TremulousTetra
prismatic universe
Sorry to do this, but I will reply to your post on a point by point basis in red.
SWP: Mother of all splits looms?
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butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Hocus, can you reply in green please?
Not necessarily...I said I favour Democratic Centralism and gave a very brief explanation of what that means - rigorous internal debate resolved by voting and then unity in action (everyone bound by the democratic decision).
Now obviously conference cannot be in permanent session so leadership bodies need to be elected to take forward the conference perspectives and to take decisions in the face of a rapidly changing situation. However, such decisions need to be subject to debate and scrutiny and to be overturned if wrong. The precise ways in which this organised are not to be set in stone. If the SWP structures and processes can be modified to enhance democracy then they should be - that is what the democracy commission have been elected to consider and, after facilitating a debate on the question, to report on with recommendations to a special conference.
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
but it's not wrong. In the SA they party was very clear that part of its reason for being invovled was because it hoped that it could recruit workers to the SA, and some of them from there to the SWP. Before it joined it had thought they could recruit directly, there was no need for any 'halfway house', but when that didn't work, they jumped aboard. When they still didn't recruit, they pushed for Respect (not the only reason for the move to Respect, but certainly one of them).
The party was very clear about that, and many members would simply say 'well of course that's what we want.'
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Little cog pushing big wheel, yes it's changed a new, fresh start 
Nigel Irritable
Five, Ten, Fifteen Years
This is one of the stranger parts of arguing with members of the SWP about internal democracy.
They really don't seem to understand that the SWP's version of Democratic Centralism, although allegedly based on the practice of Lenin and Trotsky, is unique to the SWP and is very different from that practised by the Bolsheviks. There have been quite an array of "democratic centralist" structures in the Trotskyist movement, but the SWP's version - with collective responsibility in the top committees for thirty years and a ban on minorities organising themselves most of the time - is considerably closer to the Stalinist parties understanding of the term than it is to that of the Bolsheviks.
Now there's nothing wrong with doing something differently to the way Lenin or Trotsky did it the best part of a century ago. But I find it hard to see how it can seriously be justified that the chief differences should be that rank and file members have less rights than they did under conditions of Tsarist autocracy.
Even the way people like Groucho phrase the issue is revealing. "I don't agree with permanent factions" is a nearly meaningless statement, given that few people in the wider Trotskyist tradition or for that matter in the Bolsheviks have advocated permanent factions as a good thing. Instead the argument is that removing the right of minorities to organise is much worse than the ill it allegedly cures.
What "I don't agree with permanent factions" actually means is "If I have the temerity to disagree with the leadership, I think that the leadership have a right to stop me from organising for my views." This quite obviously rigs all debate in favour of the leadership from the start.
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
Indeed.
Groucho (and anyone else) - from what you say on here I'd assume you think Stalin should have expelled Trotsky from the Bolsheviks for leading the Left Opposition faction for four years. But you don't think that do you?
Originally Posted by Hocus Eye (text in black) and responded to by ResistanceMP3 in red. My comments are added in drak blue and in invisible ink.
Although this whole thread is about a supposedly massive split in the SWP and Resistancemp3 refers repeatedly to factions on the Central Committee, I don't think that there is any kind of faction-led conspiracy against John Rees. that's what I have been trying to say in all my post's Although there has been a faction fight on the cc in which John Rees was in the minority and which was defeated at conference.
What I think happened is that with the failure of the Respect campaign that the CC picked up on the views within the party that the substitution of an invented left wing parliamentary party to replace the old Labour party was a waste of time energy and money. well that is certainly how I felt. I have used the word substitutionism myself.This is entirely wrong. The majority of the party do not see the Respect initiative as essentially incorrect despite its failure. It was the correct thing to try. It failed largely due to an attempt by Galloway and others to move the project to the right which was resisted by the SWP. However, there was insuffient clarity within the SWP about the aims of the initiative because the level of debate until the split was insuffient. Eventially there would have been a reckoning between reform and revolution and therefore a likely split. In the meantime there would be battles. Although the split came earlier and on a terrain not of our choosing many comrades were not prepared for the eventuality because there had not been sufficient theoretical clarity.
