Weekly Worker 605 Thursday December 15 2005 Subscribe to the Weekly Worker

Letters

Sisters

To call the Sozialistische Alternative Voran (SAV) “the Socialist Party’s German section” is not correct (‘Opposition party or coalition partner’, December 8). The SAV is the German affiliate to the Committee for a Workers’ International, with its own representatives on the CWI’s international executive committee (IEC).

The CWI has a democratically convened world congress and an elected IEC; it is not owned by any affiliated group. As both the SAV and the Socialist Party are CWI members, this makes them sister parties.

Jorgan Schmitt
Germany

Linkspartei

On November 30 3,000 students from across the federal state of Nord-Rhine-Westfalia gathered to demonstrate against the first reading of the bill proposed by the local state coalition government of the Christian Democrats (CDU) and the Liberals (FDP) to introduce student fees of €500 per semester (around £675 per academic year). The demonstration coincided with demonstrations in other federal states - with 10,000 students in Stuttgart, for example.

It is no secret that German universities, and the selective, elitist German education system in general, is in financial and structural chaos - the various Programme for International Student Assessment studies, sponsored by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, have caused much embarrassment amongst those who extol the virtues of the German education system.

The ‘solution’ of introducing fees is, of course, nothing new. British students have already protested (in vain) against such attacks and will be familiar with the numerous excuses and feeble attempts to justify the gradual introduction of the market into education. Despite Blair’s emphasis on the primacy of education, the truth, in Britain as in Germany, is somewhat different - understaffed classrooms, dilapidated buildings and overcrowded lecture theatres.

The latest attacks are part of a broader programme of cuts in public spending that go far beyond students. Former chancellor Gerhard Schröder started this destructive process with his ‘Agenda 2010’ blueprint and the whole process will be intensified now that Schröder’s SPD has cosied up to the CDU in the national coalition government. In spite of the brilliant turnout for the Linkspartei in the September general election, it is clear that a genuinely radical left force, a force able to lead the fight to overturn these ‘reforms’, is lacking.

Indeed, it can be said that the focus of the two constituent groups of the Linkspartei - the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS) and the Electoral Alternative for Work and Social Justice (WASG) - is ultimately aimed towards a restoration of the old social partnership between labour and capital in the form of the social state. The PDS flyer on the demo called for nothing but the participation of all students and non-students on further demonstrations. Yet the problem of student fees, as well as the cuts in public services as a whole, demands a political answer in the form of a strategy that can defend our higher education and at the same time fight for reforms in our interest in a revolutionary manner. Attack is the best form of defence.

The WASG programme states that “the current schooling and education policy has turned away … from equal opportunity” - implying that our aim in the struggle against student fees should be limited to the restoration of a welfare capitalism. The sad truth is that, while both groups contain many people who are, at least in private and amongst trusted friends, convinced socialists, the ‘S’ word is to be found in the programme of neither.

Ben Lewis (CPGB)
Fine Tonhauser (Sozialistische Alternative Voran)
Germany

Antics

Steve Freeman indulges in his usual method of debate (Letters, December 8). Distort the other side’s views - in this case those of the Democratic Socialist Alliance (DSA) - into a caricature and then throw as much mud as you can, hoping some will stick. This is not a serious way to build a Socialist Alliance. Let us have some honest accounting and acknowledgement of differences, not playground antics.

The question I asked in my original letter (December 1), and which Steve Freeman refuses to answer, is: what have we learned from our experiences in the SA since 1996? Some excellent recent articles in the Weekly Worker have highlighted the difficulties in forging socialist unity in Australia and Germany. At the same time we are now faced in England and Wales with new unity initiatives from the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers and the Socialist Party. Do we learn from our past experiences or do we keep going down the same blind alleys and cul-de-sacs?

The DSA has identified a number of lessons from our recent past. From the Socialist Labour Party and Arthur Scargill’s 3,000-votes-in-the-back-pocket experience, we conclude that democracy is absolutely essential - no self-appointed leaders and no secret deals. From the first attempt at an SA in 1996, when the Socialist Party were the dominant left group, we believe ‘the Scottish turn’ by Scottish Militant Labour to have been a courageous and correct move. We need a working class party in which left groups can become factions or platforms.

