De Leon’s opposition to
reformism, a central element in his ideological perspective, superficially resembles the
position defended today by the ICC and the rest of the Communist Left. However, De
Leon’s views, originally formulated as early as the 1890s, were based on a total
confusion on the operation of capitalist economy and were actually incorrect for the
period in which he lived. Here it is important to differentiate clearly between reformism
and reforms. As we pointed out in Internationalism, #21, "Reformism has always
meant the theory and practice of a peaceful transition to socialism, whose hallmarks have
been a commitment to parliamentarism, legalism, and pacificism. This theory and practice
of reformism…has always been antithetical to the interests of the working class and
has represented the invasion of bourgeois ideology into the ranks of the
proletariat." On the other hand the struggle for reforms – for durable
improvements in the conditions of the working class, i.e., the end of child labor, the
eight hour day, etc – "in the ascendant phase of capitalism when it was pse of capitalism when it was possible
for the working class to win durable reforms from the bourgeoisie…occurred on the
class terrain of the proletariat and was a manifestation of the fundamental antagonism
between capital and the wage-working class." Thus in the late 19th and
early 20th centuries, the struggle for reforms was correctly supported by
Marxist revolutionaries. De Leon on the other hand did not support that struggle. Instead
he denounced the struggle for reforms as synonymous with the counter-revolutionary
practice of reformism.
