Editorial: Preparing for Power

[p008] EDITORIAL Preparing for Power WHEN THE Conservative Party was returned to office in the British General Election of June 1970, a new stage was reached in the political situation. This new stage was part of a change in the relation of class forces internationally and not only in Britain. Capitalist economists and politicians in every major country are agreed that the basic problem facing their system is manifested in what they call ‘inflation’. The working class, basing itself on the living stan- dards and organization built up during the un- precedented boom following World War II, now confronts the capitalists with wage demands and expectations of full employment which cannot be satisfied without endangering the rate of profit and even the survival of whole businesses, entire national industries, and the system itself. The purpose of the ruling class must now be to organize a reaction powerful enough to repulse this working class decisively, to destroy everything it has gained. This is not a temporary measure, a question only of change of policy to meet a passing crisis. The functioning of modern monopoly tends inexorably towards the total disciplining of the worker. He must be reduced to an individual appendage to the plant. Every means by which he organizes and effects in favour of the working class the division between wages and surplus value must be liquidated. If not, then the capitalist cannot realize the maxi- mum utilization of every minute of the life of his machinery and plant, installed at ever- increasing cost. And that would mean death. We are back to the political problems which suddenly confronted the countries of continental Editorial Europe in the 1920s and 1930s, but now at a higher level of development: even more than in those years, there is no way out of the crisis except through socialism or fascism. From the standpoint of monopoly capitalism, bourgeois parliamentary democracy, the political expression of the individualist basis of capitalist ownership and ‘free’ wage-labour, must be dis- pensed with. The last quarter of the 19th century saw liberal democracy stretched to include the whole or sections of the working class in the major capitalist countries. The reformist labour aristocracy, creamed off from the working class with the super-profits of imperialism during the 1890s and after, successfully collaborated with the ruling class in stopping the first wave of revolution after October 1917 in the European countries. After this, monopoly capitalism turned more and more to the method of Fascism, above all in those countries which, late in establishing capi- talist nationhood, had urgently to find a way to compete internationally as imperialist nations. To get into the imperialist world picture, the ruling classes of these countries had to settle accounts with their own working class in the name of a national revitalization—this happened in Italy, Germany and, in their own ways, Japan and Spain. Parliamentary democracy survived longer in some other countries, but it has more and more become a mask for the growth of centralized and bureaucratic power in the state, reflecting the concentrated power of monopoly and finance- capital. The authority of the state, i.e. the instru- ment of the most decisive sections of the ruling

[p009] EDITORIAL Preparing for Power WHEN THE Conservative Party was returned to office in the British General Election of June 1970, a new stage was reached in the political situation. This new stage was part of a change in the relation of. class forces internationally and not only in Britain. Capitalist economists and politicians in every major country are agreed that the basic problem facing their system is manifested in what they call ‘inflation’. The working class, basing itself on the living stan- dards and organization built up during the un- precedented boom following World War I, now confronts the capitalists with wage demands and expectations of full employment which cannot be satisfied without endangering the rate of profit and even the survival of whole businesses, entire national industries, and the system itself. The purpose of the ruling class must now be to organize a reaction powerful enough to repulse this working class decisively, to destroy everything it has gained. This is not a temporary measure, a question only of change of policy to meet a passing crisis. The functioning of modern monopoly tends inexorably towards the total disciplining of the worker. He must be reduced to an individual appendage to the plant. Every means by which he organizes and effects in favour of the working class the division between wages and surplus value must be liquidated. If not, then the capitalist cannot realize the maxi- mum utilization of every minute of the life of his machinery and plant, installed at ever- increasing cost. And that would mean death. We are back to the political problems which suddenly confronted the countries of continental Editorial Europe in the 1920s and 1930s, but now at a higher level of development: even more than in those years, there is no way out of the crisis except through socialism or fascism. From the standpoint of monopoly capitalism, bourgeois parliamentary democracy, the political expression of the individualist basis of capitalist ownership and ‘free’ wage-labour, must be dis- pensed with. The last quarter of the 19th century saw liberal democracy stretched to include the whole or sections of the working class in the major capitalist countries. The reformist labour aristocracy, creamed off from the working class with the super-profits of imperialism during the 1890s and after, successfully collaborated with the ruling class in stopping the first wave of revolution after October 1917 in the European countries. After this, monopoly capitalism turned more and more to the method of Fascism, above all in those countries which, late in establishing capi- talist nationhood, had urgently to find a way to compete internationally as imperialist nations. To get into the imperialist world picture, the ruling classes of these countries had to settle accounts with their own working class in the name of a national revitalization—this happened in Italy, Germany and, in their own ways, Japan and Spain. Parliamentary democracy survived longer in some other countries, but it has more and more become a mask for the growth of centralized and bureaucratic power in the state, reflecting the concentrated power of monopoly and finance- capital. The authority of the state, i.e. the instru- ment of the most decisive sections of the ruling

