The Party and the Programme - Discussion Forum

On forming a Marxist Party - Some principles for discussion

Author. Dave Spencer

1. We aim to put an analysis of Marxist political economy at the heart of any decision-making on policy and activity. This means examining the effects of the decline of capitalism; globalisation and the policies of the IMF; and the role of finance capitalism on the lives of the working class.
   
   
2. The emancipation of the working class is a task for the working class itself. Therefore we are in favour of the maximum amount of internal democracy within the party - no bureaucratic centralism, no elites, no self-appointed leaders. Building the party is a process of interaction between the experience of the working class in struggle and the memory of the class as stored by the members of the party.
   
   
3. We campaign for the extension of democracy throughout society in communities and in the workplace.
   
   
4. We reject the approach of Stalinism, its economic determinism and its abandonment of elementary human rights. Nationalisation without workers' control and workers' democracy is not socialism.
   
   
5. Workers of the world unite. We have an internationalist approach to all struggles, in policy, in solidarity and in co-operation with parties in all countries. We are opposed to national sectionalism.
   
   
6. We reject the sectarianism of most Left Groups whereby they put the building of their own organisation before the process of developing the working class movement as a whole. We co-operate with all struggles and campaigns of the working class reserving the right to put our own point of view. Firmness of principle, flexibility of tactic - no populism, no opportunism.
   
   
7. We recognise that the continuation of capitalism threatens the future of humanity and the planet - for example in wars, poverty, disease, ecological disaster and the exhaustion of resources.
   
   
8. Marxism is not a dogma and must be constantly enriched by debate and action.
   
   
9. In academic circles we fight to develop a humanist Marxism and against the remnants of Stalinist ideology and fashionable post-modernism. We attempt to create an interaction between the specialist knowledge of academics and the experience of the working class.
   
   
10. We recognise that the leadership of Social Democracy and the Trade Union are now in general the preferred option of the ruling class to control the working class. The future of socialism must involve a break from this tradition.
    
    

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