Our overall assessment of the NCRNO is based on the Conference Committee’s stated goals: 1) to move forward the theoretical and political line struggle on the race/national question and on the struggle against racism in the communist movement; and 2) to struggle to unite the trend. Our assessment of these goals is based on both the content of the positions articulated in the working papers as well as the manner in which principled relations were carried out in the preparation and in the conduct of the Conference.
We do feel the conference has moved forward the theoretical and political line struggle on racism and national oppression. It was a positive initiative by Line of March following the ideological, theoretical, and political disarray caused by the OCIC’s Campaign Against White Chauvinism (CAWC). The Conference papers represented the summation of much positive theoretical and political work over several years, especially the theoretical work by the Race/ National Question Study Project. We feel that the Conference represented a relatively more correct general orientation than has been popularized within the new communist movement. This reflects our movement’s overall maturing in regards to its handling of these questions. Even the Philadelphia Workers Organizing Committee (PWOC) position of a few years ago was a relative advance, not to mention the work of individuals over the last several years. In relation to the working papers, we think the critique of the Black Nation Thesis is basically positive. We generally agree with using the framework of racially defined oppression, as opposed to solely nationally defined oppression, of Black people in the U.S. as put forward in the Conference papers. In addition, it was positive that the Conference Committee attempted to summarize the struggle against racism in the communist movement.
However, we are not convinced that because the Black Nation Thesis has been rejected that dogmatism has been rooted out in the approach to these questions. Many of the assumptions taken for granted regarding Stalin’s work on the national question, we would not take for granted. Much of the historical foundation for the position in the papers is far more controversial than suggested and is largely unsubstantiated, at least in these working papers. For example, there is the theoretically questionable theory of U.S. capital development (the idea of capital without wage labor) and a one-sidedness regarding the relationship of minority oppression to class wide struggle. Here we suspect that the most serious mistake being made is that the old “white skin privilege” line, popular several years ago in a more moralistic stage of the movement’s development, comes dangerously close to being resurrected. Ironically, at the same time, it seems that many features of Black oppression of a cross-class character (social and political aspects perhaps similar to aspects that would be emphasized in a nationalist framework) are not taken seriously enough and there is a tendency to reduce Black oppression to economic class oppression. Generally speaking, we think there is a tendency toward overly rigid categories (view of a nation, racial vs. national minority oppression) and a narrowing of the scope of analysis in order to focus on what is considered the essence of the matter, “racialized class oppression.” These points are all developed in more detail in the following sections on content.
With this mix of strengths and weaknesses, we would have to say, as we said at the Conference, that time will tell as to what extent and in what ways the Conference was an advance. This depends very much on whether comrades see these questions as open to debate and in need of development. By the very fact that the Conference papers were being typeset during the Conference, raises doubts as to whether the positions put forward in the working papers were approached by the Conference Committee with the self-criticalness and tentativeness which would be more useful and appropriate.
All of us participating in the Conference were fully aware that the Conference was essentially initiated by people in or close to Line of March. We consider ourselves to be part of the trend and have some agreements and disagreements with LOM. We are not consolidated around LOM’s perspective or, obviously, we would be in LOM. We are bound to be quite concerned then with whether 1) the Conference was initiated by LOM but genuinely with an intention to be trend-wide or at least willing to discuss differing viewpoints in an open and critical spirit or 2) whether it was frankly dominated by LOM, with some other people and tendencies present to give the Conference the appearance of being broader than LOM.
First, was there an attempt to get broader participation in the Conference? Yes, to a certain extent. Although the numerical preponderence of the invitations clearly favored LOM, we know that many more non-LOM forces were invited than attended. But, given the political and theoretical diversity on these questions in our trend, we don’t think enough effort was made to seriously involve some non-LOM forces. For example, a group such as Theoretical Review (TR) should have been involved from the beginning if there was a serious desire to see them participate at all. Although we disagreed with TR’s decision not to participate in the Conference, this could have been expected when they were not considered to be on the Conference Committee to help in the mobilization and planning, and development of the positions in the working papers.
The criteria for participation on the Conference Committee was demonstrated national participation in the anti-racist struggle, theoretically or politically. In light of this, we feel that TR had the basis to be on the Conference Committee for the following reasons:
1) TR was one of the leading forces in opposing the OCIC’s CAWC at the Western Regional Conference in July, 1980.
2) TR was and is a major organized force in the trend and has a different framework from LOM.