From the experience in the SA with the Socialist Workers Party we conclude that a major problem with forging socialist unity is the sectarianism of left groups. What we mean by this is that groups put the interest of building their own organisation before the building of the movement as a whole.

It is clear that Steve Freeman does not accept this definition of sectarianism - not surprising really, since he is a member of a sect: the Revolutionary Democratic Group. He accuses the DSA of “anti-RDG sectarianism” because we do not think that republicanism - hard, soggy or lukewarm - is a major issue in the building of socialist unity. We have not discussed republicanism because of a “lack of courage”, as he puts it, but because of a lack of time; we have more important issues to discuss.

Dave Spencer
secretary, DSA

Not splitters

Steve Freeman’s letter dishonestly claimed the DSA is composed of Trotskyist sectarian splitters from the ‘new Socialist Alliance’.

We are not a Trotskyist organisation, we are not splitters and we are not sectarian. The DSA is a Marxist organisation with comrades from a wide variety of revolutionary socialist traditions - including comrades with a background in Trotskyism, although I am not aware of anyone who currently considers themselves to be specifically Trotskyist.

The comrades involved have been fighting for working class unity in a mass workers’ party for some years in the SA and in the SLP. Unlike Steve Freeman, who made compromises with Arthur Scargill’s witch-hunters, some of our comrades were out-and-out fighters for workers’ democracy in the SLP.

The DSA took a wait-and-see attitude to the ‘new SA’. The majority took the view that we should not dismiss the SA or its founding conference. We sent four comrades to take part. The decision not to join the ‘new SA’ was unanimous at our last members’ meeting. The DSA cannot split from an organisation it has never joined.

The call for a Marxist workers’ party at the SA’s founding conference was heavily defeated. A significant section of the meeting did not believe workers were ready for a Marxist party and doubted there could be a common definition of Marxism. This negative emphasis was reflected in the programmatic aspects of its constitution, which stated that the SA was not a party, was not set up in opposition to other groups and was not attempting to persuade members of other socialist organisations to leave their groups. This was a step backwards from a workers’ party. A step the DSA is not prepared to take.

The constitutional monarchist state is not the main barrier to socialism, as the constitutional programme of the SA states. As the DSA’s leaflet at the meeting pointed out, it is a fallacy to suppose that there is an inevitable intermediary stage in the struggle for socialism, such as a capitalist republic.

Barry Biddulph
DSA

Sick fetish

Now that Marcus Ström has proffered the final word on the future of the Australian Socialist Alliance, maybe he will leave us alone (‘Cannonites and the way of the dodo’, December 8). And maybe, just maybe, he can find something else to write about, rather than being so caught up in baiting Democratic Socialist Perspective (DSP) and denigrating the SA.

Nonetheless your readers may like to catch up with the exchange on this topic on the Green Left Weekly list after Marcus decided to share his forensic thoughts there (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/GreenLeft_discussion/). When challenged about their veracity, Ström fell silent.

The real issue on the Australian left is not the condition of the SA and the DSP’s role. I am sorry, but that is true. It may be a sick fetish for a small number of like-minded acolytes - especially within the Sydney left zoo - but there are bigger outcomes at stake.

Dave Riley
Brisbane

Don’t be hasty

Sachin Sharma ought to get a new set of reading glasses (Letters, December 8).

“Does comrade Douglass then claim that the method the working class should employ to gain political power in the UK is to subordinate the battle for extreme democracy to the maintenance of a liberal democracy ?” No, he does not!

Nothing I said in my original letter dealing with the class politics of World War II can be read like that (December 1). Neither did I say that workers should fight fascism “under the leadership of the bourgeoisie”. I stated the opposite: “Certainly we should have fought fascism, preferably on our own terms in red detachments, but clearly with some coordination with, although not subjugation to, the ‘allies’. At the same time we would have prosecuted the class war at home against ‘our own’ ruling class.”

Not to recognise this puts Sachin in the same league as those who dive to their PCs to fire off a hasty response without reading what they are ‘responding’ to.

David Douglass
Doncaster

Carried away

I like the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty for being honest and direct, but Paul Hampton really gets carried away in his rant against Nick Rogers’ article on Venezuela (Letters, December 8).

