategy outlined above just looks like a blueprint of a social milieu for old lefties.
“a social milieu for old lefties” sounds like what holds British Trotskyism together nowadays!
He’s clearly positing something more united and effective than just some friendship networks with a conscience. But not the monolith that most left micro-parties are born as, or become.
Anti-neoliberal is also a sound strategic goal considering the present balance of class forces. Insisting on uniting around anti-capitalism, when none of the working class organisation, or therefore cultural-ideological cohesion exists to carry it out, suggests ineffective idealism, not political engagement.
Well it could be, Dan, though that’s not what I understand from Mark’s article. He is recognising that we on the Radical Left have to restablish our ideological “base” positions appropriate to the 21st century as we confront the capitalist offensive – escaping from the sterility of the current Far Left’s outdated jargon (and relating everything to The October 1917 Revolution).
Left Unity could be just a middle class discussion group. The point for radical Leftwingers is surely to join in and push it constantly into radical action against the austerity offensive. If you agree we have to build a radical Left Party to displace the now totally neoliberal collaborationist Labour Party, then this is a chance to do that. If you still think “Pushing Labour Left” has life left in it, then say so. If you think that only a “Leninist” cadre party is needed then say so. Just sneering about Left Unity being “wishy washy” in the abstract is not adding anything to the discussion. Demanding a “General Strike Now” is certainly “dead hard”, but simply leaves a group demanding it today totally isolated – certainly with no chance of mobilising masses of ordinary people who want to oppose the bosses’ offensive on a broad front, including electorally.
Aye, me too Joe, nice one Mark: one of the few writers I come back to the LU site for.
Reply to Dan
Wishy-washy?
So UK Uncut and Occupy London, the anti-tuition fees protests and the Sussex University occupation achieved nothing? No, none of them have won but they secured an impact out of all propopryion to their size, something both the traditional Labour movement and the far left paties have singulrly faled to do in fighting the cuts have singularly faled to do.
No, I didn’t say socialism or communism are ‘out’, I said we need to rethink our vocabulary. If it was as simple as restating the politically obvious people wouldn’t be signing up to Left Unity they would be voting us into power.
Your description of the organic intellectual I agree with absolutely. But if this becimes a routine that only the ultra-active can pursue then the numbers involved will be very narrow. We need a space and a practice in which all experiences of austerity and neoliberalism can be shared to shape an alternative not just those who alredy know the lingo of activism.
I specifically said this should be a party but I don;t assume it will be organised in the way all previous, and faled, efforts towards this have been. Why on earth would we want to repeat those failures?
A social milieu for old lefties? Well actually much of the discontent with the traditional ways of working is generational, but interestingly its cross-generational too, appealing to all those who have been alienated and disenfranchised by both labourism and leninsm.
Of course should Left Unity grow and grow such forms would have to adapt. But we are a long way short of being Syrizia, Die Linke, Left Bloc or Front de Gauche, and might never get there! Right now at this stage our greatest resourece is the 8000 signs up, the 80 local groups, the 50 who turn up for a meeting in Brighton. At every level we need a party for all, not just for some. And at this size we can do that, horizontally through maximum involvement, not vertically by delegation and command.
Oh and Ben, you’ve made my day. Thanks.
Mark
Mark,
I agree with much of what you write there. Apologies if I seemed dismissive before.
Without wanting to be too negative, I DO think it is important to emphasise that (despite their impact) of the examples you list, “none of them have won”.
Not because I dismiss their relevance, but because (although far in advance of the staid far-left sects and crushing, careerist banality of the Labour Party) the level and style of political activity they represent is not in itself sufficient to facilitate a rebirth of the Left.
I think there is a key ‘absence’, which helps to explain the failure of each movement to progressively advance on the position inherited from the previous one – instead, it seems each ‘outbreak’ begins from Ground Zero…! This absence is the lack of an organisational form: to concretise the lessons of individual campaigns and experiences; to act as a ‘memory bank’ for the movement; and to provide some measure of continuity to our efforts; encouraging best practice and giving a sense of permanency to emerging networks.
Which is why I don’t think our STARTING POSITION should ape the Owen Jones mantra that all parties must lead to Blairism or Leninism, that we should revel in the ineffectiveness or informal hierarchies of the ‘anti-politics’ milieu.
