It Is Time to Stop

Add a subpage to this text

Read the help page for usage.

 

On August 19 the plenum (International Secretariat) adopted a decision of great political responsibility: the break with the Comintern and the course of a new International. The first result of the new orientation was the principled document of four organizations opening up the era of the preparation for the new International. The second result was the adherence to the international Bolshevik-Leninist organization of the Revolutionary Socialist Party of Holland (RSP), numbering about a thousand members. In a number of countries (England, Sweden, Czechoslovakia, Switzerland …), the new orientation opened up wide perspectives. All our previous work had only a preparatory character. In the full meaning of the word, we are entering a new epoch; from propaganda circles we are becoming fighting political organizations of the proletariat

Under these conditions the discussion in the French League opened up. The drawn-out character of the disintegration of the French Communist Party, the abundance of elements of revolutionary decomposition (groups, sects, cliques without ideas and without a future), the numerousness of national immigrant groups that are especially affected by the disintegration of communism — all these causes, combined with the lack of firm and consecutive leadership, led to the fact that, almost from the very beginning of the existence of the French League, its inner life represented a series of crises that never reached the level of principles but distinguished themselves by extreme bitterness and poisoned the atmosphere of the organization, repelling serious workers despite their sympathy for the ideas of the Opposition.

The present crisis of the League, despite its external similarity, at least at the first stage, to the previous crises, differs from them profoundly in that it coincides with a great turn in the whole policy of our international organization. The enormous progressive importance of the new orientation consists partly in that it permits the testing of the old groups, tendencies and individual workers not by chance and subjective criteria but by faultless objective criteria flowing from the whole course of our development No matter what the origin of the discontentment, conflicts, personal friction, etc., may have been, all the old disagreements must of necessity group themselves now around the basic alternatives: forward to a wide arena of the Fourth International or backward to small circles stewing in their own juice.

Lifeless, sectarian elements of the French League, as well as of other sections, feel that the ground is slipping from under their feet The coming out on a wider arena frightens them, as their whole psychology is adapted to an atmosphere of closed circles. Some of the defenders of circle life rebel openly against the new orientation, discovering in it tendencies towards the Second International; under the cover of ultra-radical formulas borrowed from the Stalinists is concealed capitulation before new tasks, new difficulties and new perspectives. Others recognize the new orientation in words but determine their policy independently of the new orientation, entering into blocs with its adversaries or advancing the criteria of yesterday, as if nothing had changed in the outside world and in our policy. The irresolute say: "The new orientation did not change practically anything in France." A great error! Despite the greater slowness and backwardness of the inner differentiation of the French workers' movement, it has accumulated numerous revolutionary elements that are waiting for a new banner and a new orientation. The present struggle among the socialist leaders reflects the deep regroupments in the working class itself. The banner of the new International will become an irresistible rallying force also for the revolutionary workers of France: it is only necessary to take this banner firmly and confidently into one's hands!

The vast significance of the new orientation for the League — we repeat again — consists in that it makes it possible to get rid of all that is accidental, personal, secondary, that it places squarely the question of principle and unmistakably separates the living and creative elements from hopeless products of circle life.

The problems of the inner regime of the League, of the methods of work and the composition of the leadership, of course, do not lose their importance even now; on the contrary, all these questions are inseparable from the question of the new orientation. It would have been a miserable reaction to attempt to build and rebuild the inner organization of the League independently of the main task of the new period. From now on only those elements should be and must be admitted to the leadership of the League, as well as of other sections, who have understood the significance of the new orientation, who place it as a basis for their whole activity, who are ready to break all obstacles on the new road, and with ardent zeal lead the organization forward, not permitting inner reactionaries to pull it back.

In close connection with the new orientation, it is necessary to pose in a new manner the questions of organization, discipline and leadership.

Undoubtedly the leadership of the French League, as well as that of a number of other sections, has not acquired the necessary methods of constant ideological contact with the organization, of constant and timely information to all the members of the organization about the proposed important steps, tactical changes, etc. This serious shortcoming in the work inevitably leads to a separation of the leaders of the organization, gives rise to unnecessary misunderstanding and conflicts, and hampers the political education of the members. Correct and timely information is the basis of party democracy. The development of the League is no less harmfully affected by another characteristic of the leadership: passive tolerance of elements known to be alien and of disrupting activity. A revolutionary organization cannot develop without purging itself, especially under the conditions of legal work, when not infrequently chance, alien and degenerate elements gather under the banner of revolution. Since, in addition, the Left Opposition formed itself in the struggle with monstrous bureaucratism, many quasi-oppositionists have concluded that inside the Opposition "everything is permitted." In the French League and on its periphery prevail practices that have nothing in common with a revolutionary proletarian organization. Separate groups and individuals easily change their political position or in general are not concerned about it, devoting their time and effort to the discrediting of the Left Opposition, to personal squabbles, insinuations and organizational sabotage. For the last three years, the Jewish Group has become an example of such "policy." The impunity of this group and of elements akin to it should be considered as a grave fault of the leadership of the French League, as a manifestation of impermissible weakness and of organizational vagueness.

Any defense measure by the organization against decomposing elements, any appeal to discipline, any repression was described as Stalinism by some members of our own organization. By this they only showed that they are far from understanding Stalinism as well as the spirit of a truly revolutionary organization. The history of Bolshevism has been, from its very first steps, the history of educating an organization in the spirit of iron discipline. The Bolsheviks were originally called the "hard," the Mensheviks the "soft," because the former stood for a harsh, revolutionary discipline while the latter replaced it by mutual indulgence, leniency, vagueness. The organizational methods of Menshevism are inimical to a proletarian organization no less than Stalinist bureaucratism. The Jewish Group and the elements connected with it advocate and inculcate purely Menshevik conceptions of organization, discipline and leadership. Such practices are suited to the club of Souvarine and other "democratic" (in spirit, Social Democratic) organizations. Bolshevik-Leninists reject democracy without centralism as an expression of petty-bourgeois content To be able to cope with the new tasks, it is necessary to burn out with a red-hot iron the anarchist and Menshevik methods from the organizations of the Bolshevik-Leninists.

We are making an important revolutionary turn. At such moments inner crisis or splits are absolutely inevitable. To fear them is to substitute petty-bourgeois sentimentalism and personal scheming for revolutionary policy. The League is passing through a first crisis under the banner of great and clear revolutionary criteria. Under these conditions, a splitting off of a part of the League will be a great step forward. It will reject all that is unhealthy, crippled and incapacitated; it will give a lesson to the vacillating and irresolute elements; it will harden the better sections of the youth; it will improve the inner atmosphere; it will open up before the League new, great possibilities. What will be lost — partly only temporarily — will be regained a hundredfold already at the next stage. The League will finally get the possibility of transforming itself into a fighting organization of the workers.