I will ignore the silly point about Chávez using the military against workers (I do not remember Trotsky being shy when it came to coercing workers by force for the ‘good of the workers’ state’). The main point is that Chávez does not meet any criteria Paul himself sets for Bonapartism: “Trotsky said Bonapartism occurred where the bourgeoisie was compelled to tolerate the uncontrolled command of a military and police apparatus in order to preserve its possessions.”

Indeed he did, but I have to ask when did Paul start considering a vicious propaganda campaign, a bloody coup, a national lockout that sent the economy into freefall and screaming about ‘communists’ while virtually begging the US to intervene, as the Venezuelan ruling class tolerating Chávez?

Akimov Konigsberg
email

Masterly

I enclose £15 to the fighting fund and am sorry I have been unable to donate for some time.

I think you are at your best when you leave off the rather pathetic minutiae and ‘personalities’ associated with Respect and the SWP, and concentrate on attempting to develop an effective and genuine communist intervention in politics in your (our) own right.

Your recent articles on climate change and the Chávez phenomenon (Weekly Worker December 1) were masterly, informative and educational, and started to develop an effective communist intervention and perspective on these issues, which can resonate and engage with the working class.

The fact you provide a platform for the excellent Liz Hoskings and her brave, principled stand against unlimited abortion and degradation of working class women is also a good reason for continued support.

Andrew Northall
Northampton

Huff and puff

I have just been reading The strange death of Liberal England by George Dangerfield.

It is worth everyone in the Stop the War Coalition reading the chapter on the suffragettes, if nothing else. The determination and intensity of their protest make the STWC, for all its size, look like a comfortable picnic.

Where have the militant protests been? Why no pickets of the docks, where munitions, tanks and supplies are loaded and sent to Iraq? Why no pickets of barracks in the UK? Why no protests at airfields, where the torture flights land? So opportunist has the SWP become, it has lost sight of any form of militant class tactics.

There are still plenty of US bases in the UK that could be the target of demonstrations. The fact is that the SWP led the STWC into Respect. Galloway has used the STWC to get re-elected and parade around the world as some sort of unaccountable ‘leader’.

For all its huffing and puffing, the STWC has never been serious about stopping the war because the people who lead it have no faith, hope or confidence in the working class. They seem to be more keen on feeding egos (Galloway) or pursuing very limited media careers (Rees and German).

Rudolf Rocker
email

Population

Dr Gordon Downie raises an interesting point regarding overpopulation of the earth (Letters, December 8).

But it is wise to be cautious about population projections. To put it crudely: in the developed countries the rich can afford to have children, but haven’t the time to look after them; the poor have the time, but haven’t the money; and the great majority have neither the time nor the money to biologically reproduce themselves.

The fact is that populations are decreasing in urbanised societies.

Arthur Lawrence
email

Witch-hunt victim

Jack Conrad/Enso White’s latest missive contains a ‘question’ that can only be asked by a complete anti-Marxist (Letters, December 8). Given that I believe that the CPGB is islamophobic, would I support a crown prosecution of the CPGB under Blair’s religious hatred legislation? The question does not follow from the premise, but it does reveal something of the mindset of someone who evidently cannot distinguish between the existence of reactionary prejudice on the left and in society generally, and the incitement of hatred, which is thankfully a small subset of such general bigotry. Very stupid, and an indication of chauvinist degeneration in itself.

The very idea of anyone on the left demanding the prosecution of the CPGB, or even the AWL (which is considerably worse in its islamophobia) is absurd. I could, however, conceivably critically support the prosecution of someone like, for example, the late Theo Van Gogh, who wrote, among many filthy things, that Dutch muslims were a “fifth column of goatfuckers” in Dutch society. Just maybe, were he able to be prosecuted for his remarks, he might not have fallen at the hands of one of the likely victims of the pogroms he evidently sought.

What is clear, however - since the CPGB publishes material defending the ‘democratic rights’ of Nazis like the ‘Racial Volunteer Force’ against prosecution under the laws outlawing racial hatred - is that the CPGB is coming from an ultra-libertarian position that puts the ‘rights’ of such scum above the rights of their intended and actual victims. The CPGB published material (by the Worker-communist Party of Iraq) bitterly condemning the killing of Van Gogh. So the CPGB’s message to muslims (and others) on the receiving end of such pogromist incitement is: ‘Learn to like it - we’ll condemn you if you turn to the law, and we’ll condemn you if you use violence as well.’ Well, I know which side I am on in these matters.