I think democracy is the best means of helping Left Unity grow into something positive, and that requires some very old-fashioned practices in terms of meetings, membership and activity. :)
Mark is mixing up united fronts which brings activists from a variety of parties and what Left Unity needs to be: an organisation that challenges the pro-capitalist parties (including Labour, Greens, SNP) while holding its elected representatives to account. No one dismisses UKUncut etc as wishy washy. But they refuse to stand in elections, and their program is always strictly limited. That is not what Left Unity has to be about or it is just replicating what already exists. What we need is a party that is able to tap into the alienation that can sweep up the protest vote that will otherwise seep into UKIP’s coffers, giving Miliband his excuse to move ever rightwards, dragging the centre of gravity of official politics rightwards. Left Unity has to expose the fact that the BBC, SKY, Channel Four News etc are out of touch, mere megaphones for the richest 1%, NATO war mongers, anti-union bosses, the Royal Family. That should not be difficult if the left genuinely wants to be united. But we cannot do any of this if we pretend that we can solve the problems of a global capitalism in utter chaos due to decades of surviving on debt. It is not neo-liberalism that is the problem but capitalism. We cannot create social harmony in an exploitative system where wage slaves are being crucified to allow those who own the means of production, distribution and exchange want to slash our living standards, destroy our pensions, reduce the social wage because the expropriators don’t want to pay for it with their taxes, including wealth taxes, and the masses cannot afford to pay for it. We need root and branch change. You can’t control what you don’t own, and that means we need to repopularize nationalisation. That is something we cannot do so long as the vote of the left is pitiful. And that means we have to address the electoral landscape. It is not a question of who else is standing against Left Unity but how we see to it that the left vote is not split. Anyone who wants to stand against TUSC is crazy. Fusing TUSC and Left Unity, or at least starting with electoral pacts, has to be top of eferyone’s agenda.
Tom
I’m afraid I entirely disagree with your prescriptions.
Firstly, if it was as simple as Left Unity lashing together the various anti-capitalist trends in GB into one party to get a serious challenge to UKiP hoovering up the protest vote, we’d be halfway there already. It isn’t, and every attempt along those lines has failed.
Secondly, the idea of an electoral pact with the imaginatively named Trade Union and Socialist Colation is absolutely laughable. Gawd, how low do you want to set your ambitions, this is a party of the sort you want to crate that scored an almighty 0.62% of the vote in the recent Eastleigh by-election. It is an utter irrelevance and points to the enduring failure of the tried and tested. If Left Uniy doesn’t expect to do considerably better than that, well lets stop bothering right now, its not worth it.
Thirdly, neoliberalism. Left Unity is not a revolutionary socialist party, or at leat I hope its not because thats not what I signed up for, if thats what you want join one of the socialist this, that or the others currently selling their papers outside Left Unity meetings. Nor is it a communist party, theres several of those already too. Left Unity seeks to restore to the political mainstream the kind of values represented by the Spirit of ’45, in a new form for the 21st century, that is neither revolutionary nor communist but it is what new Labour extinguished.
Fourthly, your particular version of the ‘united front ‘ (personally I have always prefered the infinitely more successful popular fronts but we’ll leave that historical distincton by the by for now) is extraordinarily conservative. You seem to put in one box ‘social movements’ and in another ‘political parties’. Of course the most successful political formatons of the radical left, Syrizia being the most obvious example, combine the two, one influencing the other. There should be no distinctoon of the sort you cling to.
This last point is crucial. Your vision is a lash up of the pre-existing organised far left which is tiny. Left Unity in a matter of weeks has shown the potential to go way beyond this. And to achieve that potential unlike you I would say we need to fundamentally face up to past failures and find new ways of organising as a party, and a new vision of ’45 too.
To coin a lovely phrase used as a headline on this site ‘Left Unity has to be fun if it is to be serious’. Now that’s my kind of party, it doesn’t sound much like your’s tho’.
Mark P
Mark is quite correct here, Tom.Your idea that “Left Unity” requires the cobbling together of current, tiny, and frankly utterly irrelevant, campaigns like TUSC, et al, with some sort of composite, “programme” that every Trot sect can sign up to, is utterly wrong. The radical Left is in full retreat, breking apartin factional infighting more each day. Yet the need for a radical Left Party ,to bring together the masses of ordinary decent people ever more starting to be drawn to oppose the sheer vicious inhumanity of the bosses’ “Austerity” offensive ,is more urgent and has more potential , for the right sort of new radical Left movement, as each day goes by. Left Unity seems to have “hit a chord” amongst a surprisingly wide spread of people. We need to stop quibbling and try to build on this head of political steam. OK, it may fall flat on its face, but the needs of the time require a leap of political faith, a willingness to put aside deeply ingrained bunker mentality Marxism, and actualy work to pull together a mass movement of resistance and HOPE.
