Here we republish two letters concerning Communist Students attitude towards the ‘Reclaim the Campus’ conference which re-launched the Education Not for Sale front of the Alliance for Workers Liberty. These letters appeared first in the Weekly Worker.
Absurd
I write in astonishment at the absurdity of Ben Klein’s article, ‘Rebranding exercise flops’ (May 22). As part of the “so-called anti-capitalist movement” and as one of the “few anarchist types in tow” of Education Not for Sale, I am astonished that comrade Klein thinks that anarchists can “be won” to accept the principles the CPGB was proposing at Reclaim the Campus.
The main thrust of the proposals was that ENS should exist “to promote the ideas of Marxism”, which it recognises is important “as a guide to practice”. What is meant by this? Namely, what Klein thinks Marxism teaches the working class in his article, ‘Left unity not on offer’ (May 15): “that the working class is the gravedigger of capitalism … when it is organised into a mass, revolutionary Communist Party”. What anarchist would be “won” to this? What anarchist would “accept” this, let alone proposals that advocate entering parliament, socialism as “the first stage of the worldwide transition to communism” and fighting for communism in general?
Anarchists and the many libertarians in further and higher education reject communist parties and vanguardism as alien, hierarchical and elitist. I advocated a simple, loose anti-capitalist network of student activists. I could have formally proposed that ENS take on anarchist organisational principles - ie, a total absence of hierarchy and structure, absolute autonomy of campus groups from a central body, and the consistent use of consensus decision-making. But I realise that many Marxists, including those in the CPGB, would refuse to get involved in such a network. ENS needs Marxists within it, so I did not advocate a structure or aims that would alienate them. This structure would not involve the unity of “all those committed to revolutionary change”, but neither would the CPGB’s version of Marxism.
The CPGB and its student group, Communist Students, should realise that what the student movement needs most at the moment is action, not another Marxist talk-shop. Both the AWL and Revo have realised this and they did not want to alienate those anarchists and libertarians in education who believe it too, those who regularly participate in direct action. This is, arguably, the best way that anti-capitalists can project their message. A bold, successful piece of direct action, even if it involves a handful of people, can be more powerful, far better at attracting students to the movement, than handing out a thousand copies of the Weekly Worker.
What the student movement needs is an activist network that will encourage students who believe this to coordinate their actions across the country. The CPGB does not want this; all they hope for is a few more people to hand out “propaganda for Marxism”. Such a hopelessly inadequate strategy will take the student movement nowhere and it will never attract numbers to the cause of anti-capitalism. The outstanding success rate of Communist Students shows this.
If the CPGB and CS continue on their present course, they will lose what little credibility they have left and be forced even further to the sidelines of the student left.
Robbie Folkard
Manchester
Anarcho-elitist
Robbie Folkard’s letter is a good illustration of why Marxists should not be scared of putting forward Marxism, as Communist Students did at the Reclaim the Campus conference (May 29).
Comrade Folkard decries communist parties as “elitist”, yet he fails to realise that the actions of the anarchists, the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty and Revo were absolutely elitist. We see Marxism as something that can be universally understood and universally applied, not something to be kept for the anointed few. Comrade Folkard and the other anarchists came with no vision for the student movement, no proposals and, quite frankly, no politics. The project of building a movement for radical social change needs more than a loose anti-capitalist network. Lots of anarchists recognise that, and I doubt they spent hours using consensus decision-making to decide it.
Folkard asks: “What anarchist would be ‘won’ to this [Marxism]?” Well, many actually. The history of the anarchist movement is one of tailism, be it to the bourgeoisie or to sections of the workers’ movement. This, coupled with an inability to arm the working class with the necessary organisation and ideas to achieve workers’ power, has enabled Marxism to win workers from anarchism and other immature trends within the workers’ movement time and time again. Those of us in Communist Students are confident that we can do the same again.
As early as 1873 anarchist followers of Bakunin discredited themselves with their actions during the Spanish bourgeois revolution (1868-74).
Engels wrote: “As soon as they were faced with a serious revolutionary situation, the Bakuninists had to throw the whole of their old programme overboard. First they sacrificed their doctrine of absolute abstention from political, and especially electoral, activities. Then anarchy, the abolition of the state, shared the same fate. Instead of abolishing the state they tried, on the contrary, to set up a number of new, small states. They then dropped the principle that the workers must not take part in any revolution that did not have as its aim the immediate and complete emancipation of the proletariat, and they themselves took part in a movement that was notoriously bourgeois. Finally they went against the dogma they had only just proclaimed - that the establishment of a revolutionary government is but another fraud, another betrayal of the working class - for they sat quite comfortably in the juntas of the various towns, and moreover almost everywhere as an impotent minority outvoted and politically exploited by the bourgeoisie” (‘The Bakuninists at work’, 1873). The anarchists in Education Not for Sale will play a similar role - exploited and used.
When in practice the anarchists set about revolutionary change, the inevitable failure of their enterprises usually leads to workers abandoning anarchism and moving towards something else. At times this has been towards a Communist Party. It is the task of communists to ensure that the working class acts independently to achieve the necessary hegemony for revolution. The early period of the Russian Revolution is a prime example of how Marxists in action can win the working class to a Marxist programme, to the necessity of taking power and to the need for a Communist Party.
So when we came to Reclaim the Campus proposing the formation of a radical students group led by Marxism, we came openly and honestly. We did not hide or water down our politics for sectarian gain. No other group did this; no other group came to build genuine left unity, because they already have their own sects.
Another thing that comrade Folkard highlights is the need for action. It is true we need action; we need a movement that can strike with an iron fist. However, there is something just as important as building a movement that can strike with an iron fist, and that it is making sure we are punching in the right direction - hence our insistence on Marxism as the guiding light of our movement.
Folkard also fails to understand what ‘direct action’ is. It is not sporadic stunts taken by a few activists; that is elitist. Direct action is “working class self-activity independent of the state, the employers and the labour bureaucracy” (CS political platform). An example of actual direct action is the recent refusal of dockworkers in South Africa to unload arms bound for Zimbabwe. After World War II it was the CPGB that led actions to seize empty houses for the homeless. Now that, comrade, is direct action. The role of the Weekly Worker, then, is to facilitate the creation of a movement that can actually take direct action. Surely, propaganda by the deed should have died a death in our movement a long time ago?
Communists should unashamedly fight for Marxism. Narrow opportunism for short-term gains has led the left into disaster after disaster. Surely, the implosion of the Respect project should be a most recent and obvious reminder that such a method cannot build the movement, or the Communist Party we need.
Chris Strafford
Manchester
