Date: Fri, 1 Mar 96 10:55:45 GMT
From: Adam Rose <adam-AT-pmel.com>
Subject: Re: labor



> Workers in Britain and other countries with mass workers parties take it for
> granted that political power must be fought for. It will be a great leap
> forward...when the US working class absorbs this idea, even if the current
> leadership of the working class party is reformist.

I agree.

> Once there is such a
> party, then we will start a more advanced discussion in the working class in
> which the fight for socialism will become central and the weakness of
> reformism more obvious.

I don't see that you have to put off this discussion with a minority till
after the majority agree with the idea of a workers party, especially as the
way that a new workers party turns out depends on the influence of socialists
within it.

If you look at the 30's, it was possible to win large numbers of US workers
to support the CP, on the basis of class struggle and revolutionary language,
before there were moves towards a Labour Party. Unfortunately, the CP was
also a Stalinist Party, despite its strengths.

I don't have any real information on this, but as I understand it, the CP blew the
chance for a Labor Party then.

You should remember that the British labour Party was very much an oddity
in the way that it was formed - most mass workers parties at the time were
Marxist, at least in phraseology.

I think If a Labor party gets set up, this would be a step forward - and 
socialists have to play a constructive role in that. But you shouldn't 
assume that the struggle moves in, dare I say it, a stageist way. A wave
of struggle and the current idea that "all politicians are crooks" could
provide the basis for revolutionaries to get a very wide audience. Again,
the Trotskyists in the 30's did exactly this.

Adam.

Adam Rose
SWP
Manchester
UK


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