What Mandel said to 'Der Spiegel'

[p069] WHAT MANDEL SAID TO ‘DER SPIEGEL for the workers’ movement. Spiegel. In the Federal Republic... Mandel. . . . our work is absolutely open, because _ this freedom for the workers’ move- ment exists. Spiegel. The Federal Ministry of the Interior, which declared you a dangerous. subversive and barred your entry into German territory, charges that you have worked in conspiracies. For example, that you have been re- peatedly active in Germany under fictitious names. Mandel. This is complete nonsense. Until now I was allowed to enter legally. For several years I wrote some news- paper articles under the name Pierre Gousset, that’s all. Spiegel. Just a pen name? Mandel. That’s all. Spiegel. That was not the only one. You also published under another name... Mandel. Not any more. Spiegel. Germain? Mandel. Yes, yes. Also a pen name. But in any case, I never travelled under this name. Spiegel. Did you intend to transfer the Secretariat of the Fourth International to Berlin after your appointment? Mandel. No. That is a fabrication from start to finish. The Secre- tariat is composed of many people, not just me. I did not even intend to move to Germany myself. Spiegel. When you wanted to give a speech to the business managers of the Duttweiler- Gesellschaft in Switzerland last year... Mandel. . . . even former Chan- cellor Erhard was invited... Spiegel. ... you were not allowed into Switzerland on the grounds that in classes you gave earlier in Lausanne you’ had called for revolution. Mandel. Nonsense. The official charge was that I had held a closed lecture that had not been previously announced. replied that I did not realize that the 213

[p070] innumerable bankers, for example, report to the police before they come to Switzerland to hold their evening chats about important political questions. The themes of my lectures were purely historical. Spiegel. Mr Mandel, in your books you claim that ‘the bourgeois state must be over- thrown through centralized political action ... and replaced by a workers’ state.’ Is that still analysis, or is it practical direction? Mandel. Naturally I don’t confine myself solely to scientific analysis. Spiegel. As a scholar, or are you now a political activist again? Mandel. Those are two com- pletely different things. Spiegel. This schizophrenia .. . Mandel. . . . this is not schizo- phrenia, but a question of method. You cannot equate the moon-landing with astrophysics, which created the scientific pre- requisites for it. If you analyze the universe, it doesn’t mean you have the conspiratorial intention of landing on the moon. Spiegel. Back to the earth. What does Mandel the revolutionary do in order to bring down bourgeois society? Mandel. An interesting question. Now we come to the neurotic attitude of defenders of the present society toward people like me. The socialist revolution will not be set in motion by conspiracy or agitation, but is possible only through the con- scious participation of the masses of wage-earners, who in the Federal Republic are the absolute majority of the population. ; Unless neo-capitalist society is crisis-free. In that case the activities of people like me, whether in education, propa- ganda, or daily political action, will be limited, and could not go beyond the framework of this society. Spiegel. Then the revolutionary would be a Social Democrat? Mandel. No, Social Democracy is the attempt to strengthen the existing society through reforms. We want to alter society funda- mentally, even if in the far future. Thus, when objective revolutionary crises break out, like May 1968 in France, or fall 1969 in Italy, the revolutionary organization must create’ the preconditions for the workers to use this crisis to alter society. Spiegel. And you want to lead the proletariat as a vanguard? Mandel. We cannot set the workers in motion to change society or the state. We see our- selves as the yeast in a dough that must be there to start with ... Spiegel. ... but you hope to stir it a little. As a member of the conscious vanguard, how do you prepare for the overturn? Mandel. Given an existing mass 214 revolutionary movement, our task is only to lead it to success. Thus, in the factories, in the universities, we must broaden consciousness, so that the masses will be prepared for the decisive act. Spiegel. And then what should the masses do? Mandel. In the midst of a broad mass movement, hold general meetings and elect democratic collective bodies, like councils, to take state power. Spiegel. Employing parliamentary democracy? Mandel. Ah, you know I am a more consistent democrat than the advocates of the bourgeois- parliamentary state order. There is a contradiction in the bour- geois constitution between the guarantee of private property and the