[p010] class, can less and less afford to be obstructed by the rights and demands of a working class as defined with a parliamentary democracy, with its own unions and parties. The development of the world economic crisis now accelerates this tendency. Every monopolist and banker under- stands that intesified competition will mean the elimination of large blocks of capital, and that only the strongest will survive. Hence the great tension of class relations today. The capitalist class is objectively com- pelled to attempt to inflict the greatest reversal of standards and expectations on the working class, to disturb the assumptions of ‘democratic’ rule in unprecedented fashion. But it has to do this against a working class more determined and able to defend these very things than ever before. Because of capitalism’s requirements (they can no longer afford to ‘rule in the old way’), the defence of these standards, including defence of the trade unions, takes on the character of a revolutionary struggle for power. From the struggle on apparently elementary demands—‘basic rights’—the question of power itself is posed: how can these rights be pre- served without the expropriation of the capitalist class? In Britain this general crisis is acutely aggra- vated by the particular historical crisis reached by the nation’s old capitalist structure. Of all capitalist countries, by very reason of its former uniqueness and predominance, Britain is in the least favourable position to carry out the neces- sary ‘rationalization’, both economic’ and political. This is the reason why Heath had to talk, at the Tory party conference, about ‘changing the course of history of this nation’. Time-worn customs and compromises must be hacked away, and most important among these are elementary democratic rights. Seen in this context, the decision to deport Rudi Dutschke from Britain has a historical meaning which must serve as a warning to the labour movement. This is no mere question of academic freedom, but a para- mount question of civil liberties. Dutschke was condemned after appeal proceedings where all the state’s witnesses gave their evidence in secret, so he had no chance of reply. Dutschke’s defence representative claimed that the evidence collected against him was gathered by informers and secret agents. Since it is alleged against Dutschke that he consorted with ‘subversive’ groups, we can conclude that these groups came under the same surveillance. None of these intelligence reports is quoted in the Tribunal’s printed report, in which the decision to uphold the deportation of Dutschke is announced. It is evident that the decision to expel Dutschke is only one of a series of decisions by a ruling class which senses strongly the need to make a historic change in the political relation of forces between the classes. The old situation, where the comparative strength of British capi- talism remained sufficient to lean on the working class, through the trade union and labour bureaucracy, no longer exists. The trade union bureaucracy is now called upon by the bourgeoisie to take its class- collaboration role to a qualitatively new level. First it must provide the conditions for the capitalists to rush through changes in the law designed to integrate the unions into the state. Then it must play its part in imposing the con- sequent repressions, or itself be repressed. These are the historical requirements, overriding all subjective will on the part of those concerned. To persist in reformist illusions is only to assure with even greater certainty that these results will come about. The tenseness of the situation in Britain is a particular reflection of the world crisis. Un- employment continues to grow quickly despite the complete failure of all attempts to arrest inflation. Enormous pressure is on the capitalists everywhere to impose police-state measures on the working class. As we have already indicated, the paradox is that they must attempt these measures against a working class filled with the confidence and high expectations bred by the post-war boom. The old reformist and Stalinist leaderships suddenly find themselves caught in a historical vice. Not a single demand of the working class can be fought for without coming up against the necessary political and economic requirements of the bourgeoisie. Every fresh section of workers and youth thrown into struggle today will want to test out the existing leadership of the mass organizations, but they will do so under conditions where the refusal of these leaders to take on the class enemy politically is exposed in the shortest possible time. The Stalinist bureaucracy internationally is itself confronted by a new and great wave of struggle by the working class in Eastern Europe. After Czechoslovakia 1968 now comes Poland. The political revolution to overthrow the bureaucracy goes forward by great leaps. The more desperate becomes the concern of the bureaucracy to avoid revolution in the advanced capitalist countries, the less do their policies ,accord with reality, and the less are they able to put themselves forward as the inheritors of Fourth International. Winter 1970/71