Creating a parliamentary party out of the opposition to the war was meant to enable recruitment from that party to the SWP itself. < sorry, this is wrong. Are you aware of trotsky's analogy of the revolutionary party little cog, engaging with the bigger cog the organised working class. It has to do with the takeover of the Labour Party by New Labour. To some extent in the days of 'Old' Labour there were links between some members Labour Party branches and SWP branches and the paper was sold to Labour party members. This was a source of new members for the SWP as the Labour Party was seen to disappoint when in power. RMP3 is right that the Respect initiative was not simply or mainly about recruitment to the SWP. There was a genuine commitment to establishing a broad based electoral coalition of the left to challenge the hegemony of the LP over worling class politics. The SWP would still favour such a coalition were it possible (it isn't currently)
Once 'Old' Labour was killed off by the new masters at Millbank the SWP had no connections or influence upon people working in Parliamentary politics or in Local Councils where most grassroots politics used to take place. A similar thing was happening in Trade Unions. One sphere of activity of the SWP was on Trades Councils. As union membership declined, Trades Councils also reduced in size and influence.so this was an opportunity for SW to recreate a vehicle for working class organization, and for revolutionaries to be at the centre of that basically reformist organisation. ******<This was how the project was sold to the members SW. It was not short term recruitmentdrive. ********* Respect was more complex than a basically reformist organisation. It was an organisation around a set of policies and demands around which reformists and revolutionaries could agree. (A 'centrist' organisation.) These demands could not in fact be won via Parliamentary or council reforms but would necessitate a militant fight that would eventially pose the question of reform or revolution. Revolutionaries would fight for leadership of the movement that emerged.
I can quite understand how the SWP senior management - sorry CC became concerned and saw the numbers of people supporting first of all 'anti-capitalism' and secondly the anti-war movement as the potential recruits. The whole Respect adventure followed from this. Galloway was an appealing and coherent speaker against the war and it is understandable that he seemed to be a useful ally. Sadly the SWP had very little experience of fighting elections and just using mass leafleting with very verbose and complex leaflets made less impact than they hoped. mostly trueish They came very late to the idea of canvassing and in relying on Muslim family connections to deliver mass votes in Muslim wards did not work for them as well as it had for the Labour Party of the past.not realy true imo
So my guess is that the CC eventually having realised that Respect - especially after it split was not a worthwhile use of resources. true I think that the majority members of the CC made a policy decision in a back room somewhere and worked out that the only way to quickly dispose of Respect which it could not even sell to its own SWP members, was to remove John Rees from his influence on the CC.why did they need to do thatIt is true that Respect post split is/was not capable of developing into a challenge to New Labour. There was a debate over use of resources on the electoral front in which Rees was wrong to imagine that there was still mileage in Left List/Left Alternative at present
They rightly concluded that it would not be necessary to remove Lindsey German as she would doubtless go of her own volition. I don't know whether they thought that Chris Nineham would leave.
I don't think that there are now any 'factions'. The official 'slate' was voted in because the rival one by Lindsey was withdrawn.
As for why the conference was billed as the Democracy Conference, this will be because it was the event where the Democracy Committee was created. What that will produce is yet to be seen.I don't believe the dubbing of conference as the 'democracy conference' - this isn't an official label btw, rests on the establishment of the Democracy commission. See my earlier post.
Although this whole thread is about a supposedly massive split in the SWP and Resistancemp3 refers repeatedly to factions on the Central Committee, I don't think that there is any kind of faction-led conspiracy against John Rees. that's what I have been trying to say in all my post's Although there has been a faction fight on the cc in which John Rees was in the minority and which was defeated at conference.
What I think happened is that with the failure of the Respect campaign that the CC picked up on the views within the party that the substitution of an invented left wing parliamentary party to replace the old Labour party was a waste of time energy and money. well that is certainly how I felt. I have used the word substitutionism myself.This is entirely wrong. The majority of the party do not see the Respect initiative as essentially incorrect despite its failure. It was the correct thing to try. It failed largely due to an attempt by Galloway and others to move the project to the right which was resisted by the SWP. However, there was insuffient clarity within the SWP about the aims of the initiative because the level of debate until the split was insuffient. Eventially there would have been a reckoning between reform and revolution and therefore a likely split. In the meantime there would be battles. Although the split came earlier and on a terrain not of our choosing many comrades were not prepared for the eventuality because there had not been sufficient theoretical clarity.
