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From The New International, Vol. XXIII No. 2, Spring 1957, pp. 71–80.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for the Encyclopaedia of Trotskyism On-Line (ETOL).
The Krushchev “revelations” which undoubtedly provided a measure of legality to the dramatic outburst of discussions in the Stalinist movement of the world were merely symptomatic of the underlying pressures within it. Since the close of the war, the totalitarian vise of the system tightened on the vast populations of the Russian and satellite nations. In each of these countries, and particularly Russia, the depth of dissatisfaction must have been enormous to have produced the dangerous medium which Khrushchev chose to allay the feelings of the people, for he surely knew before hand that he had taken a calculated risk in his unprecedented attack on Stalin, the demigod of the new order.
The discussions that followed in all Stalinist parties and movements under its control and influence and the infinitely more significant revolts in Poland and Hungary revealed that if the world at large was unaware of the burgeoning crisis of Stalinism, the leadership of the Russian despotism was uneasily conscious of it. Khrushchev’s tactic was designed to mitigate an inevitable explosion even at a stiff cost. For his speech, if taken to its logical conclusion, was dangerous to the whole Stalinist system. The discussions which followed were only initial signs of the crisis.
Stalinist expansion, imperialist in aim and practice, has enormously increased the contradictions of the system. The significant economic advance of the Russian state has taken place on the basis of an unprecedented exploitation of the Russian masses, and since the war, of a similar exploitation of the masses of the satellite states. The severe economic exploitation at home and the ruthless economic exploitation of the satellite countries, joined to the dictatorial political systems, emphasized the greyness of life in the “new peoples’ democracies.” In a system so devoid of the simple democratic rights of the people and the rights of the individual, so devoid of the most elementary forms of democracy, the Khrushchev speech took the form of a catalyst in disturbing the three-decades-long inner-quiet of world Stalinism. The Russian leaders probably expected, and in a sense looked forward to, a “fundamental” discussion inside Russia and all other countries. What they did not calculate accurately, circumscribed as they are in their thinking by their totalitarian tradition, was the depth and extent of the dissatisfaction of the masses in and out of the Communist Parties, and the scope of the explosion.
Although that explosion which reached its height in the Polish and Hungarian revolts has been momentarily resolved, in the one by reluctant political compromise and in the other by the vicious military suppression through the Russian army, new and even more severe repercussions will be heard from the Russian domination of the nationally-suppressed satellite countries. The discussions of “basic questions” within the Communist Parties which seem to have run their course in most countries and which ended with the reassertion of the domination of the Stalinist leaderships has, notwithstanding all of that, opened up a new era for these parties. It is still the Stalinist system but with a difference. The element of doubt about the infallibility of the leadership and the eternal truth of its doctrine has been permanently installed within the movement; the desire for internal freedom, the right of discussion, and all of that, spills over into the broader desire for democracy. These questions will continue to press within the movement and produce further conflict. The door to these conflicts has been opened.
Of all the countries in which a discussion of Russia and Stalinism took place, none has reached proportions such as in America. Here, the leadership of the Communist Party fell apart. The brutal suppression of the Hungarian revolt, the openness of the Stalinist anti-Semitism, life in a bourgeois-democratic nation far distant from the borders of the dominant Russian state, are some of the causes which served to move the discussion further than elsewhere. The emergence of the Gates tendency and the struggle it undertook was the most expressive evidence of the collapse of the American Communist Party. Overnight, this once powerful organization, which held itself fairly strong in face of severe governmental prosecution and persecution, faced schismatic disintegration. The membership has disappeared in the hundreds and thousands, so that at its convention held in February, the party, which once dominated the radical movement in the United States, appeared as it really is: decimated, disunited and isolated from the main streams of American life, and most particularly, from the American labor movement.
While it has an independent validity on the basis of American historical developments, the discussion of socialist unification and regroupment in the United States, was brought to a head by the crisis of Stalinism here and abroad. In an important sense, though the movement is tiny in this country, the problem of socialist unification and regroupment is part of a world process in the struggle against Stalinism and capitalism. The crisis of Stalinism in this country and the discussion of unification and regroupment, had therefore, by its nature, to involve all socialist, dissident Stalinist and Stalinoidal groups. Even those who sought to avoid the problem by some ultimatistic declaration have found it impossible to escape the demands of the current political situation in the small and isolated radical movement.