[p011] October. What haunts Stalinism above all is the spectre of Trotskyism. The generation of workers now impelled towards revolutionary politics by capi- talist crisis encounters a Trotskyist movement steeled for long years in the fight against Stalin- ism. This Trotskyist movement has been able, on the basis of adherence to principles and insistence on the building of independent revo- lutionary parties, begun to build up the resources which made real mass work possible. In Western Europe and the United States, as well as in Britain with the daily ‘Workers Press’, the struggle for principles, the fight to train a cadre in battle against all revisionism and bour- geois ideology, has now placed the forces of the International Committee of the Fourth Inter- national in a position to prevent the Stalinists and centrists from heading off the rising mass movement. The thesis of the Transitional Pro- gramme, that the historical crisis is now concentrated in the crisis of revolutionary leadershship, now presents us with gigantic and immediate responsibilities: the task of -Trot- skyism is to defeat the agencies of reformism and Stalinism in the course of the day-by-day preparation of the struggle for working-class power. Never were there such favourable con- ditions for the development of Marxism and the march forward to the proletarian revolution. Int CHINESE REVOLUTION PROBLEMS OF THE CHINESE REVOLUTION by Leon Trotsky The tempestuous events which have trans- formed China and the world situation in the past 40 years and the tasks with which Marxist revolutionaries are confronted today have enhanced the importance of this book. This volume is invaluable for the light which it sheds on a crucial and tragic episode in the history of the Chinese working class and peasantry. But its principal concern is with the tactics and strategy of world revolution. It forms part of a continuous struggle for theory waged by Trotsky and the Left Opposi- tion which began in the early 1920s and is continued today by the International Com- mittee of the Fourth International. 354 pps. including glossary and chronology. Price: 22s. 6d. (soft cover); 37s. 6d. (hard cover) NEW PARK PUBLICATIONS LTD. 186a Ciapham High Street. London. S.W.4 Editorial

[p012] October. What haunts Stalinism above all is the spectre of Trotskyism. The generation of workers now impelled towards revolutionary politics by capi- talist crisis encounters a Trotskyist movement steeled for long years in the fight against Stalin- ism. This Trotskyist movement has been able, on the basis of adherence to principles and insistence on the building of independent revo- lutionary parties, begun to build up the resources which made real mass work possible. In Western Europe and the United States, as well as in Britain with the daily ‘Workers Press’, the struggle for principles, the fight to train a cadre in battle against all revisionism and bour- geois ideology, has now placed the forces of the International Committee of the Fourth Inter- national in a position to prevent the Stalinists and centrists from heading off the rising mass movement. The thesis of the Transitional Pro- gramme, that the historical crisis is now concentrated in the crisis of revolutionary leadershship, now presents us with gigantic and immediate responsibilities: the task of -Trot- skyism is to defeat the agencies of reformism and Stalinism in the course of the day-by-day preparation of the struggle for working-class power. Never were there such favourable con- ditions for the development of Marxism and the march forward to the proletarian revolution. THE CHINESE REVOLUTION PROBLEMS OF THE CHINESE REVOLUTION by Leon Trotsky The tempestuous events which have trans- formed China and the world situation in the past 40 years and the tasks with which Marxist revolutionaries are confronted today have enhanced the importance of this book. This volume is invaluable for the light which it sheds on a crucial and tragic episode in the history of the Chinese working class and peasantry. But its principal concern is with the tactics and strategy of world revolution. It forms part of a continuous struggle for theory waged by Trotsky and the Left Opposi- tion which began in the early 1920s and is continued today by the International Com- mittee of the Fourth International. 354 pps. including glossary and chronology. Price: 22s. 6d. (soft cover); 37s. 6d. (hard cover) NEW PARK PUBLICATIONS LTD. 186a Clapham High Street. London. S.W.4 Editorial

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