SWP expulsions and squabbles

[Das Uberdog]

they created all the social infrastructure which has made life in the post-war West the best era in human history in which to live, so, yes

 

[belboid]

you're a joke, and no it isn't

please show us your workings then. Precisely where is this 'concrete commitment,' or the 'economic methodology' - and then show us how these worked in practise.

 

[Das Uberdog]

it's clearly not a golden bullet or anything, but the statement that it's meaningless is ultra-left twattery of the highest order

 

[Das Uberdog]

please show us your workings then. Precisely where is this 'concrete commitment,' or the 'economic methodology' - and then show us how these worked in practise.

all of post-war British domestic history up til 1979 - next

 

[belboid]

they created all the social infrastructure which has made life in the post-war West the best era in human history in which to live, so, yes

good old William Beveridge, eh, that staunch socialist, lol

it's clearly not a golden bullet or anything, but the statement that it's meaningless is ultra-left twattery of the highest order

but it is meaningless, it was deliberately vague and meaningless so that it would be acceptable to left and right in Labour. the only bit that was correct in your initial post was the word 'marker'

 

[belboid]

all of post-war British domestic history up til 1979 - next

wrong. try again - and this time at least attempt all parts of the question

 

[Das Uberdog]

i'm certainly not here to answer your questions, belboid. i reserve the right to respond when you start spouting this idiotic crap though. seriously - Clause IV is a direct ideological commitment to the collectivization of social resources. the fact that an ideological statement in itself is not enough to guarantee full communism is by the by, it's clearly a step towards that on an abstract front (which aids the practical fight). it's also utterly ridiculous to try and claim that Old Labour was no more committed to collective economics than New Labour, and that the removal of Clause IV meant nothing in regard to that change.

and it is really fucking stupid to act like the social democratic consensus of the post-war era counted for nothing, that Old Labour (and its commitment to its own form of collective economic programs) played no role in its formation and continuation, or that it didn't play hugely important role in the creation of a society in which life for working class people became its most bearable in all human history.

Old Labour was always on the right of the left, but still on the left, and all but the most ridiculous contrarians and sectarians can recognize that.

 

[andysays]

it's clearly not a golden bullet or anything, but the statement that it's meaningless is ultra-left twattery of the highest order

I've avoided getting involved in this little spat as it has unfolded, but seriously?

I'd say that Clause 4 was more totemic than tokenistic, in that it has a symbolic value among certain tiny section of the left, both inside and outside the Labour party. It has fuck all resonance with the wider public, even among the significant numbers who are in favour of, for instance, re-nationalisation of the railways.

What is really meaningless, pointless, and self-centred micro-left twattery IMO is for anyone in TUSC to try to set out the conditions under which they would go back to o r support the Labour party, and to focus their demands around an old shibboleth which meant nothing far longer ago than the 20 years since it was abolished.

 

[belboid]

i'm certainly not here to answer your questions, belboid. i reserve the right to respond when you start spouting this idiotic crap though. seriously - Clause IV is a direct ideological commitment to the collectivization of social resources. the fact that an ideological statement in itself is not enough to guarantee full communism is by the by, it's clearly a step towards that on an abstract front (which aids the practical fight). it's also utterly ridiculous to try and claim that Old Labour was no more committed to collective economics than New Labour, and that the removal of Clause IV meant nothing in regard to that change.

Simply repeating your assertion does not make it true. And I made no claim about any distinction between Old and new Labour, so your second point is wholly irrelevant.

and it is really fucking stupid to act like the social democratic consensus of the post-war era counted for nothing, that Old Labour (and its commitment to its own form of collective economic programs) played no role in its formation and continuation, or that it didn't play hugely important role in the creation of a society in which life for working class people became its most bearable in all human history.

Again, you are complaining about things I did not say. Yes, that 'social democratic consensus' was important, but it is false to say it was solely down to Labour, and still less to Clause IV. See my point about William Beveridge, to whose name you could add Rab Butlers.

