Reply to the SPGB's review of ‘The British Communist Left’

Submitted by ICConline on 8 November, 2005 - 11:32

The SPGB in its review of the British Communist Left (Socialist Standard 1213, September 2005) shows that it has understood nothing of the question of revolutionary organisation, even after 100 years of existence. Less than half of the review actually deals with the book; the rest is an attack on the ICC. The article as a whole seeks to dismiss the communist left, yesterday and today, as irrelevant.

Class Consciousness and the Role of the Revolutionary Organization: Comment by Red and Black Notes

Submitted by Internationalism USA on 20 October, 2005 - 21:09

The exchange of views below continues a discussion with Red and Black Notes on the vitally important question of class consciousness and the role of the revolutionary organization. As readers will recall, in Internationalism 134 we published a letter to R&BN commenting on a joint public forum they held with the Internationalist Workers Group, the Canadian affiliate of the IBRP, last winter. We publish below R&BN’s response to our letter, followed by some further comments that we offer in an effort to deepen the discussion on consciousness and revolutionary organization.

Is it possible to reconcile anarchism and marxism? (ICC reply to GLC - extracts)

Submitted by International Review on 14 June, 2005 - 20:04

In Révolution Internationale n°300, we only cited the two most significant anarchist tendencies, those of its two “founding fathers”, Proudhon and Bakunin. We are not unaware of the other tendencies which emerged out of this dual matrix, but we think that the development of the most significant anarchist currents has to be placed in its historical context, which will be dealt with in other articles.

Letter To the Editor of Red and Black Notes, Toronto

Submitted by Internationalism USA on 9 June, 2005 - 23:38

On February 26, 2005 the meeting in Toronto on class consciousness and the role of the revolutionary organization could not be developed in depth because the discussion got cut short due to time limitation. We would like to take this opportunity to explore further the topic of the meeting...

In memory of comrade Mauro

Submitted by World Revolution on 7 June, 2005 - 17:22

We recently learned of the death after a long illness of Mauro Stefanini, one of the oldest and most dedicated militants of Battaglia Comunista, and himself the son of an old militant of the Italian left. We are publishing here extracts from the letter of solidarity which the ICC sent to the militants of the IBRP and from the letter of thanks written in reply by a militant of the IBRP in the name of his organisation.

Letter of the ICC to the group called the “Internal Fraction of the ICC”

Submitted by ICConline on 18 February, 2005 - 19:41

To all the Parisian members of the group called the “Internal Fraction of the ICC”

We took note of your text published on your web site in which you support a "Declaration", dated October 2nd 2004, of a "Circulo de Comunistas Internacionalistas", which is presented in the form of a successor of the NCI of Argentina, to denounce the "ignominy" of "these bastards" (according to your own words) who direct the ICC. In this text, you denounce slanders of which you have been victims and that were used to justify your exclusion from our organisation...

Correspondence from Red and Black Notes on the Causes of the War in Iraq

Submitted by Internationalism USA on 10 February, 2005 - 20:56

Dear comrades,

Thank you for your letter of July 22, 2003 containing a critique of two leaflets I produced for anti-war rallies in Toronto in the spring of last year. I regret that until now I have been unable to reply to the comments and criticisms raised in your letter.

Reply to the SPGB: The bourgeois state can't be converted - it must be destroyed

Submitted by World Revolution on 6 January, 2005 - 19:45

Our recent 4-part survey of the Socialist Party of Great Britain on the occasion of this small group's centenary (WR 272, 273, 274, 276) did not call for a celebration.

Debate with Red and Black Notes: The irrationality of imperialist war

Submitted by Internationalism USA on 31 December, 2004 - 00:34

Over the past year Internationalism has been involved in a correspondence with the Toronto based group Red and Black Notes that publishes a journal of the same name. We have already published previous installments of this correspondence. The following letter is a reply to the Red and Black letter published in our last issue (#129).

