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A great initiative by the LCR
The following text is part of a message I started distributing on the internet on the 23rd of February 2008:
I welcome the decision of the French Ligue Communiste Révolutionnaire (LCR) to launch a new revolutionary anti-capitalist party, as reported on favourably by Peter Manson, the editor of the Weekly Worker (February 21, http://cpgb.org.uk/worker/709/defeatliquidators.html). The LCR has established itself as the most serious far left party in France, with just over 4% in last year’s presidential election.
Calling the new party “anti-capitalist”, rather than “socialist”, “communist”, “Marxist” or “Trotskyist”, will have some advantages. I have long felt that calling themselves “communist” limits the LCR’s appeal, due to the association with the Stalinist regimes that collapsed in the USSR and Eastern Europe, and the collapse of the vote received by the official Communist Party (PCF), to a meagre 1.9%, seems to confirm this hypothesis. Calling themselves “Marxist” would cause a similar problem, and using the term “Trotskyist” would limit their appeal to a subset of Marxists. Calling the new party “socialist” could make them appear less radical than they really are, due to the existence of the mainstream Socialist Party (PS), which is clearly in favour of the continuation of the capitalist system.
“Socialist” means different things to different people. I have a minor criticism of LCR leader Olivier Besancenot, who said that the new party will “counterpoise, against the management of existing institutions, the perspective of a workers’ government”. The term “workers’ government” would seem to imply a Marxist form of socialism, composed of hierarchies of committees based on workplaces, where the middle class has little or no say. Whereas I would support some degree of workers’ control of industry, I am in favour of a government elected by proportional representation (PR) using single transferable vote (STV), and I wouldn’t want the new party to exclude socialists like me. A good sign, however, that the new party would not do so is the fact that the LCR has held discussions with the anarchist grouping Alternative Libertaire (AL) and anarchists are massively opposed to hierarchical structures. Although AL has rejected joining, the new party could attract some anarchists to its ranks and win the support of others in elections; I have found that the best anarchists tend to welcome the efforts of genuine left-wingers who do stand in elections even though they do not want to participate in electoral campaigning themselves.
The sectarian Trotskyist group Lutte Ouvrière (LO), which had previously outpolled the LCR, has criticised the proposal for the new party by suggesting that it would attract “liberals and do-gooders”. How could a revolutionary party ever come to power without attracting such well-meaning individuals? Many of them could of course be won to socialist ideas, but even those who aren’t tend to play an important positive role in society. For me, the most important struggle is between good and bad, for a world in which people can democratically choose the form of society they want (and I would argue that the STV form of PR, which many liberals argue for, is important to enable such choices to be made), and against the drift towards a totalitarian society in which revolutionary change is impossible.
An assessment of Murray’s role in the struggle for socialism
I was a member of a Trotskyist organisation, the Militant Tendency/Militant Labour/the Socialist Party of England and Wales from 1990-98. This organisation was (and still is) affiliated to organisations with similar political positions elsewhere in the world via the Committee for a Workers’ International (CWI). One of the CWI’s best initiatives was the establishment of Youth Against Racism in Europe (YRE). As well as uniting ordinary black, Asian and white (primarily young) people against racism and fascism in particular countries, using a combination of public (sometimes mass) demonstrations, physical confrontation with fascists and education (presenting a left-wing alternative hinting at socialism), the YRE held an international anti-racist demonstration in Brussels (Belgium) of around 40,000 people in 1992 (which I was unfortunately unable to attend). [I did attend the other international event the YRE held, a summer camp in Eastern Germany in 1994.]
Murray Smith was the leader of a group of around 100 mainly young people in France that had previously split from the LCR. They heard about the Brussels demo and organised a contingent to it. Subsequently they merged with the CWI’s tiny French section to become Gauche Révolutionnaire (which means “Revolutionary Left”), a more significant section of the CWI. Murray joined the CWI’s leading body, the International Secretariat (IS).
Murray was the only IS member to visit Scotland during the debate that took place in 1998 about whether the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) should be formed, as proposed by the leadership of Scottish Militant Labour (SML). This proposal was opposed by the rest of the IS and the leadership of the British section of the CWI. [Although called the Socialist Party (SP) in England and Wales, the British section encompassed SML.] There was overwhelming support for the proposal in Scotland, and probably unanimous support in France. Two regions of the SP (my region Manchester/Lancashire and Merseyside) had majority support for the proposal too. I attended the 1998 European School of the CWI, and was the o
I met Murray and chatted to him at the 1998 European School and again (on two occasions I think) when attending important events of the SSP. However, I have not been in contact with him at all in recent years, which may have helped him since I have had a habit of mucking things up. It is a healthy sign that the LCR has established itself as the main far left party in France and then launched this initiative without my influence, enabling me to be more modest about the role I have played (radicalising the masses but undermining the left to quite a large degree, largely due to my mental health situation).
