The British Road to Revisionism
In the January/February 2008 edition of Lalkar
we carried an article which highlighted the revolutionary programmes of
British Communism and finished it with a few brief words about the revisionist British
Road to Socialism. The purpose of this article is to broaden that analysis
and criticism of the series of programmes of first the Communist Party of Great
Britain (CPGB) and then the Communist Party of Britain (CPB) that went under
the title of the British Road to Socialism (BRS).
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1951 version of BRS
The first BRS was adopted in January
1951 and made a staggering change to CPGB policy.
This 1951 programme champions the idea that
socialism can be achieved in Britain by winning a majority of seats in
Parliament and legislating socialism in, stating: “…to bring about a
decisive change in Britain, the millions of workers in the trade unions,
cooperatives and individual members’ sections of the Labour Party will have to
use their political and industrial strength to make it impossible for either
the right-wing Labour leaders or the Tories to carry on their present
pernicious policy.”
Further, “It is through this struggle that
the unity of all workers by hand and brain, of professional people and farmers,
can develop into a movement strong enough to defeat the rich and their
defenders in the Labour Party and to ensure peace and a future for all working
people” and “Only by united action between all sections of the Labour
movement can the working class rally all its forces and all its allies for
decisive action to win a Parliamentary majority and form a People’s Government.”
Note that to bring about the “decisive
change” the workers need only use their “political and industrial
strength” which, although extremely desirable, cannot achieve much unless
they are also prepared to use their vastly greater numbers in violence against
the ruthless enemy who will stop at nothing to regain what they have lost.
This un-Marxist idea of taking power by
wishing it to be so was not only championed by the CPGB in 1951 but they were
quite upset that anyone should think that they would try to achieve power in
any other way! The 1951 British Road to Socialism says: “The enemies
of Communism accuse the Communist Party of aiming to introduce Soviet Power in Britain and abolish Parliament. This is a slanderous misrepresentation of our policy…the
British Communists declare that the people of Britain can transform capitalist
democracy into real People’s Democracy, transforming Parliament, the product of
Britain’s historic struggle for democracy, into the democratic instrument of
the vast majority of her people. The path forward for the British people will
be to establish a People’s Government on the basis of a Parliament truly
representative of the people.”
This quote uses the
terms democracy and democratic without any qualification but is there anyone
living in the real world that thinks that there is one democracy which stands
above class interests, obviously a product of the classless state that can be
utilised by any class to rule peacefully? This is nonsense that crumbles under
the least investigation, if the interests of different classes are different
how can there be one democracy that serves them both and if the interests of
the different classes are not different but identical, we surely have no need
to replace the bourgeoisie as rulers of society as they can look after our
interests as well, or better, as we can ourselves?
Other notable quotes from this programme
include: “Despite the acute danger of war, the Communist Party declares that
a third world war is neither necessary nor inevitable. The Communist Party
rejects the ‘theory’ of the inevitable war between the socialist and capitalist
camps. On the contrary, it declares that the peaceful co-existence of
socialism and capitalism is possible on the basis of mutual respect for
national rights and independence.”
Lenin taught us that imperialism will always
lead to war, it is the nature of the beast, it cannot but lead to war between
opposing classes, between the imperialist nations and the weaker exploited
nations and even between the different imperialists themselves as they try to
spread their power into each others ‘spheres of influence’. If they cannot live
in peace with each other by what logic will they tolerate a world turning
towards socialism without lifting a finger?
Another quote from
this 1951 BRS repeats the fable that the means of political power for the
advance to socialism already exists and is to be found in Parliament: “The
power of the working people, uniting all sections who recognise the need for
social change and participate in carrying it through, as expressed and laid
down through the elected Parliament, is alone capable of securing peace, high
wages for working people, raw materials for British industry and markets for
British goods, and creating the conditions for the establishment of Socialism
in Britain.”
This quote does not even allow for this use of
the bourgeois Parliament being just one of the ways of “creating the
conditions for the establishment of socialism”. No! This “alone”
is the way according to the early revisionists.
We leave the reader with two quick quotes to
ponder:
“Revolution does not mean that the new
class will command, govern with the aid of the old state machine, but that this
class will smash this machine and command, govern with a new one” (Lenin, State
and Revolution).
