Debatt om vänsterenhet i Storbritannien

Regissören Ken Loach har tagit initiativet till organisation, Left Unity, som ska utgöra ett socialistiskt alternativ till det nyliberala Labourpartiet. Både det lilla cpgb, Communist Party of Great Britain, och "IS Network", avhopparna från det post-trotskistiska SWP, har hoppat på vagnen. Men de har divergerande åsikter om hur det nya partiet borde se ut, vilket lett till debatt dem emellan.

IS Networks ståndpunkt går ut på att partiet borde byggas upp underifrån genom att övertyga dem som deltar i kampen. Deras argumentation framgår i denna artikel. Här följer ett  par belysande citat:

As socialists, we can be united in the aim of building a mass socialist organisation. The main problem with existing far left parties is that they believe that they can achieve this in the abstract, that they can, in isolation from the working class, formulate a plan of action, through use of their one ‘correct’ and ‘pure’ theory, and simply deliver this to the movement.

When engaged in struggle this seemingly abstract question translates into concrete issues on a day to day basis, but the task of revolutionaries is to win those sections of the class engaged in struggle to revolutionary methods and ideas, not through abstract propaganda, or by somehow manoeuvring themselves into leading positions in the movement, but by uniting with them in common organisations with common objectives, and winning them to a revolutionary programme through argument, and by demonstrating the validity of their ideas through application. A broad party of the left, uniting all those who wish to confront the capitalist system, and bring about the socialist transformation of society, has the potential to provide the vehicle for this.

 Lite överraskande kanske har cpgb, som jag uppfattat som osekteristiskt,  kraftigt reagerat mot denna ståndpunkt i  artikeln "To get out of the gutter, begin by looking up at the stars":

A ‘broad party’ designed to accommodate everyone from Stalinites, Trotskyites and left reformists to anarchists, feminists, eco-activists and anti-austerity protestors. In other words, a ‘broad party’ in which ‘revolutionaries’ are expected to drop or suspend their principles in the name of unity with forces whose politics are, in fact, incompatible.

We, in contrast, state that the existing far left can, and must, unite on the basis of a political programme that can map out the transition from capitalism to the rule of the working class (the minimum programme) and the transition to communism and generalised human freedom (the maximum programme). 

Det verkar som att cpgb kräver inte bara att det enade partiet ska bestå av "marxister" utan att dessa ska vara marxister av cpgb:s sort. Men vad är då vitsen med att arbeta för enhet inom vänstern? Om det inte bara handlar om att värva de andra organisationernas medlemmar...