3) There is no substantiation of the Conference Committee’s excuse that neither the Tucson or Boston TR political collectives have ever engaged in theoretical or political anti-racist practice.
4) Not all members of the Conference Committee had any more specific anti-racist experience than TR.
After a conference call was issued that included mostly LOM members or close supporters, the Conference was bound to be more narrowly identified as a “LOM conference.” In addition, in some cases non-LOM people were not approached or given conference materials sufficiently in advance of the conference. Two Native American comrades from New York, who had been discussed by the Conference Committee in the fall of 1980 to assist in facilitating the Native American panel, were not met with until a week before the Conference. Given the underdeveloped nature of the line on Native Americans in our movement, this is a particularly glaring oversight.
Although an effort was made by the Conference Committee to involve some non-LOM forces, we don’t think it was taken up seriously enough. As a result, the Conference did become narrowly identified as a LOM conference and this impaired its ability to build more trend-wide unity. However, we don’t doubt that some forces were consolidated more closely around Line of March through the process of the Conference.
Given that many non-rectification forces did not or could not come to the NCRNO, there was not adequate representation of the various lines within our trend on the controversial issues on this question. Without the direct participation of those representatives of the different articulated viewpoints in our trend, i.e., PWOC, El Comite-MINP, Black Liberation Press, TR, and numerous independents, thoroughgoing line struggle was not conducted at the Conference. This objectively limited the extent to which adequate line struggle on the race/national question took place.
The content of the Conference focused on several fairly substantive papers, a perspective developed over a period of time in groups associated with LOM. The discussion groups leading to the Conference and the Conference itself aimed to “familiarize” people with the concepts in these papers and, to a certain extent, struggled for unity on the basis of a “leading line.”
We think there are advantages and disadvantages to this approach of organizing discussion on the basis of a “leading line.” Advantages are that, to a certain extent, a common language is defined and discussion is given a clearly defined focus. Disadvantages of this approach can be that, as so often has been the case in our movement, minority opinions and even critical thinking generally can be stifled in the pressure to “unite with” the dominant line.
If this Conference were that of a cadre organization that had a great deal of unity to begin with, such a “leading line” would provide the basis for an even higher level of unity. However, in the face of controversy arid disunity on many questions, debate often becomes narrowed into whether one unites with or opposes the “leading line”, either sweeping aside objections and questions in favor of “essential unity” (and reproducing the “flunkey-ism” unfortunately that has been so common) or the focus is on sharp polarization of “two-line struggle” when there is significant disagreement.
We are not saying that putting out a “leading line” as a general concept is wrong. Unity based on an advanced scientifically developed analysis and program is at the heart of a Leninist conception of a party. We agree that unity must be built by struggling to win others over.
We see this process as more complex and protracted, however, than LOM supporters apparently do. The question of self-criticalness and respect for differences is a decisive factor if we are to avoid the sectarianism, rigidity, and shallow inadequate politics that have characterized our movement for years. There is no formula for a Leninist party that will guarantee this. Even to say “it is correct to put forward a leading line”, while abstractly correct on a certain level, may not be an adequate approach to the problem at hand and would be hence incorrect.
The problem faced by the Conference Committee was to put forward a “leading line” in a way that could be genuinely interacted with. This would have implied putting out papers more in advance on the Conference if the intention was to flush out differences in a useful way by allowing time to develop critiques. It would have recognized that questions are not so quickly considered settled. It would have meant not putting forward controversial questions, i.e., the slavery as capitalism argument or the “white racial interest” concept, without adequate documentation and indication in the documents of alternative viewpoints. It would imply putting out basically only material for which there really is time to question and discuss. And finally, it would involve some serious intention to re-evaluate the politics put forward on the basis of criticism and discussion.
Regarding the latter point, there were many important criticisms of the papers put out in the plenary and workshop sessions of the Conference. There was little attempt to systematically sum up these differences or to respond to some of the issues that were raised. None of the criticisms were reflected in the working papers as published.
We were particularly disturbed by the “white racial interest” position. During the plenary, a number of positions were put forward on what will certainly remain one of the most controversial aspects of the line. (This question has always been controversial, with plenty of examples of serious mistakes made in either direction.) It seemed that despite the inconsistency and vagueness of the line, however, there was little willingness on the part of the Conference Committee, to seriously and honestly grapple with differences. What resulted was a highly charged emotional reaction to any questioning of the line, including veiled and not so veiled suggestions that any criticism of the line stemmed from racism. In short, we were disappointed with the unwillingness of the majority to explore differences in an open and comradely spirit.
