[ALB]

Tom Rogers wrote:

Attributing a philosophy or viewpoint to the priorities of capitalists doesn't explain why and how it exists and why it is so widely-accepted.

Doesn't it? What about the ruling ideas in any (stable) period being the ideas of the ruling class? Since employing the most productive (of profit) workers, irrespective of skin colour or gender, is in the overall interest of capitalists and capitalist corporations you would expect the aspiration to "race" and gender equality to become the dominating view (as opposed to discrimination).The book I'm reading, Remaking Scarcity by Costas Panayotakis, sums up Walter Ben Michaels' case as:

Quote:

According to Walter Ben Michaels, who has voiced this view, concern with racism, sexism, heterosexism, and discrimination amounts to little more than "the dream of a truly free and efficient market" which obscures the real source of injustice, namely class inequality. In Michaels's view, American society's interest in non-class forms of discrimination constitutes a capitulation to "the neoliberal consensus" that "[t]he only inequalities we're prepared to do anything about are the ones that interfere with the free market"

 

[ALB]

What is interestnig in the figures Oxfam have produced is that they are talking about the global elite's income rather than their wealth. This avoids the objection that to direct some of their wealth towards the starving would only be a one-off. Highlighting their income is to draw attention to a continuing stream of wealth. Of course it's not going to happen, but it does show that enough wealth is being produced even today under capitalism to eliminate extreme destitution. This vindicates our contentiont that, by in addition eliminating the waste and artificial scarcity of capitalism, socialism could easily produce enough to provide everybody on the planet with a decent standard of living.

[ALB]

I'm just reading a book which criticises the author of this book, The Trouble with Diversity: How We Learned to Love Identity and Ignore Inequality, Walter Benn Michaels, but it seems to put the case against "identity politics" (as opposed to class politics) quite well. In other words, that capitalism can live with (and even encourage in the interest of economic efficiency) "race" and gender equality but not with social equality.More on his views here:http://newleftreview.org/II/52/walter-benn-michaels-against-diversityhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wyruiScXqcUhttp://www.amazon.com/The-Trouble-Diversity-Identity-Inequality/dp/B001GQ3DTC

[ALB]

To see how criticism of the SWP's self-styled "democratic centralism" applies to other such organisations, look at the constitution of the "Alliance for Workers Liberty" here:http://archive.workersliberty.org/resources/constitution.htmlOther Leninist organisations are criticising the SWP for not applying "democratic centralism" properly. Our criticism is more fundamental: we are critcising "democratic centralism" as such.The AWL constitution clearly spells out what "democratic centralism" means in practice — a hierarchical organisation dominated by its leaders.

Quote:

To be effective, our organisation must be democratic; geared to the maximum clarity of politics; and able to respond promptly to events and opportunities with all its strength, through disciplined implementation of the decisions of the elected and accountable committees which provide political leadership.(emphasis added)

Below the "leadership", there are two levels of membership: "candidates" and "activists":

Quote:

Members will normally be admitted as candidates, to go through six months of education, training and disciplined activity before being admitted as full activists. A branch or fraction may, at the end of six months, extend the candidate period if it judges that the above requirements have not been fulfilled adequately. In such a case the candidate has the right to appeal to the Executive Committee. Candidates do not have the right to vote in the AWL.

On promotion to "activist", members are required to, among other things:

Quote:

2. Engage in regular political activity under the discipline of the organisation;4. Sell the literature of the AWL regularly;

They have to ask "leave of absence" if they can't do this for some reason:

Quote:

A member suffering from illness or other distress may be granted a total or partial leave of absence from activity for up to two months; but the leave of absence must be ratified in writing by the Executive Committee, and the activist must continue to pay financial contributions to the AWL.

If they stop selling the AWL's paper without this permission, then they are in trouble:

Quote:

Where activists have become inactive or failed to meet their commitments to the AWL without adequate cause such as illness, and there is no dispute about this fact, branches, fractions, or appropriate committees may lapse them from membership with no more formality than a week's written notice. Activists who allege invalid lapsing may appeal to the National Committee.

They can even be fined:

Quote:

Branches, fractions, and appropriate elected committees may impose fines or reprimands for lesser breaches of discipline. Any activist has the right to defend himself or herself before a decision on disciplinary action is taken on him or her, except in the case of fines for absence or suspensions where the AWL's security or integrity are at risk.

