PWOC’s strategies for the labor movement and partybuilding are seriously inadequate. PWOC’s theory neither consistently and effectively guides practical labor work toward a rank and file movement nor toward a revolutionary workers movement and party. Although PWOC has significantly criticised the sect groups for failing to fuse communism with the workers’ movement, PWOC’s own theory and practice in this area are woefully underdeveloped.
If we judge PWOC merely as a local collective, then these errors are not so significant. Few, if any, collectives have done much better. Our present movement must expect much amateurishness, and the standards we apply to local collectives must therefore be low. But when a local collective’s labor strategy receives national currency, it is especially important to critically examine the theory and its practical results. Otherwise any errors threaten to be multiplied many times over and repeated for some time.
We did not write this paper because we feel that we have all the answers which PWOC is lacking. We wrote this paper because wo and our movement as a whole don’t have the critical theory we need to direct our practical work. At best, our paper raises some important questions–questions which can only be answered by debate and discussion which combines the ideas and experiences of Marxist-Leninists in many cities.
Too often, theoretical debate in our movement lacks a certain concreteness. Too much polemicizing has been done, and too many lines of demarcation drawn around theoretical issues which do not imply clear, developed strategic alternatives (For a fuller elaboration of these ideas see our earlier paper, “Debating Strategy: A New Turn for the Movement”). Our purpose in writing this paper is to provide an example of the kind of theoretical discussion we feel our movement needs and to help stimulate that discussion.
We are aware that the PWOC and other forces in the anti-dogmatist trend have been working for some time to promote greater unity and build closer ties among the groups in the trend. One possible outgrowth of these efforts is more public discussion among different groups and the idea of a common theoretical journal has been mentioned. We see tremendous potential in these developments provided that debate is focused on key questions end conducted in a concrete way. We believe that it is the central task of these national partybuilding efforts to organize and promote concrete debate and discussion of fusion theory. One way of organizing this discussion is to systematically address questions relating to what ideology we seek to fuse with the workers’ movement, who we seek to reach and influence, and how we aim to achieve this fusion. Or, to elaborate:
1) To what particular understanding do we seek to educate workers? What understanding is necessary to distinguish a revolutionary communist from a liberal, reformist, anarchist, populist, or other ideologue?
2) Which workers and how many should we seek to educate to this level at this time?
3) How can we create this fusion? What analysis, methods, organization and experience do we need in our practical work in labors and other movements? What sort of unity and organization do we need among Marxist-Leninists?
Our efforts to fuse communism with the workers’ movement will be greatly advanced if we can bring the experience of a broad range of Marxist-Leninists to bear on these three strategic questions. Another area for beginning discussion is concrete’ examples of revolutionary political education. Many leftists (ourselves included) have an undernourished understanding of the potential for revolutionary political exposures in different areas of work. It would help to examine the potential raised by various struggles and issues.
Regarding PWOC, we urge them to carefully read and evaluate our criticism. We will give PWOC leadership the first opportunity to read this paper and discuss it with us. If PWOC should decide to take our criticism to heart, we offer whatever assistance and cooperation we can. We could, for instance, cooperate with the Organizer to develop revolutionary political exposures for the labor movement.
The day may come when all of the ideas presented in our criticism of PWOC have been proven by Marxist-Leninists to be politically unsound. If that follows from a long process of concrete discussion of the questions raised in this analysis and others, then our movement will have better theory as a result of it. We look forward to that day.