Old Labour was always on the right of the left, but still on the left, and all but the most ridiculous contrarians and sectarians can recognize that.

Yes, but so what? That has nothing to do with your assertion re Clause IV.

 

[Das Uberdog]

I'd say that Clause 4 was more totemic than tokenistic, in that it has a symbolic value among certain tiny section of the left, both inside and outside the Labour party. It has fuck all resonance with the wider public, even among the significant numbers who are in favour of, for instance, re-nationalisation of the railways.

totems and symbols are important in any political movement, and the modern left's condescension towards them reveals a huge gaping hole in our strategies for building a movement with its own clear sense of self and mission. Clause IV is an important ideological commitment - a statement which all members of the Labour Party would be implicitly signed up to simply by merit of being in the party. as such, it's a constant bearing upon which an argument in favour of retaining that collective economic focus, against the 'reformers' who prefer the fluidity of not being pegged to any kind of ideological mission whatsoever.

Simply repeating your assertion does not make it true. And I made no claim about any distinction between Old and new Labour, so your second point is wholly irrelevant.

who's repeating assertions now? and the distinction between Old and New Labour is implicit in your dismissive attitude towards the importance of Clause IV - considering how the battle to remove it was such a significant aspect of putting the cosh over the Labour left during Blair's ascension.

Again, you are complaining about things I did not say. Yes, that 'social democratic consensus' was important, but it is false to say it was solely down to Labour, and still less to Clause IV. See my point about William Beveridge, to whose name you could add Rab Butlers.

i didn't say it was solely down to Labour, i said that Labour played a massively important role. and it played such a role in the context of being a party which was constitutionally and ideologically committed to its own form of municipal socialism/collectivity. this is not the be all and end all of the left - obviously - but it is massively significant and has directly contributed towards the relative historical wellbeing of the British working class.

 

[cantsin]

they created all the social infrastructure which has made life in the post-war West the best era in human history in which to live, so, yes

but created in specific circumstances, with the aim of trying to get a war ravaged country back on it's feet, and more importantly, it's workers back to productivity , all on a socialised basis . As soon as that process was as complete as it was going to get, the LP switched slowly and surely back to privatising the ensuing profits, and were happy to see that infrastructure go back into private hands, so much so they ditched clause 4.

 

[Das Uberdog]

but created in specific circumstances, with the aim of trying to get a war ravaged country back on it's feet, and more importantly, it's workers back to productivity , all on a socialised basis . As soon as that process was as complete as it was going to get, the LP switched slowly and surely back to privatising the ensuing profits, and were happy to see that infrastructure go back into private hands, so much so they ditched clause 4.

With the obvious exception of Bennism and other leftwards burps... the Labour Party is a complex organization and serves a raft of different historical purposes, relative to your general position on the spectrum. Regardless, Clause IV is clearly of the better aspects.

 

[belboid]

totems and symbols are important in any political movement, and the modern left's condescension towards them reveals a huge gaping hole in our strategies for building a movement with its own clear sense of self and mission. Clause IV is an important ideological commitment - a statement which all members of the Labour Party would be implicitly signed up to simply by merit of being in the party. as such, it's a constant bearing upon which an argument in favour of retaining that collective economic focus, against the 'reformers' who prefer the fluidity of not being pegged to any kind of ideological mission whatsoever.

All of which may well be true, but all of which is a vastly weaker statement than your original one.

who's repeating assertions now? and the distinction between Old and New Labour is implicit in your dismissive attitude towards the importance of Clause IV - considering how the battle to remove it was such a significant aspect of putting the cosh over the Labour left during Blair's ascension.

still irrelevant.

i didn't say it was solely down to Labour,

really? Who posted this then?

they created all the social infrastructure which has made life in the post-war West the best era in human history in which to live, so, yes

oops

i said that Labour played a massively important role. and it played such a role in the context of being a party which was constitutionally and ideologically committed to its own form of municipal socialism/collectivity. this is not the be all and end all of the left - obviously - but it is massively significant and has directly contributed towards the relative historical wellbeing of the British working class.