We feel the Conference Committee was inconsistent on this question. They repeatedly encouraged people to caucus concerning differences. Our grouping met previous to the Conference to discuss our problems with the process and the line being put forward. However, we did not function as a caucus during the Conference or have any collective discussion of summation. But we uphold our right to have done so.
Nevertheless, it appears there was an incredible amount of grumbling about “what are these people up to.” The Steering Committee barely concealed its contempt for and intention to isolate certain individuals within our grouping. This involved specifically those associated with the primacy of theory movement.
This was particularly apparent in the heavy handed manner in which one Steering Committee member took it upon himself to reprimand one of these individuals. We won’t go into the particulars but suffice it to say that we feel the charge that this person was trying to undermine a Steering Committee decision and the Conference was totally unsubstantiated and unjustified. However, justified or not, to expect this degree of conformity or uniformity with the attitudes of the Steering Committee is quite unrealistic and, in effect, quite sectarian in its implications. Basically, this involves a failure to appreciate that the trend at this point is made up of people with differing politics. There is a necessity to respect differences and to look for ways of maintaining principled relations in spite of differences.
Additionally, we feel there was an attempt to “draw out” differences in the Conference in a fashion that seemed antagonistic. One comrade was particularly singled out for very sharp attack in her workshop and in the plenary for her supposed failure to be “drawn out”. It is a little hard not to feel “set up” given this “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” set of attitudes.
The Steering Committee and LOM seemed too willing to assume that the expression of differences implied that we were trying to be divisive and obstructionist. Ironically, this attitude was combined with the oft-repeated criticism of us for not expressing our differences. However, when we did, as individuals, there was heated response. For example, one woman from our grouping raised a process criticism at the Bay Area delegation summation meeting during the conference. Immediately following she was surrounded by approximately 15 LOM people and was bombarded by criticisms. She continually said she was misunderstood. She was not given time to adequately respond. She was not given time to even gather her thoughts. The incident ended with her in tears, fighting off the accusation of being “set-up” by our grouping.
Did we express our differences? Yes, we think we did. We raised criticisms of both process and politics during the preparatory discussions and during the Conference. Our differences were not raised as systematically as we are raising them in this critique, particularly criticisms of political line. But we think it would have been unrealistic to expect us to have fully developed positions given the short period of time (one month) to interact with the voluminous papers before the Conference. We think the Steering Committee and LOM rely too much on this criticism of our grouping “hiding their differences.” We think they drive it into the ground.
We feel the problem was more the “fall into line or else we’ll attack you” mentality, ironically reminiscent of the ultra-leftists of old who saw every difference with their line as representing “objectively” the interests of the bourgeoisie. This kind of thinking provided a justification for the “center of the universe” mentality that came to characterize these groups, especially as they felt the need to justify their capacity to take on the mantle of party leadership. In this sense, it probably is true that our differences really come down to party building approach.
We understand that our grouping was attacked sharply as being “factionalist” at the Bay Area Delegation summation on August 2nd, which we did not attend. We think the Steering Committee and LOM are falling into a bad habit, an all too familiar habit in our movement, of labeling those who disagree as “factionalist.” In the absence of a democratic centralist basis of unity and structure, such a charge is ridiculous and, frankly, we can’t help but suspect that it does betray something of how these comrades envision a party operating. Monolithic unity with leadership is not, in our opinion, a realistic goal. In fact, great harm has been done to the political life of the movement and the principals of democratic centralism have been distorted under this assumption. A campaign against factionalism, like the OCIC’s campaign against “federationism,” can only vainly try to enforce a uniformity of opinion that is grossly inappropriate in our loosely constructed and very diverse trend.
Our views on the organization of the Conference are that the Conference was only to a very limited extent trend-wide. It didn’t stretch far beyond those already being consolidated around LOM. This was in no small part because there was not a serious enough effort to make the Conference broader than LOM in political representation. Many of the non-LOM forces who did attend were critical of the extent to which the Conference was politically dominated by the politics of LOM. Line was put forward in a way that was often hard to more than superficially interact with. There was a high degree of tension and paranoia generated by the Conference Steering Committee and LOM towards our grouping’s criticism of process or line. None of this strengthened trend-wide unity, nor did it help in the clarification and strengthening of the theoretical and political line on the important question of racism and national oppression.