I certainly enjoyed your post Mark! Regarding your last comment though, TUSC is still something to contend with and we’d be daft not to try and co-operate with them if at all possible. They polled nearly 5% in the Liverpool mayorals, true it’s not much but then if there were an easy road to winning left majorities all over then we’d be there already! If the SP turn out to be utterly intransigent about it then fair enough. But we should start with the intention of combining forces as far as possible, apart from anything else it looks ridiculous to have ‘Left Unity’ on the list in competition with other left candidates.
Whatever the problematic traits of the SWP, SP etc as parties, with the state of the British left as it is they’re home to a large proportion of the best union and community activists so any attempt to simply bypass them is likely to fail. Otherwise, why haven’t mass Trot-free anti-austerity campaigns sprung up? Sure UKUncut have done a great job but they’re hardly mobilized thousands. Well certainly not consistently. There’s a big constituency out there for a transformationally anti-neoliberal politics, no doubt, but the number of us ready to do the hard work (and thinking) necessary to reach into it is small so, we need all the alliances we can muster.
I think we need to steer clear of seeing ‘old’ labour as a model, too. Even the outstanding technical and political achievement represented by the NHS was flawed from birth, by leaving primary care privatized. The Labour’s organisational practices fostered dependence on elected politicians and their policy timidity undermined popular support for social democracy: look at low quality Council housing, support for private housebuilding, paternalistic social services delivery, no democracy in the workplace, and of course one-sided incomes policies….all a consequence of prioritizing electoral/state-oriented strategies above all else. Culminating in what may well be the only rightwards split from a European social democratic party. Of course – I’d love to go back to the 60s and 70s, but since we can’t do that anyway, there’re a lot more negative than positive lessons to learn from labourism. Controlling state policies needs to be the final piece in the jigsaw once the movement is strong, but the overwhelming temptation is always to try and leap ahead into government, local or national, but this needs a huge mass base to counter the deeply embedded ruling class logics of state action. (maybe time to we cracked out the old Poulantzas volumes!)
I certainly enjoyed your post Mark!
Sorry, missed this last time. Mostly agree Oscarsdrum, with exception of “SWP, SP etc … home to a large proportion of the best union and community activists” is simply untrue. “Best”? Think of all the people who have been put off this and previous campaigns – plus political activity as a whole – by the sectarian antics of ‘people who know best’ and – if we let them, treat us either with contempt or as “useful idiots” to quote out-of-context dear old Lenin.
You must have led a very sheltered life if you haven’t witnessed hi-jacking / take-over attempts / arrogant, macho domination of local and national campaigns / events, etc. The nadir of this was 1980s ‘Militant’ in Liverpool, but there are lots of more recent examples. If this had actually produced any gains for “the masses”, it would be galling, but we would have to grudgingly accept it. The fact it hasn’t and we are where we are today: a left virtually bankrupt of ideas, disunited and unpopular, is testament to that.
On your last point “…overwhelming temptation is always to try and leap ahead into government, local or national, but this needs a huge mass base to counter the deeply embedded ruling class logics of state action” agreed, we need a long term approach with the patience and discipline NOT to aim for the 2015 election – a ludicrously short time to prepare and become known and trusted by people who vote and – most importantly for us in the short-medium term I think – people who don’t/spoil. The only exceptions should be what Jeremy Taylor proposes in his reply to ‘Local Elections: Prospects for the Left’ (April 15th – elsewhere on this site – see too my contribution at the end).
I agree totally,
Mark Perryman.
Mark I agree totally, your quite correct here,
I wholeheartedly agree again Mark.
“we need to fundamentally face up to past failures and find new ways of organising as a party” – check out my reply to ‘Local Elections: Prospects for the Left’ (April 15th – last comment, at time of writing).
