Weekly Worker 456 Thursday November 14 2002
European Social Forum
Communist SWP
One rather amusing incident took place in the Fortezza da Basso castle shortly after the Globalise Resistance rally.
The SWP amassed in the central ground of the fort and proceeded to march around the lawn chanting, “Peace not profit, peace not war” and “One solution - revolution”. Evidently the need for more demonstrations, put forward by the SWP but subsequently rejected during the talks leading up to the ESF, was such that comrades simply could not hold in their anger against capitalism, and decided, in the absence of a permit to march in the city, to parade around the venue instead. Yes, the SWP were behaving like revolutionary clowns.
Also amusing was the SWP’s attempted use of the word ‘communist’ - albeit in Italian - when selling Socialist Worker. According to sellers, the paper was one of “English communism”. Comrades were also selling a journal which contained the previously unutterable ‘c’ word in the title. Thankfully Socialist Worker is no longer welcoming the “death of communism”, as it did in 1991. When in Italy do as the Italians do, but when back in good old Blighty then it’s a case of aping rotten old Labour once more.
The irony of this superficial posturing was compounded by Socialist Worker’s list of the principal groups attending the ESF - Rifondazione Comunista was listed simply as “Rifondazione”. This is not only dishonest, but degrades the significance and political meaning of the word ‘communist’. This ‘where the wind is blowing’ approach does little to concretise and develop politics, but might perhaps help feed the SWP’s rotating door recruitment methods.
David Hunnam