Creating a parliamentary party out of the opposition to the war was meant to enable recruitment from that party to the SWP itself. < sorry, this is wrong. Are you aware of trotsky's analogy of the revolutionary party little cog, engaging with the bigger cog the organised working class. It has to do with the takeover of the Labour Party by New Labour. To some extent in the days of 'Old' Labour there were links between some members Labour Party branches and SWP branches and the paper was sold to Labour party members. This was a source of new members for the SWP as the Labour Party was seen to disappoint when in power. RMP3 is right that the Respect initiative was not simply or mainly about recruitment to the SWP. There was a genuine commitment to establishing a broad based electoral coalition of the left to challenge the hegemony of the LP over worling class politics. The SWP would still favour such a coalition were it possible (it isn't currently)
Once 'Old' Labour was killed off by the new masters at Millbank the SWP had no connections or influence upon people working in Parliamentary politics or in Local Councils where most grassroots politics used to take place. A similar thing was happening in Trade Unions. One sphere of activity of the SWP was on Trades Councils. As union membership declined, Trades Councils also reduced in size and influence.so this was an opportunity for SW to recreate a vehicle for working class organization, and for revolutionaries to be at the centre of that basically reformist organisation. ******<This was how the project was sold to the members SW. It was not short term recruitmentdrive. ********* Respect was more complex than a basically reformist organisation. It was an organisation around a set of policies and demands around which reformists and revolutionaries could agree. (A 'centrist' organisation.) These demands could not in fact be won via Parliamentary or council reforms but would necessitate a militant fight that would eventially pose the question of reform or revolution. Revolutionaries would fight for leadership of the movement that emerged.
I can quite understand how the SWP senior management - sorry CC became concerned and saw the numbers of people supporting first of all 'anti-capitalism' and secondly the anti-war movement as the potential recruits. The whole Respect adventure followed from this. Galloway was an appealing and coherent speaker against the war and it is understandable that he seemed to be a useful ally. Sadly the SWP had very little experience of fighting elections and just using mass leafleting with very verbose and complex leaflets made less impact than they hoped. mostly trueish They came very late to the idea of canvassing and in relying on Muslim family connections to deliver mass votes in Muslim wards did not work for them as well as it had for the Labour Party of the past.not realy true imo
So my guess is that the CC eventually having realised that Respect - especially after it split was not a worthwhile use of resources. true I think that the majority members of the CC made a policy decision in a back room somewhere and worked out that the only way to quickly dispose of Respect which it could not even sell to its own SWP members, was to remove John Rees from his influence on the CC.why did they need to do thatIt is true that Respect post split is/was not capable of developing into a challenge to New Labour. There was a debate over use of resources on the electoral front in which Rees was wrong to imagine that there was still mileage in Left List/Left Alternative at present
They rightly concluded that it would not be necessary to remove Lindsey German as she would doubtless go of her own volition. I don't know whether they thought that Chris Nineham would leave.
I don't think that there are now any 'factions'. The official 'slate' was voted in because the rival one by Lindsey was withdrawn.
As for why the conference was billed as the Democracy Conference, this will be because it was the event where the Democracy Committee was created. What that will produce is yet to be seen.I don't believe the dubbing of conference as the 'democracy conference' - this isn't an official label btw, rests on the establishment of the Democracy commission. See my earlier post.
Resistancemp3
In an addendum to your quote from me you asked why did the CC need to remove John Rees from his influence on the CC.
The answer is earlier in the sentence. It was the only way to quickly dispose of Respect. John Rees was the prime mover in Respect and would want it to continue. If his voice was removed from the CC, even with Lindsey as convenor (whatever that is) Respect could be allowed to disappear as many of the party (SWP) members wanted.
Oh damn I forgot to reply in green.
Edited to add: I now see and note the post by Groucho.
In an addendum to your quote from me you asked why did the CC need to remove John Rees from his influence on the CC.
The answer is earlier in the sentence. It was the only way to quickly dispose of Respect. John Rees was the prime mover in Respect and would want it to continue. If his voice was removed from the CC, even with Lindsey as convenor (whatever that is) Respect could be allowed to disappear as many of the party (SWP) members wanted.
Oh damn I forgot to reply in green.
Edited to add: I now see and note the post by Groucho.
TremulousTetra
prismatic universe
NO NO NO NO NO! Where did I say " allowing minorities to be represented on leading bodies automatically leads to them paralysing and dividing the body concerned."? What I actually said was "that minorities shouldn't be be able to paralysis, diviide, and engender factionalism etc in the SWP." This does not say minorities should be able to exist.
minority viewpoints are welcomed and encouraged in debate. But if it gets to the point where you are no longer doing anything beside debating, then obviously there has to be some mechanism by which you draw a line under the issue, and move on. At some point you have to have a vote and move on. In our democratic cenraltialist organisation, it is demanded once the vote has taken place, there is unity in action. These are the rules of the organisation. If this means people have to go their separate ways when the vote goes against what they believe is truly best for the party, so be it. If this means people remain within the organisation, and let history prove who is right and wrong, so be it.
That is the real democratic socialism of the socialist workers party. If you want to have a go at that, feel free, don't think you should really create some straw man of " allowing minorities to be represented on leading bodies automatically leads to them paralysing and dividing the body concerned."
there is really no possibility of any other explanation?
yes I mostly concede that. When you coutch your comments the way you have there, they make a lot more sense to me.