My replies to Ed Rooksby’s ‘The Crisis and Socialist Strategy’ were an attempt to inject some (humour? =) sarcasm and feeble irony into an amazingly po-faced and crushingly banal analysis; and I reserve the right to use this tactic again, but I’ve gorn all serious now…
Mark Perryman prefers popular fronts to united fronts? Why does that not surprise me. Mark was a supporter of the British Communists when they denounced the rise of Tony Benn and their Eurocommunist leadership defended Kinnock’s witch hunt against the left and demanded a cross-class alliance stretching as far as the Liberals and former Tory Party leaders, Ted Heath. Popular fronts are anathema to socialists. The perspective you propose, Mark, is the kind of politics that was tried and failed in the 1930s, paving the way for fascism in Spain and France. We need genuine left unity and that means posing an alternative to capitalism, not more of the same.
We’re actually not going to get too far if we draw uncrossable lines in the sand about interpretations of events in south west Europe pre-ww2.
If Left Unity stands for witch hunts against the Socialist Party and Socialist Workers Party, then count me out. That would reduce it to a sick joke. I don’t want an electoral pact between TUSC and Left Unity as a long term goal because those are liable to crumble at a moment’s notice. What I would like to see is a broad workers’ party that allows both of those organisations to operate within them as the bolshevik faction did inside the RSDLP or both the SWP and SP supporters did within the SSP. The model we should propose, I would suggest, is like the pre-WWI SPD. That had a centrist wing around Kautsky, a reformist wing around Bernstein (which could cater for Mark’s needs) and a revolutionary wing around Rosa Luxemburg. Rosa failed to organise very well. Hopefully, Left Unity’s revolutionary wing will prove less amateurish. There is no good reason why Arthur Scargill, George Galloway, Owen Jones, John McDonnell, the SWP, SP, Ken Loach and the rest of the 7,000 can’t work together within a single party, with Bob Crow, Matt Wrack, Mark Serwotka and many other trade union leaders and members. Mark Perryman might want to ponder on elections inside the trade union movement. Read this in this week’s party notes of the SWP:
Jerry Hicks won nearly 80,000 votes in the election for the Unite general secretary – an extraordinary 36 percent despite the fact that virtually every one of Unite’s full time officials (and most of the organised left) had thrown their weight behind current general secretary Len McCluskey. See http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art/33011/Jerry+Hicks+gets+an+amazing+80,000+v... The result proves that the SWP was right when we said there was a big audience that was not content with McCluskey’s strong rhetoric but little action and his support for Labour.
OK. Lets get some things clear.
The top priority for Left Unity is turning the 8000 signatories and 80 local groups into some kind of political party.
Its a process that has to be shaped bottom-up by the members. How this process unfilds will decisively shape what we become. The ‘how’ just as important as the ‘what’.
Its a process that should not assume that pre-existing models are the only models. Almost all those models in GB have either failed or are in decline.
In that process menbers of pre-existing Leninist organisations will take part. All of these groups have been part of previous efforts that have failed and to a greater or lesser extent the way they operate has contributed to that failure.
Thats not a witch-hunt, it is about facing up to past failures. No exclusions, no bans but the vast majority of us who have signed up to Left Unity are not members of these groups, these groups should not be allowed a privileged position in the process of Left Unity becoming a party, thats what has happened before and has been a key part in past failures. Nor should membership and experience of these groups somehow be translated into these are the experienced menbers we need, theres plenty with other experiences and skills who have never been or are no longer members. I’ve heard this prvileging several times and it isn’t a good start to wards the process of beciming a party of equals.
As for TUSC. Nobody is suggesting that Left Unity’s aim is to stand against their candidates. But nor is it our ambition to match their pathetically low vote and failure from the start. Our aim is to do considerably better, and in sheer numbers of signatories to the appeal, the local groups, the first vibrant meetings we have shown the potential. So don’t lets reduce our ambition to the lowest common denominator.
There is a myth of activism that we also need to address. Long-standing mebers of socialist this, that and the other parties have stood outside Tescos for generations selling papers, given out hundreds of thousands of leaflets to passers-by, attended hundreds of meetings, marched from the Embankment to Trafalgar square more times than they can remember. But this isn’t the only model of being politically active, Left Unity needs to be about being effective.
And history? Are we going to be dragged into arguments about who was right or wrong in 1936, the Bolshevik party and so on. Thats not to say history isn’t important but the socialist this that and the others only want to talk about their particular and narrow version. Theres all kinds of histories to draw on. What about William Morris, Edward Carpenter, the Suffragettes, the Levellers and Diggers and more. If we only draw on one version of history we end up with the same old same old and somehow I don’t think that the Bolshevik Party is quite what most of us was thinking of when we signed up, so lets put that one to bed now and move on, decisively, to something different.