general rights and freedoms —-freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, freedom of opinion, freedom of movement freedom to organize. So long as private property in the means of pro- duction exists, the Majority of people can exercise these rights only in a limited way. Therefore, I am indeed for bringing down Capitalist property... Spiegel. Private property is not a constituent element of the Federal Republic. If anything, even full socialization is com- patible with the basic law. Mandel. Well in that case my political activity is not in con- tradiction with the basic law. Spiegel. Doesn’t the soviet repub- lic for which you propagandize mean a restriction of political freedom? Mandel. On the contrary. For the masses of people, only then would these rights become _ really meaningful. Spiegel. Would you say that the soviet system is compatible with the liberal-democratic basic order, being even more free and democratic? In the soviet repub- lic, for example, would the prin- ciple of division of powers still hold? Mandel. Sure, that is in our pro- gramme. Spiegel. Not at all. Your pro- gramme calls for the unity of the executive and the legislature. Mandel. That has nothing to do with the principle of division of power. We think of it much more broadly. Spiegel. It is not a question of breadth. Division of power means separation. Should judges be independent or—as in the model of the Paris Commune—be sub- ject to recall on any occasion, if they make an unpopular decision, for example? Mandel. Not on every occasion, but from time to time. Sviegel. Over what intervals? Mandel. Not every ten days, but also not every ten years. We would rather let that be deter- mined by the practical work of the German soviet republic. We have worked out a model for the division of powers in a soviet republic. We are, to give just one example, in favour of written, as opposed to arbitrary law. Spiegel. Who isn’t? Mandel. We are for the indepen- dence of the unions, and naturally for the right to strike, even in a workers’ state; and we are for full separation between party and state institutions. Spiegel. Should the people’s representation flow from general, equal, free, secret, and direct choice? Mandel. On that we are agreed. The question is how this choice should be carried through, how this representation should be put together. Spiegel. Indeed it is. Should only workers have voice? Mandel. In the W European countries it would be senseless to exclude the bourgeoisie from elections. Spiegel. In your soviet Utopia... Mandel. ...in the soviet model... Spiegel. ...is there room for democratic essentials like people’s sovereignty, accountability of the regime, legality of the adminis- tration... Mandel. ... all granted. Spiegel. Are you for a multi- party system? Mandel. Absolutely. Spiegel. Would non-socialist Parties be permitted in your soviet republic? Mandel. No party would be banned because of its views. But if we could prove in court pro- ceedings that people had violated the law, that conspiracies had been organized, weapon-stores accumulated, and alliances made with foreign powers, then we would ban such a party. Spiegel. That’s just how Husak argues in Czechoslovakia. Mandel. And also just how the constitutional court of the Ger- man Federal Republic argued when it banned the Communist Party. Spiegel. You make it sound like the Trotskyists have become completely domesticated—they no longer want a conscious overturn, but a parliamentary majority. Mandel. We have always held the view that under the existing socio-economic relations, parlia- mentary bodies cannot (or can only in exceptional cases) give expression to the interests of the wage-earning population. The possibilities of choice are small, the differences between the big parties that support this state have lessened so much that parliamentarism increasingly degenerates into an empty formal mechanism. Real demo- cracy is direct decision-making by the masses, and thereby is nearly identical with what I mean by revolution. Spiegel. Revolution is the applica- Fourth International Summer 1972