Given the situation created by the Stalinist crisis in this country, what do we mean by saying that the question of unification and regroupment has an independent validity in the United States? The nature of the problem is illustrated by the fact that this country is the only major capitalist nation without a mass socialist party, and on another plane, even a labor party reflecting the elementary economic interests of the working class in a political manner. The socialist movements in this country are small, indeed, they are sects, largely isolated from the vast labor movement. The old socialist traditions that did exist in this country are no longer vivid. What does remain of them is hardly perceptible. Bourgeois politics continues to dominate the American labor movement and the working class.
American socialism which once developed strong roots in the nation was the first victim of the vastly-expanding economy and prosperity, of New Dealism and the long existing war economy. The socialist movement which is linked forever with the name of Eugene V. Debs, has not been able to reclaim its early glory primarily because of the objective factors of American social growth. The historical prosperity of the United States, resting on a series of peculiar but favorable conjunctures in the world economy and the unusually fortunate results of two world wars, produced a conservative working class disoriented as to its own needs and interests by the influence of bourgeois ideology.
During the economic crisis of the Thirties, this conservative political state of the working class was interrupted. Then, the working class demonstrated what it had in common with the working classes of all countries: militancy, the will to struggle, the desire for organization and the readiness to pass beyond mere economic battle to a defense and advance of its social position as the most important productive class in society. This promising development was halted by the war and post-war developments. Underneath the present quiet, however, are important social factors which promise, in the not too distant future, to alter the course in the social development of the American working class. A radicalization of the American working class appears on the horizon and the socialists of this country must first of all recognize its signs and then prepare for such a development.
THE POLITICAL COMMITTEE OF THE Independent Socialist League in its Memorandum on Our Perspective and Orientation in the Matter of Socialist Unity sought to give direction to this problem. In stating why it believed the next stage of development to be a political one, the Memorandum said:
The unification of the AFL and CIO has brought the American working class to its highest point in strength and made it the most numerous and powerful social movement in the country ... The unification of the labor movement in this way is an historic turning-point for the American working class. At the same time, an historic turning point is being recorded by another section of the working people, the Negroes in the South, in the irreversible movement for equality that embraces virtually all of them. Not only are the two movements historically linked but, despite the insignificant organizational ties between them at present, they are already linked politically and socially in the significance and consequences of their development.
Almost all socialists in the United States believe that the basic political development of the American working class will be reflected in the emergence of an independent labor party. Given the fact that the working people of this country have little or no independent political tradition, i.e., have no lasting, operating and effective independent political tradition, the creation of an independent labor party on the broad foundations of the labor movement, encompassing even broader millions of the population for whom the labor movement must learn to speak, would be the expression of a most radical political development of the American people, even though it would not yet be socialist. The task of socialists in this country is to work faithfully to assist in the creation of such a party, to establish their roots in it and to seek to influence its ideological development toward socialism. In our view, the future of American socialism is linked to this development of the American working class; Socialists must first of all be conscious of the problem and then do everything they can to realize these perspectives.
American socialists must learn to speak the language of the American people, to avoid the deadly trap of sectarian ultimatism and theoretical dogmatism which talks down to the working class and isolates them from the labor movement. They must be in the very center of the labor movement, working with and for the working class and assisting in the political education and experience of the masses. But before they can even do that elementary thing, socialists have to organize themselves effectively for the tasks that lie ahead in this country.
For many years the Stalinist movement dominated the radical working class; the Russian state commanded the allegiance of tens of thousands through the activities of the American Communist Party in its various formations and guises. But by the very fact that it constituted the ideological, political and organizational leadership of the radical movement, the American Communist Party, was the principal source of the ideological disorientation and confusion of the radicalized masses; more than anything else it was responsible for the distortion of the meaning and aim of socialism. Socialism became identified in the minds of other tens of thousands with Stalinism and Russian totalitarianism.