Correspondence With Red and Black Notes: Opposition to War Must Avoid the Many Traps of Bourgeois Politics

Submitted by Internationalism USA on 31 December, 2004 - 00:26

Earlier this year, Internationalism received copies of two leaflets distributed by the Toronto based Red and Black Notes at the anti-war demonstrations of last winter. In an effort to develop a constructive process of debate and criticism among the various tendencies in the “proletarian political milieu” (PPM) in North America, we have responded to these two leaflets with the letter that we reproduce below.

Revolutionary intervention and the Iraq war

Submitted by World Revolution on 30 December, 2004 - 18:34

Now that the butchery and destruction of the US military intervention in Iraq has been declared officially over, it is time to make a brief balance sheet of the various claims made in Britain to provide a political alternative to imperialist war. We won't bother here with the huge marches against the war in Iraq, organised by the Stop the War Coalition that was supported by leftists of all descriptions as well by the Labour Left, the Muslim Association of Britain, the Daily Mirror and others. They not only did not prevent the war taking place but also gave it a green light. By mobilising millions behind the illusion that a peaceful imperialism was possible they proved to the executive organs of the state that there was no effective counter force to the imperialist juggernaut.

Correspondence with International Communist Union: There are no more national liberation wars

Submitted by World Revolution on 30 December, 2004 - 17:57

ICC Introduction

We are publishing the platform of one of the new groups in Russia, which is moving towards the positions of the communist left. The ICU originated as the Kirov Marxist group in 1997 following a strike by teachers in that city. Initially the group attempted to work with the official Communist Party, later with various leftist groups, but more and more found that such activity was a “useless waste of time”. The current title of their paper in Russia is World Revolution.

ICC appeal to organisations of the Communist Left

Submitted by International Review on 28 July, 2004 - 22:52

Wars, like revolutions, are historic events of capital importance in demarcating the bourgeois camp from the revolutionary camp; they provide proof of the class nature of political forces. This was the case with the First World War which provoked the betrayal of Social-Democracy at the international level, the death of the Second International and the emergence of a minority which formed the new Communist Parties and the Third International.

Reply to the IBRP, Part 2: Theories of Capitalism's Historic Crisis

Submitted by International Review on 20 September, 1995 - 17:03

The International Bureau for the Revolutionary Party (IBRP) has replied in International Communist Review no.13 to our polemical article “The IBRP’s Conception of decadence in capitalism” which appeared in our International Review no.79. In International Review no.82 we published the first part of this article, which demonstrated the negative implications of the IBRP’s conception of imperialist war as a means for the devaluation of capital and the renewal of the cycles of accumulation. In this second part we are going to analyse the economic theory that sustains this conception: the theory of the tendential fall in the rate of profit.

Reply to the IBRP, Part 1: The Nature of Imperialist War

Submitted by International Review on 20 June, 1995 - 16:39

The IBRP has responded, in the International Communist Review no 13, to our polemical article “The IBRP’s Conception of Decadent Capitalism” which appeared in no. 79 of our International Review. The IBRP clearly expound their positions. Thus the article is a contribution to the necessary debate that must exist between the organisations of the Communist Left, which have a decisive responsibility in the struggle for the formation of the proletariat’s communist party.

Correspondence with Emancipacion Obrera: On the Regroupment of Revolutionaries

Submitted by International Review on 10 April, 1987 - 17:11

Last year, two groups in Argentina and Uruguay issued an ‘International Proposal to the Partisans of the World Revolution’, which we published in no. 46 of this Review. The question of the necessity for the regroupment of revolutionary forces, in the perspective of the development of the class struggle, is vital today. It’s necessary for the different groups to confront and clarify their respective political positions and orientations in the present period in order to envisage the rapprochement and common work which the present situation of the proletarian political milieu does not yet allow...

Polemic with the CWO: The International Communist Left

Submitted by International Review on 1 October, 1984 - 02:39

The history of the workers’ movement is not only that of its great revolutionary battles, when millions of proletarians have launched themselves on “the assault of the heavens”; it is not only two centuries of constant resistance, of strikes, of incessant and unequal combats to limit the brutal oppression of capital. The history of the workers’ movement is also that of its political organisations – the communist organisations.