Mark P
Well said Mark, on looking well beyond the Bolshevik Party and the SPD for our inspirations for radical Left organisational and political forms. From the semi-religious attachment of the Far Left to October 1917 and Leninism, you’d have thought the Russian Revolution had been a permanent historical triumph ! Sadly it wasn’t, once the Stalinist bureaucracy had seized power from the isolated ,brief,Workers and Peasants State, the Russian revolution became one of the greatest,blood-soaked,tyrannical, working class defeats in world history. It, and the equally disastrous record of Grman Social Democracy, provided no kind of exemplar or inpiration for a ,hopefully successful,. radical Left movement today. We need to move on from 1917, and Leninism. It failed.
I would just like to say, while of course we need to have socials, gigs, etc, the times: mass poverty, inequality, harassment of claimants, etc deserve a very serious approach to our politics, its not a hobby…
btw, not sure why anyone thinks the SWP don’t/didn’t have ‘fun’ is full on wrong, in fact often the ‘fun’ between much older cadres and students led to the dodgy situations they find themselves in now,
We have all seen more than enough top down politics over the last 25/30 years to last us a life time . Communities up & down the country need just two simplistic things that are not rocket science .First one is engagement at grassroots level ,that will take shape via various forums & once that first principle is established then the second is to listen ,take in & digest what working people tell us & thats where the bottom up politics kicks in establishing the political platform to empower those groups within our communities to get things done ,be it housing,local economy.youth provision etc .
Its real localism that has the community & local left unity groups working /pulling in the same direction .
It moves things on from the stale dogma that has engulfed our body politic for to long .
It may not fit this ism or that ism ,but its long over due & somebody has to have the vision to deliver community empowerment that has a community based political appeal that people will do one of two things either work with you & the political dimension is to join you .
Stemming from the community movement evolves the regional /national policies . But first is your local dimension community based politics & you move from there.
Peter……………
John. Too right, no more pre-determined models, yes to blank sheets.
Jonno. I far you fundamentally misunderstand the need to remake the political. Being serious, not just a hobby, this is what has narrowwed the membership of all the pre-existing groups and produced a rapid turnover of membership, to no good effect. Being ‘fun’ isn’t about putting on a gig or a film-show, its about the actual practice of politics being enjoyable. A good starting point is meetings, not ones we’re lectured at with speeches we already know the content of because its all been said before, but ones in which we all take part in and the outcome cannot be predicted at the outset.
Peter. Yes, the local should be central to how Left Unity is organised, a bottom-up party shaped by each and every one of those experiences.
Mark P
@MP
I really don’t need lessons from those who were involved in the 19th C left: I think you will find that it is and has been common practice in many of the new social movements, from the 90’s such as Reclaim the Streets, European Social Forums, to Climate Camp to have open democratic meetings without (top table speakers'(isn’t the People’s Assembly exactly that)but I wouldn’t call it fun, just the right way to do things. That is how I have organised the many events and political meetings I have been involved with.
To be honest, I am not usually critical or negative of new grass roots initiatives and I think LU could be great, I just think that a new ‘way of doing things, even if I agree with it is slowly being imposed, bit like the ‘jazz hands’ in the direct action movement.
Dear all,
Much of this thread has been deeply depressing, in part because it has concentrated almost entirely on those things about which we disagree and barely mentioned anything that we can all agree on. As I sit here typing this I can look across at my bookcase of socialist literature, some well read and some frankly unopened, and compose my own thoughts about popular fronts and united fronts. I’m happy to acknowledge that, at some point in the future, this discussion might be of absolutely vital importance, but do we need to talk about it now?
We have just seen a publicly funded grotesque display of capitalist triumphalism with wall-to-wall coverage of sycophantic eulogising, aided and abetted by a quisling media and Labour front bench. Millions of people are outraged by what has happened but feel that no one is speaking for them. George Galloway, Dennis Skinner and Glenda Jackson (apologies to anyone I’ve missed out) were isolated and ignored voices of reason and class-consciousness.
Left Unity must speak for these people currently without a voice; Left Unity must BE these people. Our first task therefore, it seems to me, is to challenge the consensus that ‘there is no alternative’. We have to give people the hope and belief that things don’t need to be like this and that there is a way out of the mess we are in.
That way out is socialism, using the wealth of society for the benefit of all rather than the few. If that is the core belief of Left Unity then we can debate: the causes of the rise of Stalinist dictatorship in Russia, the failures of the SDLP in Germany, and the finer points of the Law Of The Tendency Of The Rate Of Profit To Fall, as we grow and move forward.