The increasing disappointment in reactionary Stalinism and, even more important than that, the mass opposition of the American people to it, became in effect an opposition to socialism itself. This is the tremendous burden of which socialists in this country must be relieved. It will not be an easy task in any case, but it is made even more difficult by the fact that while Stalinism in its crisis and the American Communist Party has lost its vitality and power, the ideology of Stalinism, which has perverted so much of socialist thought and practice, is not at all dead. It continues under various masquerades. Yet, no socialist regroupment is possible unless the movement is freed without reservation from Stalinist influence so that it can truly appear before the American working class as “an alternative pole of attraction to that constituted by Stalinism.”
Taking into account the objective conditions in this country, so roughly and generally drawn here, the real ideological and organizational development of the working class, any discussion of socialist unification and regroupment dictates to socialists the need for the creation of the broadest socialist movement with the broadest socialist program so that it may not only become more nearly attuned to the realities of American life, but also be in the best position to embrace all socialists within such a movement. The warnings against sectarianism and ultimatism with Friedrich Engels sent to the Socialist Labor Party near the end of the last century remain appropriate to this very day. American socialism contributed to its isolation from the working class by ideological and political programs beyond the comprehension or ability of the class to respond to them. A new start has to be made; it is imperative if the vacuum produced by the Stalinist crisis and the general crisis of socialism is to be filled with the hope of a socialist future. With this in mind, the Memorandum referred to above, stated:
Our decisions must facilitate, not in some unrealizable ideal of abstract sense, but in the sense of the maximum possible under the concrete circumstances, the advancement of our ideas of democratic socialism in the ranks of labor and Negro movements, and the corresponding growth of a socialist movement based on these broad mass movements and exercising and increasing influence among them. Any decision taken in the matter of socialist unity, or in relations with other groups, must serve this objective. Any decision, no matter what successes it seems to yield of a temporary or isolated nature, but which conflicts with this objective, which does not serve it, or which is not conceived and carried on in a way which is consciously subordinated to the attainment of the objective, is wrong.
The premise for this thinking has already been indicated in our references to the role of Stalinism and its influence in this country. The great issue of modern socialism is: totalitarianism or democracy. Stalinism, in all or any of its forms, is a cancerous growth and influence in the working class. It is not merely a political or organizational evil; it is above all a social evil that has served to distort and blacken the socialist ideal of human liberty in all its forms and has substituted a modern slavery for socialist freedom; it has created a contempt and distortion of the meaning of democracy and destroyed the integrity and freedom of the individual which is of the essence of socialism.
If socialist regroupment is to have any meaning at all and any promise, it can only take place under the banner of democratic socialism. No socialist movement in this country can hope to win favor with, not to speak of leadership of, the American working class, if it equivocates or refuses to speak out plainly on this question. It is not enough, and never was, for socialists to carry on the struggle for democracy in this country; they must champion democracy everywhere and support the democratic struggles of the people in all countries. That means in Asia as in Africa, in Europe of the East as well as of the West; it means to fight for democracy in China as in India, in Russia as in Algeria. It means to fight for the same rights of the exploited and oppressed of the Stalinist states as in any other country.
Any movement, any organization, and institution, any temporary coalition of people, whether it is for the purpose of working for socialist unification or the holding of permanent socialist forums, which refuses to take a clear position on this, or haggles over it, is guaranteed to stamp itself in advance either as Stalinist, Stalinoid, or under the influence of one or several of its ideas. The American working class has a healthy hatred of totalitarianism and no socialist can afford to be muddy-minded about it. Democratic socialism, by which is meant forthright opposition to totalitarianism everywhere, has to be the watchword on the banner of any hopeful socialist movement that must emerge in this country out of the ruins of the present.
THERE IS ANOTHER VITAL REASON why it is wrong to equivocate on this question. If it is true that there are thousands of disaffected, disoriented and disappointed former members of the Communist Party, of whom there must be a considerable number who have not permanently abandoned socialism, then it is the responsibility of those who do understand the problem to cooperate with such elements in developing the democratic socialist position. This cannot and will not be done by hiding the problem, confusing it, or distorting it in a fictitious allusion to unity. Nor will it be done by catering to the political prejudices of those who not yet have broken with the ideology of Stalinism.
