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Richard Seymour wrote: > Sure, but there's a difference between the question of how radicals > relate to the masses and how revolutionaries should do so. I'm in > favour of forming broader groups that could be called any number of > things. They certainly don't have to say 'socialist', or 'workers', or > 'communist', or 'hammer' in their name. I was in a group that called > itself 'Respect' for Christs' sake. For people new to Marxmail and unfamiliar with British far left politics, Richard is a member of the British SWP that recently suffered something of a split involving leading members John Rees and Lindsey German. While I am not familiar with all the disputed issues, I know that the Respect experience was fairly important. Both sides seem to support a "united front" approach to electoral formations such as Respect that in my opinion is a formula for disaster since it requires the "revolutionary" members of the group to accept the discipline of their own organization. From my own experience in the American SWP, this kind of behavior in the mass movement alienated just about everybody who was not a member or sympathizer of our sect. Here is my analysis: http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2007/11/04/the-swp-respect-and-the-united-front/ ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
