reprinted from the Guardian, Fan the Flames, 8 November 1978)
When will the left ever stop talking to itself? The complaint is as familiar as a pair of worn-out slippers–and just about as useful.
Serious Marxist-Leninists judge the left not by the extent of its internal dialog but by its content and even more specifically, by what questions it addresses. Concededly, much of what passes for discussion and debate on the left would try the patience of those who get off on watching 6-day bike races. But the assumption implicit in the stale comment cited above is just one more spin around that tired track of contempt for theoretical work which continues to plague the U.S. communist movement.
If impatience, spontaneity and militancy alone were capable of toppling bourgeois rule, we would be a lot closer to socialism in the U.S. than we are. But they aren’t, we are not–and no amount of pragmatic prejudice will change that fact.
The purpose of the left’s internal ideological struggle is precisely to settle the outstanding theoretical questions of revolutionary strategy as they have already manifested themselves–both among Marxist-Leninists and in social practice. This process, while taking place through the forms of theoretical debate and political polemic, is overwhelmingly practical in its actual function. The ideological struggle becomes the arena in which the basic questions of political line are resolved, genuine Marxist-Leninist forces are identified and–in the actual circumstances of our own movement–the conditions most conducive to the task of reestablishing a communist party in the U.S. are developed.
If anything, the left is not talking to itself enough. The statement is made with full awareness of the outcry it is likely to provoke in some quarters, but it is a fact nevertheless. What would we think of the general command of an army that committed its troops to battle without a plan? No matter how bravely the troops fought, no matter how much the officers themselves would stand in the front lines and lead the battle charge, we would condemn that general command for a lack of preparedness.
And if the general command itself had not yet been formed? If the task of bringing it into being still remained, would we criticize the leaders for discussing among themselves the way in which it would be done? Of course, if they were taking too long to come up with a plan, if they were being side-tracked by personal rivalry, if they were not making a serious attempt to resolve their differences–well, then we could rightfully criticize them for not going about their business properly.
All analogies ultimately fall short, but in discussing the major piece of outstanding business before the left–the reestablishment of a revolutionary working-class party in the U.S.–the references to armies and a general command is not an analogy at all. For the class war between bourgeoisie and proletariat is as fierce a combat as any military encounter in history and the attempt to create an organization of revolutionaries who can serve as the general staff of the proletariat in that war is most certainly the principal task in the class struggle for revolutionaries at this moment.
All this, however, is only a set of easily stated generalities. The struggle to realize this objective in its particularity is much more difficult. The task requires, first of all, that a number of individuals actually agree to take it on. To do so, they must be able to identify the principal difficulties standing in the way of realizing their objective and they must be prepared to give leadership to the actual human material at hand–since along with the concentrated experience of the working-class movement summed up in Marxism-Leninism, it is the only resource that exists. This human material does not exist in the abstract. It is made up of a large number of individuals of different stages of political development, practical experience and varied organizational affiliations.
To bring these forces together on the only possible basis that can lead to the establishment of a Marxist-Leninist party requires the development of a political line in which they have confidence. For our movement today, that line may be seen in two aspects: one is the reaffirmation (not merely the restating) of the fundamental principles of Marxism-Leninism, particularly on those questions in which revisionism has tampered with the line of revolutionary thought in the U.S. communist movement; the other is an independent elaboration of Marxism-Leninism to the actual conditions prevailing today both nationally and internationally as the basis for developing the program of the new party.
But it is not enough for a handful of leaders or theoreticians to take up this task. Rectification of the general line of the U.S. communist movement is a wide-ranging task which must involve all who consider themselves Marxist-Leninists. This is the only basis on which the actually rectified line–which is not merely a formal statement of positions but a living process embracing thousands of people–can become a material force in our movement capable of assuming the organizational expression of a party.
A rectification movement likewise takes up the task of cadre training–in both theoretical and practical work. At this stage, the theoretical training in the fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism is clearly a priority, but not to the exclusion of gaming experience in practical, political and organizational tasks.
In the course of a wide-ranging rectification movement, different political views will emerge, something which has already happened in our movement. This is only to be expected and should not be any cause for alarm. The important thing is how we deal with these differing views. If we attempt to subordinate them to the cause of “unity,” we will never produce more than an opportunist grouping. If we magnify each difference to the point of antagonism, we will only promote sectarianism. Our goal in every case must be the struggle to find the correct application of Marxism-Leninism to each question and it can make no difference whether one organization or another or one individual or another holds to any particular position in determining which position is correct.
What is the relation of practical political activity to this whole process of rectification? Unlike some who have a hot-house vision of theoretical work which proceeds in isolation from the real world, Marxist-Leninists understand that their theoretical tasks are taken up in the context of the actual social conditions that prevail both in the world at large and in the left. The question is not whether Marxist-Leninists engage in practical political work during this period–they obviously must–but what their expectations from such work should be and the relationship of it to their theoretical undertakings.
First, Marxist-Leninists engage in a wide range of practical activities at the present time–and not only in the working-class movement–because this is an indispensable part of the concrete social investigation required in the formulation of a general line. In this sense, at the present stage, the communists attempt not so much to lead the class struggle as to learn from it.
Second, Marxist-Leninists engage in practical political activities to stay in touch with the masses. And here we must add that all too much of the political activity many left forces undertake today is of the kind that makes symbolic presence felt against the bourgeoisie but only very minimally involves those who are not yet among the conscious elements in the population.
Third, Marxist-Leninists engage in practical political activities to train themselves, to acquire organizational skills, to understand the dialectics of tactics and strategy, to experience the dynamics of class struggle as it actually unfolds in life.
Fourth, Marxist-Leninists engage in practical political activities to identify other communist forces or those who may be ready to embrace Marxism-Leninism on the basis of their own experiences in the spontaneous movements as they have developed.
Fifth, Marxist-Leninists engage in practical political activities in order to observe how all other political forces conduct themselves–in particular to see revisionism, dogmatism, Trotskyism, social democracy and anarchism in practice.
Sixth, Marxist-Leninists engage in practical political activities because even considering the limitations imposed by the absence of a party, they have some modest contribution to make to the urgent revolutionary struggles as they are already developing internationally and to the more advanced spontaneous struggles of the working class, oppressed nationalities and women at home.
But aside from this last consideration, it is clear that Marxist-Leninists engage in practical political activity under today’s conditions primarily as an extension of their theoretical tasks and not yet as a force capable of intervening in the course of events in a meaningful – let alone decisive – fashion.
The present period for our movement is one in which the debate within the left must, if anything, intensify. The times call for both a quantitative and a qualitative change. Quantitatively, there are still too many Marxist-Leninists so consumed with practical tasks that the key theoretical questions before the movement command only a small amount of their political attention. Qualitatively, there is still needed a centralizing focus to the ideological struggle and the statement of theoretical tasks. Unrealistic expectations about communist practical political activity at this stage likewise tend to distort the actual valuable experiences which Marxist-Leninist organizations and individuals are acquiring.
As to when the left will stop talking to itself, let us hope never. Lenin, after all, wrote “State and Revolution” in the period between the February and October revolutions in Russia in 1917–certainly a period of the most intensive and demanding practical political activity. And it is obvious that in this case especially Lenin was talking to the left.
Need it be added that the sole purpose of the left in talking to itself, however, is to enable it to speak to the masses with clarity and with the revolutionary insights which are capable of becoming the most powerful of material forces only when the masses take them up?