When it is objected that this is an ultimatistic demand on certain groupings in the general socialist movement, the objection is an evasion of the problem. For example, all groups, ex-Stalinist, ex-Progressive Party, Socialist Workers Party, the Gates tendency, the Daily Worker, and others have denounced the Russian intervention in Hungary and have declared themselves to be, in one fashion or another, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism. To be sure, not all who say they are for democratic socialism mean the same thing by it. The test is not a complicated one: we are for democracy here; we are not less for democracy in Russia, Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria and Rumania, as we are for all countries. For the ISL this is the crux of the question of socialist unification and regroupment and that’s why in its Memorandum it stated:
“For us to declare that collaboration with other groups requires their acceptance of all our theoretical positions, including our position on the nature of Stalinism and of Stalinist society, or that such acceptance is required for coexistence in one socialist organization, would be wrong, ultimatistic and contrary to our conception of the socialist unification that is now required. We make no such declaration and we reject it when made by anyone else. We regard the theoretical differences on the Russian question, on Stalinism, which were the main cause of the splits in the past, as ‘frozen’ for the present as regards the groups now discussing unity. We do not refrain from advancing our own theoretical position, but we do not make it, or the position of any other tendency, the pre-condition for unity. The pre-condition for unity is acceptance of the general principles of democratic socialism, agreement upon a democratic life for the united organization and support of the democratic struggle against the totalitarian Stalinism regime. This does not encompass the full position of the ISL, to whose tendency we reserve the democratic right of advocacy in a responsible and not disruptive way in a united socialist organization, which is the right of any other tendency as well. This viewpoint indicates that we do not regard or put forward the ISL as the basis of the reunification of the socialist movement, but do consider it as an indispensable element of the unity and as a tendency in it enjoying full equality with all others.”
If this is not the basis for a socialist unification, then the condition for regroupment would have to be posed on the narrowest ideological and programmatic grounds. To begin the discussion of regroupment on those grounds means to preclude its achievement in advance. Our view, since it proceeds from an analysis of the development of the American working class, the needs of socialism under American conditions, and on the basis of an abundant experience, holds that the ideological, theoretical and programmatic questions will be resolved under the conditions of a unified socialist movement, as the result of a process of development and a coalescence of socialist forces and not beforehand. For those who live by “finished programs,” for those who believe that everything ideologically and theoretically necessary has already been determined for all time, the above is certainly absurd. But then, they are not ready for socialist regroupment. They have everything they need; yes, and just about everything they want except political influence. And they will continue to live their well-satisfied sectarian lives in the eternal certainty that the masses will come to them because they have been proved correct all the time.
As we view the real situation in relation to the socialist organizations in the country we believe the best framework for socialist unification is the Socialist Party, or rather, that it can become that framework, provided it understands the enormous role it can play in the situation and responds to it intelligently and with agility. So far as the ISL is concerned, we are ready to unite with the SP under the broad conceptions stated above. The question of socialist unity in this country, chronologically at least, arose in the Socialist Party Convention of last year in the form of a resolution favoring unification of the SP with the Social-Democratic Federation and a resolution including the ISL in such a unification. This proposal for unification involving the ISL did not carry in the convention but almost a third of the delegates supported it. In response to the proposal made by advocates of unity with the ISL, the latter made it known that it favored such unity and defined the basis upon which it hoped to see it take place. In a resolution of the Political Committee of the ISL, printed in the November 5, 1956 issue of Labor Action, it said, among other things:
This basic position of the ISL did not change with the actual unification of the SP and a section of the SDF. On the contrary, that unification made even more pertinent the position of the ISL, since it regards that development as only a part of the process of socialist regroupment in the United States. For the first time in a number of years a unification, rather than a split, has taken place between two adult socialist organizations.