“In all these circumstances, to assume that
in a revolution that is at all profound and serious the issue is decided simply
by the relation between the majority and minority is the acme of stupidity, the
stupid prejudice of a common or garden liberal, the deception of the masses,
concealing from them a well-established truth. This historical truth is that
in every profound revolution, the prolonged, stubborn, desperate resistance of
the exploiters, who for a number of years enjoy important practical advantages
over the exploited, is the rule. Never, except in the sentimental phantasies
of the sentimental simpleton Kautsky, will the exploiters submit to the
decision of the exploited majority without making use of their advantages in a
last desperate battle, or series of battles” (Lenin, The proletarian
revolution and the renegade Kautsky).
Many other quotes from these two works could
be used. We do suggest a thorough reading of both or, indeed, numerous other
works of Lenin dealing with the state, democracy and the nature of imperialism
to back up our claims.
The 1958 version
And so onto the 1958 edition of the BRS. The
decision to rewrite the BRS followed the 20th Congress and Khrushchev’s ‘secret
speech’ (secret from the Soviet people that is) and the Hungarian uprising
(counter-revolution), when, alarmed by resignations and the criticism that was
being hurled at the Soviet Union and communism generally by imperialist
leaders, their news-writers and their puppets in the working class movement,
the Labour Party (both left and right) and the trade union hierarchies, the
CPGB leadership panicked and lurched further down the path of revisionism.
The gems of revisionism included in the 1958
version are “a transition to socialism without armed conflict is possible
today in many countries” after which we are told that this is definitely
possible in Britain “where there is a strong tradition of democratic
institutions.”
And that in using these “traditional
institutions and rights, we can transform Parliament into the effective
instrument of the people’s will, through which the major legislative measures of
the change to socialism will be carried. Using the rights already won in the
Labour movement’s historic struggle for democracy, we can change capitalist
democracy, dominated by wealth and privilege, into socialist democracy.”
This could be achieved; we are informed
because “a general election fought on the issue of a socialist solution to Britain’s problems could bring decisive results. It could return to Parliament a socialist
Labour and Communist majority and establish a Socialist Government which, with
the backing of the people, would begin to carry through a fundamental social
change.”
This is nothing new but it is far more clearly
spelt out then in the original BRS. Our 1958 revisionists haven’t forgotten
everything that Lenin taught them, though, they do recognise that the ruling
class might not like or go along with their peaceful socialist revolution, no
matter, they have that covered, they explain “the working class and
progressive movement needs to be vigilant, and if necessary to use its political
and industrial strength to defeat any attempts by the big capitalists to
restrict democratic rights or block the road to democratic advance.” So
the working class can still use their “political and industrial strength”
to defeat the entrenched enemy, in fact, anything can be used except force and
proletarian justice it seems!
On the subject of war we are told “A third
world war is not inevitable. Capitalist and Socialist countries can live in
peace and settle any differences without war.”
While on the next page, still in the same
section we find “It is only imperialism with its drive to maintain, restore
or extend exploitation over other peoples which gives rise to war.”
Well, we must ask the questions, if the CPGB
in 1958 recognised that imperialism leads, by its very nature, to exploitation
and suppression of workers at home and to a greater extent in the countries it
considers to come into its sphere of influence, if it desires to “restore”
the exploitation of peoples in socialist countries, if it cannot but lead to
war against its rival imperialists as it seeks to “extend” exploitation,
by what logic would communists declare that the transformation to socialism in
the imperialist nations themselves can be peaceful? What logic of the madhouse
says that these imperialist hyenas would truthfully contemplate living in peace
with socialism when they cannot even live in peace with themselves?
Given that these ideas put forward in the BRS
can no more lead to socialism than immersing ones head in flames for ten
minutes leads to a perfect complexion, it is no wonder that the dictatorship of
the proletariat, that vital stage that Lenin deemed absolutely necessary for all
socialist revolutions, is forgotten.
Indeed, the 1958 version of the ‘British Road’ says that “The essence of socialist democracy is to replace the control of
the rich by participation of the people in running the country, in the work of
local government and in the management of industry. The existing organisations
of the people, built up to fight for their interests, are the chief instruments
through which this principle can be applied. The Labour Party and the
Communist Party, working together for their socialist aim, are the working
class political organisations on which the success of the change to socialism
primarily depends. At the same time the right of other political parties to
maintain their organisations, party publications and propaganda, and to take
part in elections, will be maintained provided that these parties conform to the
law.”
So if by some absolute miracle we should
overcome the bourgeoisie by following this revisionist road, we have to ensure
the rights of the deposed enemy with his advanced political organisation honed
over hundreds of years, his international connections, his army of
news-moulders trained in the art of deception, not to mention all the threads
of command he would still maintain through the armed forces, to take back that
power? What would there be to stop them, “The existing organs of the people”
one supposes, “political and industrial strength”?
