Date: 04 Mar 96 23:16:54 EST
From: Jon Flanders <72763.2240-AT-compuserve.com>
Subject: Labor



 -------------------------------------------------
 FORWARDED MESSAGE - Orig: 04-Mar-96 06:21
 Subject: Reply to: Re: Reply to: Re: labor
    From: Adam Rose > INTERNET:adam-AT-pmel.com
      To: Jonathan E. Flanders 72763,2240
 -------------------------------------------------




 Jon Flanders writes:

 >
 >  >> But you shouldn't assume that the struggle moves in, dare I say it, a
 > stageist way. <<Adam Rose
 >
 >  Depends about what you mean by that. In Britain you have had a Labour
Party
 > "stage" for almost 100 years.
 > <cut>
 > Are we
 > going to skip the labor party stage in the U.S. and go directly to a mass
 > bolshevik type party? Or a mass vanguard party? However you want to put it.
 >

 I don't know !

 All I was saying is that it isn't neccessarily the case that the next step
forward that the US working class will actually take is the foundation of
 a Labour Party.

 I don't think it is fair for you to argue that the Trostkyists in Minneapolis
didn't achieve much lasting influence - the main thrust of my argument would
be to cite the CP, which was seen at the time as a sizeable revolutionary, non
parliamentary" ( I can't think of the correct American term - "constitutional"
perhaps ) party.

 The history of the US labor movement has been one of massive waves of
struggle subsiding to leave little in the way of permanent political
organisation.

 I don't believe that Labor Party type organisations tend to grow during these
upsurges, but after their defeat. During the upsurges themselves, workers look
to their own strength. This is certainly the case in Britain - the ILP was
founded
 after the defeat of new unionism in the early 1990's, the Labour Party only
started
 getting really large numbers of votes after 1919, the peak of the
revolutionary wave
 in Britain.

 I guess that the pressures keeping most union leaders tied to the democrats
cannot be overcome without such an working class upsurge - why should they
believe they could have more influence via a Labor Party ? [ In Britain after
WWI, the TU leaders had been incorporated into the government during WWI,
 the Liberal party was in turmoil - meanwhile, there was revolution in Russia
].

 So I think the question is "how can revolutionaries affect the outcome of
these massive upsurges ?" when ( and not if ) they come ?

 Adam.

 PS our conversation seems accidently to have become private - if you have
 no objections, please forward this message ( and yours perhaps ) to the list.

 Adam Rose SWP Manchester UK


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  E-mail from: Jonathan E. Flanders, 04-Mar-1996




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