[p071] tion of violence. Mandel. What do you mean by violence? Spiegel. Doors broken down, people . beaten, barricades built, machine guns posted. Mandel. For a long time now there has not been a revolutionary mass mobilization in a western country that did not begin peace- fully. Violence has come from the other side, being used to suppress the movement. Against this we must protect ourselves. Spiegel. As counter-violence you consider violence legitimate? Mandel. If by violence you mean the occupation of tactories— good, then I say, right on, I’m for violence. Only I call it something else: the workers taking their own rightful property—that which they have built them- selves. That is the affair of the workers themselves. We will not lead a revolution behind the workers’ backs, and we will also not make them happy against their will. We are not con- spirators. I am not a putschist. But my ideas are feared. I am not allowed to present them to Berlin students. Spiegel. As a champion of a soviet republic could you take the official oath of the liberal- democratic order? Mandel. I would probably make an additional statement. Never in my life have I disavowed my con- victions. Spiegel. Either you take an oath or you cannot be a professor in Berlin. You cannot attach a letter containing reservations to the oath. Mandel. Must I then read the basic law before I can be a professor? Spiegel. Mr Mandel, we thank you for this interview. COMMENT BY CLIFF SLAUGHTER Ernest Mandel is one of the leading spokesman of an international tendency (Pabloism) which broke from the basic programme of the Fourth International in 1952- 1953. This tendency now goes under the name of the ‘United Secretariat of the Fourth International’ and is supported by the US Socialist Workers Party. Mandel is always presented by his own supporters aS an eminent expert on economic affairs, a ‘well-known’ exponent of Marxist theory, a man of impeccable academic qualifications. He appears at innumerable international seminars and colloquia and his articles are published in journals of the ‘new left? type which like to appear very open-minded by having an occasional ‘Marxist’ flavour to their general revisionist output. Indeed, Mandel’s political identity is nowadays entirely a matter of his impact as some sort of celebrity descending on various capital cities and university cam- puses. This is undoubtedly con- nected with his own theory that capitalism has been replaced by ‘neo-capitalism’, requiring a very different political ‘style’. Essentially, it is a matter of appealing to the middle-class intelligentsia and not to the working class. As imperialism (not ‘neo- capitalism’!) moves rapidly into its worst-ever economic and political crisis, it must desperately suck away these middle-class elements to some centrist poli- tical force to deal with that phase of the crisis when new masses are thrown into political struggle. Such centrist forces cannot be sucked out of nothing as it were. Mandel is hatching out the kind of politics to fit the bill. Of course, imperialism uses the centrists in this way only as a short step on the road to the eventual fascist and dictatorial repression. ‘ What Mandel said to ‘Der Speigel’ Mandel’s latest moves show how far Pabloism has gone in this rightward process from revolu- tion to bankrupt reformism. Pabloites everywhere are cam- paigning against a decision by the W Berlin Senate which bars Mandel from taking up a profes- sorial chair in Economics at the Free University of W Berlin. He was invited to take up this post by the students and assistants there. Further, they are cam- paigning against the action of the W German authorities in refusing Mandel permission even. to enter W Berlin when he recently tried to attend a ‘teach-in’ there. Now, of course, the Socialist Labour League is for the defence of the rights of all persons to travel without restriction, and against all arbitrary actions by the authorities in excluding individuals from universities. But we attack these infringements of elementary democratic rights by mobilizing the working class, behind whom the support of other elements can be rallied. Mandel and his friends approach the matter quite differently, and in a manner with reactionary implications. For example, Mandel has, since his exclusion, given interviews to the German capitalist magazine ‘Der Spniegel’ (March 6) and even to the fascist ‘National-Zeitung’ (March 17). The latter is particularly despicable. The issue of ‘National- Zeitung’ concerned has a front- page banner headline: ‘Revolution in Germany? Interview with Pro- fessor Mandel, Leader of the IV International’ and on the back a full-page, call to a ‘March on Bonn’ under the slogan ‘Unity against Communism’! organized by the ‘German People’s Union’. Quite avart from the fact that Mandel does not use this inter- view to expose those who inter- view him. nor does he give the slightest analvsis of the policy of the W German government and its relation to the struggle of the working class in Germany. it is an abomination that the inter- view should ever have been given. Its purpose is only to confirm the anti-communist hysteria of its few thousand readers in the ‘Volksunion’. vye can see from Mandel’s agreement to give this interview what is his conception of a struggle on democratic rights. For him, it is only a question of ‘maximum publicity’ and speak- ing to as many individual ‘citizens’ as possible, and not of making the issue one on which the organization and conscious- ness of the working class can be advanced in a revolutionary way. Perhaps a ‘public relations’ expert would be a good idea for this ‘celebrity’. One of Mandel’s answers in the interview, however, is extremely informative, and forms the background to the _ opinions expressed in the ‘Der Spiegel’ interview also: National Zeitung: Herr Profes- sor, you have been prevented from entering the W German Republic. How do you under- stand this action by the Minister of the Interior?’ Mandel: I consider this action by the Minister of the Interior as an attack on the basic demo- cratic rights and freedoms of European citizens, and as a blow against the preparations for the political integration of Europe.’ Here we have Mandel apparently wanting to defend his democratic rights, but at the same time accepting the main strategy of the European monopoly capi- talists—the ‘political integration of Europe’, i.e., the development of the Common Market, entry of Britain, etc. The very development of the European monopolies, which con- stitutes the threat to the demo- cratic rights of all workers, is appealed to by Mandel as some- thing which will suffer if he continues to be attacked. We can only assume that the ‘preparations for the political integration of Europe’ would be enhanced if Mandel were to 215

[p072] become Professor of Economics in W Berlin! No doubt this is at one with his remark in the ‘Der Spiegel’ interview: ‘We want to alter society fundamentally, even if in the far future’ (my emphasis, CS). In other words: no challenge to the present development of monopoly capitalism (Mandel’s ‘neo-capitalist society’), but simply a general demand for the democratic right to advocate some far-off socialist solution. Here we have the true content of the Pabloite attack on Trot- skyism. General lip-service is paid to the idea of a workers’ revolution and socialist solutions, but there can be no question of the working class today having any revolutionary significance. In this context Mandel tries to persuade his readers that really the Fourth International (i.e., his own spurious ‘United Secretariat’) is not revolutionary vanguard at all but simply a = missionary society. Spiegel: And you want to lead the proletariat as a vanguard?’ Mandel: We cannot set the workers in motion to change society or the state. We see our- selves as the yeast in a dough that must be there to start with... Spiegel: ... but you hope to stir it a little. As a member of the conscious vanguard, how do you prepare for the overturn? Mandel: Given an existing mass revolutionary movement, our task is only to lead it to success. Thus, in the factories, in the univer- sities, we must broaden con- sciousness, so that the masses will be prepared for the final act. Pabloism’s political essence has always been to reject the Trot- skvist theory of the need to build independent revolutionary parties which can defeat the existing leadership of the workers and lead the masses to state power. This relationship of struggle, the central notion of the crisis of revolutionary leadership as the key to mankind's crisis, is entirely missing from Mandel’s _ inter- views. On the whole fundamental question of state power, Mandel unashamedly distorts the posi- tions of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky. We see it summed up in his sentence: ‘Real democracy is direct decision-making by the masses, and thereby is nearly identical with what I mean by revolution.’ Mandel, seeking _bourgeois- democratic support for his cam- paign to travel and work freely 216 in Germany, makes a complete continuity between bourgeois democracy and workers’ power! Marxism, however, insists first of all that the bourgeois state must be smashed, as an organ of capitalist oppression, and that parliamentary democracy is a deception and a fraud, an essen- tial part of this oppressive state machine. No wonder, having thrown out these basic Marxist ‘concepts, Mandel can mouth the complaint —impossible for a Marxist—that his exclusion from Germany con- travenes ‘the rule of law’! What law? Whose law? So concerned is Mandel about his respectability in the eyes of the bourgeoisie and its law that he proposes to allow bourgeois parties complete political free- dom under a proletarian dictator- ship. ‘In the W European countries {why only there] it would be senseless to exclude the bour- geoisie from elections.’ So Mandel has finally come round openly to the Stalinist ‘parliamentary roads to socialism’. The nature of the campaign of Mandel and the Pabloites on this question fits in with these. poli- tical conceptions. Against the reactionary tendencies flowing from the interests of the mono- polists, Marxists fight in the working-class movement on a programme of socialist expropria- tion of these monopolies. Only the boldest initiatives against capitalist property can stem the reactionary tide. In such a period, it is fatal to make the appeal to democracy in general. The middle class who are fondly supposed to respond to such a ‘democratic’ programme (as in the Popular Fronts of before World War II) are in fact being shaken out of their democratic illusions by the same crisis which pushes the monopolies to the right. They will respond onlv to the strongest and most resolute lead from the working class... or to the fascists. Instead of building support around such a workers’ mobiliza- tion, the Pabloites are distorting the Marxist tactic of united front by talking about a united front of all those who will defend democracy. Such an alliance of protesters is nothing to do with the Leninist united front, but is very similar to the Stalinist ‘popular fronts’ of the 1930s, behind which the murder of Trotskyists and the betrayal of the working class were prepared. Let us return, finally, to one point we made earlier in passing. Mandel nowhere attacks Stalin- ism, and has only a_ historical rebuke for the Social-Democratic majority party in the German government. Quite apart from anything else, the present division of Germany, and of Berlin, and the restoration of German capitalism after Hitler’s fall, let alone the earlier victory of fascism, were the consequences of the Stalinist and Social-Democratic betrayal. Mandel wants to campaign on ‘democracy’ in Germany without conflicting with the Stalinists! He will not find it so easy! Brandt, the Social-Democratic Chancellor of W Germany, has staked his whole future in the service of the bourgeoisie on his ‘Ostpolitik’, i.e., agreement with the USSR and E German Stalinism. If Mandel’s previously un- hindered travels in W Germany have suddenly been stopped by the Social-Democrats, it is because even the mention of Trotskyism is too sensitive an issue for the Stalinists, and the Social-Democrats do not wish to offend them. Behind this sensitivity is the fear of the resurgent working class of Germany and all Europe. Mandel’s conduct of his cam- paign without any reference to this working class and _ its independent interests is a capi- tulation to the Stalinists and Social Democratic apparatuses. Brezhnev went out of his way in March to make overtures to the European Common Market, i.e., to the monopolists of W Europe. Instead of exposing this treachery, Mandel falls in with it, bemoaning ‘blows against the preparations for political integra- tion of Europe’. The fact that he himself is in a small way the victim of the measures flowing from _ these latest Stalinist manoeuvres pro- duces in him only an even more craven and cringing subservience that he had already shown in his work for Pablo in 1952-1953 and in the Belgian General Strike of 1960-1961. The principal zsequirement of the working class today is the building of a party which will win for the class its political independence. That means an implacable struggle against counter-revolutionary Stalinism and reformism. Mandel and the United Secretariat are moving rapidly in the opposite direction. Fourth International Summer 1972

[p073] BOOKS - PAMPHLETS - PERIODICALS GENERAL Stalinism in Britain by Robert Black (paper) (cloth) Ten Days that shook the world (John Reed) Revolution and counter-revolution in Spain (Felix Morrow) (Paper) _ (Cloth) ... Revolution and counter-revolution in Hungary (G. Healy) French Revolution Betrayed, May/June 1968 (Tom Kemp) Barly History of the Communist Party of Great Britain (B. Pearce) Lenin: Speech to the Petrograd Soviet, 1918 (G. Zinoviev) ... Revolutionary Silhouettes by Lunacharsky ... vee wee _ Platform of the Left Opposition (1927) _... wee wes wee Problems of the Fourth International (G. Healy) ... Moscow Trials Anthology . . Behind the Moscow Trial (Max Shachtman) Notebook of an Agitator (J. P. Canon) (paper ... (Cloth) New Nationalism and the Negro struggle (Tim Wohlforth) Karl Marx (1818-1883) (C. Slaughter) : . A Balance Sheet of Revisionism (C. Slaughter) . . wee Moscoso Affair—A case history of revisionism (M. Banda) wee The Socialist Labour League and revisionism Lee . The Class Nature of the International Socialism Group (C. Slaughter) An open letter to Richard Clements (M. Banda) . Reform or revolution (C. Slaughter) An open letter to J. Hansen . bee tes _ An open letter to J. Hansen (R. Black) Lae ves wea Who are the International Socialists (C. Slaughter) The Theory and Practice of Revisionism (M. Banda) After December 8th? The next step vee . wee The Measured Day Work and Productivity Deal Swindle (B. Franks) YOUNG SOCIALISTS How to build the Young Socialists .. We demand the Right to Work SOCIALIST LABOUR LEAGUE POCKET LIBRARY No. 1. The case for a General Election