I do think that we need to learn from the failures of previous attempts to build a new broad-based left party and this will include developing structures that protect those who haven’t signed up to any particular version of the Fourth International, as well as those who are members of those versions and wish to remain so.
The Tories are the enemy’s comrades, not any of the contributors to this thread!
Regards,
Colin
Which tories are “the enemy” the red tories or the blue tories strikes me with all the establishment parties singing from the same song sheet “the enemy” does not come in just one political colour ?
Peter…………….
…3, 2, 1 – see yer Tom and anyone who agrees with you. Who is Lenin in your little scenario, by the way? Actually, I don’t care.
Agreed again Mark.
Well, I went to my first LU meeting last week and was very inspired. It seemed very welcoming. Then we get Mark Perryman’s in some ways reasonable article that can’t resist jibes about ‘Socialist this that and the other’. Left one of those parties a long time ago but I thought the idea was to be welcoming to various currents on the left and not start ridiculing them before we’ve even started. While I agree we need to think about how we organise if you are seriously commmited to constructing an organisation from the bottom up why start by dismissing those who might be interested? This article has left me feeling rather sad; not because of its content but because of the tone. I thought we were trying to get away from all that. I’m obviously naive.
While I think I understand the feeling Gary, “Left one of those parties a long time ago” shows you’ve been there and rejected it. Good. Then why would anyone want to “be welcoming to various currents on the left” if that includes people/groups who don’t just gently jibe, as Mark does, but castigate/use/abuse and justify the very ‘hard edged’ factionalising that has poisoned and killed many left / progressive initiatives?
I took Tom’s advice and had a little look at SWaPshop site and then Jerry Hicks’ and it was a bit like (although obviously very different to) reading The Morning Star: first a yawn, then irritation, followed by mild anger (why does anyone put up with being shouted at in any context, apart from the bosom of one’s family, let alone at a meeting where you’re supposed to agree with what’s being said?) and then crushing depression as the realisation hits you that Oh no, THIS IS THE LEFT ALTERNATIVE!!
If people are interested in the sense that they are actually sick of the above and want to do something better, more effective and more “fun if it is to be serious” as has been said – great. I don’t think anyone is “dismissing those who might be interested” but just saying what their bottom line is at the off. If the arguments are persuasive enough, some people might even change their minds, or agree an honest compromise.
Hopefully we’ll get all this off our chests, “count me out” or storm off in a huff if we’re going to and then the rest of us/you (as that may be me) get on with it.
Mark makes a lot of good points in his article about how this new party should develop. First it has to be a party not just a network or movement. The majority of people see politics is about parties that are organised and contest elections. Of course the party we want to build, as Mark says, is not the same as the tories or Labour in that we don’t want to create a bureaucracy but empower people and encourage self-organisation in struggle and hopefully within a new eco-socialist future. Often movements or networks don’t resolve the problem of elites, bureaucracy or accountability – just observe how Beppe Grillo’s movement in Italy is doing a number of correct things but is not democratically organised. Building a party that has some level of centralising capacity is a recognition of the reality of state power which is highly centralising and very powerful. Changing society will mean at a certain stage confronting it.
Secondly that level of organisation does not mean blindly copying certain temporary models of bolshevik organisation. I am totally with Mark on this – we need the widest possible discussion and bottom up building with horizontal connections is fine. Fun has to be an integral part of a new party – i would define this in terms of culture and sport more than anything else. As someone who has been on and off in groups of a trot tradition (altho these days we self-define as ecosocialist, marxist and feminist rather than use the trot visiting card)I have always found we take ourselves a little too seriously at times. Fourthly let’s not have double standards and be more welcoming to independents and new people than to members of existing left groups. I totally agree we need to be strong in arguing against privileges or a federal top down set up. Any currents joining LU must loyally build it as individual activists. Such currents should be exposed if they attempt to use LU as a mere recruiting ground or pull it in a certain direction by packing meetings. We need to discuss this as I said in an article posted on the LU site since the initial success of LU is attracting interest from SWP and the SP. However Mark, please don’t lump all the organised rev left into the same bag. Some currents (Socialist Resistance,ACI and the new ISN split from the SWP) are enthusiastic about LU and share your opposition to the behaviour we have seen in the past in campaigns or electoral intiatives. Finally I think you are absolutely right to state clearly that LU is not the new revolutionary party – it a broad class struggle party that opposes social democratic neo-liberalism and will stand against Labour. It will include revolutonary currents, anarchists, left reformists and anyone else who wants to fight for a left alternative to one nation labour. We have to be flexible and see how best to work with TUSC, Respect, the Greens or other electoral forces to the left of Labour. We need to be a little modest before dismissing TUSC. Although it has not developed precisely because of its cartel nature and lack of strong local groups we have not yet achieved anything electorally with LU. I agree that we could do better than TUSC if we play it right.