that isn't what you said, tho. Of course Labour was important, and played an important role in the 'wellbeing of the working class' - but it is wholly false to ascribe this wholly, or even mostly, to Labour. And even then it would not justify your initial assertions re Clause IV - especially re it being 'concrete' (which it explicitly wasn't) and an 'economic methodology' (which it just isn't, even if it is a part of such a methodology)

 

[Das Uberdog]

... the Labour Party did create all the post-war social democratic infrastructure in Britain... which is a different statement from saying the Labour Party was responsible for all of social democracy. yes, Labour was important. very important. they were the organization in actual power which actually did the deed (in the context of all the rest). that puts them on a very high weighting on the 'scales of significance'.

and Clause IV is a concrete commitment to a collective economic strategy. there's no way to interpret it which doesn't mean some form of economic collectivity and public ownership, in principle.

To secure for the workers by hand or by brain the full fruits of their industry and the most equitable distribution thereof that may be possible upon the basis of the common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange, and the best obtainable system of popular administration and control of each industry or service.

it could be more specific, i'll warrant you. but there's not a single other statement in the constitution which commits itself to those principles any more clearly. it's a clear statement of ideological commitment - that's clear to elements of the Labour left who want it returned, and it was clear to the Blairites who wanted rid of it. it'd be a great step for it to be brought back into the text and emblematic of the renewed position the Labour left and the Unions have in the leadership of the party.

 

[belboid]

... the Labour Party did create all the post-war social democratic infrastructure in Britain... which is a different statement from saying the Labour Party was responsible for all of social democracy. yes, Labour was important. very important. they were the organization in actual power which actually did the deed (in the context of all the rest). that puts them on a very high weighting on the 'scales of significance'.

lol. Have a break, you must be tired after your constant shifting of goalposts. Labour implemented some tory and liberal plans, soe had been begun before Labour took over. So you're just plain wrong.

and Clause IV is a concrete commitment to a collective economic strategy. there's no way to interpret it which doesn't mean some form of economic collectivity and public ownership, in principle.

so is it concrete, or a general principle? You can't have it both ways. The second sentence above essentially recognises that it isn't concrete. Which is fine, nothing wrong with a general principle, just don't claim it's 'concrete'

it could be more specific, i'll warrant you. but there's not a single other statement in the constitution which commits itself to those principles any more clearly.

Quite, Labour was, iirr, the only member of the Second International not to be openly, statedly, socialist, they relied on C4 to cover that for them. But it was always deliberately vague and meaningless, a token commitment, that could be interpreted in many ways.

it's a clear statement of ideological commitment - that's clear to elements of the Labour left who want it returned, and it was clear to the Blairites who wanted rid of it. it'd be a great step for it to be brought back into the text and emblematic of the renewed position the Labour left and the Unions have in the leadership of the party.

meh, I'd want a new, much clearer, statement, one that looks forward not backwards. yes, there'd be a symbolic resonance in bringing C4 back,but I'd prefer something, I dont know, a bit more...concrete.

 

[Das Uberdog]

shifting of goalposts? my original statement said that Clause IV was more than just a mere tokenistic gesture and that it represented something actually meaningful (for all the reasons subsequently elaborated). there's been absolutely no manouvre on my part - though you have accepted most of the individual points it seems. and yeah, like the 'liberal plans' for the NHS were in any way as comprehensive as the actualization of the NHS. or as though the vast nationalizations of industry/mining/transport would have been enacted by any other party. it's really quite desperate. as is the floundering pedantry over the word 'concrete'. yes it's concrete, concrete is a metaphor for stability and immovability and is totally compatible with association with a general principle. you're lucky i give a damn about content over petty terminological disputes, otherwise we'd be engaged in some ferociously boring argument about the word 'tokenistic' right now

 

[belboid]

though you have accepted most of the individual points it seems.