This 1958 version ends not with a bang but
with the usual whimper for the Labour Party to be nice to them. Calling for
the bans and proscriptions against the CPGB by the Labour Party the programme
asserts: “This could lead to further steps towards unity, including the
possibilities of affiliation, and eventually of a single working class party
based on Marxism.”
Is it any wonder after reading this that so
many militant workers and students, in the coming decade that saw a massive
resurgence of interest in socialist/communist ideas, shunned the CPGB and were
instead led astray by that other supporter of social-democracy which, on the
face of it at least manages to sound more revolutionary, Trotskyism!
The 1968 version
We now come to the 1968 version. The very
first thing this one does is to deny the leading role of a Communist Party in
revolutionary struggle when in the second page of the introduction it states, “socialism
can only be won by the combined action of the working people led by their
socialist and democratic organisations. The Communist Party has a vital role
to play, but it does not seek an exclusive position of leadership.” That
position falls, we presume, to the Labour Party as the 1968 BRS tells us that “in
the course of this many sided struggle the labour movement will find the way to
throw off its right wing leadership; that new political alignments will come
about, and create the conditions for the election of a Parliamentary majority
and government pledged to a socialist programme.”
At this juncture we must apologise for boring
the reader to tears with rehashes of the same tired arguments in favour of
revisionism that fill each successive programme from 1951 onwards but it is
important to understand the history of the BRS, the history that the CPB today
proudly claims as its own.
Once again, as it did a decade earlier, the
1968 BRS states that “a democratic advance to socialism, as outlined in our
programme, entails a multi-party system in which parties contend for the
people’s support. We believe socialism can be achieved in Britain, not without prolonged and serious effort, but by peaceful means and without armed
struggle, and this is our aim.”
While we are on this question, yet again, we
are forced to ask; what of the lessons of the Irish struggle for independence?
Did it not occur to any of these heroes of revisionism that if the British
bourgeoisie through its state could commit the prolonged carnage and genocide
that it already had in 1968 against the Irish people for demanding independence
this would be as nothing compared to what it would do if seriously challenged
at home by the forces of socialism which was threatening to take everything
from it?
Page 17 repeats the drivel about taking power
in Britain “without armed struggle” due to the “new relation of
forces in the world” opening up possibilities for further advances to
socialism.
The obvious question has to be that if in 1968
“the new relation of forces in the world” made it then possible to
advance to socialism “without armed struggle” what was the reason for
having that line ten years earlier in the 1958 version prior to that “new
relation of forces in the world”?
In the 1968 BRS there is a lot more of the
same, with slightly different wording. We won’t go through them all as it is
un-necessarily repetitive, however we would like to mention one at the top of
page 52 under the title of ‘Socialist Democracy’ it states: “Democratically
organised political parties, including those hostile to socialism, would have
the right to maintain their organisation, publications and propaganda, and to
contest elections.” Apart from guaranteeing counter-revolution this
doesn’t even carry the rider that appeared in previous manifestations that they
would have to obey and work within the law!
Going back to the God of the CPGB, the Labour
Party, this edition has this cringing remark to make on its relationship with
that organisation: “We do not and will not in any way seek to impose Marxist
ideas on the members of the Labour Party. Acceptance of the Marxist standpoint
can only come through personal conviction, as the fruit of experience,
discussion, argument and study.” Oh the pious arrogance that is beaming
from this statement is breath-taking!
First how could the authors of the BRS impose
Marxist ideas, you have to possess something before you can impose it on
others!
Secondly, what happened to the earlier wish to
join with the Labour Party as a single party of Marxism? In the next sentence
they claim that that is still a possibility but “only when the majority of
Labour Party members come to accept Marxist ideas.” So, obviously even that
is not something that they were going to seriously work for, how do you educate
someone, how do you argue/debate/discuss or even study with someone on the
issue of Marxism without seeking to impose Marxist ideas! What idiocy makes
its movement forward depend on someone else learning something but then goes on
to say that they must learn it for themselves? Political education was
obviously seen as an enemy of revisionism and rightly so as even the most basic
knowledge of Marxism-Leninism shows up the 1968 BRS as the babblings of fools
and traitors.
