CWI

[Lech]

I'm curious about what the IMT's relationship is to CWI. Do they just have methodology disagreements or do they really hate each other? Do they ever collaborate or are they opposed to each other?

[Faceless]

Hello comrade,

that is a good question because on the surface at least there are a lot of similarities between the CWI and the IMT. As marxists however we know that the surface appearance can be deceptive - what can appear to be minor methodological disagreements can disguise a much more fundamental schism.

As an example: the split between the Menshevik and Bolshevik factions in the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party was only initially over how open the party membership should be. Many onlookers couldn't put their finger on the difference other than that the Bolsheviks felt more "hard" whereas the Mensheviks were more "soft". In the end though the roles played by the Mensheviks and the Bolsheviks during the 1905 and 1917 revolutions couldn't have been more different!

This is a very limited example of course but the point is that when we take these methodological differences to their extreme we can arrive at very different - even diametrically opposed - conclusions. The "softness" of the Mensheviks in defining their programme made them much more malleable to pressure from the capitalist class whereas the "hardness" of the Bolsheviks meant that they were able to build a solid, educated party able to put forward its own independent, revolutionary programme. I know this may sound silly, and we can all make mistakes after all, but it is true that if we stubbonly refuse to correct our mistakes in the face of the facts these small differences can spiral out of control and even destroy an organisation.

Back to the IMT and the CWI... The split took place in the 1990s apparently over small differences in the orientation of the Militant. The question wasn't initially over whether or not the Militant should leave the Labour Party, but only over whether or not they should launch an electoral challenge to the official Labour candidate in the Liverpool Walton constituency. The majority of the leadership pressed ahead and in the end the Militant candidate, Leslie Mahmood, was smashed by the official Labour Party candidate with something like 2,000 votes to 22,000 votes. The question is, what should have happened next? It was obviously a mistake - the working class in Britain, even in places where the Marxists had a strong presence, still loyally adhered to the Labour Party and the prospects of building a "new workers' party" were poor. But like I said, "a mistake which we refuse to correct will spiral out of control".. and this is what happened. The Militant leaders heralded the by-election defeat as a great success and triumphantly declared that this represented "2000 votes for socialism!!" This was to have big consequences - people like Peter Taaffe extrapolated this argument and eventually declared that Labour Party, and all of the workers' parties in the world, have now become capitalist and that the working class would turn to the Militant and the international affiliates of the CWI in their droves. He even went as far as to predict the "Red 90's"... All of this is a long way off from the initial decision to stand an isolated candidate in a constituency of Liverpool - and it has proven to be totally incorrect.

The comrades who recognised this mistake went on to form what we now know as the IMT. Do CWI/IMT members hate eachother? We must remember that the older IMT members have seen the destruction of an organisation of 4000 people, a household name in the Labour movement. Personally I don't have any personal animosity with CWI members - infact I've even got a couple of friends who are members here in Britain.

The real difference however are fundamental to building a mass Marxist Tendency. The CWI have turned their back on the mass parties of the working class and believe that they have become too right-wing to ever be a point of reference for the working class. In fact the Labour Party in Britain at least has never had a "golden age" of Old Labour - that's a complete myth. The party has swung to the right and somewhat to the left - depending on events - but it has always been under the control of despicable bureaucrats who only care about themselves. At the bast however the party remains as it has always been - a party based upon the trade unions and upon the votes of working people. This is more or less true of all the workers' parties around the world. Because of this the CWI have condemned themselve to total irrelevance in the Labour movement.

Do the CWI and IMT cooperate? Where we can, of course we should. But as a general approach both organisations are too small to gain much from cooperation.

[Lech]

Ah, I see. Given that, would the IMT be open to reunification with the CWI? Say if they recognize their tactical mistakes (I agree with the IMT in this regard) and decide to reconcile.

[Faceless]

Hi Lech,

Hypothetically, absolutely yes, if the CWI agreed that they had made mistakes and we could come to an agreement on the fundamental differences, I would personally be 100% for a principled re-unification. On the question of whether or not that is a likely: I have to admit to being less than optimistic.

The reason is because I think the mistakes of the CWI run deeper than just tactics, although this is the most obvious manifestation. To justify their newly discovered tactic of abandoning the workers' parties they have had to thoroughly overhaul their theoretical understanding of the workers' parties. These parties are now, in the opinion of the CWI, completely capitalist and the working class must see the light if socialism is ever to be possible. This is the "theory" which the CWI have been educating their new and old members in for the past decade and a half. At the root of their theory is a lack of confidence in the working class to change its own organisations. This lack of confidence is reflected in a range of other mistakes that they have made. In the civil service union (PCS) in Britain for instance the CWI supported a right-wing candidate because they had no confidence in the rank and file Left candidate, Mark Serwotka. In the end Serwotka won and the CWI lost a lot of credibility. It's not impossible that the CWI could return to the workers' parties in many parts of the world should an obvious left wing emerge in those parties - and it wouldn't be the first time that a so-called "marxist" organisation with incorrect ideas has suddenly reorientated itself towards the workers' organisations at critical junctures. There have been many small left groups who have gone into bigger parties without previously having worked out their reasons for doind so (Here in Britain I'm thinking of the Stalinist Communist Party in particular). In the end they've often failed to win over the best workers and have instead aimed at splitting those parties or trying to woo the bureaucracy within those parties.

Haha, after all the ranting my "yes" is starting to sound like a "no". I would say it's a wishful "yes" because I have friends who are CWI members although I feel it's more likely that individual members will trickle back towards the IMT as our perspectives continue to be confirmed although it's less likely that the CWI as a whole will want to make ammends.

Ben

[Lech]

There's nothing wrong with a little healthy pessmism. I would very much like to see a reunification of parties but not at the expense of theory.