As to branches and "fractions" (AWL members boring from within other organisations), they can elect their own organisers but these are responsible to the leadership not to those who elected them:

Quote:

Each branch or fraction shall elect an organiser and other officers. The organiser is responsible to the AWL and is subject to the political and administrative supervision of its leading committees for the functioning of the branch or fraction and for ensuring that AWL policy is carried out.

They can even give orders to those who elected them:

Quote:

Branch or fraction organisers can give binding instructions to activists in their areas on all day today matters.

But if they step out of line the leadership can remove them and replace them with someone of their choice::

Quote:

The Executive Committee and the National Committee have the right in extreme cases, and after written notice and a fair hearing, to remove branch or fraction organisers from their posts and impose replacements.

What self-respecting person would want to be a member of such an organisation? I think this means that we are not going to get anywhere with current members of these organisations, and that we'd do better to direct any efforts in this direction towards their ex-members. Perhaps, then, any statement on the current SWP situation should adopt the "we told you so" approach.

[ALB]

I don't like the term "privileged position" in relation to us. Since our Rules 12-16 concern the EC and Party Officers, a better term would be "positions of responsibility". Also Rules 29-31 are not about complainsts against members elected to responsible positions. Indeed, Rule 31 gives the EC the power to charge an individual member. The protection against abuse lies in the fact that the EC only lays the charge while it is the general membership who act as the jury and decide. Since Rule 26 (on Party Polls) has nothing to do with the voluntary participation of members in Party activity, this means that all the references to our Rulebook are either misleading or irrelevant. So I think we should drop them.And if we are going to mention the SWP's Rules I think we should quote them or provide an internet reference to them.I agree with Alan that we need a more general statement contrasting the difference between the Leninist "democratic centralism" of the SWP and others with the democratic structure we have (and some early trade unions had). Section III of this document could provide the basis for such a statement:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/education/study-guides/where-swp-coming

[ALB]

The difference between mouse behaviour and human behaviour depends on the different proportions in which the behaviour of each is culturally determined and which is biologically determined. Most human behaviour is culturally determined (with only a few bodily reactions being genetically determined) while most mouse behaviour is biologically determined (not all, as researchers are finding that more and more of animal behaviour has to be learned).Mice have to tunnel to survive, but there is no human equivalent of this. We have to survive in nature but our genetic make-up is such that we can adopt different behaviour-patterns depending on the environment in which we find ourselves. Which explains why our behaviour has varied so much since our species evolved, in contrast to mouse behaviour which has hardly changed since mice first evolved.Since mice have to tunnel to survive it is not a great shock that researchers have discovered that it is genetically-determined. This is what you would expect and the achievement of the researchers is to have proved this by identifying the gene involved. If, Jonathan, you think that human behaviour could be changed  by genetic engineering you need to come up with an example of what this might — in fact, conceivably could — be. What, in other words, would be the human equivalent of mouse tunnelling?So far, genetic research on humans has only found genes that influence the make-up of the body and so genetic engineering of humans would only be able to eliminate certain bodily defects, not change human behaviour (though of course eliminating these defects would allow those who might otherwise have inherited them to behave differently).

[ALB]

That's of mice not men. Since human behaviour is culturally-determined I doubt that it could be influenced by manipulating genes. The most I would think that genetic manipulation could have on human behaviour would be to change the limits of the behaviour an individual human could engage in.

[ALB]

There were also two local council by-elections yesterday in the Wirrall which TUSC contested:http://www.wirral.gov.uk/election/results/2013-01-17/all.shtmThings must be different up North if TUSC can get 31 votes and beat both the Liberals and the Greens ! Perhaps we should have a go there.(but then we'd have to persuade our Northern branches to take up local election activity).