Ultimately, this is about equality. The likes of Conrad/White are not likely to be under the gun of those inciting racial or religious hatred. So he doesn’t give a damn about anyone who is. He is a ‘left’ social-chauvinist, whose ‘Marxism’ is merely a reflection of the social mores of today’s middle class, many of whom spend considerable amounts of time tut-tutting about terrible muslims and their non-secular ways.

Legal measures are certainly not a strategy for liberation; but the legal recognition that it is impermissible to say simply anything at all, no matter how vile, against an oppressed minority means that the bourgeois state has been compelled to at least formally recognise that the oppressed have rights. That is a social gain, even if, like many such gains under capitalism, it can be and no doubt will be abused in various ways.

So I’m hardly surprised that Conrad/White claims that there was no ‘witch-hunt’ last year against myself for fighting internally against the CPGB’s opportunist coddling of the more virulently islamophobic and overtly anti-Leninist wing that was the fruits of its ‘third campism’. No, I never wrote any material at all critical of that third campism, did I? Just as I never fought against the CPGB’s ‘solidarity’ with the CIA/Daily Telegraph witch-hunt of George Galloway, at the time it broke out in April 2003. And I never wrote any material, such as that of May 8 2003, arguing a very hard line in the opposite direction, did I? Nor did I write front-page material arguing for solidarity with the Fallujah and Najaf uprisings, noting that “The war of liberation against the occupation has begun” (April 15 2004), which the CPGB must find acutely embarrassing. It was all a figment of my imagination.

The written record, in the Weekly Worker’s own archives, says differently. Conrad/White’s fatuous assertion that no repressive action was taken against myself is of course contradicted by Peter Manson himself, who admitted in the pages of the paper last year (October 14 2004) that the entire membership was placed under moderation on its internal discussion list in July 2004 to stop “undisciplined” contributions by myself. Since these contributions were entirely non-public, “undisciplined” obviously really means contributions the leading clique found unpleasant. So Enso’s assertions don’t really add up, do they?

Ian Donovan
South London

Shrill

Sometimes I think Ian Donovan is blinded by the light of his own convictions and ends up saying things he does not really believe: for instance, about the attitude human beings (never mind socialists) should take towards anti-homosexual bigotry (Letters, December 8).

I could hardly believe my ears at the recent Respect conference when speaker after speaker got up to assure us that they did not support the beating up of homosexuals. I felt like shouting out, ‘Neither does the pope, but he’s still a bigot’. Then we were assured that there was no link between the bigotry of law-abiding people and thugs who make physical assaults on gays. Presumably thugs dream up their own prejudices rather than select them out of the pool of ‘respectable’ tosh that parades itself as wisdom in our society.

I would have thought, Ian, that you would have opposed most strongly the viewpoint that homosexuality is an abomination, wherever such ‘reasoning’ came from. Instead, you shift the argument to one against gays who are, in your words, “islamophobic”, “pro-imperialist”, “anti-immigrant”, and even “reminiscent of the BNP”. I know you do not say all homosexuals, although you did not mention any that are progressive. Meanwhile, you have nothing to say about Respect’s dropping of gay rights from its election manifesto. Apparently you agree with the SWP that homophobia can be excused in the fight against islamophobia - and then have the nerve to attack the CPGB for opposing both equally.

We are not “shrill” in our denunciation of “any hint of backwardness among muslims on the question of gay rights”. The people who cheered and clapped this rubbish were almost all non-muslims abandoning their long-held principles for opportunistic reasons. People like you, Ian: people who should know better.

Phil Kent
London

Equipment

We need to look past a newly emerging barrage of flag-waving patriots to find a genuine and rational solution to the question of independence in Scotland.

It is impossible to understand the nature of the national question without first understanding the nature of the class question, the class system and capitalism. To attempt to find a solution to the national question without making a class-based analysis would be the equivalent of trying to climb Ben Nevis without the necessary equipment. In other words, it is impossible and can only lead us up the blind alley of petty bourgeois nationalism.