No I haven't. I have disputed your wild and unsubstantiated assertions, and argued clearly that you are massively exaggerating both what Labour did, and Clause IV's influence upon that. You have contradicted yourself, and refused to actually respond to direct points. As for concrete being a 'metaphor', it really, really, isn't. The whole point of concrete proposals are that they are NOT metaphorical, but the exact opposite.

 

[Das Uberdog]

christ do we really need to get into a lesson in basic linguistics? the word concrete as it is being used in this thread is a metaphor for stability and immovability. i used it in the context of describing Clause IV as having a concrete commitment to a collectivist economic program, which it does. 'concrete proposals' are another matter entirely, and since you're the one who started us off down this utterly meaningless semantic path you should stop adapting crucial phrases in the sentence to further cloud this clusterfuck of an argument you're making.

for those who can't be bothered to read this boring drivel, the crux of the actual dispute has fuck all to do with the word concrete or various manifestations thereof - but around belboid's original assertion that the reimposition of Clause IV would be a totally meaningless 'tokenistic' gesture not worth doing, and that Clause IV in and of itself is devoid of any significance written by non-socialists and enforced by a party which didn't build socialism. i disagreed, saying Clause IV has a meaningful commitment to a collective economic program (which once again, it indisputably does) and its removal was part of the final destruction of the left of a party which - for all of its failings - had played a vital role in the development of British post-war social democracy and all of the benefits that brought.

belboid has accepted all the important parts of that argument other than the wording - which he's weasling about with to give off the impression there's actually some kind of serious dispute at stake.

 

[belboid]

the word concrete as it is being used in this thread is a metaphor for stability and immovability.

oh well, if you are just going to pretend words mean things other than what everyone else in the world thinks they mean, then wibble wobble biscuit barrel to you.

you have not in any way countered the, decades old, view that Clause IV was a deliberately vague and opaque statement that could mean almost anything to anyone. The new version is even worse, but that does not alter the fact that the old one was tokenistic.

belboid's original assertion that the reimposition of Clause IV would be a totally meaningless 'tokenistic' gesture not worth doing, and that Clause IV in and of itself is devoid of any significance written by non-socialists and enforced by a party which didn't build socialism.

please point out where I said that, or stfu

 

[Nigel]

I've avoided getting involved in this little spat as it has unfolded, but seriously?

I'd say that Clause 4 was more totemic than tokenistic, in that it has a symbolic value among certain tiny section of the left, both inside and outside the Labour party. It has fuck all resonance with the wider public, even among the significant numbers who are in favour of, for instance, re-nationalisation of the railways.

What is really meaningless, pointless, and self-centred micro-left twattery IMO is for anyone in TUSC to try to set out the conditions under which they would go back to o r support the Labour party, and to focus their demands around an old shibboleth which meant nothing far longer ago than the 20 years since it was abolished.

Wasn't it Wilson who said; along with the statement that he never read passed the first page of Kapital(probably one of the reasons he left Britain in so much debt; borrowing heavily off the Yanks: one of the reasons he gave for not giving them so much grief over Vietnam), Clause IV is like the first chapter of the Bible: No one really believes it, but you wouldn't want to dispense of it.

Many of the reforms pre-war would proposed and initiated by Liberals; Bannerman, Asquith, Lloyd George, based on the foundations of C. Booth, Bentham, J.S. Mill etc.(backed by Churchill when he was a liberal) later Beveridge et al. Labour generally had different ideas about social reform at the beginning of twentieth century; arguably better.

The Atlee government came on the back of a strong and militant trade union movement, a country in which had just fought a world war against Nazism and in much culturally left leaning with a Communist Party in tens of thousands & highly influential; Harry Pollitt for instance being minister during the war & a strong grass root Labour movement. People at that time demanding change and social, if not cultural and meritocratic reform. Labour acting just as much as a safety valve under Keynesian (hardly socialist) socio economic influence and policies rather than anything that was prepared to overthrow the establishment.

 

[cutandsplice]

Wasn't it Wilson who said; along with the statement that he never read passed the first page of Kapital(probably one of the reasons he left Britain in so much debt; borrowing heavily off the Yanks: one of the reasons he gave for not giving them so much grief over Vietnam), Clause IV is like the first chapter of the Bible: No one really believes it, but you wouldn't want to dispense of it.