[ALB]

Our vote corresponded to what members had speculated it might be — between 20 and 50. But we didn't contest primarily for the vote (except to avoid a derisory score, which we did) but to publicise the case for socialism. Here we exceded our expectations, thanks to a lively and very fair local on-line newspaper, the Brixtonblog (which we hadn't known about before). Here is a list of the internet publicity we got, not just for the fact that we were standing but also discussion of our ideas:http://www.brixtonblog.com/brixton-hill-by-election-danny-lambert-socialist-party-of-great-britain/9198http://www.brixtonblog.com/brixton-hill-by-election-hustings-round-up/9402http://www.brixtonblog.com/hustings-video-what-would-you-do-about-unemployment-in-brixton-hill/9336http://www.urban75.net/forums/threads/brixton-hill-council-by-election.304465/http://vote-2012.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=byelection&thread=1240&page=1#46349We also leafletted the ward three times. 9 people (6 members and 3 sympathisers) took part in this. For the record, we got 1 reply.We will probably contest this ward again in the full council elections in May 2014, especially because it is covered by a lively on-line paper. In the meantime we'll add Brixton Hill to the areas we regularly leaflet with a newsletter.

[ALB]

For a short while towards the end of the 1930s Orwell held a position on war similar to ours. See:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/1990s/1997/no-1113-may-1997/george-orwell-spain-and-anti-fascismBut when the War broke out he reverted to type (Old Etonian and Colonial policeman) and came out as a British Patriot and War-supporter.

[ALB]

I don't think that Hedley was doubting the wisdom of a general strike, but rather the state of preparedness for one. I got the impression that he was pissed off at being dragged across London on a freezing night to speak to 12 people and that this was his way of telling the organisers that they needed to put more work in.Actually, to tell the truth, I would think that, to the extent that austerity and the cuts can be mitigated, the only way that would have any chance of succeeding would be some kind of trade union action (as opposed to heroics by councillors, who are essentially elected civil servants who have to carry out central government policy mainly with central government money and who can be disciplined if they don't). But unfortunately the reality is, as Hedley observed, that not enough workers have the stomach for this.

[ALB]

ALB wrote:

Don't know if in view of the weather any or us (or anybody for that matter) will be going to the TUSC meeting  in the end,

In the end 3 of us did go, helping to bring the total audience up to 12, heard an SWP speaker (Paul Holborow of Anti-Nazi League fame)  urge a vote for TUSC and got denounced by the RMT London Regional Organiser, Steve Hedley, as "Mensheviks", apparently because we criticised the Bolshevik seizure of power in November 1917. We never mentioned this at the meeting, but he knew.  At least this shows that we are well known in militant trade union circles. In fact, the other RMT person present told us that the first socialist paper he ever bought was the Socialist Standard.

[ALB]

Don't know if in view of the weather any or us (or anybody for that matter) will be going to the TUSC meeting  in the end, but in the meantime someone has put a link to one of the three leaflets we distrubuted in the area:http://i48.tinypic.com/34h9hs3.jpghttp://i48.tinypic.com/auz1g4.jpgIncidentally, the text of this leaflet doesn't seem to be anywhere on our site if some technical bod here can find a place for it.

[ALB]

ALB wrote:

And here's what the Anti-Duhring Brigade thought of the husting. Pictures plus this comment:

Quote:

The SPGB candidate summed up his party's position and program in one perfect sentence, "There's nothing we can do." Well done comrade. That's a great message to give out to the working class. Marx & Engels and all the working class martyrs would be proud of you (not)

There's a full report on the hustings up now on the Brixtonblog:http://www.brixtonblog.com/brixton-hill-by-election-hustings-round-up/9402It records what Danny actually said:

Quote:

Socialist candidate Danny Lambert had a more radical suggestion: “In times of recession public services are the first thing that gets cut. This is the nature of capitalism and it’s time to wake up. We’re in a society that doesn’t work in our interests. There’s nothing we can do about it unless we dump the capitalist system.”

And here's what he said about the George IV pub:

Quote:

Danny Lambert said the pub’s closure was one of many symptoms of capitalist economics. “If this pub can’t be run at a profit it’ll get closed down and something else will open that can,” he said. “People come a poor second to profit. Until we get shot of capitalism we’ll have this problem over and over again.”

[ALB]

imposs1904 wrote:

is pretty much a game changer for the SWP. I'd be genuinely surprised if this time next year the SWP resembles the organisation it currently is, the organisation it has been for the last forty plus years. It's the most serious schism in the IS/SWP tradition since the IS Opposition split in the mid-seventies.

You could be right that this could be the SWP's equivalent of the effect on the CP of the Russian invasion of Hungary in 1956, with people whose basic position (university-educated militant Guardian-readers in professional jobs) has long been out of sync with being in a top-down, centralised, Leninist party choosing the occasion to leave. We'll see.

[Author]

Posts