It should be abundantly clear from the foregoing analysis which we have made of the problem of socialist unification and regroupment that the ISL is totally uninterested in the question of “capturing” the SP. Our general perspectives do not permit even thinking in such terms. Capturing the Socialist Party today will not only not create a mass socialist movement, but will militate against the prospects of unification and regroupment and defeat the perspectives which we do have vis-à-vis the future political development of the American working class. What we do want to see is the development of the SP-SDF into an:
“... effective, influential, broad democratic socialist movement in the best traditions of the Debs period ... Without for a moment abandoning our support of the principles and practices of democratic socialism, but rather by insisting upon these principles, we aim to build a socialist party which successfully takes up the challenge offered by the existence of great numbers of radicals who have already broken with Stalinism or are in the course of doing so, and seek a vigorous socialist organization which rejects sectarianism and aims at becoming a living movement ... the ISL favors unity with the SP as the organization which it is possible to build up as a serious pole of attraction to all radicals of yesterday, today and tomorrow, which offers a significant alternative to Stalinism in the struggle against capitalism and imperialism.”
AT ITS UNITY CONVENTION, the SP-SDF adopted a resolution Toward Socialist Organization which indicates an awareness of the problem. The resolution said in part:
This Unity Convention marks a first step in the rejuvenation of the socialist movement in the United States. But while socialist unity is vital, unless this historic meeting is followed by an intensive campaign to gather together all democratic socialists into our organization our present enthusiasm may be wasted.
Everything in this quotation is correct and wise. But we feel that the occupation of the new organization with this question has not been “intensive” enough, nor has it participated in the many discussions taking place within all organizations nearly enough in relation to the importance of the problem. The SP-SDF should be playing a leading part in the present process of clarification occurring in the many discussions which take place all over the country. That it hasn’t done so formally and officially is, of course, regrettable, but we are still in the period of discussion and one way or another, the new organization’s participation in this process is unavoidable.
In all the efforts of the ISL it has sought to prevent the discussion from being a mere removal of the conflict over ideology and program, for reasons already stated. As an example of what this can mean, are the references that emerge in all discussions over “left wing” and “right wing.” That these terms contribute to political confusion, certainly not to any clarity, is easily demonstrated by the fact that “left wing” is applied to Stalinism (read totalitarianism), to those who defend the Stalinist regimes or the “degenerated workers’ states,” and “right wing” to those who fight for democratic socialism.
No one best illustrates the futility of this approach to socialist unification and regroupment than the Socialist Workers Party. When it became aware that the discussions which were taking place between socialist organizations, these self-styled orthodox Trotskyist leaders acknowledged their existence and explained the basis for them in the events of the Twentieth Congress and the general world Stalinist Crisis. But for the SWP socialist unification and regroupment in the United States is predicated on support to the “defense of the Soviet Union.” So it was in the beginning. In the Fall of 1956, its International Socialist Review described the problem in part in this way:
Up to now, the Shachtmanites, who were once defenders of the Soviet Union, have commented on this development but have proved incapable of intervening actively and participating in the discussion that is now going on in the American radical movement about making a fresh start [ahem]. The reason for this is the refusal of the Shachtmanites to defend the Soviet Union. They thus exclude themselves at the ground level from serious consideration. Their position on the “Russian” question, as has been the case in the radical movement since 1917, determines the limits of their effectiveness in answering the “American” question. (Emphasis mine – A.G.)
If you refuse to defend the Soviet Union you exclude yourself “at ground level” from any discussion of or participation in, regroupment. How ultimatistic; how sectarian! The ISL is not alone, however:
Similarly with the Socialist Party, unreasoning opposition to the Soviet Union, without discrimination between the good and bad, discredits what they have to say. What radical-minded worker cares to consider the opinions of Norman Thomas on this subject when you can get it straight from the State Department.
This is the way the SWP reacted in the beginning. In fact, it is not at all concerned with a broad regroupment of socialists that has any relationship to this country. Its perspective, in general, is the same today as it was twenty years ago. For although the discussion is “a most important one” it does not occur:
“... it must be emphasized in response to a wave of radicalization among the American workers ... Consequently it will largely be confined to the class-conscious vanguard, those who are already convinced socialists and supporters of the Soviet Union ... A thorough discussion of theoretical positions in this period of relative quiescence in America will help regroup the radical forces and build the revolutionary leadership needed for success when the next wave of mass radicalization brings with it the opportunity for action on a big scale.” (My emphasis – A.G.)