Let me be perfectly clear. I understand the nature of the imperialist British empire, I know that its break-up is essential to the building of a socialist society in Scotland, England, Wales and Ireland. But I am a firm believer that any ideas of a ‘two-stage’ process towards an independent capitalist nation, which puts socialism on the agenda ‘later’ (in other words ‘never’) should always be avoided like the plague by socialists in Scotland, or anywhere else for that matter.

We should never be fooled into thinking that we can find solutions to any problems under capitalism. We should be equally as dismissive when we are told that the dreams of romantic nationalists can further our cause as workers fighting for class liberation.

Matthew McLean
www.MarxismOnline.com

Shame on you

It is typical of the Mensheviks at the so-called Weekly Worker that you would post an article by the Labour Party Pakistan (‘No to World Trade Organisation’, December 8).

Shame on you!

Karl Shayne
Dundee

No exception

The emergent Kenyan dictator, Mwai Emilio Kibaki, has reappointed thieves, traitors, opportunists, murderers and tribal chieftains in a ‘new look’ cabinet that has met with strong and immediate condemnation.

Although Kibaki was elected on a platform of fighting corruption, he has failed to send to jail even a single thief. The Kenyan government tells people that tourism is bringing billions to the country each year, while at the same time leaving imperialist economic agents to repatriate profits abroad without interruption.

The Kenya Scandinavia Democratic Movement (Kesdemo) believes that Kibaki should not be allowed to finish his term. He must be overthrown democratically and since he has refused to accept a vote of no confidence (in last month’s referendum) in his government, there is no alternative but to force him out of office. After losing the referendum, Kibaki’s stay in power cannot be accepted or tolerated in any functioning democracy - Kenya is no exception.

Martin Ngatia
Kesdemo

Aaronovitch

The Weekly Worker is something of a conundrum. On the one hand, it is probably the most widely read newspaper on the Marxist left in Britain. Yet, on the other hand, the financial predicament facing our little paper is all too evident (see our appeal, Weekly Worker December 8).

To some extent this is not difficult to understand. Possibly our biggest group of readers are members of the Socialist Workers Party, keen to learn about the latest political development in their own group. Unfortunately, too few of these comrades take out a paid subscription, frightened stiff that the high priests of the SWP might catch them reading such material. Yet this should not explain the reticence of others to cough up to the paper they read so avidly.

One such reader is David Aaronovitch, the former Euro-Stalinist, turned Blairite groupie. As many readers will be aware, this prolific press and broadcasting hack is not averse to purloining extracts from Weekly Worker to make his turgid articles for the ‘quality press’ slightly more interesting.

This is all too evident in his latest waffle (‘Here’s my apology on the “disaster” of the Iraq war. Now, where’s yours?’ The Times December 13). Although largely aimed at Matthew ‘Tory’ Parris, a rightwing critic of the war, he cannot resist a dig at the CPGB. His method is instructive, so I will quote the sage at some length:

“There is, on parts of the left, a long and ignoble tradition of trashing democracy. This week one ultra-left group was arguing for the slogan, ‘Troops out now! The main enemy is imperialism!’ It is a slogan that seems, psychologically at least, to unite many diverse objectors to the war. But the groupuscule’s argument then went something like this. It understood that the insurgency wanted to oppress Kurds, suppress the shia and ‘physically exterminate’ trade unions and feminist groups. However, communists, it said, ‘recognise that an imperialist defeat would objectively open up possibilities for the working class, and we would therefore welcome it even if it came at the hands of reactionary anti-imperialists’. And sod the Iraqis.”

Not once does he mention either the journalist, the CPGB or the Weekly Worker by name, although he quotes freely from Paul Greenaway (December 8). Why is Aaronovitch so reluctant to mention our organisation explicitly? Has he too caught a bad case of SWP-itis? Surely not.

Of course, one might argue this is not the issue and that one should instead take offence at his criticisms of us. Perhaps. Yet this ex-‘official communist’ travels so light politically, his views are so laughable, one cannot take him too seriously. Although making numerous apologies for the conduct of the war, Aaronovitch remains a warmonger. My favourite bit in his article is his apology to “the parents of children caught in crossfire and everyone else that the planners and executors of the invasion that I supported, and still support, may have let down by neglect or stupidity”. Says it all really.

Cameron Richards
Wales

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