Many of the reforms pre-war would proposed and initiated by Liberals; Bannerman, Asquith, Lloyd George, based on the foundations of C. Booth, Bentham, J.S. Mill etc.(backed by Churchill when he was a liberal) later Beveridge et al. Labour generally had different ideas about social reform at the beginning of twentieth century; arguably better.

The Atlee government came on the back of a strong and militant trade union movement, a country in which had just fought a world war against Nazism and in much culturally left leaning with a Communist Party in tens of thousands & highly influential; Harry Pollitt for instance being minister during the war & a strong grass root Labour movement. People at that time demanding change and social, if not cultural and meritocratic reform. Labour acting just as much as a safety valve under Keynesian (hardly socialist) socio economic influence and policies rather than anything that was prepared to overthrow the establishment.

Where on earth did you get the idea from that Pollitt was a minister during the war; sure he supported the war effort but he was never part of the government. I bet he would have liked to have been. Incidentally, Wilson was very lukewarm over Vietnam which is why he didn't send any troops there.

 

[SpackleFrog]

What is really meaningless, pointless, and self-centred micro-left twattery IMO is for anyone in TUSC to try to set out the conditions under which they would go back to o r support the Labour party, and to focus their demands around an old shibboleth which meant nothing far longer ago than the 20 years since it was abolished.

You don't think TUSC supporters should comment on the Labour Party? Why not? And if its meaningless for us to comment, what's the significance of you weighing in?

 

[andysays]

You don't think TUSC supporters should comment on the Labour Party? Why not? And if its meaningless for us to comment, what's the significance of you weighing in?

Commenting is one thing (anyone can do that, and I haven't said different).

What I think is meaningless is for Nellist to set out conditions under which TUSC would or might co-operate with Labour, and for those conditions to be based on the revival of clause 4, which as far as I can see and as I've already suggested has no resonance beyond a tiny minority. If he'd said something relating to JC's specific proposals, even if it was that he doesn't think they go far enough, that would be quite another thing and would have some point.

If you don't like the way I've "weighed in", at least criticise what I've actually said rather than a parody version.

 

[SpackleFrog]

Commenting is one thing (anyone can do that, and I haven't said different).

What I think is meaningless is for Nellist to set out conditions under which TUSC would or might co-operate with Labour, and for those conditions to be based on the revival of clause 4, which as far as I can see and as I've already suggested has no resonance beyond a tiny minority. If he'd said something relating to JC's specific proposals, even if it was that he doesn't think they go far enough, that would be quite another thing and would have some point.

If you don't like the way I've "weighed in", at least criticise what I've actually said rather than a parody version.

I think you should read the article and consider the context of why DN was being interviewed as the national chair of TUSC, in response to allegations that we're infiltrating the Labour Party.

 

[andysays]

I think you should read the article and consider the context of why DN was being interviewed as the national chair of TUSC, in response to allegations that we're infiltrating the Labour Party.

Why do you assume I haven't read the article?

Allegations that TUSC are infiltrating the Labour Party are nonsense, as discussed on various other threads. Nellist appears to me to be responding to these allegations with more nonsense, and the context in which he's interviewed does nothing to change that.

 

[treelover]

We shall overcome! (@WeShallWeekend) on Twitter


The SWP are going to be thinking they have loads of new members/supporters, the massive 'We shall overcome' music weekend across the Uk has their clenched fist in red as their logo!

yes, I know it predates them but still

 

[SpineyNorman]

Isn't it about time this thread was allowed to die?

 

[JimW]

Isn't it about time this thread was allowed to die?

Perhaps we could split it into several smaller competing threads

 

[imposs1904]

Isn't it about time this thread was allowed to die?

I think it can still be Salvaged.

 

[treelover]

Is Shelley Asquith, really good student activist, NUS VP welfare, etc, Counterfire?