You have made a number of assumptions, Ben, as well as caricatures of the revolutionary left, and I find your tone quite sneering. I have just left the SWP but would welcome them as well as any other individual in a revolutionary left organisation into the left unity group I am in. Indeed there are people from small, ‘paper selling’ organisations in mine. They all seem to be completely non-sectarian and keen to move forward with those who aren’t. We have agreed that we have individuals, not blocs, and I agree with that. I am not willing to participate in smearing anyone based on what party they are in or what paper they sell. Let’s not create unnecessary divisions by pre-empting behaviour of people.
By the way, what are your politics Mark and Ben.
Ok, I’m bowing out of this now. My instinct has always been to discuss things with people face to face. On the web you can’t get tone, body language, ironic smiles. It all seems rather nasty and sneering. My point was that if as Mark Perryman says in the article: “The days of strong power, vertically-organised left parties are numbered. What will bind Left Unity together are the values we identify and share. This needs to be a bottom-up movement of ideas, not being afraid of the messy and the incoherent because that’s how life is.”, then you have to accept that some of those people at the ‘bottom’, in the local groups, might have a political history or even political present you don’t agree with. Or are we in the business of picking and choosing who it’s ok to be in LU at this stage? That sounds very top down to me.
There is all the difference in the world between being provocative and being offensive.
There is all the difference in the world between disagreeing and smearing.
There is all the difference in the world between the inclusive and the exclusive.
Left Unity is in its earliest stages of development but choices made now wll go a long way to shaping where it ends up.
A lash-up between pre-existing groups, based on pre-existing models of not only organisation and ideas but political culture and activism will end up with one version. And I’ll be quite clear Ilm not interested in that persinally, been there, done that, failed, don’t want to endure that again.
So actually it is a case of pre-existing groups, whoever or whatever, taking a step back. Left Unity prioritising listening to those who’ve never signed up to anything like this before, finding out why they haven’t, what Left Unity offers that others haven’t, what they’d like it to become. The accumulated failure of all the pre-existing groups demands a degree of humility. Maybe the 8,000 signatories, the 80 local groups, these first meetings won’t amount to very much. But at least provide it the space to find out, for itself. Such a process will be anarchic, messy, incoherent sometimes but if that means something resembling 8000 signatories becoming 8000 members of a new Left party, 80 local groups becoming 80 branches then it wll be well worth it. So no bans but no prescriptions on what Left Unity can become either. This demands a purposeful prority given to the voices of those never prevously involved with anything like this before. Comrades, its called taking a step back to go forward, as Lenin once almost put it.
Mark P
“This demands a purposeful prority given to the voices of those never prevously involved with anything like this before.”
I couldn’t agree more Mark but hope you acknowledge that does not therefore include yourself! Like Alison and Gary I think this thread has gone on too long and been too divisive.
I can only refer again to what our real purpose must surely be. Someone is being made homeless in Britain every 15 minutes, they haven’t time for us to be fractious, factious or ‘messy and anarchic’.
Colin
Again, so many assumptions, and very much based on a one sided view. As Gary says, time to bow out…
Absolutely blown away by this! There is a real hunger for a nationwide, electable left alternative.
Like a lot of people, over the past few years I’ve become increasingly politicised and frustrated by the in-just, destructive society that neo-liberalism has created. Huge sways of people have been cast aside and left to fend for themselves, young and old, black and white. For far to long community’s have felt abandoned.
I’m completely new to this, until recently I’ve never even considered joining a political group or movement. At times it’s felt as if I’ve been grappling around in a dark room looking for a light switch.
The left has to engage and educate people in far greater numbers than it has for a long time, but it also has to reeducate and redefine itself. There’s many reasons why party’s from the left have been unable to remove itself from the fringes and into the mainstream of British politics and unless we learn from this then we too will amount to no more.
Ambition and communication is key, with the arrival of new social media never before has the potential to engage such large numbers been so easy.