That was a lot better than your first post, in my humble opinion.
articul8
Dishonest sociopath
As I said "keep the rank and file in the dark" about the aims until it's clear whether the initiative succeeds and - ex post facto - suggest that the core of the leadership was in the know all along which would have become clear if the membership were more politically "developed".
Always.someone.else's.fault.
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
this is still rather unclear. Do you think that minorities should be represented within the CC. The current CC DO argue that for them to even be on there would lead to just such a paralysis. Do you agree?
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
NO NO NO NO NO! Where did I say " allowing minorities to be represented on leading bodies automatically leads to them paralysing and dividing the body concerned."? What I actually said was "that minorities shouldn't be be able to paralysis, diviide, and engender factionalism etc in the SWP." This does not say minorities should be able to exist.
minority viewpoints are welcomed and encouraged in debate. But if it gets to the point where you are no longer doing anything beside debating, then obviously there has to be some mechanism by which you draw a line under the issue, and move on. At some point you have to have a vote and move on. In our democratic cenraltialist organisation, it is demanded once the vote has taken place, there is unity in action. These are the rules of the organisation. If this means people have to go their separate ways when the vote goes against what they believe is truly best for the party, so be it. If this means people remain within the organisation, and let history prove who is right and wrong, so be it.
That is the real democratic socialism of the socialist workers party. If you want to have a go at that, feel free, don't think you should really create some straw man of " allowing minorities to be represented on leading bodies automatically leads to them paralysing and dividing the body concerned."
there is really no possibility of any other explanation?
yes I mostly concede that. When you coutch your comments the way you have there, they make a lot more sense to me.
That was a lot better than your first post, in my humble opinion.
It says the same damn thing.
Where do the fault lie?
TremulousTetra
prismatic universe
I agree with that, it's a good job that's not what I said.
TremulousTetra
prismatic universe
with respect, what are you talking about?
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
I agree with that, it's a good job that's not what I said.
well, you eitgher said that, or not much at all.
'Sometimes conspiracies happen" Well, yeah.
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
That te hangover from the Workers Fight debacle has led to the SWP's unique version of democratic centralism (he was responding to my post just before that one)
TremulousTetra
prismatic universe
where have I said any such things? I have simply said I am happy with it, you don't have to be.
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
From the fact that you took my disagreement with the SWP's version of DC to mean I didn't agree with DC in any shape or form. Which only really follows if you think the SWP's version is the only version.
Fair enough if that isn't what you think, but would you care to expand? Do you think the parties version is the best interpretation? Do you think it could be improved upon? If so, how?
It is not entirely clear that sections of the leadership were theoretically clear on what they were doing. 'Keeping the rank and file in the dark' whether by design or neglect is not an option post conference.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Why not?
TremulousTetra
prismatic universe
I would have been one of those members who would have said simply, that is what we want, a bigger SW, let's go and recruit. But honestly, you are wrong, what you are describing was not what happened within SW. I know because I was there. The argument was put to me, how I described it to nigel. They had to win me to that position from the crude " simply a short term recruitment opportunity".
ps. Just indulge me, and jog my memory. Are you the guy who is a member of the SP who I had a discussion with about your belief that SW change the constitution of the socialist alliance so it could control it?
The reason this has been dubbed the 'democracy conference' is because the majority have asserted that the leadership should have engaged, and will in future engage, more with the membership and be more accountable to the party structures that exist precisely for that reason. The cc majority have accepted that (and some have been fighting that corner for a while). This process did not start at the top.
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
Nope, not me, I had a lot of sympathy with the change of constitution, still do, despite how it all worked out.
As to the other bit - i think you are being over-simplistic. For one thing, recruitment was only one of the reasons for joining (as I said), but also there were various members who did take part just for that reason. Not everyone follows the 'party line' as perfectly as the CC might hope, after all.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
That's what the top table are telling the members though. It's not what happened. There was no mass participation, no revolution from below. There was a controlled move to allow some pressure to be released
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Put your cards on the table b. and see how the tone changes.
TremulousTetra
prismatic universe
I have no idea whether anybody at any time in history has had a better interpretation. I just know in my lifetime I haven't seen a better example being more fruitful in the UK, have you?
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
Fruitful? If you count having grown a prune fruitful then I guess you could call it that. Fact is, it hasn't been very fruitful at all.
As to history, do you not read about the bolsheviks any more?
Nope. Not at all.
Neither could the national committee be controlled by the cc even if they desired to do so. Neither could the Democracy Commission be manipulated by the cc even if the cc desired so to do.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Who chose the Democracy Commission members?
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