It might be said that this was written some months ago and that things have changed some since then. Surely, the SWP cannot be totally oblivious to life as it really is. But no. In the current issue of the ISR, the SWP, through its new political pundit, emphasizes these views in another form. Murray Weiss poses the question exclusively as a problem of theory and program. Says Weiss:
We think the circumstances call for a thorough discussion of program as the prelude to organizational steps leading toward actual regroupment. The question of program, in our opinion, is decisive ... The task of regroupment, in our view, does not consist of ignoring or watering down the programmatic differences between revolutionary Marxism on the one hand and Stalinism and Social Democracy on the other. On the contrary, the task is to regroup the radical workers around the program of revolutionary Marxism and thereby create the class-conscious vanguard that will enter the mainstream of the working class to bring militant socialist consciousness to its struggle.
Apart from the stale phrasemongering, the unyielding cliches that have really nothing to do with the problems in this country, Weiss equates revolutionary Marxism with the “defense of the Soviet Union.” This, indeed, is the unique contribution of the SWP. Most important, however, is that this kind of an approach to the question of socialist unification, is designed to prevent unification. For unification in the mind of the SWP means accepting the “finished program” of the SWP and joining it.
Weiss would of course build the new movement around the conceptions against which we warn. He is opposed to the ISL position because it implies, in the context of the world and American situation that social democracy, in the broadest sense of the term is progressive in relation to Stalinism and in relation to the present stage of development of the American working class, and, finally, he rejects the view of the ISL that no one interested in reconstructing a broad socialist movement in the United States can have a perspective of splitting the new movement.
The whole radical movement now knows from the public statement of its spokesman and its practical activity, that the SWP regards the present situation ripe for “raiding” all organizations in the name of its programmatic intransigence and purity, based upon the position of the need of all radicals to “defend the Soviet Union.” So that of all tendencies in the socialist movement, the SWP is least interested in socialist regroupment unless, of course, it takes place under the dogma of its “finished program.” The SWP hovers like a hawk over all groups waiting its chance to pick up a stray individual here and there.
WE DO NOT BELIEVE THAT this is the period of splits or raids; that any movement can even begin to make progress with such conceptions and practices. Either the unification of socialists will take place on a broad, general program of democratic socialism, free of the stigma of Stalinism and embrace many, many forces, or it will not take place at all. Socialist reunification based upon the SP-SDF, or SP-SDF and ISL alone will not be all-deciding, by any means. The hope of such unification lies in the promise that it holds out. That is why the Memorandum of the ISL summarizes its views in the following way:
“Our aim with regard to the Socialist Party must serve in turn our wider long-range aim with regard to the labor movement, as the most important of the mass movements in the country. The present period is a long interlude between the last radicalization wave and the one to come. In such a period it is not possible to think in terms of a genuinely powerful socialist movement numbering many tens of thousands and influencing many hundreds of thousands and more. But it is possible and necessary to utilize to the maximum all the possibilities now at hand to consolidate during this interlude the kind of socialist movement that will be best able to assist the working class in its further economic and political progress and be assisted in turn by the most conscious elements from its ranks who join and build the socialist wing of the labor movement.”
And finally:
The ISL has no grandiloquent illusions about the immediate possibilities for a powerful socialist movement. It is, however, anxious to do all in its power to utilize present concrete possibilities, no matter how modest, in conscious preparation for the much greater possibilities of the future. It is also in this sense that the ISL is prepared to unite with the Socialist Party and to pursue a course of building it up that will best advance the cause and influence of socialism in the labor movement, now and later. It is in the same sense that we refuse to support any movement which equivocates on the key question of the Stalinist regimes, for, among other reasons, it is precisely the identification of Stalinism with socialism in the minds of the American working class that has militated so strongly against the progress of socialism in this country.
April 25, 1957
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