The 1977 version
We now come to the 1977 BRS, this was to be
part of the final battleground in the war between the two opposing revisionist
wings of the CPGB, the ‘Euro-communists’ and the group around the Morning
Star (MS) who eventually formed/reformed the CPB. We wouldn’t expect
anyone to challenge us when we call the Euro-communists revisionists and
opportunists but perhaps there may be some who would disagree over those who
rallied around the MS and formed the CPB. If so, please ask yourself a
question: could you consider someone who supports the BRS in all its manifestations,
after reading all that has already been mentioned, as anti-revisionist?
Anyway, to briefly sum up that war between the
two groups, the Euro-revisionists took their opportunism to its logical
conclusion and liquidated the Party, the losing group then ‘re-established’ the
CPB on the basis of the BRS and have themselves revised it further over the
years. That last CPGB programme carried all the usual hallmarks of
revisionism, war is not a natural outcome of imperialism, no need for
revolution using force, (they had even had the lesson of what happens to
‘peaceful revolutions’ from Allende’s downfall in Chile) Parliament and
existing structures are all that is necessary for implementing the change to
socialism, freedom for all who oppose socialism to express their ideas and work
against a future socialist government and of course, the need to support the
beloved Labour Party in elections (albeit calling it a new type of Labour).
They even move from the denial of the
Communist Party as the leadership of the class in the struggle for socialism to
the more, if it is possible, ridiculous position of saying “however large
our party, we could not envisage achieving this by ourselves. Other parties,
social forces and organisations will play an essential role in this process.”
Of course it is a joke to think of these renegades from socialism playing any
kind of positive role in a socialist revolution, but for people who consider
themselves communist to declare that however large they became, however much support
the working class gave them, they would not assume the leadership of the class
in struggle is to openly declare class treachery, Lenin would have had them
shot and rightly so!
The CPB and the BRS
The CPB have added nothing of significance to
this programme in its various revisions since its own reformation and they
certainly have not taken away any of the treacherous opportunism that has been
its hallmark since 1951 (the latest version has undergone a slight name change
and is now called Britain’s Road to Socialism, it can be read on the CPB
website). It still seeks to bolster and popularise social-democracy even
though the majority of the working class are now totally disillusioned by the
Labour Party. It still talks of the need to give a free hand to counter
revolution in a future socialist society, it still raises the banner of
non-violent revolution and that war is not inevitable under imperialism. It
still believes that the state, as it exists, can be adapted to ‘legislate’
socialism into being.
The CPB may wave red flags and some of them
can use revolutionary phrases to hide their revisionism but they are still the
betrayers of socialism, the underminers of the achievements of the Soviet
Union, the purveyors of defeatism within our ranks, the force that calls on
advanced workers to follow ‘Britain’s Road to Revisionism’ and give total
support for social-democracy in the image of the Labour Party even while it
carries out imperialist murder and brigandage around the world. There are very
few who are politically aware in Britain who can claim to be ignorant of the
CPB’s servile position re the Labour Party but before we close this article
compare that with the view of the CPGB in 1929 as expressed in the programme Class
against Class when talking of the Labour Party:
“This Party is the third capitalist party.
It lays claim to the title of Socialist Party, but has nothing to do with
socialism. Whatever associations it has with the working class are due to its
development as a parliamentary wing of the trade unions, now turned to account
as the means of subordinating the trade unions to its dictatorship on behalf of
capitalism. It rejects working class politics and exploits the workers’
organisations for ‘national politics’. The Labour Party ‘in principle’ stands
for the nationalisation of the banks, land and industry by purchase, i.e.,
State capitalism, but relegates in practice even this ‘principle’ to the far
distant future.”
This is the vision of the Labour Party that is
as instantly recognisable today just as it was in 1929. Since 1951 the CPGB,
BRS, and (from 1988) the CPB have tried to conjure up visions of the Labour
Party as a vehicle for movement towards socialism, as the mass party of the
working class, but can anyone seriously consider these visions as true in the
middle of imperialist wars of plunder led by the Labour Party?
There are other revisionists in this country
but the largest revisionist group is the CPB and those who are genuinely
seeking to work for revolution need to be confronted with this truth, which is
written on every page of their claimed programme from 1951 onwards.
The CPB are not a party of communists who
differ with some other communists over tactical matters, they have abandoned
the principles of Marx and Lenin and seek to cover their cowardly treachery in
revolutionary sounding phraseology. We declare that they have failed in this
miserable venture and we will not only carry on exposing their rottenness but
we call on each individual CPB member to study the CPB programme and its
forerunners and to see their party as it really is. We further call on
communists in the CPB to throw away their membership cards and come to the
Communist Party of Great Britain (Marxist-Leninist), Britain’s real communist
Party.